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Whitney, are you ready? I am ready all right I’m ready the people are ready let’s go Welcome to light blood engage. This is George G. Our guest today is strong and powerful Whitney Freya, she is a modern day mystic and expert in inspired living. She is an author, excited to have you on Whitney, tell us a little about your personal life some more about your work and why you do what you do. Yeah, thank you, George. Um, well, I think the reason I do what I do for myself and everybody else is I just wanted to have a super fun life. Like I remember as a kid, always feeling like there was so much more than,

Whitney Freya 0:50
you know, society, what we talked about around the dinner table was revealing to me, and I graduated from the University of Michigan went out and sold books door to door for four summers, which was a super intense experience. But was important because it like nothing was scarier than that. And in the process of wanting to shift out of that job, but knowing that I was kind of waiting for my call, right, like the one idea that I was supposed to run with.

I did come up with an idea via a book called Zen and the Art of making a living. And in it, the author, Lawrence G. Bolt says that unless you adopt an artist mentality, you won’t be able to create the life of your dreams. And I was like, Well, I know I want a dreamy life. And clearly, you know, having been selling books, for at that point three summers after graduating from the University of Michigan life is way more like a blank canvas than a multiple choice test. But I had grown up a total, one of the artists had been told by an art teacher, that drawing wasn’t my thing. So every time I kind of gained the courage to reach out and try and take an art class or something, it I met with closed doors, like the registration deadline had just passed, or you had to take drawing 1011 or two, painting 1011 or two to take mixed media collage, you know, and I was like, well, I can’t paint or draw. So I guess that’s not available to me. So I actually ended up opening an art center in Nashville, Tennessee, in 96, called the creative fitness center, where people could come to learn how to create what they wanted, with paints, and I had pottery classes and paper mushy and paper making, drawing all kinds of things that were taught by other people. So that they could go back out into the art that is their life and create the change they wanted. So I literally opened the doors without even ever having painted on a canvas. So it was a very transformational experience for myself, as well as others, which led to publishing my first book came out in 2007. Starting online programs, when I knew I was moving out here to Oregon, moved out to the 700 acre ranch, the brand new home, that I lived in nine months left the marriage, because energetically, it was very low vibration, it was not a healthy, happy relationship. And I gave myself finally permission to just be me Do me, right, instead of trying to help the other, get happy. And so that led to, you know, the last, what’s it been now nine years of really taking back my own power, giving myself permission to live life my way, which has led to lots of international travel with work, creating online programs, you know, on an island in Greece, learning how to paraglide fly off mountains. You know, it’s been one of those, like, how, how can I live as authentically and in my power, and really observing and getting to know all the ways that we tell ourselves these stories about what’s available to us are not available to us what we’re good at not good at, you know, a good mother doesn’t travel to Dubai to speak at a conference or fly off mountains or it’s like Who says so? Right? It’s like, this is what I want to do, and, and then turning around and, and hopefully giving permission to others to do the same. So it’s been pretty fun, I have to say,

george grombacher 4:19
I think that’s awesome. And I appreciate everything you just said. So the the name of that book is Zen and the Art

Whitney Freya 4:27
of what? Zen and the Art of making a living. And

george grombacher 4:31
and now you look back on that and you say, well, that person was right. You do need to do need to embrace your inner creative, your inner artist, but that’s essentially been beaten out of us or whatever

