I have been tidying up and organizing a lot lately, just wrapping up summer and welcoming fall. It's that time of year where I just want to make space and I'm craving new vibes and new energy as we shift seasons, but also as we start to head into the most wonderful and busy time of year with travel, holidays, school things, work, all the things. I have three kids, and last weekend our youngest, Neil, turned three. So now he's like a big kid. I mean, he's been telling me for a while that I can't call him baby, that I have to call him my big kid, and I just can't believe that we're really here. Most of the time I take it in stride and I don't really say, like, time slow down or time's a thief or all that stuff. I don't actually enjoy that kind of story that so many mothers especially, but parents in general and humans in more general buy into, but the night of his birthday we were sitting in the rocking chair where I've rocked all of my babies and we were watching a video of him, just he and I were watching this video of him when he was a baby and to see him watch his baby self and just to feel those feelings again, I just can't believe it. So he's a big kid, he's totally out of diapers. We have plans to switch around the room so that he'll be out of a crib and in a big kid bed with his sister and then we're going to move our oldest into his own room for the first time in many, many years, which I believe that shift will be welcome for everyone. Our oldest is in third grade and it's really good for him to have his own space sometimes, so I'm excited to just see how all of these shifts unfold. There's a lot of change in the air in my house, but everywhere I'm sure in your home too. And this can be a really revitalizing feeling, but it can also be very frazzling. There's a lot of opportunities for the mind to chime in and say how things should be instead of following the guidance of your inner wisdom, of trusting your gut, following the flow of things. And so that's just something to be aware of. As you're aware of it, then you can maybe make some adjustments and tune back into your intuition, which is what we're going to talk about today. Hello, welcome to episode 180 of Celebrate Cultivate. I am your host, Kaleen Elise Seuss. If you happen to be new here, I'm an intuition coach and a mom of three living in Austin, Texas. I started this podcast in 2020 after my previous podcast went on a quick hiatus because of COVID, we didn't know it at the time, but we all know how that changed things forever. And some of you have been following my journey for an even longer time. This month, my website, Kaleen Elise dot com is 15 years old. Today, I'm going to share some of my favorite moments of intuition from my own life and from some of my clients. It's my intention that by sharing these, you'll find some evidence of where you're already trusting your inner voice. And also some ideas to gather for tuning in word more in work, relationships, creativity, and motherhood. When we hear stories about other people listening to their inner voices, trusting their intuition, getting that intuitive nudge and spark, it helps make it a little less out there to our minds. And oftentimes what we really need is that confidence, that reassurance that you're not going to do anything wildly crazy by listening to your inner voice, that your intuition is part of you and that it has your back and it's guiding you in ways that are supportive and good for you. So before we get into all of that, I do have a few updates that I want to share with you. If you are listening to this episode live, the day it came out and you're a member of a year of calm, our autumn welcoming ritual call is today at 11 AM central. I cannot wait to see you there and welcome this season together. If you are in a year of calm or the inner circle or if you are working on one of my client packages or we are working together on a client package, be sure to get your sessions booked. My autumn calendar is starting to fill up and I am going to be traveling for work a few times this season, which is really exciting. But also I want to make sure that you are getting the session scheduled that you need too. So be sure to book those. If you are not in a year of calm or the inner circle, but you know you want to be, today is the last day to join either for this year. So be sure to sign up. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, a year of calm is my signature coaching program. It is an entire year of rituals, coaching, community, intuition, resources, guidance, so much goodness to help you let go of perfectionism and live with more inner peace in all of the areas of your life through all of the seasons. And the inner circle is exclusive private coaching only for alumni of a year of calm. If you are listening to this sometime in the future and the enrollment deadline has passed, what you want to know when the doors open again in the spring, you can sign up for the wait list and you'll be the first to know when that happens. All the links for all of these things will be in the show notes for today's episode. Just open up your podcast app and click the link or visit calenealease.com. And then one more detail that is timely. The autumnal equinox is this Sunday, September 22nd. So if you want to get prompts, rituals, meditations