Last week I had lunch with a new friend, a woman who mostly knows me through my online persona. She sees my happy, colorful Facebook posts, my colorful shoes, and how I appear all bright eyed and bushy tailed in the blue tutu dress on the pages of this website and my newsletters.

She looked at me at the opening of our conversation and said:

“I really want to know, how do you stay inspired?”

and I stared at her like a deer in headlights. I had no idea how to answer that question. We sat in that sushi restaurant for two+ hours talking about all types of things in our lives, in our journeys to find ourselves, our purpose, our joys and challenges.

As soon as we parted ways I started thinking about that questions “How do I stay inspired?” and I knew the answer immediately.

I don’t.

I don’t stay inspired. What I do, (or try to do) is keep creating reasons to be inspired. It’s sort of a habit, at this point, that started with my 30 Day Muchness Challenge 2 years ago. However, like any habit that is technically good for us but hard to maintain, it comes and goes in stages, just like eating healthy, working out or, um, religiously flossing on a regular basis (TMI?)

I’ve blogged before when I have been through stages where I felt completely uninspired, where I feel like a Muchness fraud, where I am not proactively walking my walk. It usually goes hand in hand with a lack of blog posts because when I am not walking my walk I have a hard time talking my talk.

What I realized, – the “secret” and what I want you to know is that “staying inspired”, or connected, or mindful, or happy is that it’s not about an aha moment and suddenly stepping onto a new, solid foundation of inspiration, mindfulness, connectedness or happiness. It is about recognizing those tiny moments in your day that support those feelings, and then stringing them together + creating more of them to fill the gaps. It’s a choice, in every moment, to turn that moment into a Muchness Moment, and you have the power to make it.

That’s really the thought process that went into the creation of the 30 Day Deck. By providing a prompt to a feeling you want to capture, it helps you recognise those fleeting moments and  string them together to create a platform upon which to stay inspired. (or mindful, or connected or happy.) And by choosing to do it EVERY DAY for for 30 days in a row, you’ll create forward momentum that’ll keep you going well beyond the day that last card gets filled out and put into the jar.

A few months back I came across Alana Sheeren. A baby loss mom who found her strength in her loss, she shares the message that grief can be transformational. She’s even given a TED talk. “I believe there are gifts in the darkest moments and that we are all deserving of joy. I believe in accepting our ugly bits, our angry parts and our own lack of grace. I believe in the beauty of the human spirit. I believe that as each of us steps more fully into our own power, and lives in greater alignment with our deepest desires, we open the door to the empowerment of others.”

Then she went and turned the tables, asking me to be a subject of her weekly interview series “Transformation Talk”

Today our conversation was posted on her site.

Alana had a way of drawing out my story in ways and detail I’ve never shared before. I talked about how I started losing my Muchness in the first place, and what the work I do really means to me. I also shared two unusual facts about me that really define who I believe I am in this world and why I do what I do. I know so many of you will be able to relate…

It’s our unedited conversation – 32 minutes, so put it on in the background while you work…

[youtube_sc url=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HFSW0PDzvPw&feature=player_embedded”]

I have a confession.

Sometimes I wonder if I should blog more through the random crappy days where I don’t know what I’m doing and second guess myself till I’m blue in the face… but then… well, I don’t wanna be a buzz kill.

I mean, I know even the self-proclaimed Queen Of Muchness is allowed to have those crappy days, and I know that I should really allow you all to see them, because then it will you give you the opportunity to cheer me up, and then we BOTH will have a Muchness Moment! (YAY!) But still, I feel like if I’m here to demonstrate the powers of Muchness, should I really be complaining about the day-to-day crap that sometimes lives rent-free in my head?

The truth is,  I have fallen out of the habit of blogging about all types of stuff whenever…and I miss it… I think at some point I got it in my head that every post had to be deep and meaningful and purposeful in a way that I could articulate.

This idea got me totally messed up in my head for a long time. 

Because clearly everything I write is incredibly deep and meaningful.

No. Because this is simply my blog. And some days I have shitty days. And some days I can’t find Muchness. Actually THAT is not true. Somedays I don’t feel like looking for Muchness. Somedays, I just want to dig my ass into the couch and watch TV with my husband. Or, watch TV so bad my husband refuses to watch it with me.

But, the fact is, I am both a teacher and a student of Muchness.  I am putting myself out there so that others can learn as I  learn. Through practice. And honesty.

Here’s a bit of light entertainment:

I have a friend that started a juicing company…. shes obsessed with fresh made juices and how they make you feel amazing and all this stuff… This passion runs through her to her very bones. She was handmaking and delivering juice all around NJ for months…. running herself ragged…. she was so burnt out and stressed and broke she started bartending to make ends meet. Stopped making juice because she couldnt afford organic produce and found herself drinking beer instead. We were talking and she was like “I feel like such a fraud!!!!” and I was like “That’s how I feel when I wear sneakers!!”

No matter who you are or what you do, no one is perfect and the most we can do is aim your time and life at more positive and helpful than negative. The honest truth is that my day-to-day is SO MUCH better in so many ways than before I found the Muchness that I don’t even measure it against the same stick. I need to remember BTM (before The Muchness) and really keep seeing my littlest Muchness Moments —- there are a ton of them!!

Today’s Muchness Pic Of the day! No Heels!!!

PS- Thanks Ronit for the reminder!