How you work the magic words. How the magic words work you.

Are you ready to make some magic?

On March 14, we begin another #7MagicWords adventure together. If you're new to my community, or haven't been able to make space for this free weeklong challenge in the past, here's the gist:

At the turn of each season, you're invited to find seven magic words. You'll get a prompt each morning that will help focus your attention and open yourself to the possibilities that linger in your everyday language.

It's my hope that a daily practice of "magic word seeking" will invite you to pause and notice that creative magic really is swirling about you all the time. And, at the end of the #7MW week, I hope that your words reveal patterns that help you reflect on the last season and set intentions for what's next.

Those who have been part of any of the three previous #7MagicWords Challenges will know that we talk about how the magic works in multiple ways. Every day, you realize that the magic word finds you as much as you find the magic word. And, we know that when you focus all of the thoughts, feelings, and mysteries of a day into one word, you are often inspired to tell a new story that goes deeper and takes you into unexpected territory.

The word I couldn't call "magical"

Earlier this week, I struggled to find just the right word. I knew I didn't want to go with my first instinct, so this is what I shared on social media as my daily  #365MagicWords post:

Whose earth is this anyway? Saturday's snow beside Tuesday's flip flops... We linger side by side in the afternoon sun. Peaceful coexistence between polar opposites is possible here and there after all.

But here's the thing: that wasn't the full story. It took me a while to get to that word and those brief sentences. I kept dancing with the ideas and the process itself the next morning. This is what emerged the next morning:

Yesterday's magic was so obvious. Swishing about in my favorite sleeveless dress with its full skirt and trading the boots for the flip flops during a Hudson Valley February? That is the very definition of fantastical living.

I'd have been happy with making the day's magic word a grin and a spring in my step that transcends all language, but the writing coach in me is committed to finding the words. (As Seamus Heaney says, "If you have the words, there's always a chance you'll find the way" and I know I need to keep finding the way no matter what the weather, no matter what I'm wearing.)

Last night, as I tried to pair a word with this perfect moment and the sweet little picture I'd captured, I thought about "coexist." Snow and flip flops are the perfect symbol of peacefully getting along, right? I thought of that bumper sticker that celebrates world religions. When I had that on my first car, the sentiment seemed pure and powerful. But, in 2018, I admit that coexistence seems fraught and heavy and just too much for the delicate joy of an out-of-season day to carry.

I ended up picking up my journal and writing into "coexistence." I was so grateful that this patch of heart shaped snow wanted to teach me so much.

Through my writing practice, I found "linger."It felt right to share that tender magic with a world that's in the midst of the grief, the fear, the gun debate, and the Twitter storms of the last week.

I steeped myself in the inspiration of "linger" while I took on the hardest issues of the day, while I wrestled with why it seems harder than ever to share space with difference, to respect each other despite our divides. I lingered in my own judgments, my own defenses, my own refusal to believe "us" and "them" can coexist until they change.

I lingered in the shame and fear for a while, but then I returned to the simple magic of the original moment: I remembered that I'm a human with a body that loves the warm breeze. I stepped back into the sensual surprise that is a late spring day stolen from the teeth of winter. I stepped back into the magic without disregarding the reality.

Will you join us March 14 - 21?

This is the sort of inquiry that becomes possible when you look for a single magic word to capture the power and potency of a day... And that is why we return to #7MagicWords each season.

The #7MagicWords Challenge is free and open to all who want to open themselves to possibility and renewal, one word at a time.

What if you found the magic words you were yearning for?

The yearning…

It’s what gets us to buy books, to join challenges, to hire coaches, and see healers. In that yearning, we reach and stretch and search. We grow, we transform, we evolve.

And, all too often, we crash against the rocks of our own disappointment, berating ourselves for failing to reach the perfect shore. We set sail again, making new promises, gathering new resources, and hoping that the next journey will take us to that ultimate destination, to the place on the other side of the yearning.

