This is what I’m holding onto right now

By Andrea Schroeder / April 4, 2021

Before I jump in - The Art for Earth e-course bundle sale is ending TODAY.

This is a bundle of art e-courses valued at over £2900+ GBP, but - for one more day only - is sold for only £75 GBP! (In USD that's a value of roughly $4,000 for $104)

Two of my courses - the Creative Dream Incubator ($147 USD value) and the Creative Business Incubator ($199 USD value) are a part of the Art For Earth 2021 bundle sale.

Check it out here.

WHAT YOU ARE FEELING IS NORMAL.

I'm feeling like this needs to be said more often. Like too many of us are feeling all alone in our feelings by feeling WRONG for feeling all the things we're feeling.

You're not wrong.

What you're feeling is normal. All of it. Even the parts that conflict with each other.

Here's what I'm feeling this morning:

A sense that I call "cognitive shut down" where my brain just CAN NOT
A wish to feel hopeful for the future
But then also a feeling that feeling hopeful is dangerous, too vulnerable, and that those hopes will soon be dashed so why bother
A deeper desire/need to FEEL GOOD AGAIN as my baseline feeling
Sadness about not feeling good
Grief about everything I've lost
Panic about everything I could lose next
Relief that my husband's health emergency from last week is still serious but not an emergency this week

But I've also had these moments of feeling more creative, peaceful and powerful than I have in a long time.

It can be so confusing to have so many conflicting feelings going on.

But this is what it means to be human.

We live in a culture that teaches us to NOT feel.

But denying our human feelings doesn't dissolve them, they just go underground where they control most of our behaviour, limit our possibilities and just generally do a lot of harm.

And now we're in this time when we can't keep stuffing it all down. There's just too much.

Every breaking point is also a doorway into a new possibility.

That's not just some bullshit thing people say to try to gloss over how hard the breaking point is.

It's the truth.

The degree to which we can be present with the hard parts determines the amount of new possibilities we can receive from the experience.

I mean - it takes work and support and courage. But the opportunity is there.

That's what I am holding onto right now.

I'm grateful for those moments of creativity and clear thinking and feeling peaceful and powerful and like I can do anything. I am using those moments to take care of my business and move important projects forward.

And in the rest of my time, I am resting and making art just for me and reading a lot and also reminding myself that there is an opportunity here.

That "my stuff is up" and I can see it more clearly than ever which means this is an opportunity for healing.

That I can emerge from this difficult time with less of my stuff weighing me down.

Things are hard anyway, why not go on a full on journey through my own underworld and see what I can clean up?

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I had a breakthrough yesterday.

By Andrea Schroeder / February 23, 2021

I had a breakthrough yesterday.

I hit (another!) pandemic wall on the weekend and I did the things that help best when I am in Full On Overwhelm. I finished my day with a hot lavender bath, I did yoga and meditated, and I went to bed early.

Normally, this helps me wake up the next day ready to take on the world. Yesterday, I woke up still crabby. And as my day went on I stayed crabby - even though I was doing all the things that usually help.

My husband (who is STILL working from home) noticed, of course, and towards the end of the day came upstairs to tell me a silly story in the hopes of cheering me up. That's when I started crying.

"Sweetie, what's wrong? I'm trying to cheer you up."

I realised later, that it was because I was touched by him trying to cheer me up, that I finally felt some of what I was actually feeling. That all that crabbiness and overwhelm was really more about having-so-many-feelings-I-can't-feel-anything and being all bottled up, emotionally.

And expecting my usual self care routines to take care all of this right now is unrealistic. I need more.

That's the breakthrough. To look for ways to double my self care.

The best breakthroughs seem boring and obvious once you've had them. But nevertheless, they change everything.

So I doubled up on my self care practices and gave myself more space to be where I am and I woke up this morning feeling more clear and grounded and I am remembering - we just had 3 weeks of brutal winter weather, and everything is still closed.

Normally, I can go for walks in brutal winter weather. In -40s, I can bundle up and go for a 30 minute walk - I'll just be cold by the end of it. So I walk to a coffee shop/bakery with a wood fire oven. It's toasty warm in there, and in the coffee shop section they've got huge sunny windows and dozens of plants. The warmth, the sun, the plants, the coffee, the treats, the whole place smelling like whatever's baking - it's a pretty epic spot to do some journaling and writing. Plus I warm up enough to walk 30 minutes back home, no matter what the weather.

Bundling up to walk 15 minutes from home, then turn around and walk back, just doesn't have the same feel to it, you know? So I haven't been bothering to do it, and now I'm feeling the effects of not getting out at all.

Last weekend we went to my friend's farm.

Normally, my friend and I would have lunch or coffee together at least every other week, since she works in the city.

My husband is a traditional Cree medicine person. He received messages from some spirits who needed to be fed, so he needed space to have a sacred fire. So I spoke to my friend at the farm and she offered her space - provided we didn't go inside her home.

We were only there for about 2 hours, but it was AMAZING to see my friend again and just sit around and hang out (it was a warmer day and we had the fire going).

It was after that, that it hit me how much I've lost. And how very much I miss my people.

This turned up the volume on the I-Have-Too-Many-Feelings-I'm-All-Bottled-Up thing that was happening. It pushed it all over the edge.

It was my little breakthrough that helped me see this differently, helped me be more compassionate with myself. "Oh sweetie. Of course you're crabby. Look at what you've lost. Of course you're sad."

