Tell me your story

  On their first day, new clients receive a 10-point questionnaire. Homework! The A-students love it!

Number 3 is a doozy. I can only imagine the look on their faces when they get to, "Tell me the story of your life in less than five pages."

Most, perhaps none, of them expect to go on for that long, but it happens. Somewhere on page two of writing about their childhood, favorite vacations, what the first days of college meant to them, how they knew where they wanted to live -- they begin seeing themselves in a new way.

When you tell your story you see your whole self.

It's just like how you feel when someone you care about first tells you their story. You love them more in that moment. You feel it deep inside; adoration, care and gratitude for this living being who is sharing themselves with you.

It makes you want to share back, to experience mutual understanding and love.

It's what happens when clients share their stories with me -- and what happens when they share them with themselves by writing it down. They feel a deep appreciation for all of the things that happened to get them where they are today.

It's how I felt while reading this Facebook post shared by my friend DeChelle Harris, owner of Washington D.C.-based Chelle Albert Interiors. I think you'll love her more now, too.

[box] Still kinda blows my mind that people have pillows with my name/logo on them in their homes...

The entire process is a labor of love. Bringing something from an idea to tangible product/service is no small feat. I've learned so much. I've been burned more times than you can count following this dream of mine but my vision encourages me to keep growing & evolving. Every time I have encountered a setback, I've thanked God for the lesson and that I learned it early while I have had less to lose.

When I think back to how I spent most of my young adult life preparing to go to med school; my high school and college summers spent at UNC doing internships in Biology, Pharmacology and Rheumatology, studying Biochemistry and Immunology in Helsinki, Finland with the idea of going on to med school to become an oncologist and then to think about when I upended it all and told my parents I was going to get a Master's in Interior Design and they said I was crazy...I had spent my whole life preparing for something else.

To think of all that and what I have accomplished and how far I have come on a "crazy" idea about following my heart...It really just seems like a dream...[/box]

It's your turn. Tell me your story. The ups, downs, serendipities, and memories that added together make up who you are today. Share it in our Facebook Group, in a video, or by photographing a handwritten page from your journal.

I can't wait to see it, and even more I can't wait for the love fest when YOU read/watch/hear it.

You are one-of-a-kind. Your story is proof.