Your Gifts Are Your Gateway: 8 Steps to Living and Loving Who You Really Are

Purpose, purpose, purpose, so many of us right now are questing for purpose! Google “find your purpose” and you’ll unearth pages of books, articles and programs…(DISCLAIMER: many of which I’ve taken or read…)

And it IS important, it IS urgent. We are feeling a bubbling up within that is SO big, SO real. We are experiencing a palpable expansion of consciousness, but also watching the world in its beautiful and terrifying cuckoo-ness and thinking we better get on this train now! That’s what the books and programs are urging too.

I have been riding this urgency train myself for a few years now — not without reaping rewards — but I am feeling lately like we are going at it just a little bit…assbackwards.

If we want to be high vibin’, big loving, super-abundant powerfully on-purpose beings, then we have to rethink how we qualify our success. We can’t be measuring ourselves within the confines of a world that is just so — well — 3D.

The old benchmark has been, however cleverly disguised, “are you LIVING your purpose,” which is really just masking the question, “are you making a living at your purpose?” Which adds a crazy making element. When you depend on vocation to define your highest purpose, you build a whole new labyrinth to yourself. Not only do you need to find said purpose, but you need to get good at it, market it, sell it, and then keep it expanding, without necessarily knowing how to expand yourself.

In fact, what we are talking about when we marry purpose with vocation is FREEDOM. We want freedom FROM all the stuff we don’t like. We want the freedom TO be wholly immersed in what we consider a more meaningful existence (even if we have no idea how to bring meaning to our lives moment by moment). We don’t want to be divided anymore or exhausted by our quest.

But the noise and pressure of this quest messes with our inner guidance. The desire for urgent success, to be rescued from our choices up to this point, can blot out the real joy of discovering, uncovering, celebrating, practicing and embodying the truly divine, unfathomable, radiant beings that we REALLY are, and learning how to LIVE that way.

This is, I believe, why it is sooo hard for so many of us to find our true selves. We have this confusion that our gifts reside within the talents we think we have, which, if we are blessed and committed and aligned and supported enough, will unlock and provide our true vocation, which will provide freedom.

Well, um…maybe…

But our real gifts are not necessarily the talents we know about, because we have not even begun to experience what is possible within ourselves, if we have not been completely honest.

Our real gifts are living and breathing parts of us. We each have energetic receptor/generators within us that act kind of like pheromones. We have specific ideas, things, places, energies and people that activate them. We have things that literally turn us on. And once we start to flip those switches, we find whole new dimensions within ourselves — and realize that there are futures we have not even been able to imagine! And THAT is freedom! No frontiers, endless capacity, endless connection.

These days I am living a beautiful life, not because I have found my purpose-filled vocation (it’s coming along), but because the QUALITY of my life is elastic and expansive and rich. My joy has a viscosity, a long-lasting vibration. My sense of connection to the divine, to all of creation, to other beings, reverberates through my body and soul. It flows through me, and from me, and into a joy for others. Not all the time. But a lot.

And every action has begun to take on a quality of purpose. Well, except spreadsheets. And dishes. I’m still working on those.

But I am guided every day in what I hear, who I meet, what I listen to, to do things I never imagined. I channeled a book this year. What??? (Once I got over it being weird and embarrassing, it was the easiest and most divine experience of my life.) And I did it on a hilltop above the 101 freeway in Los Angeles, in the hour just before I got on that freeway and drove to work.

Your deepest purpose may or may not have anything to do with your vocation. Your real vocation may not even have been invented yet! That’s how quickly the world is changing. That’s how powerful the shift is.

But cliche as it sounds, the journey to your purpose IS your greatest purpose! And as a spiritual practice, that journey is not just about “being” (fantastic practice, but we are, after all, creative beings, and we want to create). At the risk of being oxymoronic, the real journey is “being” with an action plan. It is the unlocking of who you really are, the gifts you are here to share with the world. And then offering them.

