Alicia M. Rodriguez's Blog, page 2

Life Interrupted

On Monday, April 28, we had a widespread electric outage across the Iberian peninsula and several European countries. No electricity. No internet. No phone service. No cooking if you had an electric stove, which most of us have. You didn't want to open the refrigerator lest your food spoil (faster).

The feeling of being vulnerable and isolated was palpable. No one knew what had happened nor how long this would last. Lines of communication were cut. Right before I lost all communication, I managed to text my friends nearby and text my son in the USA, telling him what had occurred and sharing that it was unlikely I could communicate with him beyond this message and asking him to watch the news for updates. Just as the message left my phone, all communication was cut.

Life interrupted.

There is no work to do. You have no water if you have a water pump dependent on electricity. You don't drive because the traffic lights are out, and drivers are panicked. My car is now charging my phone, and I am getting news as I sit in the driveway with the engine running.

I think of my friend Leslie who lives on a farm outside of Lagos. This badass woman can easily live off her land. Her garden blooms with berries, tomatoes, and assorted vegetables. She has an outdoor kitchen and grill. She is a vegetarian, so there's no need to refrigerate meat. If this lasts longer than a few days, Leslie will be fine while the rest of us empty our refrigerators and grill what we can while the rest spoils—no trekking to the supermarket or restaurant for food. Everything is closed. 

There is no one to talk to (unless you walk to your neighbor's house like I did), no Spotify music, no audiobook or podcast to listen to, no television to watch, no news, no NOISE.

That sense of vulnerability transforms into curiosity for me. My (our) dependence on technology is undeniable. And it's a bit frightening. To see how integrally it is woven into our day-to-day when it is removed gives me pause.

In a few short hours, anxiety turns into curiosity and then gratitude. It is so QUIET!

It is a beautiful, warm, and sunny day. Without anything to do, I relish sitting in the sun, reading a manuscript I promised to blurb, and working on a few poems and essays I plan to submit soon. These things I had said I would get to "in time" are front of mind now.

Later, I walk through the fields nearby with my dog, Sophie. Instead of hearing cars and construction sounds, I listen to birds and a few barking dogs. I return just as the sun sets and pull out my laptop to write this by candlelight. My cottage looks so inviting, glowing with this subtle lighting, inviting me to transition from the day's chores (none today) to slowing my pace as I prepare for sleep.

I have no idea if the electricity will be on when I awaken tomorrow or if this outage is a multi-day event. Sitting here by candlelight, I am not concerned, simply relishing this silence in the heavenly glow of candles scattered about.

Tomorrow, I'll worry about the food spoiling, the appointments missed, and the work left undone.

Tonight, I'll listen to the heartbeat of the night as I fall asleep.

The Liberation of Vulnerability

There's a gentle awakening that comes, not on any particular birthday but somewhere along the sacred journey past midlife—a quiet moment when your soul realizes: you simply have no more fucks to give.

This isn't a hardening of the heart. It's a beautiful unfurling.

I've been contemplating why we become more willing—even eager—to be vulnerable as we age. To speak our truths with tenderness. To share our stumbles and wrong turns with compassion. To reveal ourselves without the careful masks we once thought necessary for survival.

This was very personal as I wrote my memoir, The Shaman's Wife: A Mystical Journey of Surrender and Self-Discovery. My writing mentor was correct when she appraised my first chapters. "You're a good writer, Alicia, but you're not in it. You are emotionally distant." I knew she was right. I had not allowed the essential vulnerability to appear to write the story I knew had gestated inside me for years.

The Sacred Emptying of Fucks-to-Give

The heart has its own wisdom, and it whispers: enough.

This gradual emptying is both a letting go and a filling up. One morning, you wake to find that the energy once poured into maintaining appearances, into pleasing others at your soul's expense, into hiding your authentic light—it now seeks a different channel. There is no violent prying open of your revered treasure box. It now becomes a voluntary sharing with the world, a cleansing of sorts.

