by Tara Joyce | Jan 7, 2015 | Innerpreneurship
You make a difference by being what you truly are. You change your world by being the light you naturally are and by holding onto it, no matter what externally flies your way. In living your True Nature, you support others in realizing theirs.
Another can hurt you, or attempt to, but in knowing and holding your light, their is no need to reduce yourself in reaction to them — despite their desire for you to do so. Reacting to them with fear only results in you holding less of your light and in you feeling less than. The cycle of fear and of drama continues.
When you can accept the pain you feel, you can find the strength and presence to respond with your light. You have the right to hold the light you naturally are, no matter what externally flies your way. You have the power to respond to other people’s darkness (and your own) with fairness and compassion.
Others darkness and how they use it does not have to change your light. Unless you choose for it to.
photo credit: Dave King
by Tara Joyce | Dec 19, 2014 | Cultural Creativity
We share stories to share our voice and our perspective in a way we feel will be emotionally impactful. We craft our stories in a particular way, changing them each time we tell them. We craft them from our experience and imagination, and the beautifully unique way we each perceive our world. They’re not the truth, nor our truth. They are our stories.
It’s not even the whole story that we get the privilege of hearing or sharing with each other when we’re storytelling. It’s only a glimpse that we can see, and/or show in our moment of connection together. It might sound like the complete story I’m sharing but please believe me, it’s only part of a greater whole. The truth, my truth, is far more nuanced and complex than my story can share.
If our stories were our truth, we might call them that.
I love stories… but I don’t put a lot of energy into them. My stories and the stories of others are here to entertain, to persuade, to educate but to take them as “the truth” or to hold my own experiences up to them in comparison, is a game I’d rather not play.
I’d rather work on treating stories lightly, for my own health and happiness. They are not “the truth”, nor “my truth”. Our stories are a reflection of us and our own unique way of perceiving things. They’re our version of events. They’re our tools for connection, for empathy and for identity. They’re integral to us but they are not, and can not, be all that we are. We are so much more than our stories.
photo credit: Alessandra Di Nunno
by Tara Joyce | Dec 8, 2014 | Innerpreneurship, My Journey | What's On My Mind, Personal Branding
There’s a growing phenomenon in Business, specifically in Marketing and Branding trends, of increasingly emphasizing the importance of telling your story — or more truthfully, selling your story.
This concept confuses me.
Asking me what my story is confuses me. You knowing what your story is confuses me.
When I’m asked what my story is, for instance, I may think about my “Innerpreneurial” story just to help my mind focus, but even then I fragment into a million directions. Do I want to share about getting my business starting? Do I want to share about reclaiming my artist and overcoming my creative and mental blocks? Or do I share how I’ve managed my home when both my husband and I are entrepreneurs? What about how I’ve needed to and have completely redesigned my life and world? Where and what part of my life experience is the part that sells?
Maybe this whole story business is suppose to confuse me. Maybe there’s benefit for me to be confused and feeling unsure. Maybe there’s benefit to you seeming clear in your story, and I, not. Maybe then I will more easily buy your story.
Maybe I’m to be confused by the idea that I have one powerful story to tell and sell, and that I can neatly fit my life and my experiences into it. Maybe that’s the point. To present life, or me, or my product, as more simple and clear, together and whole, than your life currently is. Maybe then you will buy the story I’m selling and telling.
There are so very many experiences and learning within me that when I attempt to present you with just one, I wholly feel the incompleteness of the perspective I am presenting. This feeling leaves me wondering, how valuable is it for us to be attached to our own and others stories? What value do we get from these stories we repeat about our Self and others?
There are so many potential stories within us, the ones we attach to and share, what do they say about us and how helpful are they?
photo credit: Venture Vancouver
by Tara Joyce | Aug 5, 2014 | Cultural Creativity, Pay What It's Worth Pricing
There’s always been something about the statement, “give freely, receive freely” that didn’t work for me, but I could never quite put my finger on it. The sentiment sounded so lovely, but I knew there was something I was missing. I needed to see beyond the freedom ideal, to the totality of the statement.
Have you ever been given something that is more work to receive than the value you place on it?
Have you ever been given something that came with conditions?
If I give freely, without restraint, I will receive freely, without restraint. But is giving, and receiving, in this way what’s best for me?
What I really need is to NOT be totally free. What I really need is to have some constraints. Because the truth is, sometimes, the thing I’m giving is something you’d benefit from NOT receiving.
Sometimes, I’m unbalanced in my giving. Sometimes, I give for the wrong reasons. You do not need to receive everything that I want to give you, just as I don’t need to receive everything that you want to give me. Sometimes, you and I give for the wrong reasons, and it’s important to honour this truth about ourselves.
I could leave myself open and free to receive whatever, and open and free to give it too, but I know that’s not what’s best for me. I could “give freely, receive freely” without bias, but then I wouldn’t be responsible to the whole truth of myself, and of you — that sometimes the things I want to give, you do not need; and sometimes the things you want for me to receive, I do not need. Sometimes, our giving isn’t helpful or generous.
So truly, giving freely does means receiving freely, and this includes exchanging all our “stuff” that would more responsibly be managed with more constraints, not less.
photo credit: Ari Moore
