Where is our support?

I’ve been married twice and though each wedding was completely different, they were both held in loving support. My first wedding took place in Welfare, Texas on the Strange Range (and we slept in Comfort!). I was 27 years old and I married another artist and our community was thick with actors, musicians, writers, artists, and producers. A film production designer put together our wedding altar, complete with hand plucked and dried flower petals. A theater costume designer designed and sewed the men’s outfits, complete with custom buttons on the vests. A popular local band specializing in gypsy jazz played a series of Italian and French songs by Django Reinhardt. We had two ministers: one from my childhood and one from my first wife’s childhood. The food was fantastic, the wedding cake and wedding pies were delicious, It was a total hoot, and everyone had a fantastic time. It was colorful, big, very social, and the party went on and on, way into the morning. A lot of people were invested to make the whole thing happen and the marriage was launched with spice, verve and a wild sense of adventure. My second wedding consisted of my wife and I, her daughter and my sons, my parents and our mutual friend who performed the service. Only those 8 people. The ceremony was in our living room. We cut down pine boughs from our yard, filled the room with candles, and played recorded Celtic music over the speakers. My parents cried, the kids were proud, and my wife and I were awe-struck at how it all came to be. A few months later we had the community “barn dance” where we hired a contra dance band and a caller that specialized in teaching beginners. Family and friends came from around the country, to dance with our local community in a Revolutionary War era hall. It was hot, everyone was covered in sweat, they guzzled down lemonade and danced and danced declaring it was the most fun they’d had in a long time. The love and support was thick and strong like concrete. The love and support in my first wedding was also thick and strong like concrete.

The violet-white crown chakra final step of the Intuitive Storytelling protocol is made of a substance that is thick and strong like concrete, where the community provides the stable surface from which true transformation can happen. 

Here is another story to make the point:

I lived in a suburb of Buffalo NY from 6th through 11th grade. The most popular and well known sports team in Buffalo is the football team, the Buffalo Bills. In the past, the Bills have not been very good. Yes, Jim Kelley did take the Bills to 4 consecutive superbowl runs in the 90s but we never actually won. Notice I say “we” and this is why I’m telling this story. I am a member of the Bill’s Mafia. The Bills Mafia is its famous fanbase. We are known for our loyalty and enthusiasm especially when our team has not had much success. We are known for our tailgating, especially for table jumping (jumping from the back of pickup trucks onto a plastic table covered in food and drinks.) We are also known for our charitable giving, and often give to the causes supported by the opposing team’s players. I’m proud to be a Bill’s fan. I can remember attending games in what was then known as “Rich Stadium” and freezing while screaming at the top of my lungs. There is often snow during Bills games, and it can get very cold, but even back in the 80s when we had one of the worst teams, the fans showed up. This is the role of the violet-white crown chakra in our process: unwavering support.

Rocket-fuel power is associated with the pivot that takes place in the green heart chakra step described in Book #4. Over our lives, we acquire “units of hardship” which gives us battle tested resilience that is dense and potent. When it is time for us to pivot out of own solitary world and become citizens of the vast forest around us, we draw on that life experience to help us make the leap. This is necessarily difficult, at least in my experience. This kind of transformation is difficult, and the fuel used for transforming can be volatile. Units of hardship can just as easily ignite self-doubt, self-sabotage, and emotional paralysis. Rocket fuel is capable of blowing up the rocket—it has happened. Green heart chakra fuel is powerful—very powerful. And in order to use it for transformation, it needs to be contained and aimed correctly. This is how the violet-white crown chakra becomes essential. We need support in order to launch. 

Now let’s explore the tailgate party metaphor a bit more. Use your imagination and see the joy and enthusiasm at this motley crew of Bills supporters gathering together in the cold. See the food, the drink, the antics, the costumes, the condiments, the songs—and recognize that these are all trappings of the celebration of being together. They are ways to express how lovely it is to gather and have a common focus. Bills fans all love the Bills. Swifties love Taylor Swift. Others love driving old cars. Others love chili or the rodeo. Others love to play Magic the Gathering. Those who gather together love these things, and I believe it is their collective love and support that make the Bills the team they are. Swifties are behind T. Swift’s success. Old cars get fixed up because the people at the rallies look forward to seeing them and each other. It is not a supply and demand sort of thing; it is more of a yin/yang thing. You can’t have one without the other. Thus a transformation is going to require both the fuel stored by way of the green heart chakra, and the stable support that will make the whole thing safe and successful. Think of the moment a rocket launches off the earth. It needs the force of propulsion, and the resilient holding of the launch pad. This is the role of our violet-white crown part of Intuitive Storytelling. We close these seven mini-books focusing on the role of support. Let’s get a better understanding of what support looks and feels like.

Who is there for you? 