to welcome fall and fully soak up this season's magic, get my self paced class and autumn of ritual for just $22, I'll link to that as well. All right, let's get into these moments of intuition. When I reflect on how my life has changed from listening to my intuition, it's pretty simple. I am a lot more aware of how I really feel about things that used to be a hard thing for me. I would not be sure I'd need a million people's perspectives or I would constantly do things and then regret them later or agree to something and then regret it later or buy something and then regret it later. That's very expensive and time consuming and frustrating, especially as a grown woman who feels like they know themselves to like always be running into that kind of circumstance. So being able to recognize a moment of intuition and then have the confidence to trust it has really been life changing. When I was pregnant with my third, there was an opportunity for a business partnership that was thrilling. It felt so clear that there was a need and that this was the bright person for me to work with. We had really good synergy. We had such amazing ideas. We started to sign up for email accounts and Instagram accounts and had all these meetings and it was like totally going to happen. I was super, super excited about it. I was also very pregnant with my third kid and also pretty established in my own business as a coach and really enjoying that work. I felt a little bit like, "Ooh, this could be a lot," but I also trust in the unfolding of things and believe that I'll be fine no matter what. So I was very wrapped up in the enthusiasm of this opportunity. Then I remember it so clearly. I was sitting in my driveway. I wasn't even really sitting in my driveway. I was driving up the driveway into the garage and I heard from a quiet voice inside my inner voice, "You don't have to do this." My takeaway from that little spark was just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. Just because something feels like a good idea doesn't mean you have to do it. If I look back at my life a lot of times, things made sense and I felt like because they made sense, I had to do them. And so this little tiny whisper of, "You don't have to do this," like it isn't a requirement to do this, was like a huge shift and a huge sigh of relief. "Oh, I didn't even know I didn't have to do it. Oh, I don't have to do this." The second I knew that I didn't have to do this. Just because it was exciting, just because I had started to make commitments to another person, I had so many other things going on in my life, including a whole new person arriving very shortly. And so I put the partnership on hold. We did not move forward. I adore this person, but we actually don't really keep in touch. It was fine. It turned out fine, right? Like they're doing their own thing. I'm really, really happy with what I'm doing now. And I didn't have to do it. That really helped me pave a path for myself that was about me and about trusting myself and what kind of intuition coach would I be if I don't listen to my intuition. Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not perfect. And I definitely do not always hear my intuition. I do not always follow my intuition. And that's okay too, because I am a human. But it's really interesting when you just start to hear those nudges and then acknowledge them and actually take action based on them. Like I was like, "Yeah, you're right. I don't have to do this. I'm right. I don't have to do this." So that was a big one. Another worked related nudge for my inner voice came relatively recently, which is when I was invited to be a guest on The Lively Show, which is Bella Lively's podcast. If you are familiar with Bella, she used to be named Jess Lively. And she is the woman who created inner voice facilitator training, which I went through in 2020. That's how I became an intuition coach was going through her training. And the summer she invited me to be a guest on her podcast to talk about my experience going through the training. I'll link to the episode if you haven't heard, because it's a really fun interview. But when she invited me, she gave me a pretty short notice. She was like, "Hey, can you get on the podcast? I'd love to have you on tomorrow." And at that time, I was driving kids to camp for summer. And it was like threading a needle to try to make this interview happen, because she is so well versed in listening to intuition. Of course, I got the inspiration to ask my inner voice, like, "Oh, should I make this happen? Should I force this?" And my inner voice said, "If it doesn't flow, it's a no." Which I definitely did not want to hear, because she's had guests on her podcast, like Elizabeth Gilbert and Gary Vanderchuk and Brene Brown. Like, I want to be on that show. I've listened to every single episode of her podcast ever. So, I definitely want to be on her podcast. And yet, it was not flowing. It was definitely a no. So, I went back to her and I told her, "Hey, look, this isn't going to work. Sorry. I've got to take the kids to camp." And I felt so lame and nervous telling her that but she responded pretty quickly and she said, "Oh, you know what? Don't worry about it at all. We're actually going to change the enrollment dates. So, we have a