Are you ready to let your leadership and imagination lead?
Aloha ,
In November of 2023, my brother’s wife, Julie put out the call to me and my siblings: “If you want to spend time with David before his ALS takes over completely, you should come soon.”
Shortly after, as I flew from Maui to Colorado to be with him. I prepared myself for what was sure to be a painful visit full of grief and loss.
What I found instead shocked me – I was immersed in a deeply healing field of love and joy.
David was not a victim of ALS.
On more than one occasion he enthusiastically told me that he loved life.
Clearly nothing that was going on in his body could take that away.
On his birthday this year I wrote about David’s shift from his head to his heart…
In relation to his story, I spoke to navigating the potentially challenging times ahead as we’re inundated with upheaval and change with the new 2027 era we face.
I believe that like David, we are being called to make this shift away from living from our heads to living from our hearts.
We are called to cultivate a field of love and joy despite what is arising…
The invitation is to extricate ourselves from our victim identities born from our childhood wounds, and to find that place David found where his wellbeing was not dependent on external circumstances.
He was no longer identifying with his capacities and accomplishments – or his loss of them.
He was no longer identifying with his body at all.
David was what I call Living Awake.
This is the path available to all of us.
What follows is my beginning journey on that path…
PART II
Growing up, I did not have the same natural talents my brother David had.
While he moved through the world with an ease I could not fathom, I spent my days navigating the treacherous terrain of my psyche.
Where he excelled outwardly, I struggled inwardly.
Caught in the mire of comparison to those who seemed to thrive in the tribal world, I grappled constantly with who I was and why I was here.
Born into a military family with five competitive older brothers, an extremely ambitious Manifestor mom, and a Cardiovascular surgeon dad…
My extraordinarily sensitive self barely stood a chance.
I thrashed in the waters of self-doubt, self-hate, self-rejection.
Chronically disappointed in myself, I wasn’t thriving in the world the way David was.
Instead my energy was entangled in a constant fight with myself.
While David was slaying dragons in corporate boardrooms,
I was wrestling with demons in my internal world.
While he was honing his business acumen,
I was learning how to survive my emotional landscape.
While he was providing gloriously for his family,
I was struggling to provide for myself.
It wasn’t that I lacked ambition.
No. I had that in spades.
I just didn’t understand the assignment I had been given.
It was different from David’s.
It wasn’t about outer success.
It was about inner peace.
And because I didn’t understand it, I made myself wrong for it.
Less than.
I was embarrassed and ashamed.
Who I was, was not right.
I hid, not aware that my uniqueness was my superpower.
I sacrificed my authenticity.
I tried to conform…
I tried to contort myself into someone I was never meant to be.
It didn’t work…
Eventually, slowly, painfully…
With a lot of therapy, perseverance, and determination…
I began to reclaim myself.
I learned to use my sensitivity and my challenges in service of others.
While David was leading companies,
I was learning how to help people find a little bit of peace within themselves.
To navigate my inner world and support others with theirs, I threw myself into every tool, teaching, and modality that called to me:
I became a Rosen Method Bodywork Practitioner and Movement Teacher, a Chi Gong teacher, and an Anat Baniel NeuroMovement Practitioner
I got my Black belt in Tae Kwon Do
I was certified in the energy medicine practices of Holographic Repatterning.
I was certified in the energy medicine practices of Holographic Repatterning.
I studied with Leslie Temple-Thurston, completing her Spiritual Warrior Training, and became an Ordained Core Light minister
I became a Licensed psychotherapist.
I worked with Faisal Muqaddam and became a Diamond Logos teacher and a Speaking Circle Facilitator
I was Byron Katie’s personal support for the School for The Work in the US and abroad, bringing her groundbreaking inquiry to the world
I immersed myself in spiritual teachings, following Ammachi for over thirty years, and engaging in a fourteen-year deep-dive into Tibetan Buddhist practices
– And, in the midst of all that, I discovered painting as creative self-expression and opened an art gallery.
This was my curriculum.
My apprenticeship.
My survival.
My initiation.
Through it, I reclaimed my goodness.
I found a level of ground and wellbeing.
I had a deeply gratifying relationship with my wife, Yarrow.
We loved living in our magical Dream Farm Road cottage in Inverness overlooking the Tomales Bay.
We valued our community.
The work I was doing with people was engaging and rewarding.
There was an idyllic quality to our life.
And then….
In 2004—Human Design entered my world.
It shed a light on the glitch in our relationship…
I was still wanting Yarrow to be different.
Honestly, I wanted her to be more like me.
My first introduction to our Human Design Type and Strategy, pointed to a fundamental difference in how Yarrow and I operate.
That awareness changed our relationship overnight.
I was a Generator.
Yarrow was a Projector.
She thought I was a workaholic.
I thought she was lazy.
We had both been misreading each other for years.
Our judgements had created a divide.
Suddenly there was context, compassion, understanding.
Her Open Sacral needed spaciousness.
My Defined Sacral needed engagement.
A portal opened between us.
A new way of relating.
A softening.
It was a kind of miracle – this simple recognition of difference.
The beginning of a heart opening – that I didn’t realize was missing.
Despite being profoundly impacted, I didn’t go further with Human Design at that time.
I was still in my head.
I dismissed Human Design as wildly esoteric.
Unfathomable.
Hard to grok.
And honestly, my toolbox was already overflowing.
Human Design didn’t call to me.
Or if it did, I wasn’t listening.
Then in 2013
It didn’t just call.
It grabbed me.
It showed me clearly just what my assignment on earth was.
Nothing has been the same since.
I’m pausing here.
Obviously there is more…
I look forward to sharing my assignment…
And perhaps hearing about yours?
🌺Blessings,
Robin
