Running From Myself

What if you embarked on a long, arduous journey that led you the top of a mountain where a wise, sage sat waiting to deliver to you the one piece of knowledge that would allow you to fulfill all of your wildest dreams?

And, after you received this clear, true advice from the sage, you did everything you could to avoid heeding it?

I believe we already have the answers to our questions within us. And, occasionally, they surface to our consciousness. But, when this happens--how often do we do everything we can to avoid following this guidance?

In early July when I attended the amazing life-changing Shakti Saddahna women’s retreat at Kripalu we did a series of guided journaling exercises looking at when and how we block our power or potential.


After a 5-day emotional, physical and spiritual “work out,” I received very clear direction that there was only one thing I needed to do to ensure I experienced abundance, flow, creativity, passion and ease in my life: mediate 20 minutes every morning.

And, even though I normally do mediate each morning—guess what I’ve been doing for the past 3 weeks since returning? Avoiding mediating like the plague!

I set aside Wednesday-Friday of this week to do some creative visioning/planning around next steps for my company. And, I knew that starting off this mini-sabbatical with a mediation session would be incredibly beneficial.

Yet today, I had to take care of a few essential items first like: pulling weeds from the backyard, sending out an email about a dinner party, cleaning out the refrigerator, making myself a snack, making myself another snack, researching yoga/dance classes in Austin, looking up recipes for Naan bread and flitting on/off email to answer “burning questions” from my team members. You get the idea.

When I finally did surrender and meditate, I had the hilarious image appear of me boxed into a solid white room, frantically dashing around the space bouncing off one wall and the next while running from ....myself ?!

Then, the walls collapsed and I was just left standing in wide open space.

I’m reading the amazing book The Big Leap right now by Gay Hendrix (highly recommended). He talks about how it’s part of our nature to self-sabotage to keep ourselves from moving out of our comfort zone and into full expression of our power/potential.

I love exploring this theme and realize that we all need to do so with tremendous humor and the greatest compassion for self.

Send me good thoughts that my meditation practice flows with ease. Or at the very least, a great recipe for Naan bread.

P.S. Interested in reconnecting with who you are? Check out our women's self-renewal circles, our FREE September 17th Global PRG Sampler Teleclass on Reconnecting with Who You Are, my upcoming The Empowered Entrepreneur Workshop on Aug. 28th in Austin, TX or our life-changing October 2-4 Fall Women’s Self-Renewal Retreat at The Crossings.

Also, visit Live Inside Out and learn how you can live more intentionally (and become a fan on the Live Inside Out Facebook page).



The Journey, a blog about coach/author/entrepreneur Renee Trudeau’s personal journey to life balance and living life from the inside out, comes out weekly. Subscribe here. For more information on Renee’s upcoming events, click here.


Photo: Renee Peterson Trudeau, dragonfly at Hamilton Pool, Texas hill country.