Authentically Alive — Blair Shackle

Why a digital detox is oh-so-important

Bright orange, vibrant red, and shimmering yellow leaves of fall. Powerful, lapping waves of Lake Superior. Tall bluffs. Muddy hiking trails. Ample sunshine. Full hearts.

This is the North Shore of Minnesota in autumn. Would you believe I spent three days there if you didn’t see any photographic or social media evidence? Hmm….

I spent three days ‘up north,’ as we say around these parts, without my phone or computer. And no, I’m not crazy 🙂 It was glorious.

digital-detox

I don’t have to remind you how much time you spend online. Searching, scrolling, squinting. There’s always something to discover, someone to connect with, and endless topics to educate yourself on. But on the not-so-pretty side of things, there’s always someone’s life to compare to yours that leaves you feeling empty and envious. And sometimes do you wonder why you’re still scrolling through websites and random social media profiles after four hours? I do. Like anything, there’s a light and a dark side to the Internet.

In my case, as a marketing and digital media specialist, I spend a loooooot of time on the Google machine. Like any job, it wears you out if you don’t make breaks a priority — especially when you could be working all. the. time. And I was not making breaks (true, get-away-from-the-computer breaks) a priority and my work-life balance was suffering.

A few weeks before my vacation to celebrate my 8th wedding anniversary (yay!), I heard some whispers that I should not bring my phone. Really? I thought. Could I do it? Would I have the sweats and shakes? I had some real doubts if I could or should do it. My ego kept pestering me to find excuses to bring my phone, but alas, I listened to the guidance of my soul.

News flash: it was way easier and more enjoyable than I could have imagined!

We headed up to northern Minnesota and I made sure to bring a few great books to read and a coloring book to keep me occupied. It was funny because I thought I would lean on them a lot in the car, but I didn’t. I simply enjoyed the ride, scenery, and conversation with my husband. It was refreshing not to have my device in tow, because I would habitually pick it up and scroll through the randomness.

After this experience, I want to make this a habit. Once a month, I am going to have my husband “hide” my phone and if anyone wants to get a hold of me, they can through my hubby (as we did on the trip). In fact, my detox weekend is coming up *this* weekend and I think I’ll also do it right after Thanksgiving 🙂

Here are a few quick things I learned and ideas that may help you if you are thinking of doing a digital detox…

If you are feeling disengaged, irritable, stressed, or unhappy, try a digital detox

Yes, I really believe a break from technology can help you reconnect to and reground your emotions. It’s like a supplement, sometimes we are deficient in a nutrient and we need something to help us feel better for a short period of time. In our wild world these days, it is super easy to become deficient in genuine connection. Now this is not only with others, but with ourselves.

By taking away something that takes us away from our true feelings and emotions, we are able to recharge our connection to soul.

When was the last time you enjoyed something without feeling the need to share it?

Sometimes we have to keep our happiness close to our own hearts. Hey…I totally get wanting to share and spread joy to others. I offer this advice often to my clients — BUT! — sometimes certain magic needs to be experienced with you (and a few select loved ones) intimately.

Experience the world around you with all five senses. Live simply for a few days. Appreciate the world around you with just your eyes and heart. This will help your body and your spirit to reground itself.

Trust that life continues to be beautiful and amazing without the approval of others

This is a toughie for a lot of people. Myself included. You can feel, well, high when the likes keep piling up on your social media feeds. It’s that sense of: “Ahh…someone gets me. They see me! They like me! This feels good and I’m going to keep doing this.” This is simple psychology and why wouldn’t we want to keep sharing things when we get attention for it? But, I want you to know something…

Your life has tremendous value, credibility, and purpose even if you don’t share everything on social media. You are a wonderful person with many talents and inner beauty no matter what. I promise.

A break will make you better at your life and job

Speaking to everyone here, but especially the online entrepreneurs of the world out there — stepping away from the computer will not cause your business to implode. Pinky promise.

