Today, I am.  Teaching. Coaching.  Doing media. Writing books.

Last November, I came to visit one of my best girlfriends in Colorado, saw a house I liked and within 2 months had moved here.  On a whim.

It turns out to be the best decision I’ve ever made.

I had the freedom to make that decision because of my business.  Internet based, I can do it from anywhere, and I get to help people at a really deep level.

Freedom.

I spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on coaches and consultants who told me they could show me the way to this business.

Often, they left me more confused than I had been when I started with them.

I always had to buy the next thing and the next thing and then next thing after that.

Until I met Dave.

Within 6 weeks of meeting him and consulting with him, I had offered my first home study course to lawyers and sold out my program (bringing in a life-changing $117,000) from a 67-minute call.

Within a year, I had created the premier training program for lawyers in my industry and within a year that business would be earning more than a million
dollars a year thanks to what I learned and applied with Dave’s guidance.

In 2009, I began working with Dave to work privately with a select few entrepreneurs.

One of our clients, Max Simon, brought in $500,000 the first year he worked with us and he is on track to hit a million dollars this year, applying what he learned from us. If you’ve ever thought of hosting your own live event, you are going to want to check out his upcoming program here.

Another one of our clients, Patti Handy, didn’t make as much financially, but she’s realized her life-long dream of publishing a book and building a business around her passion of coaching teens to be financially self-sufficient.

With our guidance, celebrity event planner, Marley Majcher, went from planning events to getting paid to teach other party planners how to get into the business. And she’s already got her second Party Goddess Uncensored business building event for party planners scheduled and if you are an event planner you should do everything possible to be there.

There’s more, but that gives you an idea of how we help people who want to help other people.

Most people can’t afford to work with us privately or as part of our private coaching and mastermind, like these three have.

So, we took our best guidance and rolled it into a program that is accessible to everyone.

If you’ve ever wanted to work with us, like Max, Marley and Patti, this is where you start.

If you want to have a business you really love that is built around your lifestyle, your schedule, your flexibility and freedom and what you really want to do, this is where you start.

No matter where you are now. No matter how just starting out or how far advanced.

Start here.

It’s only available for a few more days. If you miss it this time, no problem, we WILL offer it again.

But, it will NEVER again come with direct access to me and Dave.  Not at this investment.

Taking the year off to work with these private clients and develop the Money Map program took time and energy away from the business I built that trains
lawyers.

That business needs me back and it’s too important for me to turn my back on it before it’s ready to stand on it’s own.

So, I’m recommitting all of my resources to serving the lawyers for now and the only people getting my attention besides them will be those of you in one of our existing programs or who join us in the Money Map now.

See you there!

From the time I was a child, I knew I’d have two kids by the time I was 30. I just knew.  And I did.  Today, they are 7 and 10.

I always thought there would be another two later on.  I think about that sometimes.  Because suddenly, later on is either within the next 5 years or so or it’s not going to happen.  And based on my current life, it’s not.  But, I remain open to the possibility.

I feel the quiet yearning. It’s very subtle.  And I’m very uncertain about it.

It’s odd, this pull for two more when I have felt so resistant to the two I have and I’m so appreciative of the freedom of their older years.

My internal resistance to motherhood has been intense. Much less now than in the beginning, but still very much there on occasion.

Like now, for example.

I want to write.  And write and write and write.  Get lost in it, but it’s bed time for the kids and that means I have to pull myself away from the computer.  I do it because I love them and want them to feel my presence.  But, the resistance is there.

If I had two more kids, it would have to be from a place of freedom. With a much greater awareness of exactly what that means.

Raising children (at least if you are parenting at all within the bounds of societal norms and/or worried about the outcome) can be anything but free.

The guilt, the uncertainty, the fear of permanently ruining their lives.

If I did it again, it would be without that.

Kaia was born when I was 25. Before I understood anything about God, the Universe or myself.  I raised myself right along with both of them.

If I had two more, they’d be raised by a much different version of me.

More relaxed. More trusting. Less Resistant. More mature, grounded and sure.  More present.  With that, I’m going to get present with the two I have now.  It’s bed time.