But what a blessing follows! Suddenly, you can speak your truth with love. You can adorn your body with what brings you joy. You can create what flows naturally from your spirit rather than what the marketplace demands. You can love expansively in the way your soul has always longed to love.

Mortality: The Great Teacher

Nothing opens the heart quite like the gentle awareness that we are temporary visitors here. Not in the abstract way we understood intellectually when younger ("yes, all things pass"), but in the soul-deep knowing that arrives when beloved friends transition beyond this realm, when parents complete their journeys, when your body begins whispering reminders of its sacred impermanence.

If not in this precious moment, then when?

That question becomes less philosophical and more a loving invitation. Why am I saving this beauty for "someday"? Why am I postponing the heart conversation that yearns to happen? Why am I delaying the creative offering that wishes to be born through me?

The Soul's Longing to Be Truly Seen

Perhaps most sacred is the growing yearning to be known—truly known—in this holy now we inhabit. To release the personas we've crafted to navigate worldly success, social belonging, and others' expectations.

I find my spirit increasingly drawn toward authentic connection. Surface exchanges feel like water slipping through cupped hands—precious droplets lost. I hunger for depth. For truth. For the divine recognition that happens when one soul truly sees another. It soon becomes effortless to show up fully from that sacred place of "no more fucks to give."

In that longing, I've discovered a universal truth: we are all thirsting for the same authenticity. When I've offered my true self—tender places, uncertainties, and all—what returns is not rejection but a profound communion.

Wisdom Still Unfolding

Some teachings arrive in their perfect season:

Your existence is a blessing, not an apology. Your presence, your needs, your evolution—all sacred aspects of your journey. Save gentle apologies for actual harm, not for the miracle of being human.

Voice your heart's desires. With gentleness. With clarity. Without diminishing their importance. This remains a practice for me, having been taught to make myself small, to find gratitude in scarcity, and to place others' convenience above my truth. But each day brings new courage.

Create what your spirit calls forth. Worldly measures of success—status, wealth, influence—begin to feel hollow when held against the soul's need for authentic expression. What wishes to flow through you? What creation, what insight, what offering keeps gently nudging your awareness? That's your spirit's compass.

Beyond Our Sacred Stories

Perhaps the most profound grace of aging is recognizing how many limitations were simply stories we told ourselves. "I could never..." or "That's not who I am..." or "I've always been this way."

We are infinitely more than these narratives. More expansive, more contradictory, more surprising, and more capable than any story could contain.

Vulnerability allows us to step beyond these comfortable myths into a messy, beautiful truth: we contain universes. We are sacred works in progress until our final breath.

In that understanding comes not just the courage to be vulnerable but the recognition that vulnerability itself might be our greatest offering—the way we allow divine light to shine through our beautifully imperfect human forms.

What if we welcomed this grace now rather than waiting for age to grant permission? What would transform if we embraced this freedom in this precious moment?

I'm holding space for your sharing: Where have you discovered unexpected blessings in vulnerability? What aspects of your authentic self are you finally allowing to shine? What are you willing to share so I can see myself in you, and you can see yourself in me?

Welcome to our holy ground.

 

Riding the Whitewaters of Life

The weather has improved in the Algarve and I’m looking forward to sitting in the sun on the terrace and a relaxing day outside today. As I gazed out from my window, I had a thought. How it is that one day it is cloudy and rainy then wait a few days, and it’s sunny and bright? These cycles are never ending and yet, so often, we want to hold onto something so badly denying that everything passes.

Life is constant movement. In quiet meditation I can almost feel the movement physically, when my attention is both acute and open. Perhaps it is the energy of the Equinox last week causing a recalibration of sorts, taking that center-point within me and drawing my energy out into the Universe, a dialogue with life where the only thing I can do is listen and receive the silence as the fundamental conversation I need to evolve.

I admit that I often try to hold on to my past attachments to people, things and the habitual ways of living generated by the conditioned mind. But it’s like falling into the rapids and trying to grab a tree limb so as not to go with the current. The current gets stronger the more I resist.