Now, these last years of searching have not been in vain. I DO know my purpose. It came to me in a vision in a bathtub, and I was not initially happy to receive it, because it sounded crazy. But I am over that now. My purpose is to unlock heaven on earth. To do this, my mission is to master my own divine gifts, and to help others unlock theirs.

These 8 practical steps unlocked MY gifts. I offer them to you, in case they can be of service.

1. DECIDE TO BELIEVE IN WHO YOU REALLY ARE.

This is a watershed moment. This is the moment your life changes and your gateway begins to open. From this moment forward, BELIEVE everything you “secretly” want is really you, no matter how impossible or absurd. Don’t make it impossible before you even look at it!

Believe everything you intuit is valid. Believe everything you think might be happening to call you to more of life is the magic within you. Tell yourself that you can decide five years from now if you were crazy or deluded but right now, believe all those amazing things you see out of the corner of your eye, those times you think you know and you do, the wild synchronicities, the people you are not surprised to see even when you should be.

(It should go without saying, but do not listen to any voice that tells you can’t, you shouldn’t, you aren’t enough. That’s not you. That’s just a bad habit.)

By shedding the resistance to your deepest desires and guidance you instantly lose the dead weight of all those doubts and get to live, even if it’s just a few moments at a time at first, in the brilliance of who you are!

2. ENGAGE WITH THE ELEMENTS EVERY DAY, NO MATTER WHERE YOU LIVE

The days of sequestering yourself in a cave and shutting out the world to achieve higher consciousness are behind us. This is the era of integration. We use our bodies as the magnificent receivers and transmitters that they are. You can expand your consciousness by expanding the visceral sensations of your experience. Wide horizon. Tall trees. Rolling fields. Warm breeze. Bracing wind. Blue water. Birds singing just out of sight. Walk, stroll, run, rollerblade, bike ride. Just do it.

This commitment to touching nature every day has transformed my consciousness and given me the ability to expand heaven more than any other single act. So I get pretty bossy about this one.

If the weather is TRULY impossible, turn off all the electronics and gaze out the window. Put your hand against the cold window pane, close your eyes and listen to the rain. It doesn’t take long or take much, though if you can stretch this time into 30 minutes to an hour, you will literally feel a cellular change.

You can also use pure essential oils, what I call Godshots, tiny bottles of trees and flowers and rain and sunshine, if you can’t get outside, or to heighten your experience.

I have one other super bossy edict that might surprise you, but just trust me, and try it. Do NOT listen to familiar music while you walk or gaze or stroll. Songs trigger emotional reactions that tie you to old experiences and old brain patterns. You are seeking expansion. If your brain goes into chaos in silence, then listen to ambient music, or to an inspiring podcast while you walk. Just make it new. New vistas, new sensations, new experiences.

3. ASK TO KNOW THE TRUTH OF WHO YOU ARE

Ask over and over and over again, so that it becomes a habit and a mantra to quest for something more. And be specific about your request. This is not the Hail Mary you make to God after bad behavior (“Lord, if only you will rescue me, I will not do THAT again.), it’s a deep and earnest request akin to, “Let me know my highest purpose. Let me be of highest service. Let me be a vessel of divine design.”

Great mystics and esoteric traditions have long followed this principle, requiring a student to ask tenaciously before revealing what is sought. Ask and ye shall receive, even if it takes awhile to understand the answer!

So start a conversation with the God of your own heart., and ask in earnest, in your own words. Or if you like, borrow mine, “I ask that I awaken to the Truth of who I really am, the Brilliance of my hands, the Genius of my heart, the Limitlessness of my capacity to love and be loved.”

If this frightens you or you are uncomfortable with any of this language, just think of the force that created the blue whale, the platypus, the heron, the tiger, the Great Barrier reef, the Himalayas,…you get it. You are as magnificent and intricate in your design as the most glorious of earthly and celestial creations. All you’re asking for is to know, and share, your glory.