When do you get to slow down and tune into what’s beneath the yearning?

There’s a little patch of Cape Cod filled with tall pines that grow right up to the edge of the dunes. It’s a place outside of time, where the biggest question generally is “what’s going on with the tide this morning?”

Every summer, in the midst of all the sweet family chaos, I find myself with more time to think than my year-round life usually offers.

When there’s nothing that needs to be done besides watch the girls gather crabs on the tidal flats,  I become most aware of the yearning and all of the probing questions that come with it:  Where was I last summer? What do I wish to change about my life when I get home? What's still missing?

A map to the heart of the yearning

I often carry a battered copy of Danielle LaPorte’s The Desire Map to the beach.

Now that this book has become my summer bible, Danielle’s question “How do you want to feel?” seems like an obvious one, but I remember how it was a revelation a few years ago. She gave me a new way to reckon with my yearning. I understood it was less about crossing stuff off the to do lists and more about the quest to inhabit an emotional world that feels plain old good.

Armed with all that inspirational prose and all those gorgeous words, I assumed it would be relatively easy to find the feelings and plan accordingly.

Words like “vibrant” and “connected” and “enough” seemed like powerful guides. They certainly seemed like the right words for an entrepreneurial mama dedicated to earthly love and divine wisdom, but, it turns out, they only fueled me for a little while.

I kept finding myself carting the book on family vacations, desperate to find the perfect words and the tailor made feelings that would help me fill the empty spaces so I could get out of yearning and into being, but I was forgetting something really important...

Find your own tools to find your own perfect words

Early this July, I sat on the swing set tucked in the pines. My daughters ran up and down the same slide over and over, finding the magic in the simplicity of “playful.”

As I stared at 150+ words that describe positive feelings and considered all the usual suspects - accomplished, nourished, alive -  I realized I wasn’t going to think my way into the feelings I yearned to cultivate.

I wasn’t going to should my way or will my way into them either. Pushing wasn’t ever going to land me in a graceful, positive state of mind.

Then it dawned on me... This was just past the halfway point of the year. That meant I had found nearly 200 magic words to describe each day thanks to my #365MagicWords Project. As I struggled with Danielle’s great list of possibilities, I lost track of my own experience, my own mastery, my own magic.

And so, I quit trying to force it and I tuned into what I had learned over six months of magic word seeking - a different way of knowing, of hoping and reflecting and inhabiting each day. Instead of leaning on the usual shoulds, I pulled on the spiritual, intuitive, and, yes, mystical resources at my disposal.

The words I got were most surprising and, as it turned out, more powerful than any others I had played with before:

Relaxed and receptive.

These soft words were impossible… and perfect.

They were the antithesis of the “Do. Push. Prove. Get noticed. Make an impact.” energy that I thought would lead me to a full and remarkable life.

These words won't carry me through the rest of forever - my old friend yearning will undoubtedly come to call again. But next time, I'll remember that I have the resources I need to find them.

The Spirit of #7MagicWords: Relaxed. Receptive. And Ready.

The next #7MagicWords Challenge, the weeklong project that helps us set intentions for the season ahead begins on the Autumn Equinox on September 22 (or the Spring Equinox for my south of the equator friends!)

This time around, we are focusing on freeing ourselves from magical thinking so we can be free to do some real magic making. This means we’re looking for the words we want, but also opening ourselves to the words we need.

I promise that opening yourself and letting a magic word find you each day invites some real integrative magic into your life. I can't tell you exactly how to do it, but I can promise you that deciding to try to invite that magic in is your first powerful, magical act.

And how do you want to feel when you prepare to make real integrative magic?

Relaxed. Receptive. Ready.

(That last word came through to me at CampGLP because I realized the more I settle into myself, the more I am prepared to take the right action and welcome the most brave and delicious kind of transformation.)

It took me years to find the words I yearned for. What if it only took you a week?