Folks, I must practice what I preach to my clients. And what I preach is ease and balance. If I don’t take a break and recharge, I’m not going to be my best helping them market their business. Can you imagine someone telling a pilot or a surgeon not to take a break? Uhh…trouble ahead. I know us online entrepreneurs don’t hold people’s lives in our hands, but you catch my drift.

Oh and that precious life of yours and those incredible people in it — they’ll thank you for being present. I don’t have to say much more.

Wrapping up — listen to that small, sweet voice within

If it is telling you to take a break, try it out. Maybe start with one day, or two. Here’s the deal…social media, websites, texting, the whole gamut is most likely here to stay in our lifetime. Let’s embrace it! Let’s enjoy it! But…let’s also know when to take a break from it!

Big hugs friends!

I’m here to tell you…there’s something else

Yesterday we lost a legend, Prince.

He transcends space, time, and our earthy ways.

So many artists do.

That’s why it is so hard to lose them (and we’ve lost a lot of them this year).

DearlyBeloved

All day I have been on the edge of tears. Real, tingly, stinging-your-eyes-tears.

Why does this happen so often when the creatives decide to leave us behind and move on to the afterworld?

Why do we get so emotional even when we don’t know them personally?

It’s because they get us. They’ve been there when the highs are high and the lows are low. They help us get through this thing called life 🙂 They have the magic ability to combine beauty with pain. This magic allows us to genuinely move out of our ego and into our souls in order to accept what is happening in our life at the very moment they enter it. They give us the gift of being able to find our true selves at our core.

This is hard. Losing someone who knows us is hard.

These artists were partly put on this earth to help us all transcend space, time, and our earthy ways. To remember where we came from and where we will eventually go home.

Music is church. It brings us together, it brings us home, it brings us comfort when we need it most.

Thank you to Prince and all the artists who help us find ourselves and each other.

If you can’t beat fear…

You guys. I’m feeling you. There’s a lot of fear right now.

Politics. Personal life. Relationships. Raising kiddos. Purpose. Everything feels as it is up for review, and it really is.

If you can't beat fear, just do it scared.

I want you to know you’re not alone and we will get through this together. We’re all climbing the same mountain.

And even with the wind blowing in our face and with a path that isn’t perfectly paved, we’re doing it. Life, that is. With the unfavorable conditions at the moment, we still keep moving. It’s part of our purpose…to forge on the path ahead even when it seems impossible. With each small step, we are moving onward and upward. Slowly, steadily, one more step, one more lesson, one more breakthrough.

So keep walking your path even if you are scared. Yes, we are all climbing the same mountain, but we don’t all take the same path. Don’t worry about someone else’s. Continue ahead on your own unique and perfect journey. Even if you have to do it with fear, do. Eventually, it will pass. And eventually, it will come again. Learning to weather the storms will be one of our greatest achievements. It will get easier when you know that storms are well, just storms. None last forever. Neither will fear.

Friends, you’ve got this. We’ve got this. Let’s learn to love each other through the storms and the fear and the insecurity of this grand thing called life. Fear may never go away, but we can learn to trust that it is designed to make us better.

Art journaling: honoring the light + dark

Last Saturday, I attended an amazing art journaling workshop hosted by an online turned real-life friend, DeAnne Williamson.

We met through Liv Lane’s Build A Blog You Love program way back in 2012 and have followed each other’s journeys ever since. She even made a move from California to Minnesota last year. Glad to have her here!

She is an incredible mixed-media artist and has been teaching art journaling for years, but this was her first time teaching in Minnesota.

I didn’t know what to fully expect other than I’d get creative with color and writing, but that was about it. The whole experience went totally above and beyond all my expectations! The whole three hours I kept thinking how I didn’t want it to end…I felt so sparkly and alive! Being creative is something that is definitely a missing puzzle piece to my life. I forgot how much it adds to high spirits!

