How To Spot Energy Vampires.

Austin Kleon’s scribbled notes from a Lynda Barry interview on Energy Vampires.

1. When their name shows up on your phone, you instinctually cringe and don’t want to answer their call or read their text message.

This is a quick and effective test. Even if I’m busy and in the middle of something and someone I care about calls me, I will jump at the opportunity to chat with them, even if it’s just for a minute. This is the fastest, most intuitive test to tell if someone is life-giving versus life-sucking.

2. After spending time with them you feel more drained, negative and anxious.

Energy is contagious! There was a study done where a group of people ran on a treadmill and wore sweat pads underneath their armpits. Another group was instructed to jump out of a plane and skydive while also wearing sweat pads. Then a group of volunteers was asked to sniff each set of sweat pads. The volunteers who smelled the skydiving sweat pads had measurably higher levels of cortisol and reportedly felt more anxious. They actually caught the emotions of the anxious skydivers.

If after spending time with someone, even while doing an activity you love, you find yourself feeling frustrated, less energized or positive, this is also a powerful clue.

3. Inspiration is not equally balanced.

With friendship, it’s important that service, generosity, and inspiration flow both ways. The individuals in my ‘tribe’ give-and-take evenly, and equally encourage me to create, write, and try new things. I see the things they are also creating, writing, and trying, and there is a mutual respect. Energy vampires are the opposite. Instead of contributing to the creative ecosystem, they are tapping your resources and expecting you to continually provide inspiration. This gets old quickly.

Milton Glaser, in his “10 Rules for Life and Work” writes:

[T]here is a test to determine whether someone is toxic or nourishing in your relationship with them. Here is the test: You have spent some time with this person, either you have a drink or go for dinner or you go to a ball game. It doesn’t matter very much but at the end of that time you observe whether you are more energized or less energized. Whether you are tired or whether you are exhilarated. If you are more tired then you have been poisoned. If you have more energy you have been nourished. The test is almost infallible and I suggest that you use it for the rest of your life.

Energy vampires are everywhere. The best thing we can do is identify them. Then avoid them at all costs. In 2022, I’ve used the Vampire Test and have adjusted my time and energy and friendships accordingly. And that has made all the difference.

Life is too short to have your precious life-force sucked out of you by energy vampires.

Run! Now! Go!

How To Be Helpful.

New handmade papercut cards in my shop (this one has been popular lately!)

After a jarring event in my life, one of the best text messages I received was from a friend- “I’m so sorry this happened to you. How can I help?”

She immediately made me feel at ease because of her willingness to help.

I remember moving out of my apartment a few years ago. I was sweaty and flustered, rushing to fit the remaining boxes of kitchen appliances and coat hangers into my car before the moving trucks came. My parents, in their seventies, had their arms full holding my boxes, going up and down flights of stairs and loading up their trunk to help expedite the process. Midway through, I was completely caught off guard when someone I knew rolled up in his BMW, parked in front of my apartment and stood at the bottom of the stairs ‘to say goodbye.’ We were literally in the middle of moving. I needed help. Clearly. The last thing I needed was a hug.

To this day, my parents still joke about this. “He didn’t even offer to move one box and instead he stood there and watched us move your things!”

I always assumed helpfulness was an innate quality, but now I know it’s a skill. And like all skills, it can be learned.

First, identify when someone needs help. Then, offer to help.

Don’t be the one who just rolls up and watches.

Take a box.

Everything Starts as an Idea.

Look around you. The chair or the couch you’re sitting on, the coffee mug sitting on your desk, the fork you used to eat your lunch, the dishwasher where you placed your dirty dish, the computer or mobile device you’re reading this on… they all began as ideas.

It was literally the energy from these ideas and thoughts that created physical matter. This proves how powerful energy is to transform the formless (thought) into physical objects (matter).

Knowing this, you have the formula. Your intentions, in conjunction with positive elevated emotions, allow you to actively co-create with the quantum field. So be aware of how you think, your intentions, and where you place your attention.

Because where you place your attention is where you place your energy.

What are you capable of creating?

Projects > Jobs

Projects push us out of our comfort zones as we climb higher.