And now I feel ACCEPTING of my feelings. Like they're not all bottled up and I am not on the verge of exploding. I can just slow down and be more patient with myself.

It's a subtle shift in focus.

A shift from: "just keep going, you are one of the lucky ones, you have everything you need to get through this ok" which was only creating a backlog of un-felt feelings in me, which was making everything harder than it already was.

To: "Sweetie this is HARD, make space for all of these feelings" which helps me be more deeply present with ALL parts of me which plugs me back into my superpowers which is the thing that will actually help me move through this best.

And let's me clear: I knew this. I KNEW BETTER than to do what I was doing.

The breakthrough didn't teach me something I didn't already know.

It put me back in touch with that inner knowing in a way that it really LANDED.

And then I was able to make that change.

And now everything feels different for me. I have all these new options for how to move forward.

Breakthrough Alchemy Coaching Circle

The BREAKTHROUGH Alchemy Coaching Circle is this Saturday - on Feb 27.

A Breakthrough is a sudden shift in perspective, a radical new way of seeing yourself, or your situation.

A Breakthrough gives you new options that you didn't know you had, before the breakthrough.

A Breakthrough brings you back to your own truth.

I am not promising everyone who attends will have an instant breakthrough. I am hoping for that though!

What I AM promising is that attending the Circle, and then showing up for the next 30 days to keep working with it, will give you these things:

A radical new way of seeing yourself, or your situation
New options
A deeper connection to your own truth

Join me here.

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There is no going back

By Andrea Schroeder / February 18, 2021

There is no going back

My dream sent me this amazing vision.

It was me, sitting in the coffee shop I used to go to, in my favourite spot - at the bar along the window, in the corner. My journaling stuff was all spread out. I had a delicious cup of coffee in my hands and noise canceling headphones in my ears. Outside the window the sun was rising the the sky was soft pinks and blues and lavenders.

I was SO FREAKING HAPPY to be back there. To feel the magic of my familiar old pattern. It felt like a healing.

But then my dream arrived, in the form of sparkling golden stars. It landed in my heart and I grew 4 stories tall.

The coffee shop did not grow and I didn't fit inside it anymore.

There is no going back.

My dream asked "Why on earth would you want to go BACK??!? The way foreword is FORWARD."

And suddenly I saw it. I've been waiting to GO BACK to my old beloved routines. I've been waiting to GO BACK to my old life.

I wanted to go back to my old ME.

But there is no going back.

That's what all those FEELINGS were about in the spring and summer... it's grief. The world changed and there is no going back and we don't know what what's next. Also it's hard for those kinds of thoughts to not trigger fears about how the world will change again with climate change, which won't be as gentle with us as Covid has been.

But my dream put a much more positive spin on it.

This time is an incubator.

I am growing in ways I don't see yet.

And I get to choose who I'll be next.

I can't go back to who I was, because you can't un-grow.

But I can choose who I'll be next and I can choose HOW I'll grow.

I mean of course I'll go back to my beloved coffee shop morning routines, but I'll be a new me.

It's breakthrough time.

There are so many ways we can fuel our growth at this time.

And we do this NOT by forcing a positive spin on what's happening or hiding in conspiracy theories.

We do it by facing what's actually happening. And tending to our reactions to what's happening, and bringing love and gentleness to all of the places in us that get triggered and re-traumatized.

Because facing the hard stuff is a part of being with the truth.

And the truth is: You are more powerful that your obstacles. That your creative genius always knows a way.

And this is how you create your breakthrough.

Come do this with me at the BREAKTHROUGH Alchemy Coaching Circle on the February Full Moon. This will help you see your way into a new story of what is actually possible for you RIGHT NOW.

February 27, at 11:00 am (Central, North America).

The cost: $33 USD **As a part of my commitment to being the change I want to see in the world, I do NOT price my work "what it's worth".

What's included: The live circle, plus access to the replay, complete with a private comments section for anything you want to discuss after.

Special bonus to help you move into that new story and make yourself at home: After the Breakthrough Alchemy Circle, you also get access to my Dream Book program for one month! This includes the miraculous Dream Book journaling system, daily online masterminds, weekly printable journaling kits, a monthly new moon coaching call and access to my entire library of e-courses. It’s like having a Creative Dream Coach on call 24-7.

Can't make it live? The recording will be available within hours of the end of the event - so you can do your circle whenever you like. And there IS a private comments section for the replay - so you can still add your ideas or questions or get extra support in there - you don't have to attend live to be a part of the group.

Grab your spot here.

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You’re wrong about why you’re stuck

By Andrea Schroeder / February 16, 2021

You’re wrong about why you’re stuck

The only people who never get stuck are the people who are not going after their dreams.

You get stuck. I get stuck. We all get stuck.

It's fine to be stuck.

BUT

You're wrong about WHY you're stuck.

You're not quite seeing a part of your path clearly or you're caught up in something from the past or you just don't know what you don't know.

But once you see it more clearly - you'll also know how to get un-stuck. Those two things tend to happen together and they create the foundation for your breakthrough.

It really is that simple.

Every time.

We just make it seem complicated with all of the layers of stories we make up about why we're stuck and we can't get un-stuck, and also with a stubborn refusal to look at the thing we most need to look at.

I am not saying that you are the SOURCE of your stuck.

I'm working on a longer blog to share about that later this week - how a lot of New Age/Life Coaching approaches to getting un-stuck assume that you are 100% the cause of your problem and that leaves you powerless to get un-stuck when the cause of the stuck is any kind of systemic oppression.