A big reason I don’t draw, paint, or color often is because I can fall in the self-judgment trap. With DeAnne, she gave me *just* enough guidance to find the confidence to express my creativity without hindering what needed to come out naturally. She’s a fantastic guide on this journey and I didn’t feel hindered by my ego telling me I wasn’t doing a “good enough” job.

I don’t want to give away all the magic of the workshop, but here are a few incarnations of my process. The theme for this workshop was “Manifesting 2016.”

First we started with some power words to bring into this year.

Then we wrote a letter to ourselves that expanded on these words and what we’d like to manifest in 2016.

From there, we chose a photo that spoke to us to use in our journal. I chose this image of a skeleton half buried in sand with a little turquoise gem right by the nape of their neck. It was the turquoise that captured me of course.

I know it is a dark image, but I liked playing with lightness that surrounded this heavy photo. I also am fascinated by death, not in a weird way, but in a spiritual one. This may sound weird, but I was present at my Grandma Hanky’s passing, and it was an incredibly moving experience and one I was so grateful to be present for. Like birth, death I believe is to be honored. Also, for this year, there is so much conclusion and graduation that I wanted to honor those parts of myself that I have been saying goodbye to. I think it is important to remember “where we came from” because without that, we would not be who we are today.

After that part, came a lot of other fun parts that I won’t give away, but here is my final journal entry.

I love the colors and the contrast! To me, it is the true essence of life. Light and dark. We have to accept both in this lifetime. Both bring beauty, growth, and a higher self.

I can’t wait to do this again!

DeAnne will be offering a second art journaling class on Sunday, March 6 at the Solar Arts Building in Minneapolis. If you want to learn more, connect with DeAnne here!

Ready to reconnect, recharge, and renew

Well hi there.

How have you been? Has your heart been swirling? Energy twirling and twisting and changing? Feeling like you’ve been evolving at a record pace? Yeah…me too.

It’s time. It’s the right time to say “Hello” again. To renew. Reconnect. Recharge. Getting back to the basics of my blog when I started it back in 2012. 4 years ago!?!? Woah…time…what is up with that?

turq2016

I don’t really even know where to start with recapping where I’ve been or what I’ve been doing, feeling, thinking, learning, so here are just a few highlights:

My baby is almost 2!!! WHAT!??!?!?!
I realized that my postpartum depression evolved into just being the parent of a toddler, it took awhile to notice the difference but it was life changing when I did
So toddlerhood is kinda hard, ya’ll…but I also like LOVE IT LOVE IT…how does that work? A mystery of the Universe I suppose! I’m just gonna go with it 🙂
I’ve also realized that I have some general anxiety fixing to care for…but it’s getting SO much better
I went gluten free and it has really been a catalyst in helping me feel more emotionally stable
I QUIT Facebook…yes…for real! More on this in a later blog post…
I’m sometimes bad at following the rules, and sometimes really good, but most often I go my own way and I have to own that sometimes even though it’s hard and I’d like to play with the “normal” people sometimes
I’m toying with saying goodbye to dairy, but that sounds so hard! I live in the midwest for goodness sake! And I could never forever say goodbye to butter!
I’m in the midst of another big business change
I’ve been the doula for three beautiful women and I still feel the pain of my birth when I experience this miracle with others…what to do? What to do?
Every day I’m uncovering my soul purpose even more and feeling more and more happy and light as the days roll on…so grateful for this!
I also have setbacks and “what ifs” that come up…and you know what…I’m learning that’s absolutely perfect
I don’t know what I want to do with this blog, but I know I have to write. Even if it’s just for myself, it makes me feel better.
I’ve discovered that coconut La Croix is pretty much amazing and makes me feel all tropical during these cold winter weeks

So that’s me…what about you?

I hope you find time this year to renew, recharge, and reconnect to yourself. You absolutely deserve it. And don’t worry if it looks different than what other people are doing. Listen to your heart. Don’t stray. Your truth never leaves you or leads you in the wrong direction.

Here’s to us! Let’s bring the light into 2016!