Whitney Freya 4:45
everybody has. I think someone just told me like 85% of people, at least in the Western world have a creative wound. And we’ve been told this story that creativity, you know, growing up creativity was defined only through kind of the capitalist lens that if someone would pay you money for your art, and even then, you know, probably not gonna have good benefits, so don’t even try but you know, that was the only way art or creativity had valuers was what was worth your time. And I think the truth that we’re learning more and more are everywhere from quantum physics where the brain does not distinguish between real and imagined events. And we’re creating a reality to, you know, the more esoteric or spiritual positive psychology, we are creating an each and every moment. And so for me, the canvas makes that visible, right, because you don’t go to the canvas to intentionally paint something that makes you sad or stressed or worried. But we do that in our minds all the time. So I work with clients who are not, quote unquote, artists, you know, most of them are like me haven’t painted since, you know, elementary, junior high school. But they’re getting that this creative frequency, this creative self, is going to help bring them back into balance, you know, that achieve achieve produce, produce, tick things off the list can only keep you inspired for so long, if at all right, and so creativity, whether it’s dance, or music, or painting, or cooking, or gardening, all of that is there to help us balance that rational, logical, linear, you know, ego centered mind, which is very important, but it’s not meant to be the master. Right? It’s an old saying that the, the mind makes a terrible Master, but a wonderful servant. So what we love what our passions are, what lights us up, when we spend more time focusing on those things, everything comes back into a more intentional balance.

george grombacher 6:47
I love it. I love it. All right. And I 1,000% really, I agree with everything that you’ve been talking about 85% of us have a creative wound, I listened to a book recently, and it talked about this massive percentage of kids are just just all kids at like the age of three, this huge number are geniuses. And then as we progress through school, that number gets smaller and smaller and smaller.

Whitney Freya 7:17
Absolutely. Yeah. Because I mean, we could I mean I have three grown kids right and when they were young, I was looking for what lit them up. I remember reading that at age eight, you’re your most authentic self. And for me at age eight, I had an art center in the basement and the neighborhood kids would come over and we’d make very kind of 70s oriented art projects so um so yeah, when we can recognize that it’s not so much about going outside of ourselves to gain what we need to be happy and successful that actually life is an inside out job. Right? And and you are here to do you and what lights you up how you want to live your life what’s important to you what the priorities are where you spend your time and energy is is up to you and I know I’ve spent plenty of years you know trying to fulfill other people’s expectations and be a good dot you know, mother wife these kinds of things. But if it’s not genuine, if it’s not in alignment with who you are and and what makes you excited or what lights you up, that that genius that we had at age three, and it’s you’re going to be in discordance, you know there’s going to be discordance and imbalance and incoherence in your life which will attract to you opportunities to correct that right so oftentimes you know we all know the story where people lose their job you know suddenly fired or outsourced or of course these days so many reasons and they can look back and be like that’s the best thing that ever happened to me right because we stay committed it’s understandable we’ve spent a lot of time and energy you know learning these things or becoming proficient or an expert or achieving something a level of our careers and but when it comes down to it you know, we wouldn’t choose it over again our child’s self that age three or age eight self would say oh no, we do not want to do that you know, this is not why we’re here this is not our zone of genius. And you know, life gets us off track. So bring it back into balance by honoring that creative frequency that only knows possibility and responds to the energy of excitement and joy and love right that’s why we feel those feelings is to guide us like go that direction. Right follow that path. You just saw something online, you could learn something you got all fired up. That’s that’s a signal even if you seem and feel completely unqualified, or like there’s no way I could ever do that. If You are getting excited about a potential opportunity, you want to learn more. Right? take the next step. So, there’s a lot, there’s just so much more that we can do, to to really live, you know, with more vitality and energy and enthusiasm than we were taught. And that’s what I love having conversations about.

george grombacher 10:24
I love it. So is it ever too late to pursue this?

