Does it make your heart sing?
Have you ever felt so full to the brim with boredom / unhappiness / frustration that, like a saucepan reaching the boil, you feel as if you might bubble over at any minute?
I felt like this at the end of 2022 - burned out from juggling too many jobs, zombified by the boredom of my daily grind, and frightened by the feeling that my life, and by extension I, didn’t have much meaning or purpose any more.
One Sunday I took a notepad and pen to the beach and this poem burst out of me and onto the page. All of my wildest dreams encapsulated…
I want to distil my worldly goods
Until they fill two suitcases
One for my books
And one for everything else I truly need
I want to travel light the rest of my days
Fluttering from adventure to adventure
Using these two questions to guide me:
'Does it make my heart sing?'
'Does it set my spirit free?'
I want to hike the silk trail
Turn baguettes and cheese in Paris into poetry
Bike beside Amsterdam's canals
Walk the Camino in pilgrimage
To the Love that inspires me
I want to take a lover
Who takes me to the outer limits of ecstasy
And every year on my birthday
I want to get high
And give myself the gift of remembering
that we live in a galaxy of infinite possibility
I want to meet so many people
I could build a library with their stories
I want to deepen my connection
To the divinity inside of me
I want to hear the joyful giggle
Of an Irish fiddle
Walk the Wild West coast
Of my father's country
I want to believe again
In magic and goddesses and fairies
Meander the way of the wonderstruck
And flow in an endless stream of creativity
Writing that poem felt so cathartic - finally being able to articulate the dreams and desires I’d been suppressing for so long.
Finally being able to express the passion and wildness that crashed like waves inside of me.
When I got home I posted the poem on my Instagram account and pinned it to the top of my page as a kind of call to action to myself: Now all my deepest dreams and desires are laid bare on Insta I have to make them happen!
As I’m sure you all know by now, I finally plucked up the courage to take the steps I needed to distil all of my worldly goods into two suitcases - one of which is in my mum’s loft! - and off I set on my adventures using these two questions to guide me…
'Does it make my heart sing?'
'Does it set my spirit free?'
I’ve been travelling solo around the world for seven months now and I have a book coming out in a couple of weeks. Whenever this happens my publisher, Bookouture, will send out a press release to papers and magazines in the hope that some of them will review the book or interview me.
This time, my lovely publicist, Sarah, had the brainwave to title the press release: Meet the Author Writing Her Way Around the World, and talk about my giving up my home to travel the world solo.
It got a great response, and the UK paper the Daily Star featured an interview with me this week in their Travel Section.
I posted some screenshots from the article on my Instagram and it was such a sweet moment when I saw the article right next to my pinned poem and realised that my wildest dreams had now come true.
From dreaming, to daring, to actually doing - right there in front of me on my Insta grid.
So, this week I have a fun little challenge for you.
If you’ve been feeling bored / unhappy / frustrated with any area of your life, I challenge you to take some time to free-write about your deepest, most daring dreams and desires (free-write means to write without censoring yourself in a stream of consciousness way). You could write a poem like I did, or just pour random thoughts onto the page. And use these two questions to guide you…
'Does it make my heart sing?'
'Does it set my spirit free?'
I’d love to hear how you get on with this one, so please feel free to share your dreams in the comments, or in a private reply to me.
And I’m really excited to share that I’m now working away behind the scenes on relaunching my one to one and group coaching under the banner: DREAM, DARE, DO, as I would love to get back into helping other people achieve their dreams - whatever they might be! So watch this space…
Until next week, happy dreaming!
Siobhan
On numerous written something that really hits home to me! Just like this weeks newsletter, for me I feel we're constantly told to "live each day like it's your last" - which is extremely tiring, I'm very grateful for my daily life however I've come to a stop where I think "is this it?' I'm 33 and society has made me feel old, I said to my Mum yesterday I feel sometimes I'm just walking around doing the same stuff everyday waiting to die - I don't mean that to sound as depressing as it is but sometimes you can get complacent then question your worth/ point.
I've given myself a talking to and feel tons better, I guess like you did I had a think of what I truly want and what I need to do (babysteps) to feel more "alive" ✨️
I used to use a similar prompt “what makes you feel most alive?” as my guide, but recently integrated a second prompt into my regime. A few months ago I had to make a decision between leaving my current job or accepting an offer at a new company. I felt the new offer made me feel more alive, it was a visceral rush and I was like, “this is it.” But my friend reframed the question to, “what makes you feel the most personally enriched?”
With that angle, I realized I wanted to pick the new job because it was so exciting (new adventure, significantly better pay…but better pay meant more stress, working evenings, etc). So upon meditating what my longer term life would look like I realized my current job would support a more wholesome, balanced, enriching life. A life that allows me to enjoy life outside work instead of being shackled to a strict schedule. Anyway just to share another spin on it, but overall love this idea as a compass for how to live our lives!