Jobs have clear boundaries. They’re something we apply for and get. They have defining characteristics and the goal is to meet quota, do just enough to get by, not get into trouble, stay within the lines, and meet spec.

Projects, on the other hand, are open-ended. They are chosen and initiated by us, full of possibility, and in the vein of making things better. Projects are about discovery, pushing boundaries, and following our curiosity.

Some people spend their whole lives working at jobs. If all you’ve known is how to follow the rules, meet deadlines and facilitate meetings, it’s challenging to see the possibility of turning your work into a project.

What if we approached everything like a project? Where experimentation is encouraged, ideas are currency, and breaking old paradigms is expected, not reprimanded?

The most interesting, forward-thinking and service-minded individuals I know approach life as a series of projects and experiments. Retirement doesn’t scares them because they’ve adopted a mindset where the possibilities are endless, even when there is no longer a 9-5 schedule to follow.

Those are my people.

I See You.

“Say who you are, really say it in your life and in your work. Tell someone out there who is lost, someone not yet born, someone who won’t be born for 500 years. Your writing will be a record of your time. It can’t help but be that. But more importantly, if you’re honest about who you are, you’ll help that person be less lonely in their world because that person will recognize him or herself in you and that will give them hope.”

— Charlie Kaufman

Today someone wrote to me and shared how the words published here on this tiny piece of internet real estate made them feel less alone and more hopeful.

And that’s what all this is really for. On the long days when the blank page and cursor blink in front of me and I’m tired and my brain feels exhausted and fried, it helps to know the effort and energy of sharing my writing and these simple ‘musings’ help someone feel more seen and understood.

Thanks for being here.

Make Something Everyday.

How it’s going… the thrill of completing my largest custom card order to date!

Where it started… October 2016 after making 100 handmade cards for 100 consecutive days.

Six years ago, as a way to reinvigorate my stagnant life with some joy and creativity, I committed to making a handmade card for 100 consecutive days. I was out of practice and TBH, many of them weren’t my ‘best work,’ but they were each made with love for someone I had in mind. I learned to be ok with being a beginner again, and trust that my good intentions would somehow unfold artistically on that blank card each day.

It was the act of making something daily that would encourage and bless someone else that ultimately led to a career pivot. It revealed to me that I wanted to use my creativity and ideas outside of the hospital setting to motivate, encourage and coach individuals in their wellness.

This week I fulfilled my largest custom card order to date. As I designed, hand-lettered, and painted each one, there were ones that smeared or where the centering was off. I was gentle with myself, took a deep breath and started again. And sometimes again. I couldn’t help but remember how all this started six years ago. I felt stuck and unhappy at a job that I knew wasn’t meant for me. This practice of making something daily connected me to my heart, and I found my way out by turning inward, following my intuition and curiosity, tripping, getting back up, and believing in a bigger dream.

To this day, I receive messages from those individuals who still have the cards I made them from back in 2016. They tell me they framed it, or it sits above their office desk, or they posted it on their kitchen wall. They take it out and read it when they’re feeling down or discouraged. Someone recently told me she’s never had anyone take the time to make her a homemade card, and receiving it moved her to tears. Hearing her message moved me to tears.

We never quite know the ripple effect that a single action done in love can have. Remember, love moves both ways. What began as a project to make art and encourage people was ultimately a way that led me to a place of newfound peace and contentment.

So today, do that one thing that connects you to your heart. It can be small. In fact, the smaller the better. Tomorrow, do it again. And keep going. If you smear or trip, that’s ok. Get back up. You never know where you’ll end up and what you’ll create.

Remember Your Future.

I’m currently wrapping up my largest custom card order to date. Add to that a few more custom card orders that trickled in over the weekend. Some of them involve writing poems and paper cut illustrations. I’m so excited and happy to be creating all of these by hand, but I’m not gonna lie, it’s a lot of energy and effort. My hope is that the recipient feels this love and intention when they hold my card in their hand.

Five years ago when I shared my big dreams with my friend Brian, I told him one day I’d love to have my cards in stores. “You can even probably make custom cards for people, and they’ll place orders with you for Valentine’s Day and birthdays,” he suggested. I just laughed, sipped my coffee, and stared off into the distance entertaining that wonderful thought.