And so the places where you have a hard time getting un-stuck are likely the places where your own stucks are intersecting with some forms of oppression that you face living in a patriarchal capitalist white supremacist colonialist culture.

Which does NOT mean that you are powerless to do anything about those stucks. It just means you need to take a different approach. But, again, I'll share more about that later this week.

Think about the place where you're stuck right now.

Really take a good long look at it.

And then imagine being un-stuck. Take a good long look at what being un-stuck will be like and feel like for you.

Then look back:

What's between where you are now and where you'll be then?

That's your breakthrough.

I know, it's probably all fuzzy and unclear.

It's right in the middle of your blind spot so it's very hard to see on your own, which is why it's so easy to be stuck.

So.

Come to the BREAKTHROUGH Alchemy Coaching Circle for the February full moon!

(The cost is $33 USD, to reflect my commitment to BE the change I want to seeing the world, and not charge a fortune because I think breakthroughs should be affordable because we all need them!)

In the circle we'll go deeper into this and you'll have a chance to see your situation in a whole new light.

You'll leave the BREAKTHROUGH Alchemy Coaching Circle with:

Clarity. The kind of clarity where you KNOW FOR SURE what to do next. Either you'll just get un-stUck right away or you'll know HOW to work with your stuck, if it will take more time to clear it.
And you'll get whole month of support for DOING THAT THING in my online creative mastermind so you have space to create LASTING CHANGE for yourself.

Get your spot here.

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This is what healing looks like

By Andrea Schroeder / December 8, 2020

This weekend I ordered take out from one of my favourite restaurants.

A woman met me at the door to ask my name. Through the window I saw her coming back out of the kitchen holding my order and it really hit me right in the feels.

These people cooked my favourite meal for me, and now this woman was walking back to the kitchen to bring it to me at the door, so I didn’t even have to go inside and we didn’t take a risk of infecting each other.
It all felt so beautiful I wanted to cry for a minute there. I felt so loved. And like we’re all in this together. My heart was sparkling the whole way back home

This was so far away from how I was feeling just the day before, when nothing was working and everything was overwhelming and all I could do was cry.

But this was also a direct result of me giving myself the space to feel how I feel when everything felt stuck.

Feel how you feel, and then let it go when it’s done. This is actually the best way to hold onto the gifts and lessons - by releasing the rest.

This really does open you up to all sorts of good feelings, like turning ordering take out into some kind of cosmic experience of love and connection.

But more importantly, it opens you up to YOURSELF.

Your wishes and dreams, your authenticity, your potential - and your inner wisdom which shows you how to get there.

This is what we’re doing today at the Healing Circle for 2020, making space for reflection, processing and release.

This will be about 60-90 minutes long, depending on the discussion. We'll do a special meditation with time for reflection on your 2020 and journaling and then an alchemical releasing process.

You'll leave with a few prompts to keep exploring over the next month, and to allow the healing and release to INTEGRATE, so you are ready for the Blessing Circle for 2021 that we’ll do in January.

I can’t wait!

Join me here.

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Use your feelings as fuel to create a new future

By Andrea Schroeder / November 4, 2020

Use your feelings as fuel to create a new future

I started the day an absolute MESS of feelings.

On top of the chaotic US election process, my city is now Canada's Covid hotspot. Our hospitals are at capacity, and our health care and social services have been absolutely GUTTED for the last several years by our conservative government for the last several years, leaving us completely vulnerable. Their response? They are asking for VOLUNTEERS for Covid testing and health care services.

They're not willing to spend any money to keep us safe. Meanwhile they have given millions upon millions to their friends for consultations while they were gutting everything.

I am incandescent with rage that we allow people with no compassion, vision or integrity to govern us. I am also so completely distracted by all the news I want to check my phone every five minutes to see what's new.

So this is the vibe I brought into my daily practice today.

Anger and fear and heartbreak and worry and determination and confusion and helplessness and hope and a wish that I could work on my creative projects but the kind of focus needed for that feels so far away.

So many conflicting feelings, with such intensity, I felt like all I could do today is bounce around in my emotional reactivity.

Five minutes into my practice, all that changed.

(This is why we ALL need a daily practice - to have this container ready and working for the days when we REALLY need it)

I received a clear + helpful message: USE your feelings as FUEL to create a new future.

This message felt revolutionary and super familiar at the same time.

I got out my iPad and wrote it down in block letters and then of course i saw it: This is what I have been teaching for the last 10 years.

It's landing differently right now because of what's happening in the world.

But the work hasn't changed.

More feelings = more fuel

A better world is possible. It will take creativity, vision, wisdom, hard work and collaboration to get there.

The first step: be with your feelings.

Move beyond emotional reactivity and sink into your deeper inner truth.

Then you can HARNESS the power of all of this energy, and use it to create something good.

You don't have to do it alone.

I can help - The Hard Parts Are Where The Magic Happens Healing Circle and Inner Work Workshop is a free 80 minute video class I offer where I lead you through this process.

I recorded this class a few years go. I think we need this work now more than ever.

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We need to feel our feelings, now more than ever

By Andrea Schroeder / October 20, 2020

I ordered the noise-canceling headphones of my dreams and they were supposed to arrive yesterday.

There was all of this fortuitous synchronistic stuff happening around the purchase of the headphones, and the whole thing felt like an opportunity to step into my next-level future dream self.

The headphones represented spaciousness and ease and having my self care needs exquisitely met.

The headphones did not arrive.