I’d love to hear from you about your experience if you’ve had kids early in life and then later in life.  How different was the experience? How different were the kids.  Tell me all about it!

I recently ended a very important relationship in exactly the wrong way. Because of fear.

Fear of being hurt. Fear that something would be taken from me. Fear of the unknown.

The experience showed me everything about myself I didn’t want to see.

Brought me to my knees.

I didn’t know what was real. What was truth. What was not.  I do now.  Love is real.

Just not the way I thought.

It’s what you give.  Period.  Love, sweet love.

Thank you Universe for showing me the way.  My prayers were answered.

With love.

Today, I got to talk with an awesome lawyer who is (by her own words) more out there than me.

Her name is J. Kim Wright and she just came out with a book every lawyer needs to read called Lawyers As Peacemakers: Practicing Holistic, Problem-Solving Law.

One of the things we talked about was how the right questions can open up incredible awareness, possibility and potential.

After our talk, a question popped into my mind that could shift things for you.

I’m sure you’ve heard the question asked – what would you do if you knew you could not fail?

Well, I want to ask you a slightly different version of that.  Take this in and sit with it …

What Would You Do If You Had Nothing Left to Lose?

Be willing to do that now.

Who would you be?  How would you be?

Be it now.

When I was preggers with Noah (now 7), I was working full time at the biglaw firm.

The day before I went into labor, I woke up around 2am and was compelled to go into my office and organize my files and pack up some boxes to bring home.

Even though I wasn’t due for a week, some part of me said – do it! So, I did.

I came home later that day, went to sleep and woke up the next day in labor.

Our bodies know. We nest.

For lots of moms nesting looks like shopping for and folding baby clothes, stocking baby supplies, or getting the baby’s room ready.

For mom entrepreneurs, as with most things parenting related, nesting can look quite a bit different.

I thought it was just me, but knew it wasn’t after a couple of recent conversations.

The first is with one of my private coaching clients, Rachel. Rachel is a well known lawyer in the NYC area and she is due with her first in August.

Instead of doing what many women would do and take it easy, she is nesting by building her business.

She’s adding team and building in systems so when the baby comes, she’ll have freedom.  That’s mom entrepreneur nesting for ya.

Then, I was having a conversation with one of my best mastermind girlfriends, Ciara Daykin, who is preggo with her first and due in July.

She is the ultimate entrepreneur (a total empire builder with multiple divisions of her event planning business) and someone asked her if she was nesting.

Her response:

“I nest differently than other women. I’ve been hiring people, getting team strong, writing processes and manuals, and setting up my business to run without me.”

Yep, the nesting of a business woman.

I’ve been having a bit of a rough time lately. Not really with anything in particular and with everything at the same time.

One of my companies is in what Seth Godin calls The Dip, my 10 year old daughter is cranky and moody, my son broke his arm, and I’ve had limited time for my spiritual practice.

It might sound odd to hear this, but even with all that, I’m thrilled with my life. Pretty much.

The pretty much comes from a part of me that is not happy with my life and is not getting it’s needs met.

It’s my girl. The one inside who I don’t let out often enough.  The dreadlocked, tattooed, skirt-wearing, hippie girl.

She’s not too happy with the situation going on over here.

She wants a whole lot more freedom. To twirl and dance. To party all the time.

She wants to laugh. And feel.

She doesn’t care about the big house, flying first class and eating at fancy restaurants. She wants to run and jump and play. She wants to be outside and do art. And paddle-board. She definitely wants to paddle-board. In Hawaii.

And since she’s not getting any of that right now, she’s punishing me with negative behaviors, primarily in the form of whining and complaining.

I contain it and manage her, but she’s becoming unmanageable.

Hm, no wonder my daughter is whining and complaining as if she has PMS at only 10 years old.

Everything we experience is an out-picturing of our inner consciousness. She’s merely reflecting my girl back to me. Which is fitting since she is, well, my girl.

Did you ever notice that?

If a part of you is cranky and tired and whining, that will be projected on someone around you.

And when you are feeling resolved inside and have addressed the needs of all of your parts, everyone else around you seems more at peace as well?