I am now aware that this has all come true. I tell myself all the time, “REMEMBER YOUR FUTURE.” Instead of fixating on the past, where old hard-wired feelings program the body into the familiar past, I am consciously creating my future. Feeling into how it would feel to have my cards in shops, feeling how it would feel to hold my published book in my hands, and feeling the overwhelming gratitude of the generous present moment where I have already received everything I’ve wanted even before it’s happened.

Try it. Feel those positive, loving emotions- feel as though you’ve gotten the dream job, feel as though your project has come to fruition, feel as though you can run and ride without pain after your ankle surgery, feel as though you’ve lost the weight and your body feels strong and resilient. When your mind wanders back to the familiar past of pain, negativity and lack, woo it back into the generous present moment.

If we can master our thoughts and feelings, we can, in essence design our future.

Now back to making cards.

Tuning Out the Noise.

I can’t believe they’re still together. She must be staying with him because of the money. Anyways, when I saw her last weekend she definitely put on weight. I think her son’s going to be an orthodontist. Which is good, right? Orthodontists make a lot of money.

My esthetician shares the same space with a hairdresser. I was sitting back in the chair and couldn’t help but hear the incessant gossip coming from the other side of the beauty salon where a woman was getting her hair colored.

I looked up at my esthetician and whispered, “How do you handle listening to this all day? It would literally drive me nuts.”

She smiled. “I’ve learned to tune it out. In the beginning it really bothered me, but I’ve trained myself to not listen. It’s like white noise to me now. I don’t even hear it.”

Her answer amazed me. She became immune to the toxic conversations because she trained herself to block it out. She didn’t allow the negative energy of gossip to pollute her positive attitude and vibration.

After she was finished, I paid her and smiled. In reality, I had also purchased an important lesson. Sometimes in life we don’t have control over the people we share physical space with. But we always have seniority and agency to control the energy that we allow into our energetic space.

The Great Secret.

(Photo: Zach McGarvey)

“When I run after what I think I want, my days are a furnace of stress and anxiety; if I sit in my own place of patience, what I need flows to me, and without pain. From this I understand that what I want also wants me, is looking for me and attracting me. There is a great secret here for anyone who can grasp it.”

— Rumi

My Replenishment Cycle.

What restores your soul? Supports your physical and mental health? Fills your cup? Replenishes you? Today I identified the activities enjoyed both alone and with others that make me feel refreshed, happy and satisfied in my life, and organized them in a fun data doodle. Seeing them visualized this way helps me prioritize the big-ticket activities that replenish a large percentage of my physical/mental health so I can carve out time to strategically build them into my calendar. What’s included in your replenishment cycle?

The Reverse Gap Theory.

Someone asked me last week, “Where do you see yourself in five years?”

I couldn’t answer that question.

All of us have visions of our future- what we’ll accomplish in work, our financial security, our ideal bodies, where we’ll live and who we’ll surround ourselves with. I’ve learned it’s dangerous to fixate too much on a concrete future vision. Things change, and often our brains can’t fathom what we’re capable of accomplishing and becoming. Don’t postpone your happiness for your future self. Soak it in now by remembering how far you’ve come.

This pic was taken 5 years ago, right before I left a job I’d worked at for 11 years. It was all I’d known and at the same time, I knew deep-down that it wasn’t my calling. I was terrified and excited and felt compelled to leap and follow my heart. It would’ve been impossible to predict all the serendipitous opportunities and doors that have opened once I let go and finally surrendered.

So instead of feeling anxious about your future “5 Year Plan,” I invite you to try something called “The Reverse Gap” exercise. Take out a piece of paper and grab a pen. Write down everything you’ve accomplished and overcome and created and transformed and how you’ve changed for the better in the past five years. Read your list. Save it and read it over and over again whenever you get too caught up in “Future You” and forget to celebrate how far you’ve come.

Everything you’ve done in the past has brought you to where you are.

You’re exactly where you’re supposed to be right now. Put your hand over your heart and repeat that.

I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be right now.