little bit more time and I'd love to have you on the show. Let's just find a time that works for you." Which we did. And I got to be on the show. So, it's this really nice reminder from my intuition and from the flow of the universe that when we force something, like, really, force something, there is so much resistance to have to work through. And, believe me, I am very well versed at forcing things. I spent many years forcing things. And you can make a lot happen through force but it doesn't always feel good and it isn't always in the best and highest alignment for you or other people involved. And if you come from this people-pleasing perspective, which I used to have, you feel like you have to do something. And you don't have to. I felt like I had to say yes or because I want to be on the show but I didn't have to. And when I didn't, it actually was totally okay and worked out even better. So, if I look back at my life, in my 20s, trusting my intuition still was from a very active doing perspective. Like, I would really only look at my inner voice or ask my inner voice for something if I needed to do something. Like switching lives with another sales manager, which is something that I did when I worked in software sales and ended up moving across the country from San Francisco to Raleigh, North Carolina, was after only living in San Francisco for six months. Like, it was so much action taking, so much doing. But in my 30s, which I am rounding out here very soon, I turn 40 in March, intuitive guidance has felt a lot more like permission to not do so much, to be more discerning and selective. My inner voice still guides me to do things, but there is a lot more waiting to receive invitations. I am a projector in human design, so that is in alignment with that little perspective. And my point in sharing this isn't to say, like, "Oh, if you are in your 20s, you should be taking action, and if you're in your 30s, you should be waiting, and if you're in your 40s, stay tuned. I have the answer for that very soon." Not at all. My reason for sharing this is because what your intuition is going to guide you towards and what you tune into your intuition for is going to ebb and flow and change as your life ebbs and flows and changes. It goes in seasons. That's one of the reasons why so much of my work is gently tied to the seasons because the seasons are a really beautiful reminder that we come back around to the same things over and over and over again, and that isn't a defect or a deficit. That is actually something very beautiful about being human and living in nature and having this experience on earth that we get to evolve and grow while also coming back to the familiar and the natural rhythms of this planet. Okay, so now to switch gears ever so slightly and to share with you some moments of inspiration and intuition from my clients. I have done 190 one-on-one client sessions since I started working one-on-one with clients. So as of recording this, I am very close to getting to 200 which I'm really hopeful. I'm pretty confident I will do before this year is out. I probably have like five already on the calendar coming up here soon. So yeah, we're going to get to 200 by the end of the year and that feels really fun. Of course, each of my client sessions has many moments of intuition. And if you've never had a session with me before or never had an inner voice session with anybody before, here's a little sneak peek of how the sessions typically go. They're usually an hour long. We begin with a little chat and before you even book your session, there's a questionnaire for you to fill out. So I get a little insight into what exactly you're looking for, why you're coming to me and if you're part of the inner circle or a year of calm, we work with each other for a whole year or more. I have some clients I've worked with for many years now. So I know typically like what's going on with you. But we talk about like what you really want to focus on in the session. And then I help guide you to your intuition, to your inner voice through something that feels a lot like a guided meditation. And if you want to know what my guided meditation sound like, I have a collection of meditations that you can purchase. I think it's only $10 right now, but that price is definitely going to go up in the new year. Anyways, we do this little guided meditation to get you to your intuition. And then I ask questions from the perspective of the mind that you and I in all minds would want to know about your life. And then you listen, really listen to the voice inside of you that has wisdom and truth and wants what's best for you. That's what we call your inner voice or your intuition. And in that type of session, it is incredible because as the coach, I'm not telling you what I think you should do. I'm not telling you what works for me. We are listening to what your inner voice has to say about the things that your mind really wants to know. And sometimes it's totally open ended. And we really just listened to what the inner voice has to say. I have clients who worked with me long enough where they come to a session and they're like, well, everything's pretty good. And that is more about just spending that amazing time an hour for yourself to breathe and be and listen and not tinker and solve