Well, thank God for girlfriends because I’ve been struggling with an internal “what’s wrong” for a few weeks now and I couldn’t understand it because while there are a few hard things happening, overall so much is going so right:

• new CEO coming into company to help us through the Dip (what Les Mckeown calls Whitewater)
• clients are having huge successes (one of our Personal Family Lawyers began her firm in January and she engaged 9 new clients this month and already has 5 on the books for April)
• I’m meeting my daughter’s needs even though she is a crankypants without raising my voice or getting angry and my son’s broken arm is healing without surgery
• we are about to close on a farm about 20 minutes away from my house where we are going to have an organic farm, and
• despite that I don’t have marketing energy people are lining up to hear about the money map to freedom, which means my money map is working.

But, it took a lazy Sunday afternoon conversation with my girlfriend Sandy Grason to see “what’s wrong” and what I could do to fix it.

More focus on my personal spiritual practice.

I’ve given my business all my spiritual practice time over the last several months.

Putting LIFT in place in my own business, getting my money map running, seeing what I wasn’t seeing.

Those have been my spiritual practices in the recent months.

It’s time for me to take back some of my time and come home to me. When I do, I’ll rediscover the gratitude and truly be able to serve at the deepest level.

It’s time to rediscover my own personal spiritual practice.

Sandy’s began with journaling and she wrote a book about it – Journalution.

While I want writing to be enough of a regular spiritual practice for me, it’s really not.

My practice is something that must combine my body and breath and bring me out of my intellect and in connection with that part of me that is not being heard, my girl.

Ariana Hall, another girlfriend of mine, helped me recently understand more about these various parts of myself.

My awareness after working with her  is that whenever something is “wrong” it’s because I’m missing a communication from one of these parts of myself.

So, my practice will give my girl time and attention to be heard and felt.

As I understand more about what it looks like on a daily basis, I’ll let you know.

In the meantime, what’s your spiritual practice? Our natural state is joy, freedom and lightness.

If that’s not YOUR natural state, inquire into that.

And consider the possibility that all you need to get “better” is practice.

Several months ago, I heard Marianne Williamson speak at an event.

I asked her about the idea of combining spirituality with the business side of business.  The legal, insurance, financial and tax parts of business.

Her response was “Do Your Work.”

At the time, I thought she meant that I needed to re-immerse myself in my own spiritual practice.

Looking back now with the benefit of all that has happened since then I realize that the work she was talking about was not what I thought at all.

It wasn’t about more meditation.

The “work” I had to do was my work, the work of LIFT (my signature system for getting the business of your business on a solid foundation) in my own life and business.

I had to start looking at what I wasn’t looking at.  My messy books.  My lack of legal agreements.  Having no business insurance.  Unclear job descriptions.

Little did I know at the time that looking at those things would or could be a spiritual practice.  That doing my own work on my own business would bring up all my old patterns and fears.  It would show me what I really believed, underneath all the words, thoughts and actions.

And it would starkly show me where I wasn’t being true.

As I created my LIFT Foundation System and began to take the steps to do the LIFT work in my own business, a major shift began to happen.

I began to see what I hadn’t been seeing.  I saw exactly why I had given up on the dream and it wasn’t at all what I thought.

I began to see where I was holding back (and holding on too tightly) because of the fear that I didn’t really have what it took.  And I saw that when it came to the business parts of my business (the LIFT parts), I didn’t.

Sure, I had a great business from the outside.  It made lots of money and helped a lot of people.  But peek behind the curtain and there were a lot of shadows.  Drama.  Tears.  A company culture I wasn’t proud of.

As I’ve done my own work on my own business, the dream I had once let go of has been re-ignited and along with it the resources to make it a reality.

Just this week, I brought a CEO into my company.

I chose him as opposed to others I spoke with because he is committed to creating a company culture based on congruence, open communication, and community.  All things I stand for and believe in, but wasn’t really living in my own business.

I didn’t know how.  I was taught to manage and lead from the example of the law firm partners I grew up under.  Poor role models to say the least.

But, I didn’t know any other way to be.  The patterned behavior so ingrained.

It took a commitment to LIFT my business and do my own work on myself and my business to see the truth of what was needed and to admit that it was beyond my own capacity to bring forth.