This project offers a series of prompts that are designed to help you find the sparkly words that make you smile, and then, go deeper... We call it a challenge for a reason, after all! ;)

Will you join us for the challenge? There’s no fee to join this community event. All it takes is a willingness to pause and invite yourself to see the magic that lingers in your everyday language.

Sign up here and get set for the first prompt that will arrive in your inbox and on your favorite social media platform on 9/22!

What Kind Magic Are We Making with the #7MagicWords Challenge?

If you spend more than five minutes with me, there’s a great chance you’ll hear me use the word “magic.”

I use it to describe moments of wonder: “Look, girls, the way the light is coming through the trees… I think we stepped into a realm of magic.”

I use this to describe moments of domestic joy: “The kitchen is clean! Someone made magic!” (That someone is always my husband… don’t let them tell you that electrical engineers aren’t mystical creatures!)

I use “magic” to describe any act of creativity and vision made manifest. Sometimes my writing coaching clients may look at me a little quizzically when I exclaim that they performed magic on their latest blog post. Before they get to know me, they may be thinking that the are merely writing and re-writing, not doing alchemy, but trust me… that time and attention is exactly what sets the stage for magic.

OK, time to define magic…

"Magic is the art of changing consciousness at will."

This line is credited to the psychotherapist turned occultist and fantasy novelist Dion Fortune. She dedicated her life in the first half of the twentieth century to the study and creation of magic, and I think there’s much inspiration to draw from this idea.

Let’s unpack this phrase a little bit and think about how it can guide the #7MagicWords Challenge that begins next week.

If you haven’t checked it out yet, #7MagicWords is a weeklong community project. Sign up (it’s free) and you’ll be sent a prompt each day and invited to come up with your own magic word.

The goal is to create space for personal illumination, but it would be wonderful to spread the light wider too. Create an image with your word and perhaps share a piece of the story behind it and then post the image on your favorite social media platform (I’ve been at it all through 2017).

There’s also a Magic Words Facebook group where we’ll be talking about the process and how a daily magic word can help you set a daily intention and/or make time for nightly reflection.

So, back to Ms. Fortune and "Magic is the art of changing consciousness at will."

In the #7MagicWords challenge, let’s make art, invite change, expand consciousness, and exercise will.

Art: If you’ve been following my 2017 journey with #365magicwords, you’ll notice that the art is key to the process. Sometimes, the word finds me and I search Unsplash or my own phone for the image that might compliment it. Other days, the act of take a photograph or doodling in the margins will lead me to the word.

Someday quite soon, I hope to find the perfect word to help me understand why I had to take a dozen shots of this fungus colony. Certainly these little ‘shrooms offered unexpected beauty, but someday, I think they’ll help me understand something about community.

Change: How much will shift between day one and day seven for you? You may have a creative breakthrough that will shift the story you’re writing or the offer you’re making to your clients. Or, you may need to peer closely to catch some subtle shift in the way you look at the world and feel the words as they roll off your tongue.

Transformation in any form is something that magicians and creatives and healers seek and welcome, yes?

Consciousness: This is a big delicious word that holds everything from the state of being awake to something profoundly metaphysical.

Whether tuning into yourself and your surroundings simply makes you feel more aware and alive or whether it connects you to something much greater than yourself, you’re doing it right.

Will: It does take commitment to get from “oh that sounds cool” and entering your email address to actually pausing and finding the words and potentially creating a piece of inspiring art from them seven (or more!) times.

This project is an invitation to show up for yourself and your own creative insights. Commit yourself to show up for seven days and open yourself to the wonderful and unexpected things that will emerge along the journey.

Please join us for the sweet, simple project that begins on the first day of summer

I do hope you’ll join the community of magic makers that is growing as the Summer Solstice draws near. Let me know that you’re in and I’ll instantly send over the brand new e-booklet I put together, Find Your Magic Words: Discover the Words that Help You Tell the Stories that Matter.