A lovely letter for you
Why I stopped, online spirituality, the coaching industry and the the book I've adored this week...
In another lifetime, I would write a love letter and send it out to my email subscribers each week - maybe you were one of those humans, hello angel.
Centred around self love I would share something that happened to me and how it taught me something to about life as it is now. One not shrouded in total self loathing and the strong desire to be anyone else but me.
After my very short marriage, and what felt like a very long divorce, my fridge was empty, my bottle recycling full and my heart broken. I thought my current situation was the causation of my pain, suffering, debt and Malbec addiction but I’d been this way for as long as I could remember. The marriage breaking down was just the sneeze after an application of mascara on an otherwise finished face of makeup.
Eventually I got sober, felt my body for the first time in years and fell in love with yoga. I wrote on my Instagram about my life, perhaps prematurely without weighing up the consequence of sharing such intimate parts of myself and I enjoyed what it brought me then and not so much now.
I qualified as a yoga teacher, found my own version of spirituality borrowed and amalgamated from all I’d learnt studying different religions and various texts. Then I fell through a vast tear in the universe and into the online world of spirituality and self help. Instagram seems to dissolve both of these into one, and kindly requests we pay for it.
Manifestation, law of attraction, sky daddy, coaching, everything with goddess in the title, feminine and masculine energy, eros, tantra and plant medicine.
I believed things like ‘god wants me to have everything I want’ and ‘the more money I make the more I can be in service’ (I later found out most of these people meant helping more people by teaching them things they paid them for, not donating, in community or supporting those who need it without transaction). I was taught that if I wasn’t making more money it was a wound I must heal. That anything that happened was a direct reaction to my internal state. That I could purchase ‘feminine awakening’ and a course that could make me ‘financially free’. That I should cut out any and all negative people. To always take the path of least resistance. That I didn’t have to try, god or the universe would deliver. That if I wasn’t receiving the right energy back from someone to say goodbye. Not to accept any negative normal, healthy emotion into my field. That everything was transactional. To hire someone to clean my house even though I had 20k of debt (it would allow me more money because my energy would be spent elsewhere if you were wondering). People who charge 30k on a coaching package and if you don’t commit? You’re just not letting yourself have it.
But maybe have an orgasm on a vision board and see if you can conger up the money?
Okay okay, I went off but if you’ve ever been a part of this immensely large corner of the internet you might know where I’m coming from or experienced something similar. Or you might be thinking this girl is nuts…
I trained as a coach and dreamt of helping women take steps forward in areas of their life they felt stuck. I’m proud of the women I helped and I met wonderful humans who I will cherish in my heart forever. Having an aunt who was training to be a therapist kept me grounded. I charged £60 for an hour and a fifteen minutes of coaching, which despite people telling me was a ‘money block’, I just knew my skill set didn’t warrant a higher amount of money. Always knowing to refer out if it was something I couldn’t support with (again, not a block) and only using a person-centred approach. I occasionally ran meditation/visualisation segments I had learnt during my 200h YTT. I wasn’t there to tell them what to do. I was supposed to ask good questions and allow them to find their own answers.
I didn’t need them to be like me. To believe as I did and under the sheer noise of that space I can’t quite believe I managed to keep that intact. I’m not saying that is the right way to coach or that anyone doing things differently is wrong. Or there’s no true parts to experiences like manifestation and energy work that isn’t true. I love holistic practices. I’m not saying that the way we see the world doesn’t impact our reality up to a point - we don’t all begin on level playing fields, you cannot think your way out of poverty or to have your basic needs met. Just that some aspects this world ring true for me, and some do not, which is normal.
I believe coaching can be a great medium to support someone for a period in their life when someone has been trained and it’s the right medium for them in that instance. There are life coaches I love, Martha Beck being one of them. Her books are fantastic along with her podcast ‘The Gathering Room’ which asks really big questions. Also Tonya Leigh who is totally different, and talks around the concept of Self Image which it’s an idea I really enjoy working with but again, I don’t agree with everything and it’s a good thing that we don’t. Just because we don’t have completely aligned beliefs in this moment doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy the conversations and gifts of another.
I started to question the industry after being inside it for around a year, whilst simultaneously working for other coaches to support them inside their businesses - I am an online business manager by day. Under the bonnet everything looked less sparkly, less ‘heart centred’ less ‘soulprenour’ (urge to eye roll granted) and meeting a lot of the people I had admired for so long online, in person. That was the moment I realised the true power of how strongly we can create an online persona. How it was so easy to believe our eyes who scroll and forget that we all remain human under an Instagram post about an apparent never ending flow of money (I have not experienced this to be very true. About 1% of coaches are making ‘six figures’ and they are coaches coaching coaches coaching coaches… coaching?) or someone in a bikini on a yacht. Those I met were so kind and this isn’t a mark on anyone’s nature or even that I’m right. People think differently than us and I stopped believing that everyone needed to think the same as me a long time ago. This is an experience within an industry that is crafted this way and lots of us are living inside of it.