When I would go whitewater rafting the guides would tell us if we fell out of the raft to lie back with our feet in front of us. The current would always win. But by lying back you didn’t exhaust yourself and with feet out you could bounce off boulders in the water until the current finally took you safely to shore.

We are all in whitewater right now.

Some of us know it, some know and resist and some don’t know at all and are being violently swept downstream. There are days that the best thing to do is to lie back, feet out front and surrender to the ride taking energy from the current instead of expending energy and exhausting yourself in a futile attempt to stay in one place, too afraid to let go. It’s all part of our grand ride here.

We will reach the shore safely, not without bumps and bruises, but believe that everything passes, even now, when the waters are turbulent, but imagine that eventually, we’ll arrive on shore.

That is, after all, what hope is.

Have a blessed weekend.

Photo by Megan Nixon on Unsplash

Embracing Life’s Shifts: A Guide to Navigate Transitions with Confidence

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

There aren’t many people that welcome change. Instead, most people ease into a comfort zone and prefer to stay there. That is, until something outside their control shakes them enough to pay attention and wake up to the question, “Is this what I truly want?”

It begins with an inkling, a whisper, a gentle nudge…

Something is calling you to something more, but you’re not sure what that is, or maybe you know, but you’re not sure how to get started.

This is the first sign that change is coming.

Whether you’re ready or not or fully conscious of it, you’ve stepped again into the flowing river of life, and nothing is the same as before.

You are on the cusp of a transition.

Transitions are invitations to grow and evolve.

 It takes a while to notice when you are in transition. The signs are subtle at first.

Maybe there’s impatience with someone or something in your life?

It could be that you begin to feel an undefined uneasiness.

Sometimes, a sense of dissatisfaction with work or life creates confusion because, on the surface, everything seems the same.

But it’s not.

Something inside you is moving, calling you to make a change.

Change seems scary, but what makes it so uncomfortable isn’t the change.

It’s the resistance to change that causes discomfort.  

“Many people resist transition and therefore never allow themselves to enjoy who they are. Embrace the change, no matter what it is; once you do, you can learn about the new world you’re in and take advantage of it.”

— Nikki Giovanni

The first phase of a life transition should be creating space for deep reflection to connect to what is buried within you that is calling to you. You need stillness to do the internal work before you do the external work of planning your change.

If you are experiencing a sense of change or transition and feel stuck and unsure of how to step into a different future, intentionally use these 7 steps to move through the transition with grace and ease. Get support to help you understand what is happening in your life.

1. DECIDE

You would think this was obvious, but it’s not. It is the number one reason people are stuck in their current situation. They haven’t decided to change their lives intentionally. Without that firm decision, that big YES! nothing will change. You’ll stay stuck exactly where you are.

2. COMMIT

I’m not going to kid you. It could be tough for a while, at least until you release your anxiety and your fearful “what ifs” and allow yourself to flow with the energy. Noticing where your energy wants to go and courageously following it will get you moving toward your dreams and goals. When you commit to your dream, you are meeting resistance head-on. Speak that commitment out loud, tell your friends, write it down, and when things get difficult, remember why you committed to changing your life.

3. PLAN

Hope is not a strategy.

Without a plan, you will deplete your energy and do things that don’t serve your new life. Everything is a sparkly new thing, drawing your attention away from what matters most. Your plan must align with your commitment, be strategic, and move forward with every step, even if only a bit. Some life transitions take years to complete, but that’s fine. Every day you do something to build a new life is a step forward.

4. ACT

No bellybutton gazing allowed. You will feel more confident acting on your dream after completing the first three steps. Without action, there is no movement forward. You should strive to do one thing, no matter how small, every day toward achieving your dreams. A helpful tool to keep you focused is a planner or benchmarks to maintain your momentum and keep you moving forward. Hiring a coach to support you will keep you on track and give you moral support when you need it.

5. ADJUST

Development is iterative, not linear. You may go down one road only to find that this part of the road doesn’t serve you. There are no mistakes, only detours that will eventually lead to what suits you. It can be trial and error while you experiment with changes and new ways of approaching your life. Don’t worry. It’s part of the process.