Our basement flooded a couple summers ago. I heard the moisture alarms and went into the basement to discover 6 inches of water. I quickly turned all the utilities off and called the fire department (you might not know this but when the water is deeper than 4 inches, the fire department will come and pump it out). Not only did they pump the water out but they left me a pump I could use to remove the last inch. The fire department had my back. That last inch didn’t disappear for a week because the water kept coming in. I set up a system of other smaller pumps but the solution was clear: we now needed a sump pump. Unprecedented rain after a drought now made this our reality. After calling every reputable company, the soonest anyone could help us was a month out, and we had a very bad storm coming. I called a few other companies that said they could help, but for an exponentially larger price. We were stuck. Then a friend suggested another company. Logan came out, assessed the situation and said they had an emergency solution that might help. He called back within hours with news that they could come the next day. Carlos came and installed a temporary pump solution. The storm came and our basement was dry. It worked. And not only that, Logan called every day to make sure all was well. I got a Christmas text from him wishing us a dry basement. The fire department, Logan and Carlos were there when we needed them. 

The following exercise is about acknowledging the people and moments when we needed help. Those moments are pivotal because we tend to be vulnerable and real when we need help, and the people who have our back are the ones we trust to show that side of ourselves. Make your list liberally and honestly. You may have received help from someone surprising. You might not know their name. You might not have wanted help but in retrospect, it was exactly what you needed. 

Survey the past year and think about your most challenging times. Think about your darkest times, the moments when you didn’t know how to get out of the muck. Recall overwhelm, anxiety, depression, and strife. Let yourself remember.

List the people who showed up for you. If you find yourself rationalizing why someone should be on your list, don’t put their name. You’ll know because you’ll rush to list them. Sometimes people help out of obligation. If you suspect this, don’t put them on the list. Don’t worry, they won’t read your list. We are looking for honesty, not diplomacy. 

You can start with the big moments of support, in that they will help you recall smaller moments. List as many as you can —especially the small events where anonymous people helped you in the grocery store or outside in the rain. Who helped you when you were having a rough day, and did just the right thing and it all turned around?

Exercise: Who was there for us and why?

Make your list here. Use the big moments to help recall the small moments. Be liberal and try not to overthink it.

This next part of the exercise is best done speaking out loud. Try telling yourself a story. Go through your list of names and follow these prompts.

1. What was it about the person or the way they helped you? What was special about that? Why did they really make your list? (remember to answer these questions OUT LOUD.) Its ok to exaggerate. Its ok to not get the details right. Its ok to add things that didn’t happen. We are looking for qualities and ways of behaving that are important to you.

2. Jot down common themes or attributes you hear yourself say. You might find that emotional strength is important to you. Or calmness. Or ability to fix things. Authenticity might be important to you. Or clarity. Or a sense of humor. Jot down the word.

3. Try on these qualities yourself. See what it feels like to be calm or handy or funny. See how these qualities show up in your body.

To take advantage of an effective transformation launch pad of support, two things need to happen.

First you need to see that the support is real, that the component parts of a tailgate party are assembled in your honor. You need to acknowledge and believe it first. Once it is real for you, you need to mobilize the support. You need to set your network into action. Your community needs to be clear about their role so they can fulfill it. This part is often challenging, because it requires that you ask them to do something. The Bills don’t ask for the tailgate party, but they do ask that people pay for tickets and post images about their tailgate parties.  The Taylor Swift team wants tickets too, as well as merch and hashtags. The car rally asks for attendance and MTG groups ask you to buy cards and play the game. There needs to be an authentic commitment, and in order to secure that commitment, the people need to be asked. This can be hard for many of you, especially the intuitive storytellers because you tend to be very sensitive. It can be easier, however, once you do a simple inventory.

Exercise: Inventory your support

1. Identify what it is you want to do with your intuitive storytelling work. Write a book, plan an event, start a business, run for office, commit to transforming a relationship, become a better parent—it doesn’t matter, just pick something that is important to you. This is why you want to engage in the transformative practice of Intuitive Storytelling.

2. Make a real list of the people or groups that want you to succeed within the scope of your intention. Who has your back when it comes to the book or business or whatever you wrote above? Who believes in you, and/or what you are doing? Write down everyone that fits this description. Don’t overthink. Populate.

The list you collected in the previous exercise will be your potential tailgate party.

To be clear, you are looking for the fans, not members of the team. You are not including people who will work for you in this endeavor, or the direct beneficiaries. You are looking for Bills Mafia, not members of the coaching staff. You want other parents, not your parenting partner. Those people have a different role. You are looking for people who don’t need to support you, but choose to support you. So if you are going to start a business, the role of your tailgate party is to celebrate and support the launch of the business, not primarily to become customers. That is a different role. If you are writing a book, your tailgate party will encourage you and talk about you and find promotion opportunities for you, but their primary goal is not to buy the book. That is for someone else. They might buy the book, but that is not how they are a part of the tailgate party. They help you build the restaurant, not eat the food. They help you build the car, not drive it. They help you set up the party, but not go to the party. This is an important distinction and one that is often blurred. 

Pick the people who are in it to support you, not those who benefit from the result.

They might one day benefit, but you want your violet-white crown support chakra to be composed of people whose number one motivation is to gather together and celebrate you and your project, no matter what. Like sports fans, they are there for you, whether you win or don’t win. Winning is not the point, at least for the violet-white crown. The point is to provide the stable, solid and resilient surface from which your intention can launch.