When I checked the tracking, I saw that they had arrived in my city, and then were returned to sender. Also: no more of these particular headphones (this particular choice being ridiculously well-researched) were listed for sale on the website of the Canadian company I’d bought them from. (Yes, I can check other stores, but NO I will not shop at Amazon)

I was so frustrated and disappointed.

I cried.

And while I cried a part of me was like “WTF? Are you really this upset? We’ll find the headphones eventually”

But it wasn’t about the headphones. It was about feeling like I was stepping into that next level of having my self care needs be exquisitely met and then having it taken from me.

Feeling like I don’t deserve it.

And then feeling into all of the losses of this year.

And then remembering that my friend is gone and feeling terrified that people can just die.

An then I was like “Oh sweetie, I’m sorry, I get it, cry all you want”

So I did.

And when I was done crying I did some soothing yin yoga, kissed my husband goodnight, noticed how exquisitely my self care needs are already being met, and drifted off to sleep. I woke up feeling happy and inspired.

I see so many people asking for help dealing with their feelings, because 2020 has been so hard and we all have so many feelings.

But what most of them are really asking for is help DISTRACTING THEMSELVES or TURNING OFF their feelings.

We need to FEEL our feelings, now more than ever.

Un-felt feelings don’t magically disappear. They calcify in your inner landscape.

I’ve been helping people with this since 2008 because that calcification forms the basis of the INNER BLOCKS make it harder to pursue your dreams.

This calcification of un-felt feelings makes it harder for you to know your true self.

It makes it harder for you to act in integrity with who you really are - it keeps you in a life that is too small for who you really are.

It’s what is making parents say “but our children have lost so much already” and demand that Halloween go on without any changes, ignoring the facts about super spreader events.

It makes us entitled and greedy and short sighted and without empathy for those who are more vulnerable than we are. This is why our species are killing the only home we have. This is why white supremacy and colonization and capitalism and greed.

And this morning on social media what I kept seeing is people wishing for 2020 to end.

As though that is some kind of solution.

The end of 2020 is not a magical portal that’s going to bring us into a better place.

That’s not the way through.

People keep asking about the online healing circle I did where I lead you through the working through a difficult feeling to get to the other side of it and feel free. You can get instant access to it when you sign up for the Your Next Steps free course.

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Working on your dream is high quality self care

By Andrea Schroeder / October 13, 2020

Working on your dream is high quality self care

Today was not a good day. I woke up dizzy and overwhelmed.

It was really hard to find my creative flow and I was thinking... maybe I should just take the day off. You know - have a me day. Make popcorn, catch up on my Netflix queue.

I checked my email and saw that one of my students was wondering the same thing.

She's hit a hard part in her work with her dreams, plus there are hard things happening in her personal life, plus the whole world is overwhelming so she was wondering if it was better to just take a "self care break" and come back to it when it's easier.

But no, it's not better to take a break. Working on your dream is THE BEST form of self care that we've got.

It's just that REAL self care is hard sometimes.

It asks you to face the hard things and make the hard choices.

Taking a break, having a me day - sometimes that's exactly what we need and sometimes (more times actually) what we're talking about there is numbing and distracting ourselves.

Which is fine it itself...

But when you dress it up as "self care" then it's problematic because you are legitimizing your excuses for not facing the hard thing.

You're actually just leaving yourself stuck in the hard place.

Here's the solution: you NEED practices that meet you where you are and help you move towards where you want to be.

NO ONE always feels brave and capable.

But there's lots you can do to connect with your inner wisdom, courage, creativity and power and then you WILL feel brave and capable... and filled up and happy and ready to explore your dreams.

I do this work every day in Dream Book.

Some days I meet myself crabby and feeling disheveled from a night of weird dreams.

Some days I meet myself feeling inspired and lit up.

It doesn't matter where you start - your Dream Book shows you how to get to where you want to be.

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#BadVibesWelcome On Grief + Dreams + the healing power of being where you are

By Andrea Schroeder / September 5, 2020

But before I start: whenever I write honestly about difficult things in my life, I gets ton of unsolicited advice, which, even when well meaning, is extremely unhelpful. So my policy now is to not accept ANY unsolicited advice.

I've been in a rough spot. And I’ve noticed myself pulling back a lot.

Part of it is a very natural need to just be quiet and more inward focused right now.

But part of it is this “I shouldn’t share this it will bum people out” thing that is NOT helpful for anyone.

We need to create BRAVE spaces where all parts of us are welcome, loved and seen. This is what the Creative Dream Incubator has always been so of course there is space here for my grief now.

On top of some other shitty things that happened, a lifelong friend died.

I’ve know him since I was 5. We were great friends and he was my first boyfriend in high school, though as adults we drifted apart and back together and back apart a few times.

A few years ago he really pushed me away at a time when he was talking about making a lot of positive changes. And even though I am obviously a good person to have around when you want to make positive changes, I understood.

We can pick up a lot of baggage in these lifelong friendships. Sometimes we can see who we WERE more clearly than who we are, or who we are becoming. Sometimes we need space away from the past to create a better future.

So I respected his decision. And I expected it to be temporary.

And now of course I am wondering, if I had tried harder to help - would he still be here?

It’s a painful question to sit with, and I know I’m not the only one who has been here.

I honoured his decision out of respect, and love, and a hope for a better future for him. So of course I’m devastated that that didn’t happen.

And now I’m trying to just honour everything I am thinking and feeling even as a lot of it conflicts with each other.