4. INDULGE IN WHAT DELIGHTS YOU, CALLS TO YOU, IGNITES YOU

Once you have given yourself permission to feel what is really yours, and asked to know what is really true for you, start to notice what comes to you and inspires you.

This is very different than “looking for signs” about what you should be doing, are meant to do, or your actual purpose. You are not looking to follow a road map to anywhere but your own heart.

If you have trouble discerning these feelings after years of “shoulds,” imagine there is a candle inside your heart. As you come upon someone, some thing, some idea, some place, feel if the flame burns brighter, stays neutral, or goes out.

Pay special attention to those things that ignite you, and stand a little longer before them. (If you want an activation tool to help you recognize what speaks to you, you can download my free gifts activation meditation on my website).

Begin to consciously choose those things. Lean longer. Take the long way home to look at the sunset, to drive by that building that interests you. Follow an impulse and park the car and go in.

Notice, too, the things that you indulge in when they do not feel good, but don’t do anything about those. Just make the next choice toward the thing you love.

I promise that the things that draw you are part of your mission, but they may show up in unexpected way. If you find yourself inexplicably driving to NASA, it MAY be that you’re a late blooming astronaut, or it may be that you will someday develop an app for how to navigate not-yet-discovered dimensions. Who knows? You are limitless! Be fearless in what you enjoy and acknowledge and don’t worry yet about how it will fit. Just notice the feel of it all. Get used to the feeling of being drawn!

5. COMMIT TO SOMETHING TOTALLY DIFFICULT AND UTTERLY IMPRACTICAL

From this place of recognizing what calls to you, what ignites you, find a thing that is calling loudly, and that is impossible to master. Don’t’ worry about picking the wrong thing. The main thing is that you choose a path that will NOT lead quickly to money or fame, short of a complete divine intervention (never discount that, but it’s not the goal here).

And here is the key, TALENT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. Let go of what you think you are good at. This is pure desire. Pure delight. Pure calling. What you are teaching yourself is to KNOW yourself, to tear off the masks of what you could or should be, and discover who you are. No matter how crazy this thing is (for me, the first thing was surfing), embrace it, and GO for it! Let yourself go on a delicious ride with something you really love for no reason at all except that it is yours.

It you want, find an emblem to sanctify what you are doing, and this commitment to yourself. I wore a wave ring on my thumb. All throughout the day I would touch it, fiddle with it. It was months before I ever managed to turn a surfboard. I got injured, concussed, terrified, but I loved it and loving something that much changed me. I didn’t realize it was really just loving myself.

I will insert another bossy edict here and say that doing something physical seems to have an extra powerful effect, as it engages all of your senses, but all that matters is that it is really hard to get good at, and that you are going to do it anyway because you really really want to.

6. ASK FOR A MISSION.

You have now developed a powerful foundation to read your own heart, your own connection, your own desire. You have practiced listening to your own truth, and unmasked. You have been noticing, practicing, inviting what you love, what you desire. Practicing it. Appreciating it. No doubt, ideas have already been forming, so trust that you will not be led astray.

And from here, it’s time to ask for a mission. It does NOT have to be the biggest mission of your life. It will NOT be the only mission. If it’s so big that it sounds like your life’s work, then ask for the first piece. If it still feels too big, ask for the first step.

Trust that you already have some idea of what you have been sneaking up on. Remember the first step, when you allowed yourself to want what you secretly want? It’s in there! The key is going to be BELIEVING it, and then breaking it down into pieces that you can manage.

I will give you an example from my own life of how this can work. One of the secret things in my own heart is that I want to speak in front of a huge audience. It’s the truth! I didn’t know this until very recently, when I could finally unveil it from myself.

The challenge is, I don’t have any clue what I’ll be saying!