Whitney Freya 10:29
Absolutely not. Absolutely not. I have a woman. So I have an online program that goes along with my latest book, 30 days to unstoppable be the day dream made visible. And she’s 81 years old. And she shared with us how, you know, her goal had been for her 80th birthday to have a solo art show. And she’s like, boat with COVID. And, you know, she felt like he was already pushing the envelope, right? And we all encouraged her like, okay, at one’s a perfect time to do this, you know what’s next. And so she made a phone call, all she did is make one phone call to a community center or something. And from that came a whole community wide like 25 artists in this big outdoor Art Walk. And you know, she was blown away. And so with unstoppable dream, the premises, when you’re given these ideas, or visions or dreams for, you know, a simplicity sake, you’re given a dream of like, Oh, I’d really love to do that. When we can understand that literally, that idea is being given to us. Right like Liz Gilbert. In her book, Big Magic says like ideas are swirling around just looking for hosts, we know that everything exists is energy before matter. So when you get that energy, that feeling of enthusiasm and curiosity, and and it lights you up, and it gets you excited, that’s the energy calling you like your particular genius matches up with that dream that’s wanting to be experienced on planet Earth. And you just have to kind of midwife it into being in the book, I use the analogy of gardening, right. And I talked about, like, if you want to grow tomatoes, you would get a tomato seed. And that seed has everything, it needs to become a tomato, it doesn’t need you to teach it, how to become a tomato, right? It’s not going to accidentally become a green bean or Canada. It has everything it needs. But it does need you to open up the packet. Right, clear some dirt, put it in the dirt, allow it to germinate, water it and then keep it weeded. And all of that, right. So that’s how I feel like these dreams, we have these goals you have whether it’s to buy a red Ferrari, or travel and you know, meditate in Nepal or India, it doesn’t matter. Whatever the dream is. It has everything it needs. It just needs you to kind of be the gardener. And that’s when we can become unstoppable. And what you don’t know is that red Ferrari, what you get to do in order to be able to walk in and buy that red Ferrari. That’s probably the point not the Ferrari. I love it. Yeah.

george grombacher 13:18
How do I? How do I know that this is the one I’m supposed to stick with and turn all those down?

Whitney Freya 13:27
Oh, I love that question. Yes. So when you get an idea, right? It’s like, oh, okay, I want to I want to learn how to do this, I want to start horseback riding. Let’s just use a random example. I want to start horseback riding. And then inevitably, most of us start going because the way we’ve been raised and our minds have been trained to think we start worrying about well what if I fall off the horse maybe I’m not strong enough or I’m too old or too young or whatever. So the next step when you have a lack of clarity is just to take the very next present moment action you could take so if you decide Oh, I want to learn how to ride horses, but Oh, geez, that you know, I remember hearing about someone who got paralyzed riding horses biloela what would be the first step you could take? It might be just searching, horseback riding in your area. Right? So that’s the very next step. You’re not about to walk outside and hop on a horse right? So you just keep getting more information and what happens is by the time you google search and you contact a couple people, maybe you go visit Reno, you know horse stables or something and meet the person if you’re still getting excited. And you know, there may be a friend calls I’m like, guess what, you know, Bob just called me and told me that he started taking horseback riding lessons. It’s like, I was just thinking about the same thing, right like those synchronicities and coincidences will make themselves known to you if you’re meant to continue down that path. If you search and there are no horses in the area, and then you You know, here’s someone else that says something about, oh, I really want to do this. And that gets you more excited or, you know, there’s just, it doesn’t feel like it’s flowing, then you don’t even have to decide I don’t want to learn how to ride horses, you just take a step back and say, okay, universe, whatever it is for you, you know, if I’m supposed to learn how to ride horses, or start a business, or learn how to be a meditation teacher, or learn how to paraglide or have children, or whatever it is, you need to let me know, right? I’m not going to force anything. So this is a, you know, a big shift from like the doodoo do produce achieve succeed, you know, that driving striving kind of energy. It’s really waiting until it almost feels like this is going to happen with or without you. Right? Like, wow, okay. I can’t believe how many people have just mentioned horses to me.