I’m also noticing:

My cognitive capacity is way down, a lot of things I do that are usually quick and easy are quite slow and draining to do now.
I’m much quicker to lose my temper and snap at my husband.
I’m tired and just want to eat carbs which makes me more tired.

But even in this shitty place, my dreams still exist. That part of me is not gone because I am grieving.

I think we feel like we should put our joy aside to make space for grief. To be appropriate.

But I think the most appropriate thing is to try to be as human as possible. To embrace our wholeness.

To fully feel our grief and pain and fear and also feel whatever joy we can find.

I’ve felt creatively blocked all week. But since I’ve started writing this (I missed writing!) super awkwardly with my iPad Pro on my lap sitting on an uncomfortable bench outside a coffee shop with tears in my eyes, I feel.... better?

I don’t know if better is the right word. But feeling in touch with my creativity helps me be more in touch with ME. Like it opens up some space and everything stops feeling so constricted and dark.

Just like I teach in my classes, we can have fear and dreams, we can have self doubt and take brave steps. This works better when we honour all parts of our experience.

We can have joy and grief. Love and sadness.

The more fully we can allow and experience our actual feelings, the better off we are. Denying grief will eventually cut off joy. Denying joy will make it more difficult to fully grieve.

The more complicated our relationship was with the person we lost, the more difficult this is because it’s hard to hold conflicting feelings. We live in a culture that doesn’t have a lot of space for this, which makes it even harder to be in it.

I teach how to meet yourself where you are and use what you find there to move towards where you want to be.

We can’t only show up for this work when we feel “good” and “ready”. That defeats the whole purpose.

So this week I’ve been bringing my grief and conflicting feelings into Project Miracle even though a part of me has been saying OMG NO DON’T DO THIS!

This part of me feels that, as the teacher, I need to show up clear + focused + positive.

But that’s not true. As a teacher, I need to walk my talk.

And I would never want to exclude anyone from my programs because they are grieving or feeling lost or like everything they want is impossibly out of reach.

This is where #goodvibesonly is so toxic because it leaves us alone in our pain.

We can have bad vibes, be grieving and in pain and lost and feeling like there is no hope - we can be in that sucky space and still create space for healing and magic.

In fact, we need and deserve the healing and magic so much more in these times.

#badvibeswelcome

And I don't have the bandwidth to write more fully on this, but also think about who gets left behind in #goodvibesonly - it further marginalizes already marginalized people. It leaves the people who need help the most unable to receive it. And in the larger context of how systemic oppression works in our culture, it supports white supremacy, the patriarchy and colonialist capitalism. Let's do better than that.

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You are always worthy of your dreams. But you won’t aways feel worthy.

By Andrea Schroeder / July 23, 2020

Today I hit a milestone: All of my courses + libraries have been moved over to the new website.

This is HUNDREDS of pages of content, all re-designed, re-organized and better than ever. I’m not done, there are a least 1-2 weeks of work to get the site operational, but still, having all of the content moved is a big milestone.

I hit this milestone at 7:45 am this morning, sitting on the patio of a coffee shop I used to work out of all the time, pre-COVID. For computer tasks, I am more productive in a coffee shop and not having access to them since March has impacted my productivity, on top of how the stress of these times has already impacted it.

So it was a real gift this morning, to wake up super early and get to the coffee shop early enough to get a table on the patio, as our patios are open at 1/2 capacity with social distancing measures so getting a table is not something I can count on being able to do most of the time. Also – I usually don’t WANT to be there, but early in the morning is good.

I was up so early because I went to bed so early because I really hit a wall last night.

It felt equal parts emotional and physical. The physical part I understood but it felt like I was hitting new ground in the emotional part and I didn’t know what it was.

I did NOT have the capacity to be with it and figure out what it was. I took a hot bath and went to bed early, which is my go-to self care practice for when things are hard. It always feels more clear and hopeful in the morning.

So this morning I was happily working away at the cafe, and at one point I tried to access I page but I wasn’t logged in and this flashed on the screen:

And suddenly I knew what this new emotional wall I’m hitting is all about: I don’t feel worthy of this new website.

Like – who am I to plaster my smiling mug all over the login screen like that?

When I designed this page, I was DELIGHTED with it! I thought “it’s like I am right there smiling and welcoming them in!”

But now that “who do you think you are???!?!?” voice has taken over and trying to shame me into NOT showing up in this new way.

This is good.

Every time I level up in some way (and I must say that levelling up is NOT all about things you can measure – like an increase in income or audience – there are infinite ways to level up and our dreams will need us to level up in all sorts of un-measurable ways along the way) I come across my inner resistance to showing up BIGGER and BRIGHTER and TRUER.

This resistance is made up of parts of me who need healing before they can feel safe with me taking my next steps in living my most brave, free and authentic life.

We ALL have these parts. We live in a culture that is constantly telling us who we should be and what we should want so living by your internal compass feels TERRIFYING for some parts of us.

This is just a part of the work.

It’s never a sign that we really CAN’T do this, or that we am NOT good enough or NOT worthy of having what we want.

It’s just a thing we have to work on, a part of the process. Just as important as making the website or recording the podcast or writing the book or making the art.

This is why Dream Work and Inner Work need to be a part of your daily practices! Otherwise you don’t notice this stuff because it’s all happening way beneath the surface – and the stuff you don’t notice about yourself has a LOT of control over you.

You are *always* worthy of your dreams. But you won’t aways *feel* worthy. Read More »

Calling myself out for believing my own bullshit

By Andrea Schroeder / July 15, 2020 / creative entrepreneur

I started seeing the world differently about four years ago, and then I started re-creating my work to match my new understanding of how the world is and my vision for what the world can be.