Before I got to this, after spending years trying to create programs about what I thought I could and SHOULD teach, I finally had a breakthrough about who I was. It was at a retreat where I was, yes, looking for my purpose! And here is what I heard from my deepest guidance, “You are a juicy, prolific messenger of the divine.” Oh my gosh what??? And I had to say this out loud to three other people, and they had to say it back to me in this kind of ritual. I am sure I was many colors of red, but I knew it was the truth.

With that understanding, I became less inhibited about what I wrote and said. I figured, well, this is divine guidance, right? So if it sucks, at least it’s divine suckiness! And I started asking, in my walks and meditations, piece by piece, what the next message was. I started writing more, and differently. I recorded and published videos. I joined Thrive Global.

It was so incredibly uncomfortable and scary at first, but also weirdly familiar, and right. Then I began to hear from people. Not in droves or anything. Just one by one, here and there, individual humans who had been moved, felt heard, been inspired by the words that came through me even as I had wanted to judge those words. And THAT is what being on purpose meant to me. Being a vessel of insight and peace.

I still don’t know when I will have something clearly articulated enough for a big audience, but I know it will come. I just keep showing up, piece by piece, completing one small mission at a time, like this article.

7. TAKE A SACRED BREATH

Right now, imagine what it feels like to be and have everything you could ever want.

Imagine that you are living in the world full of people living the same way. Imagine them smiling and greeting you. Imagine that the world around you is abundant beyond words and beautiful beyond compare. See it lit in your favorite colors, your favorite season, a world where everyone is blessed and abundant and loved, including you.

Now imagine that every one around you carries a gift, and each is living and sharing their gifts as part of themselves, and you have come to the party with your heart and hands full. The party turns to greet you, smiling and receiving your offering, anticipating it, knowing that is the PERFECT thing that only you could have brought.

Breathe in this beauty, abundance, receptivity, and the highest frequency of all, celebration.

From this place, you cannot feel fear. From this place, you are already full.

From this place, take the next step, and repeat this process every time you begin.

8. COMPLETE YOUR MISSION AS AN OFFERING, NO MATTER WHAT YOU THINK OF IT, OR YOURSELF, WHILE DOING IT

You have activated your sacred gifts. It is not necessary that you have mastered them. You are in the divine playground of creation. If you begin to question yourself, go back to Step 1. BELIEVE what you have been given. This is divinity in action.

Two little sentences to get you through it: “Just keep swimming,” (it worked for Dory, come on..) and, “Never give up.” That works for everyone who doesn’t give up.

Don’t tell yourself you’ve tried and failed before. Don’t make a big deal about it. Just set aside a little time every day and show up. Take a stand for who you are. Touch your wave ring. And do your thing.

Here is where I will get a little bossy again. You don’t need a class, or to clear any blocks, or to get an accountability partner. Seek that out if it supports the commitment you’ve already made, but don’t let it distract you from this mission, which is yours, which has been divinely bestowed upon you, which you cannot fail.

If you have set yourself on the right trajectory, it will NOT be hard. You will feel the energy calling to you, even if you feel some old resistance.

If truly ALL you feel is old, stale effort, start again at Step 1.

Not to say it will all be nirvana. There will be moments of hard. You will have questions. You will have tricky parts. This is where your practice of the impossible pays off. Just make a choice and see how it goes. It doesn’t matter.

No matter the challenges, you will have the essence of who you are, of your beautiful shining unique design, on your side.

One last bossy edict: if you find the judges showing up in your head, don’t make a big deal about it. They’re just doing what judges do — judging. Give them some chocolate, or something stronger, put on your headphones to drown out the noise, and get to work.

I PROMISE. Once you complete just ONE thing that is fully aligned with who you are — just ONE — you will have taken a step to heaven, and you will hungrily seek out more. (See Step 1)

And THAT will begin its natural expansion, until you are so busy living and loving who you really are, that you show up with your gifts no matter what you are doing. That unexpected opportunities present themselves. That you are capable of things you never even imagined. And that EVERYTHING you do (or nearly everything) takes on a sense of purpose.

That feels like freedom to me.