I woke up from what felt like a spiritual, self help tsunami with a panicked, sour taste in my mouth. I had swung all the way in one direction and was preparing to swing all the way back.
I stopped everything not knowing what felt right and true and what someone else had spoon fed me. I wanted to inhale all of the personal details of my life I’d vomited online in the name of ‘vulnerability’. I stopped practicing yoga for a while. Stopped meditating. Took my vision board off of my desktop and wondered if I truly wanted anything on it (it turns out I didn’t). There is no doubt this part of my life brought great love and experience, but it came with a side of something darker and it was making want to empty my insides.
I haven’t posted on Instagram all year apart from once in a panic no one would ever publish me. It felt weird but I did it anyway, checked four hundred times if anyone had liked it and then deleted my Instagram profile for good. I’ve been working in my freelance business development role, writing different things, growing a garden, reading fiction, avoiding self help and internet spirituality like the plague and letting myself be enough.
While in that space, I was forever waiting for tomorrow. Visualising goals each morning that someone else told me to want. To manifest my dream life when I was already living it. The dream is to be alive. To be that one in 400 trillion chance we will be born into this earth.
The rituals and practices I’ve removed in my life have left a hole which hasn’t been painful but is now filled with curiosity and space.
Spirituality isn’t bad, how could it be? I mean, when we’re saying things like ‘I had a download from the universe you were on my retreat, it’s 5k pay in full or 7k on a payment plan’ that is spiritual assault - not spirituality. Many of these people discuss leaving the matrix, but it seems strange to me their interest rates are as high, or higher, than the bank of England’s.
Spirituality and religion I believe is something we miss as humans now. A belief in something bigger than ourselves. A ritual performed with care and devotion. That doesn’t have to be a God. Perhaps it could be the desire to leave somewhere better than you found it, the sun rising every morning. To be a good neighbour. To live with love and let yourself be a human. To decide your enough and turn our attention from ourselves and onto others and the world when we can. To cultivate peace. To love our children. Our plants. To ask big questions. This is one reason I enjoy the teachings of Buddhism so much - There is no belief in a personal god. It’s about life before death, not after. Nothing is fixed or permanent and that change is always possible. Through the practice and development of morality, meditation and wisdom we can become more peaceful, helpful beings. I needed to find that often talked about middle ground. These days I have decided I will continue to learn and develop my knowledge from teachers and philosophers away from Instagram. Great thinkers who invite us to think and experience deeply is, and always has been, a necessity for humanity.
After eight months I wanted to write this. As a soothing tonic for me and an invitation to others to walk forward in ways that feel good, no matter what that looks like. To choose for ourselves. To question and know it’s always okay to change our minds.
These emails are supposed to be about what I’ve been reading, noticing and just things I feel excited to share with you - and I guess I wanted to share the above today.
What I’ve been reading from the Library this week
Daughter of the Moon Goddess by Sue Lynn Tan
“Growing up on the moon, Xingyin is unaware that she is being hidden from the feared Celestial Emperor who exiled her mother for stealing the elixir of immortality. But when Xingyin’s magic flares and her existence is discovered, she is forced to flee her home, leaving her mother behind.
Alone, powerless, and afraid, she makes her way to the Celestial Kingdom, a land of wonder and secrets. Disguising her identity, she seizes an opportunity to train alongside the emperor’s son, mastering archery and magic, even as passion flames between her and the prince.
To save her mother, Xingyin embarks on a perilous quest, confronting legendary creatures and vicious enemies. However, when treachery looms and forbidden magic threatens the kingdom, she must challenge the ruthless Celestial Emperor for her dream—striking a dangerous bargain in which she is torn between losing all she loves or plunging the realm into chaos.”
I adored so much about this book (the first in the duology). Based on traditional Chinese Mythology Tan weaves immortals, love, family, deceit, war and triumph into this enchanting novel. Plus the cover is so cute. The visuals of the Jade Garden are still vibrant in my mind. I’d never wanted Jasmin tea and crispy friend ginger prawns so much in my life. I care deeply about Lì wěi, Wenzhi and most of all, Xīng yín and let’s face it, all of the characters. I didn’t know which way this story would turn and honestly, I am still unsure which I pretend to loathe but I really love.
After much procrastination I painted finally painted my project from week two of my sketch awesome course (everyone else in on week eleven but 95% of them are retired so…)
This project used a new paint medium, Gouache, and the thought of getting it all out and having to pack it away delayed me by weeks. That and the fear it would be shit.
What new projects thing you been trying recently?
PS we made Momos, let me know if you want the recipe. And next week I need to tell you about Cliveden house and my Garden…
Lots of love,
K x
Thank you for sharing the insights from the spiritual awakening business side. I agree that real spirituality is individual and felt in a person’s heart, and none of vision boards will help.