The more I learn about how colonialism and the patriarchy and capitalism and white supremacy function in the world, and all of the different forms of systemic oppression they create - the more I wanted to make my work DEEPER and STRONGER to help people free themselves from the toxicity of all of that.

Because this is NOT who we ARE.

One of the things that’s always pissed me off about the Live Your Best Life Industry is the spiritual by-passing.

I see how much the spiritual by-passing only serves to help privileged people focus on manifesting what they want for themselves while ignoring the role they play in maintaining systems of oppression in our society. I used to think it was ineffective and lame. Now I see it’s fucking DANGEROUS.

So, I've always understood that the world we live in is hostile to dreams, and that a huge part of making a dream real is this inner work of healing all the bullshit stories you have about yourself and who you really are and what your potential actually is, which you picked up from living in such a toxic culture.

But over the last four years I started to see it all much more clearly.

I started to see the connections between our personal growth and political systems and structures of oppression.

All of this learning has helped me feel so much more hopeful about how to create a better future for everyone. And more sure of my role in this as a teacher in the Live Your Best Life Industry.

Onto my bullshit story… after spending a few years re-creating my approach to teaching I felt like… I don’t know how to sell this.

I don’t know how to be marketing in capitalist systems when I want my work to be a part of helping people un-hook from the toxicity of capitalism and colonialism and the patriarchy.

And for a while now I've been in this story of… I am figuring out how to sell this.

Which keeps me in a place of… I don’t know how to sell this.

Which, today I just noticed, is 100% bullshit.

I do know how to sell my work because I DO sell my work. My work has been financially supporting me for almost 10 years.

But a part of me has been clinging to this “I don’t know how to sell this” story.

One of the ways I changed how I teach is that instead of teaching classes on different topics I now focus on helping people develop a daily/regular practice that fits into your life AND creates a MUCH deeper container for healing and growth.

Because otherwise you don’t notice where you’re living in a bullshit story!!!! Bullshit stories are GENIUS at making themselves feel true.

It’s my daily practice, and showing up each day to write about my practice in our private daily online mastermind blog, where I noticed… wow I’ve been repeating myself about this “I don’t know how to sell this”. What’s up with that?

The good thing about bullshit stories is that they don’t hold up well to that kind of examination.

Once you look them in the eye you see it’s all smoke and mirrors.

Because this part "I don’t know how to be marketing in capitalist systems when I want my work to be a part of helping people un-hook from the toxicity of capitalism and colonialism and the patriarchy.” IS FUCKING NONSENSE.

I mean the answer is obvious.

Authenticity.

Honesty.

Creativity.

Inspiration.

Integrity.

Living and working in alignment with my values.

THAT is how you market heartfelt creative work. BY BEING HEARTFELT AND CREATIVE IN HOW YOU PUT IT OUT THERE.

It’s NOT a mystery.

Yes, there are *so many* different tactics and strategies and approaches you can take. But you CAN see these as an art studio full of art supplies, each one does different things, and you get to pick and choose which ones to use and how to use them to create your own masterpiece.

And you get to experiment and try new things.

And you get to learn as you experiment and try new things.

And take what you learned and apply it to your next experiment.

So, this is me putting down my bullshit story about not knowing how to sell my work.

I LOVE what I’m doing.

I LOVE the insights and healings that happen all the time in the Creative Dream Circle.

And I LOVE my ideas for how to keep inviting YOU to join me in all of this magic.

Because there’s nothing better than that feeling of spotting a bullshit story that you’ve been living in, and then putting it down.

It feels like freedom and healing and love and joy all wrapped up in a burst of glitter.

And each bullshit story you put down moves you closer to your true self, who is POWERFUL and WISE and CREATIVE beyond measure.

That’s what I’m here for.

Calling myself out for believing my own bullshit Read More »

When you see how much growth is possible for you, it’s easy to feel small. You’re not small.

By Andrea Schroeder / July 10, 2020

When you see how much growth is possible for you, it's easy to feel small. You're not small.

I’ve been getting a TON of email about my last blog post.

I share these stories because the process of writing is a balm of healing and clarity for me. Writing it in a way that explains it to another person shows ME a new perspective on my experiences.

And I share my stories because we need more REAL stories in the world about being on the path of pursuing your dreams wholeheartedly.

We make up stories about other people’s journeys all the time! We make up that we are more stuck than this other person is, that we have more self doubt or bigger obstacles.

For example: the first three years that I was self employed with the Creative Dream Incubator, I kept getting emails from people who assumed I had a husband who was bankrolling my business! I had been single for so long and had never even mentioned having a boyfriend!

People saw my experience through their stories about how “the only way you can live your creative dream is if you have a partner who is financially supporting you”.

So, when I wrote about taking my power back a lot of people were inspired by the post and the idea that I just decided to take my power back and then flounced off into my new website.

But of course that’s not how it’s happening. So I wanted to share this bit of journaling I did while freaking out yesterday:

Today I had a call with someone to help me with the set-up of the new website. There is a LOT of tech stuff to consider in this set-up, so I had a huge list of questions and she was so super helpful and the call was great...

But then after the call I just crashed.

I was looking over my notes I just... couldn't process it.

My whole body tensed up, especially my shoulders.

I wanted to cry but couldn't.

Suddenly I felt frozen and stuck.

