Summary

[00:00:00] Dr. Stacey Gonzales: Welcome to the Build in Public Podcast. I am your host, Dr. Stacy Gonzalez. I am the co-founder of a company called Soul Growth, where we empower women to live their best lives. We're still working on what we do, who we are, how we do it. But, um, super excited to be here with you today and the way that I'm going to approach podcast number five, this is the fifth time playing in this podcast playground, um, is I decided after last week's playground that I was going to actually. [00:00:46] My update so that there is some succinctness, I dunno if succinctness is a word, but some succinctness a point to where we're headed, where we're going. So hopefully, [00:01:00] hopefully, um, episode number five takes us a little bit deeper and into the next level. So, first things first, I need to get my cheaters on. [00:01:15] Because I'm 48, and so I need to be able to see the words on the page. All right, here we go. You ready? I'm beginning to move through deeper portals into becoming more fully who I desire to be. Three years ago, I was walking on the beach. It was New Year's day 2020. We were on a family vacation, and my husband and I went to take a walk on the beach during the day. [00:01:46] I was still working at the time as a school district administrator. I didn't know how miserable I had become. On our walk, I asked my husband if he had a word of the year. [00:02:00] I asked him because I wanted to share mine. Frankly, I didn't really care about his. He said he was not sure. But I, I was certain. I had my word and the intention behind it. [00:02:17] Clarity, and with that word came a whisper: "live from spirit first." At the time I didn't even really notice the whisper, but I sense. I wasn't sure even what it meant because I had not known anyone who had "lived from Spirit first." I'm honestly not even sure I even knew what that meant, nor I would say I fully even know now, although I'm getting clearer every day as I focus on my spiritual practice. [00:02:58] Soon after the [00:03:00] vacation ended, I came home and I wrote on my whiteboard 18 months and began to make plans to leave my job and launch out on my own and start my own business. Little did I know before starting any business, my inner world would come crashing down all around me. It's an interesting thing, this living from spirit first. Many times, [00:03:28] what I'm finding now is a new intention arises in our soul, a knowing, a longing, a deep sense that it's time. In the past, I met these types of subtle insights with enthusiasm and excitement because new challenges and insights, of course, bring new opportunities. What I failed to realize then is that this live from spirit first, [00:04:00] this clarity actually means dig deeper, go darker, address old patterns of behavior that no longer serve a new way of being, and this [00:04:18] began the digging. [00:04:22] And the way I explain this is kind of like anyone who spent any time in therapy, [00:04:29] in fact, many therapists will even say as well, when working with clients that at the beginning of the therapeutic process is really the easiest. It's like going to the gym. When you first start, you begin to see and feel how hard it is and how many times it gets worse before it gets better. Because a great therapist knows before you can help a [00:05:00] client rebuild their life the way they desire. [00:05:04] There's a lot of mess to clean up and unless the client is ready to do the dirty work, there will be little to no progress. And so in January of 2020, I stepped through a new portal of self-discovery. I began to open up my heart and mind to examine new ways of being, and this is the journey I've been on. My desire is to use this space, this build in public podcast as a playground to document my journey each day, sensing using it as a stepping stone into greater understandings and new ways of being. [00:05:50] To understand who I am, moments to illuminate memories to enhance a building space, a safe [00:06:00] space. Where I trust myself to show myself and you, dear listener, where I've been, where we've been, and where we can go together full well knowing the journey will unfold before our very eyes.