Hitch will run the day to day operations of the company, lead the team,  carry out the initiatives and cultivate the company culture.

That means I’ll get to do what I do best – dream, create, innovate.  Appear in the media.  Write books.  Teach.  And not spend so much time on the business part of my business – the parts that do not bring me energy and joy.

But, here’s the big secret that so many of us miss.

Before I could attract this level of help, I had to admit I needed it.  I had to face and do those things I didn’t want to look at and didn’t want to do – the LIFT things.

I had to be willing to get the basics in place so he could see I was serious about this business.  And once I became willing to do my own work, it made space for him to show up.

The process we went through to document the agreement governing our relationship alone was eye-opening.  Our line by line open-hearted discussion of the agreement told me he was the right one.

Someone of his caliber, experience and possibility never would have been attracted to come on-board if my books hadn’t been ready, if I hadn’t had a semblance of foundation in place.  My personal expenses completely separate from the business.  My three businesses all with their own entities, balance sheets, bank accounts, and projections.

I wonder … does this apply to you as well?

Not the part about LIFT.  I KNOW that does. You NEED to face the business of your business from a place of empowerment, not fear, head on. (And I can help you do it and make it a whole lot easier.)

I mean the part about needing to do your own work on yourself?  Do you want to help others, but find yourself not serving at the level you wish you were?  It could be because you need to help yourself first.

Maybe you are a marketing consultant/coach without a clear marketing plan.  Or perhaps you are a communications expert with a fuzzy message.  Or a spiritual teacher without a personal practice.

Do your work on yourself and watch what happens.

I try to listen when the Universe sends me a message. I’ve been getting this one loud and clear.  There is a LOT of confusion about when to use a Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA).

And before you go ho-hum, boring, consider this …

If, how and when you present an NDA can make or break a relationship. And, if you just choose to do nothing, you really could get taken.

So, what to do?

Never fear, I’ve got some guidelines about:

• when to ask for a Non-Disclosure Agreement if you have an idea you want to protect,
• how to present the NDA if you are going to ask,
• what to do if someone asks you to sign an NDA (signing an NDA can often be a VERY bad idea – I’ll tell you why),
• and how this is all about setting boundaries with an open heart and you can just tell that’s a good way to go by the way it sounds, can’t ya?

This story will help you understand.

I have a team member who has a great idea. She says it’s a great idea, but I don’t actually know that because she hasn’t shared it with me yet.

Why? Because she is afraid that if she does I will take the idea and capitalize on it and cut her out.

That is a very good thing to be worried about.

I am notorious for hearing about a great idea and executing on it. I can make things happen.

That’s why she’s so excited to share the idea with me. Because she knows that I have the capacity to actually do it. And she also knows that ideas alone aren’t valuable – it’s the execution on the idea that is where the money’s at.

Yet, at the same time, she wants to be compensated for her concept.

Maybe not now, but later – when it happens.  Understandable.

Unfortunately, because she is asking for the NDA in the wrong way and at the wrong time, her idea may never make it to execution.

So that’s why when I saw self-described ambitious entrepreneur Zack Shapiro post on Twitter about whether an NDA he found on Google was legal, I had to jump in and save him from making a mistake that could crush his idea before it ever sees the light of day.

We don’t want to lose our ideas.  I get it.

But, here’s the rub, if we don’t talk about them, they are as good as lost.

You are not a mad scientist operating alone in your basement.

It’s very likely that your idea will take the pulling together of a variety of resources and people.

You have to talk about it.

So, it’s natural to think about an NDA and you should have a signed Relationship Protection Agreement (a soup-up NDA I created) with everyone you work with.  (Get a copy of my super comprehensive relationship protection agreement free here on the welcome tab of my Facebook page.)

But here’s the thing, you should never, ever  present an NDA before the relationship has been well-established.

Instead, establish your relationship before asking for a signed NDA.  Present as much about your idea as you possibly can in terms of concept and end result.

Elicit intrigue.

The first time an NDA should ever be considered is when the person you are presenting your idea to asks for more information.

Now, they are interested.