This whole thing felt impossible, like I am in WAY over my head here.

So this part of me who WANTS all of this felt like a wave crashing into this other part of me who is so overwhelmed and afraid of fucking it all up that she just wants to give up and go eat ice cream.

I am an ocean of different feelings and desires crashing into each other and I want it all to stop.

In that moment, I wanted to give up even though I knew giving up isn't an option.

I have grown enough that staying where I am doesn’t feel comfortable anymore. But I haven't yet grown into the new place. So I bounce back and forth and can’t feel comfortable, or at home, in either place.

This is what it means to out-grow a thing.

When I was nineteen, I moved away to go to University. That first summer, I came home and everything had changed. My friends had all moved on with their own lives. I didn’t really know where I fit. I had been homesick while I was away but now that I was home it was like I felt “away sick”.

I didn’t know where home was anymore.

This is the growth that our dreams demand of us.

You have to step out of where you are before you can create a new home for yourself in a new place. And that part where you are out of what WAS familiar but haven’t yet created what WILL BE familiar to you next - IS BRUTAL.

So much about what I teach is about creating space where we can stay in these hard parts because the only other option is to just NOT grow and that kills dreams.

So that’s where I am right now. I do know 100% where I want to go. AND some parts of this journey are stretching me past where I think I can be stretched. Some parts make me want to give up.

Instead of giving up I am taking breaks.

I am reading novels and going for bike rides and taking long bubble baths and going to bed early because these things help me bounce back from those places.

So after I freaked out and wrote that journaling piece, I re-potted some plants, played with my cat Bear, made hummus and ate some with a toasted pita.

Then I felt better, went back to my laptop and finished the stuff I had wanted to finish yesterday.

I see now that I freaked out after that meeting because the person I was meeting with showed me whole new options for how to do what I want to do.

Like - there are even MORE possibilities than I thought and I felt too small to figure it all out.

My dreams are always making me feel small because they keep growing. But I'm not small - I'm just ready for growth.

We are NEVER never too small for our dreams.

Your dream is here to grow you. Some parts of that growth are going to be uncomfortable, but always worth it.

When you see how much growth is possible for you, it’s easy to feel small. You’re not small. Read More »

I am taking my power back and I didn’t even know I had given it away.

By Andrea Schroeder / July 7, 2020 / creative entrepreneur

Every month I do a new moon alchemy circle + creative coaching call. During the June call I had this huge realisation...

I have a pattern of choosing "the easiest and/or simplest thing" instead of "the thing that will help me reach my goals".

😳

Like, I had NO CLUE I was doing this. I see myself as a person who pursues her dreams and goals wholeheartedly.

I felt really uncomfortable to see it, to notice where my own self concept is not allowing me to see what I am actually doing.

(We're ALL doing this, all the time btw 😉

This is why it's so important that we not force ourselves to heal or grow or to push ourselves into any kind of mould of who we think we are supposed to be.

The Live Your Best Life Industry is full of this! It's all about deciding what "living your best life" means and then shoving yourself into that shape. It’s violent and it’s dangerous. And it ignores just how hard it is to REALLY know what you want. And the fact that we you grow and change, so do your desires.

As an aside - so many people come into Dream Book feeling vulnerable and ashamed because they don't know what their dream is. I know I feel it too sometimes! But the idea that we're supposed to always know what we want is BULLSHIT. We're NOT supposed to always know what we want. The process of exploring is vital. Staying in a place of KNOWING and being CERTAIN means staying in a place of STAGNATION. Being wiling to not know, being willing to explore and grow... that's where the magic happens.

Magic, healing, growth - they all REQUIRE vulnerability and uncertainly and willingness to explore and be open. Spiritual belief systems that treat the universe like a giant vending machine that grants your wishes if you wish right bypass all of the magic, healing and growth that are actually possible for you.

But let me get back to my story.

So I explored this new pattern of mine where I choose "the simple thing" over "the thing that would help me reach my goal."

I know it's possible to just "change your mind" about a thing and instantly shift your perspective and your actions and your outcomes.

I also know that that approach can be nothing more than shoving yourself into your ego-created ideas of who you should be and what you should want. That's not what I want for myself.

So I explored GENTLY. Staying open, curious and loving. I used the tools I teach in Dream Book. I made space to just BE WITH the pattern, exploring my feelings about it, getting to know it. Not trying to CHANGE it.

Anything that is not your truth will unravel and dissolve or change into something true - when you give it your love and attention.

This is why I think the Inner Work and Dream Work NEED to be a daily, or regular, practice for anyone who is wholeheartedly pursuing their dreams. And the further you are along the path the more you need to practice 😉

And when you are doing this work you don’t even always realize or understand how everything is interconnected. You pull at at one tiny thread and it can unravel and change your whole life.

Because at the same time all of the stuff happen in terms of me moving my business which I thought was just a simple choice to use one piece of software instead of another one...

But now that I am in the process of moving, now that I am building a whole new home for my work, I’m starting to understand where the tools I have been using have been holding me back... because of that choice to keep my systems SIMPLE.

Like I am stunned by how much I have been held back by the tools I've been using. I am stunned by how much I have given my power away without even knowing it.

And in all of this surprise and shock I'm also feeling so much joy, so much ALIVENESS and so much freedom.

A LOT of energy has just been freed up for me, in the transformation of this pattern. I feel wildly energized which is really helpful because I have so much work to do getting this new site set up.

This is NOT to say that everyone who uses simple tools like the ones I've been using is being held back!!!