When I was, I got a long, passionate email from a woman in Nigeria in July of 2010. And I was out here in Oregon, it was before I moved out here, but there, this county has 2 million acres, 7000 people. So it’s a sparsely populated area. And I’m reading this email from this woman that’s sharing with me the plight of women in Nigeria, and how she really feels like my work would help and asking if I had an African branch, and I almost choked, right? Like a Brit, an African branch. I’m like, I’m like, I don’t even have a twig or a leaf. You know, I’m like, a taproot with like, you know, it’s just me. And also, I noticed, and like, I received this long, passionate email from a woman in Nigeria, like, how does that happen? Well, so I decided I would wait 24 hours until I responded, right? Because my ego was like, girl, you’re you’re not, you got nothing in Africa. Sorry. I don’t can’t help you. Within that first, like, literally eight hours, two people, my neighbor, and someone at the grocery store, I think mentioned Nigeria to me. There was a priest going back to Nigeria, and there was a guy starting his Wi Fi business that was raised in Nigeria. And no one said the word Nigeria sent me was county is that I know of cents. So 24 hours later, I went back to that email. And I was curious, tell me more like, you know, and I ended up bundling my online programs at the time, and saying, Well, I can train you to be my African brand. And it takes a village. So I’ll recruit, you know, people in the States, I’ll charge them, I won’t charge you. We called it project Nigeria. And at the end, you’ll all be certified creatively fit coaches. And the whole time, like, I still have zero certifications in anything, right. And in January, I put it very quietly on my website, I had 18 people sign up for the coaching training. And now, you know, 11 years later, they’re about 400 plus all over the world. And that coaching training, let me know it wanted to happen. And I just obediently and then without a lot of fanfare, because it contradicted my own personal beliefs about what I was capable of. I put it out there and the response, let me know, right? So if I’d put it out there, and no one had signed up, then I would have not pursued it. But it was, you know, it had a life of its own. So that’s, that’s how I want to be engaged in this thing called life, right? Is, is following like going with the current not trying to paddle against it. So we can practice that. We can practice that and we pride I practice it at the canvas and in meditation, through my teaching and my books, so it’s been highly effective.

george grombacher 18:48
Beautiful, I love it. Yeah. Whitney, the people are ready for that difference making tip, what do you have for them?

Whitney Freya 18:56
The difference making tip is focus on what you desire. paint a picture in your mind of the best case scenario. rather than worrying that it won’t happen. When we learn. When we remember how to do that. This world will change dramatically.

george grombacher 19:17
We think that that is great stuff that definitely gets Come on. Come on. Thank you so much for coming on. Where can where can people learn more about you? How can they engage with you? How can they pick up a copy of 30 days to unstoppable

Whitney Freya 19:31
right so Whitney freya.com has everything you need. Apparently I’m the only Whitney Freya on the planet so you can search Whitney Freya on Amazon and Whitney Freya canvas on Facebook, but you can find that really easily. Facebook and Instagram are kind of predominantly where I hang out. There’s a contact form on my website. I’m very accessible. So and the other thing that I would say is, you know, when we’re feeling that energy, that Excitement or that call to something like wow, this is really sparked something in me I’m curious, get curious as well about the role that fear is going to play in your next step. Because fear, you know is also the same energy as excitement. And it’s actually not there to stop you, it’s there to bring you present, perhaps let you know of some more tools in the toolkit that you want to have before you take those steps. But often, what lies on the other side of us facing that fear is our next biggest breakthrough. Right? It’s not a barricade, it’s a door just waiting for you to open it. And it’s letting you know, like, hey, there’s some unknown that you have to pass through. But as long as you’re aware of that, like this is the fear is just because of the change that’s waiting for you on the other side. So if the idea of painting at the canvas or you know, meditating 30 days to unstoppable is really a meditative journey with sacred geometry. If any of that feels you know, unknown in any way like unsafe it could be just that that’s you letting yourself know that there’s some change on the other side, the unknown is going to make itself known in your life. So that’s, that’s an important shift we’re making as well. Learning to harness fear rather than let it stop us.

george grombacher 21:27
I love it. Beautiful. Well if you enjoyed this as much as I did show when your appreciation and share today show the friend who also appreciates good ideas, go to Whitney Freya. com that’s whityfruya.com find her on Facebook and LinkedIn and pick up a copy of 30 days to unstoppable. I’ll list all those in the notes of the show. Thanks again, Whitney. Thank you, Jared. And until next time, keep fighting the good fight. We’re all in this together.