problems and hack, you know, biohack or intuition, hack your life. It's about just being in the frequency. And either way is beautiful. You can certainly come with questions and problems. You can also just come to see what your inner voice wants you to know. Either way is fine. And as you do these sessions, you can get a ton of guidance. So I have one client who's an author and a coach for authors and her inner voice guided her over the summer to make teeny, tiny books to work on. So she was in a space in her personal life where she wasn't doing a lot of work. She was caring for her son. And she told me that she completed an entire first draft of a children's book in miniature form. So this is definitely not a strategy that she would have been able to come up with from just her mind. But her inner voice guided her to make her work so small that it could fit into the summer that she was going to have. And it did. I have another client who is a full time working mom of three and her inner voice guided her to loosen her grip, like really try less and enjoy her work more. She's at a point in her career where she's really good at what she does. But it's almost like she got stuck in grind mode where her mind only thought that it could work so hard as hard as it's always worked. And of course, if you take a step back, people over time get better and better at their jobs. And so she doesn't have to work at that same intensity now that she used to have to. Like if you just think about anytime you've started a new job, it's a lot to ramp up. She's ramped like she is up. And so her inner voice was just sewing her that she can enjoy and slow down. She doesn't even have to slow down. It's not about slowing down. It's about just like releasing that grip and find more flow in the work that she does. Inner voices also give very practical guidance to. I have a client who is an entrepreneur and a graphic designer. And when I asked her inner voice, how much sleep should she get? Her inner voice said the number nine. So then I asked more questions like, should she go to bed at nine? Should she wake up at nine? Does she need nine hours of sleep? And one of the things I always ask my clients to do is just to be really honest about what you're receiving. So don't try to figure it out from the mind's perspective. We're just listening to the inner voice and all she got was nine. So we dropped it like we moved on to something else. But then later, like way later after the session, she was reading the book 4,000 Weeks by Oliver Berkman, which is a book we love. And when she was reading it, the first thing she did was open to chapter nine, rediscovering rest. So the whole chapter is about rest. And that is what her inner voice wanted her to explore was rest and what Oliver Berkman had to say about it. I share all about that story in an interview with my client, Michelle, who's also an alumni of a year of calm. I will link to that episode in the show notes. If you haven't heard it, it's a must listen. And that book, 4,000 Weeks by Oliver Berkman is really, really good. If you haven't read it or I prefer listening to the audiobook because he has such a charming accent. And it's just like a really inspiring, but also entertaining. Listen, as you've heard these stories, I'm curious if any moments of inspiration of intuition have come through for you those times where you've trusted your gut or you've gotten a little ping or a download and actually take an action in alignment with it. Or also, as informative, have you ever gotten those things or really known what you needed to do but then not done it for some reason? Because that's also very helpful information. Just reflect on it. Consider it like when in your life have you really, truly heard your intuition and listened to it. There are oftentimes areas of our lives where we live very intuitively. And then there's other areas where it feels like we're forcing to get back to forcing. We're really pushing and forcing the issue. That isn't right or wrong. That's just a natural effect of what happens. So when I work with clients, especially in a year of calm and in a circle, but even one on one just in a single session is to help you see how everything that's happening in your life right now, it's okay. It's not something that you have to aggressively fix because if you already had the fix, you would be doing it. But instead, to find ways to listen to your intuition, tune into that wisdom within and find strategies, find ways to soothe and support your mind, which might have resistance to following the guidance of your inner voice. This is a lifelong journey. It's not something that you have to get perfect or right from the start. And in fact, it isn't something that you just do once and then you're done. It is an ongoing thing. So I hope that this conversation today has inspired you in some way. If it has resonated with you, please connect with me on Instagram. Come say, Hi, I'm at Kayleen Elise. And if you choose to join a year of calm or the inner circle, I am really looking forward to working with you over this next year. And also, if you sign up for an autumn of ritual, I hope you enjoy everything I created and curated for you in there. I'll be back next week with a fresh episode. I'll talk to you then. Bye. [Music] [BLANK_AUDIO]