Until they’ve got some idea about what your idea/concept is, anyone who would sign an NDA does not know much about business and you probably don’t have to worry about them stealing your ideas anyway.

Which gets us into – when should you sign an NDA?

Never just say okay to signing an NDA.  It could be opening you up to frivolous litigation.

If you sign an NDA with someone who is litigious by nature and frequently feels things have been taken from them, you are putting yourself at unnecessary risk.

In the event that you hear the idea and you already have a project like it in the works, you could be risking a frivolous (but still expensive and painful) lawsuit.

I know a lot of people who appear to be great people you’d want to do business with, but their belief system is such that they are easily offended and think ideas are where the money is at. And they will do anything to fight for what they think is right. On principle.

This is not a person you want to be in a fight with.

So, before you every sign an NDA, make sure you know the type of person you are working with.

Make sure you know their values structure and that you understand enough about the concept they are presenting to know it’s not something you are already working on.

Whether you are the one with the idea or the one being asked to sign an agreement before hearing the idea, recognize that no matter which side of the transaction you are on, legal agreements are the starting point for the kind of dialogue that will tell you exactly the type of person you are dealing with.

When done right legal agreements are about setting boundaries with an open-heart, which is the key to healthy, stress-free business relationships that have the capacity to do a whole lot of good in the world.

If you have other questions about NDAs (when to sign em or when to present em) or any other legal questions like that and you want an answer you can not only understand, but that will help you see legal stuff from a new perspective, ask em in the comments below.

Because listen, when you’ve got your legal shizz in order, you are going to be way more creative and free than if you don’t.

#1) I won’t be able to spend a lot of time editing my posts because I have committed to one post everyday.

- Practice of just being with what is and not having to be perfect.

#2) Each post will only have top spot for one day before it is buried beneath a new post, even if I really, really love it and want it to keep top-billing.

-Practice of trusting that the right people will see the right posts and I don’t have to control everything.

#3) My creativity will have to be disciplined because to make this work I will post even when I don’t want to.

- Practice of self-discipline (one of the most important of all spiritual practices).

Lots of letting go and practice here.

Everything we do has the capacity to show us who we really are. And this is showing me I’m still a control freak, perfectionist who wants to be the best and has a hard time letting go.

Good-o!

So, I’m going to let go and get this posted so I can start my tomorrow’s post today and make it really, really good.

When I re-launched this blog a couple of months ago, I did so with a commitment to make it a “real” blog, whatever that means.

While my definition of a real blog is evolving, there are two things I think make a blog “real.”

1. Regular posting.
2. Community.

Over the past couple of months, as I’ve been stepping into a renewed vision of my business and all of the upheaval that goes along with that, I’ve felt disconnected from both of those things.

Whether that feeling is true or not is not relevant. I feel it’s true.

I want to post more. I want to experience more community.

I know myself pretty well and I know that I can want something and still not do it without accountability and a commitment to something bigger than myself.

So, when I came across Michelle Rafter’s Blogathon, I thought it’d be just the thing I needed.

A commitment to blog for 30 days straight. No matter what. Made publicly.

Yikes.

So, here I am.  Commitment is made.  I’m on-board.  And I’ll write everyday in May.  No matter what.

I’ll write next week when my new CEO comes to spend the week with me to work on revamping the business.

I’ll write the week after when I’m in Los Angeles for the mastermind meeting I host with Dave Dee.

I’ll write the week after that when I’ve got emails out the kazoo from being away from my computer for a few days.

No matter what, I’ll write.

Fortunately, I’ve got some things planned that I hope will make it easier:

1.  I’ll begin my REAL Online Business Model series in which I interview people who are really making money with virtual businesses and they share the details of those businesses, including their numbers.  It’ll kick off with Brian Clark (@copyblogger) and I’ve got Dave Navarro (@rockyourday) and Laura Roeder (@lkr) lined up after him.

2.  I am buying a farm (with my ex-husband), so I’ll write about that.

3.  I think I’ll write some about my dad.  And inner conflict.  And the transformation of my company.

4.  And about the intersection of spirituality and business.  I think I’ll write a lot about that.

One way or another, I’ll write.  Please read.  And comment.