There’s No Place Like Home. . .Creating the story of your business in 2010
The trouble with the future is, it hasn’t arrived yet. So we daydream that our house (our life!)—in which we sometimes feel so ill at ease–flies off in a hurricane, and lands SPLAT! on the Wicked Witch of the West, flattening her like a pancake. Hee-hee, she can’t scare us any more!
We glide on gossamer wings with Glinda the Good Witch, who sparkles like a cotton-candy cloud in her impossibly pouffy pink tulle dress. (That fluting voice, that high-calorie smile—oh! they make my teeth ache.)
We conjure up worlds where magic wands zap ruby slippers onto our size-ten feet. And a yellow brick road unwinds before us, showing us exactly where we are to go.
We take our first tentative steps in those shiny red shoes, accompanied by a gaggle of squealing munchkins. We’ve begun the new adventure of our lives; we’re headed for the Emerald City.
Along the way, we meet the strangest of strangers: A brainless scarecrow who regularly gets the stuffing knocked out of him. A hollow tin man who’s missing his heart and suffers from seized-up joints at the most inopportune moments. And a bully of a lion who trembles at the sight of his own shadow.
We link arms with these comrades because we see in each of them something of our own human frailty. Our sometimes-scattered minds and hollow hearts. Our fearful, roaring selves.
Arm in arm we skip along the yellow brick road. Singing, We’re Off to see the Wizard, the Wonderful Wizard of Oz.
The all-wise Wizard who’ll make us whole. Who’ll show us the way home. Who’ll make all our dreams come true.
It’s seductive, this daydream. It comes to us from the land of infinite possibility, and it carries in its heart a secret truth, the way an acorn carries the truth of the oak tree.
But, when we get to the Emerald City, all is not sweetness and light. Flying monkeys descend from the sky, bent on destroying us. We are chased by dangerous storm troopers in clanking armor, who get their orders from the Wicked Witch of the East. Her feral green face and her angry voice are awfully familiar . . . like someone we once knew.
We are saved by the love and loyalty of our little dog, Toto.
Eventually, we meet the Wizard in his inner chamber. Only to discover he’s as lost as we are. He’s a myth of his own making; he has no power to save us.
That’s when the miracle happens. The story we’ve lived through in our imaginations shapes us. The qualities we so desperately longed for come out of their hiding places in our minds and hearts.
We find the courage to leave the safety of that which is known and familiar, but too small to contain us; the intelligence to meet challenges along the way; the heart to embrace all we encounter as part of ourselves.
And in finding these qualities through the magic of story, we find our way home.
Home to our innermost selves. Home to the soul that holds the infinite possibilities of our lives, like the acorn holds the story of the oak tree. That waits patiently for us to birth our stories with love, courage, intelligence and action.
Tomorrow, I’ll host a free 75-minute teleclass and discussion on creating the new year in partnership with the soul of your business.
We’ll play with ways to connect with the soul of your story, which holds the blueprint for its unfolding. You’ll enter the story with the light of your soul as your guide, and the soul of your business as your companion and friend.
And you’ll get to see that story unfold in magical ways, as you craft it in vision and imagination.
You can register by clicking your heels here.
Please join us in the dance. And wear your ruby slippers!
I’d love to hear how you envision and create your future, and the future of your business. Ideas? Insights? Questions? Please share them in Comments.
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Wow, Hiro – that search for the all-knowing Wizard who can make us whole is so familiar to me.
Slowly I’m realizing that the Wizard is a myth, and it’s up to me to find my own way home. And I mean *really* realizing it…finally it looks as though this 30+ year pattern is starting to dissolve.
So far, the envisioning has been relatively easy (but still hard at times). It’s the creating (without defaulting back into wizard-search mode) that’s been challenging.
Thanks to you, I’m learning how to spend time listening to and getting support from my own soul and the soul of my business. Those are the things that help me feel that the creation process is doable.
Victoria Brouhard´s last post … Quitting the Man: 34 Days Since Freedom
Dear Hiro,
Thank you for sharing the fabulously beautiful analogy of following/looking for the wizard. Describes exactly what I know that I revert back to – it’s when I don’t feel in contact with my own flow – my own flow of creativity or just simply Spirit flowing through me. I start looking for the knight in shining armor or the wizard for “rescuing”.
It’s so interesting to me how we (as humans) look outside ourselves for something we have patiently and lovingly residing inside ourselves – waiting for us to play once again. Even those of us who have worked on the hard stuff for a long time and practice remembering what flow feels like – we (I) still look for the wizard/knight. Aaargh!
I am humbly grateful for the work that you do, Hiro and all that you share of yourself.
Another thing that often occurs to me when I work with my clients personally and through writing on my blog – the way we (us humans) tend to feel all alone when we are going through the hard. Every one of us (that I know anyway) has or does struggle with this. Including me. Definitely me.
I write on my blog for that very reason – to hopefully help people know that they are NOT alone in their struggle – and to remind them when they start going down that dark alleyway (as my girlfriend calls it) that they are not alone.
Wow…long comment. Thank you again, Hiro. Smiles & joy.
Maya
I wanted to say thanks for having the teleclass and apologize for not coming. I was going to but the snow storm we had knocked out the phone so I couldn’t make it. I’m so glad you recorded it and it was wonderful to listen to. Lots of good stuff.
I’ve been practicing the energy technique you taught.
Hi Hiro
Thank you so very much for your generous offerings!
I wish you much good fortune and ease for your year ahead! Waving from london to Canada on this plane from me to you!
So lucky me – I had a lovely, magical day where I felt truly blessed and listened to your audio recording which was fascinating, reassuring and made me want to ask more, if you feel able to respond.
With some experience behind me (from over 10 years ago)as a performer I am relearning some of the tools that I had developed to tap into my creativity to enable it to flow more easily. My question to myself, or my soul, has been about what my businessy thing will be? What will make me happy and speak to others also? I have had an exciting couple of months just allowing myself to dream and free flow and really just allowing myself to keep playing with some possible ideas or solutions. It has certainly felt divine and magical. And so far my ‘answers’ have felt ‘right’ – they have sat well with me and they are still emerging
What struck me today was how ingenius and wonderfully creative your use of a meditative state is(forgive me if I am applying terms incorrectly). Nevertheless I hoped you might have a few juicy bags of tricks up your sleeve to help a novice like me? So that I might encourage all the argueing voices in my head to get out of the way – since they were noisy and disruptive in my brain today!
I wondered too whether there might be a way of using my existing preferences and habits to help nudge me along the way so that I could have a good old chat with the soul of my business as suggested! I so loved this idea but the combination of stillness and direct focus on the task of asking questions as opposed to multifocussed daydreaming aspect to my brainstorming) was quite challenging. I noticed that this tended to bring up a flurry of mental activity which is basically Me being uncomfortable with Me doing this! Daydreaming as such seems to contain those soul-full elements that you describe and bypass my critical, thinking head – so I wondered if there is a way that I might help myself to tap into this mediative visualising state with greater ease so that I can reap the benefits of this exercise more fully over time?
If you feel able to extract what might be a tangible question from all this I’d be hugely grateful for your insight and wealth of experience!
Either way though I will keep practising and see if the judging irritating voices will lessen their hold with practise!
Many many thanks and love what a super day! Wonderful Hiro!
L