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Here’s the deal. 

If you want your feelings of Big “Dream Deferred” energy to dissolve and transmute into Big Dream energy, you must understand a few things. 

You must understand that your big dreams—your most delectable, most audacious life dreams on any subject—are part of the million line-item long spiritual curriculum of things you came into this life to experience.

We call this curriculum your Sacred Contract. 

Your Big Dreams are essential components of your cosmic assignments—albeit an assignment the larger, Divine Ocean assigned to the smaller Divine Droplet that is you, so it’s more like a self-assignment than an externally-imposed assignment.

Know this: You DO have an assignment. 

More accurately, you have assignments, plural. 

Your Big Dreams are on the list of your sacred contract assignments, but MOST of your Sacred Contracts are not Huge Big Things to build, perform or create. 

Your sacred contract—your assignments—include everything you came into life to be, do, have, learn, create, experience, savor, grieve and enjoy. So they number in the millions, or trillions or even more. 

So know this, too: In order to do your Big Dreams, you’ll need to break programming, break patterns, break from culture, break your old self-sabotaging thought patterns and action (or inaction) habits, and break your resistance to your own highest good. 

In other words, your Big Dreams—if you have the courage to step toward them—will require you to learn and unlearn what you need to learn and unlearn, to become who you came here to become.

This, Brilliant One, is a process. 

And processes have stages. 

So here’s another principle to catch: At any given moment, you must understand your assignment for THIS stage of reclaiming your wholeness and re-learning how to be your Big Self.

And catch this principle #5: You must continuously recalibrate your understanding of your assignment for THIS stage… this season, if you will.

Here’s #6: Best practice is to refrain from judging, tracking or grading your progress, because you’re basically always nailing it. 

You can’t get it wrong. 

You’re here in this life, creating. 

And when unwanted outcomes occur… when things take longer than you think they should… under the principles of Divine Order and Divine Timing, every single one of these plot twists and delays can ultimately benefit you (if you decide to let nothing be for nothing).

But IF you must grade your own assignment, make sure you’re grading yourself on the assignment for THIS stage. 

Here’s what I mean. 

A friend of mine recently decided to commit to stop self-silencing and say what she means, particularly with her partner. 

And so she did. 

And she reported back that the first conversation she initiated as part of her new commitment to free-and-clear communications was a disaster. 

That she timed the conversation poorly.

That she didn’t know what to say, and blurted some shit out.

That she got flustered. 

That her partner didn’t take it well and didn’t agree to her requests. 

She felt like she was failing as a skillful communicator. 

But I told her I’d give her an A+ as a baby, fledgling, fully self-expressing human. 

And I shared with her my own process of building the skills and muscles I’ve built that allow me to honor The Commitment I made about 15 years ago to fully express myself. (We’ll talk more about The Commitment soon).

I told her how when I first made The Commitment and first started practicing free-and-clear communications, and first started setting boundaries, I was kind of like This Kitty: 

I looked sweet. My intentions and heart were pure as the driven snow. And I was so un-skillful, I would just blow shit up, leaving a whole lot of spiritual shrapnel behind. 

And then I committed to my Daily Ritual. I started using the sitting time and writing time to get clear on what parts of a conversation were mine to have with my own Inner Being—and which parts I needed to bring to the other person. 

I got clearer and clearer on what hard conversations needed to be had, and when. 

I started to practice what I learned in Necessary Endings, including the nuances involved in detecting whether you need to end a pattern or a relationship. 

I started studying Non-Violent Communications and would literally script out my hard conversations before I had them, to get the energy of nervousness and fear worked out, and to go in with more confidence that I would be comprehensive and grounded in my talk.

I took The Four Agreements and committed to be impeccable with my words, which does not mean perfect but does mean to never weaponize your words. 

And I did all of that for years, whilst practicing free-and-clear communications in real time, allll the time, letting my spirit get the new wiring and feedback loops of how terrible it felt when I didn’t honor The Commitment and how free-and-clear I came to feel inside all the time when I did. 

And now it is much, MUCH easier for me to identify hard conversations that need to be had, initiate them, and have them skillfully.

It is much, MUCH easier to do this without manipulating, and without fretting about the outcome… 

Without worry about other people’s discomfort…

Without worrying whether they can handle it…

Without worrying about pleasing them or upsetting them…

Without worrying about whether they will withhold or withdraw their love and approval of me…

And even without worrying about whether they’ll ultimately do what I want them to do. 

But at the beginning, I told my friend, before you knew me? 

And you know what? 

In retrospect, I give Kitty Walking Away From Self-Created Explosion Tara an A+ just like I gave my friend.

Because at that stage my assignment was not to be a skillful, free-and-clear communicator and boundary creator. 

At THAT stage, my assignment was to break generations-old patterns of self-silencing, self-divorcing, hiding my own light, and NOT speaking up for myself, saying what is true and asking for what I need. 

And at THAT stage, I shined light. I dared to walk toward the chaos monsters that self-silencing had created in my own mind with open arms and warmth. I broke those patterns. 

A++++++.

Listen: When your kid learns to ride a bike and falls down, you don’t shame them or tell them what a shit job they’re doing. 

You don’t compare them to the folks in the Tour de France, or even the kids who have a year of bike-riding experience under their little belts. 

You cheer them on for getting one single pedal rotation on their own before they realize they did that and lose balance.

Your heart soars when they pedal a few times even though they’ve still got training wheels on. 

You are ELATED when you take the training wheels off and they can make it a hundred meters without you helping them keep their balance.

And when they fall down, AND GET BACK UP… that’s the win, because that’s all the assignment was! 

So, if you’re trying to break old patterns that keep you small or hide your light… 

And anytime you’re trying to step out of your comfort zone and let the New Beginnings begin… 

Understand your assignment for that specific, transformational, breakthrough season, stage or moment. 

Don’t let PERFORM, CONFORM, PRODUCE conditioning or culture have you judging yourself with advanced standards when you’re just a beautiful, baby,  beginner. 

Give yourself an A+ for breaking the pattern or breaking out of your comfort zone, even if the way you do it is way less masterful or beautiful than you usually do things. 

Even if you feel a little like this: 

Head up + heart out,

P.S.: Want more like this? Become a SoulTour subscriber for just $11 a month.

Tara-Nicholle Kirke, MA, Esq.
The Inner Critic Coach™️
Founder + CEO of SoulTour

@taranichollekirke on FB | TW | IG | LI