Absolutely not.

There are EXTREMELY GOOD REASONS to choose simple tools. And you can absolutely succeed in any way you choose to using any tool you choose! I wholeheartedly believe that.

But - I had an UNCONSCIOUS pattern of choosing easy/simple over effective. So my decision making process was impacted by this in ways I couldn't see.

So - for where I am now - with an eight year old membership site and a new course where I hold DEEP space for DEEP work - in an ongoing way (Dream Book baby!!!!) these are not the right tools for me.

Or another way I can look at it is - I am ready to step into my NEXT LEVEL of how I offer my work.

When I think of it in this way I don't feel shame or embarrassment about not having seen this pattern sooner, I just feel excited to let it go now.

You just NEVER KNOW what kind of changes will be sparked by doing the Inner Work.

So this is why I am I advocate and create and hold space for people to do this work in a wholehearted and CONSISTENT way.

We don’t know what we don’t know.

WE don't see out own blind spots anywhere near as well as we think we do.

And the further along we go on the path the more we start to think we DO know what we don't know - and that stops us from learning!

So that’s why we need to keep practicing, keep exploring, because there’s so much more for us.

I am taking my power back and I didn’t even know I had given it away. Read More »

How To Do Shadow Work. For when you’re ready to change your life.

By Andrea Schroeder / June 21, 2020

how to do shadow work

You will never learn how to do Shadow Work by reading about it.

It's something you need to need to EXPERIENCE.

I created a healing circle where I lead you through the process, and you can access it for free, by registering right here:

Learning how to do Shadow Work is less about perfecting a specific technique and more about staying open and being willing to feel, explore and experience whatever it is you encounter in the process.

Because Shadow Work is about facing your own shadows - the places inside you that you would rather avoid - it's just inherently uncomfortable.

I mean - you avoid these places for a reason.

And in order to do Shadow Work, you've going to have to come face-to-face with that reason.

There is no one perfect way for learning how to do Shadow Work, but there are two things to keep in mind while you're exploring:

An open mind - you don't know what you're going to discover. If you go in already thinking you know what's going to happen then you close yourself off from possibilities.
A willingness to feel your feelings and be uncomfortable. You don't have to LIKE your feelings you just have to be wiling to HAVE them.

It's pretty amazing how easy it is to trick ourselves into thinking we are doing these things when we are actually totally NOT doing them!

How to do Shadow Work: Sitting with your feelings.

Sitting with your feelings means making space for yourself to feel how you actually feel, to explore that feeling and find out more about it.

This tends to be the opposite approach from what most of us are taught about how to handle feelings.

So it's uncomfortable and it feels awkward. Which means - if you feel like you're doing it wrong, you are probably doing it right.

Unfortunately, if you feel confident and sure that you're doing it right, you are probably doing it wrong. This is the nature of Shadow Work. It just feels uncomfortable.

It takes practice and patience to get to a place of actually being open to feeling your feelings.

Your reaction to your feelings tends you get in the way of feeling your actual feelings.

For example: You dream of being a best-selling author. You are afraid that you're not good enough to do this.

Your inner critic reacts to that fear with a "Why bother? No one cares?" story and you get caught up in your feelings about that story. But the "Why bother? No one cares?" story is NOT your actual feeling.

So being with that story just makes more space for your Inner Critic to put on a show for you.

And it feels uncomfortable and scary so you think you're feeling your feelings but you're not. You're staying in this untrue story about your feelings. Your feelings are fear of not being good enough.

Sitting with this fear would feel terrifying in comparison to sitting with the "Why bother? No one cares?" story.

That's the Shadow Work.

As you sit with the feeling without trying to do anything with it, you actually move through it.

And on the other side of that terror there is something else. And once you've experienced that, you'll have a deeper understanding of yourself.

Once you sit with that fear and move through it, you start to see that this fear comes out of the fact that you're not writing regularly! So of course your writing isn't up to par with what it needs to be to be a bestseller.

No need for a song and dance about "Why bother? No one cares".

All you need to do is get to work.

Create a writing schedule and stick to it.

This is the magic of Shadow Work: When you work through the shadow and are able to reach the guidance of your True Self.

In my example you had to first be with all of the uncomfortable stories that your Inner Critic throws you way and then you have to face that unimaginable terror of feeling your actual feeling.

This is a simplified example, you may have layers and layers of feelings and reactions and stories. Your Shadow Work process will likely become VERY convoluted and weird.

Shadow Work means bravely and honestly facing what you find. Exploring by feeling your way.

You don't have to solve anything.

You don't have to discover the gift or perform a healing.

If fact it's best if you're not trying to make those things happen, and focus solely on exploring and feeling your way.

The solutions, gifts and healing are already there - on the other side of the thing you least want to face.

So you know you've successfully done your Shadow Work when you find them.

Again. You will never learn how to do Shadow Work by reading about it.

It's something you need to need to EXPERIENCE.

I created a healing circle where I lead you through the process, and you can access it for free, by registering right here:

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How To Do Shadow Work. For when you’re ready to change your life. Read More »

For the people who have inner critics

By Andrea Schroeder / May 11, 2020 / Vintage Creative Dream TV

Today I'm talking about INNER CRITICS: where they come from and what their REAL purpose is.

This one is helpful especially if you want to get better at managing your inner critics so they don't stop you from pursuing your creative dreams.

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A post shared by Andrea Schroeder (@creativedreamincubator) on May 10, 2020 at 7:38am PDT

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For the people who have inner critics Read More »