6. ACHIEVE

Make sure you acknowledge your progress and achievements. When you reach a target date or benchmark, celebrate. Maybe it’s a massage or a weekend trip. Whatever keeps you motivated is useful.

7. CELEBRATE

Little celebrations are necessary to keep you motivated. Once you’ve achieved your goal, be sure to celebrate. It doesn’t have to be a party. When I finally moved to Portugal in December 2020, I treated myself to a nice dinner in Lisbon at a restaurant whose owner I had met. It helped me feel at home in a new place. Nothing flashy. It was all about connecting to my new life.

My invitation to you is..

Start Now!

What do you need to decide? That is the first step. Find the stillness that will lead you to the decision. Once you have made your decision, write it down. Then, follow the steps, writing all the elements into a planner or journal. Don’t pressure yourself with the need to move fast. It will happen in its own time if you take one step at a time and are consistently doing one thing a day to move forward.

If you need support, find me at my website and consider a Becoming Limitless Experience or a shorter Pause with me in Portugal. The results speak for themselves.

Alicia M. Rodriguez is a writer, storyteller, and catalyst for personal growth. In December 2020, she moved to Portugal from Ecuador, ready for new adventures. Living in different cultures has been a passion that feeds her curiosity about what connects us. It is the basis of her storytelling and writing, where she shares her thoughts on living an awakened and conscious life. People come to Portugal to work with her in private curated retreats and small groups. Her mission is to empower people to embrace limitless possibilities and forge powerful futures.

Her memoir, The Shaman’s Wife: A Mystical Journey of Surrender and Self-Discovery, recounting her personal journey with an Ecuadorian shaman is available worldwide. For Updates and special events and to read a chapter of her book, visit her author page here.

The Magic Of Storytelling

Embrace the ordinary, listen deeply, and share your voice—because stories are the threads that weave us together.

We are all storytellers. Think about your conversations. Every conversation shares a story of some kind. Maybe it's what you did over the weekend or the thrill of closing another piece of business. It might be sharing your grief at losing someone or something important and the memories that come with that.

Great storytellers notice the subtle stories hidden within the ordinary events of life. Listen to the conversations that shape personal stories. Human dynamics around love, fear, connection, courage, and more populate our conversations.

My most impactful stories come from the actual events of my own life. I may add a little embellishment to entertain my audience, but at the core, these stories capture our silly mistakes, moments of bravery, and acts of kindness. It's not just our achievements but our frailties and triumphs over challenges that connect us. We share similar stories even if the circumstances differ.

Are you wondering if your stories are worth sharing? I had the same doubts. But I started sharing them, anyway. Although I adapt them to suit my audience or to add some humor, I stay true to the experience and the lessons learned. We all have collective stories based on our shared human condition. And that's where the magic happens—through stories, we recognize ourselves in one another and acknowledge our interdependence. So don't hold back—tell your stories, and your audience will see themselves in new ways through your story!

But storytelling is more than sharing your own experiences. It's equally important to listen to the stories told by others. When you actively listen to someone else's story, they feel witnessed and heard. Through the gift of listening, you'll find a reflection of yourself in their words. Listening is as essential to sharing stories as telling them. Together, we uncover the beautiful threads that weave us all together.

Have you noticed fully engaged, courageous, and joyful people tell the best stories? They dive into new experiences, step outside their comfort zone, and embrace the adventures life invites. The more you immerse yourself in the rich tapestry of existence, the more captivating stories you'll have to share.

Being an incredible storyteller is about embracing the ordinary to notice the extraordinary within. It's about listening closely, reflecting with humor, and intentionally engaging in life. Be yourself, get curious, explore, pay attention, and watch the magic unfold.

Tell your stories because that is how we build our connection to each other.

Stories are how we understand that, as different as we may seem, we are far more alike than we believe.

Seeing and Being Seen: The Meaning of Thank You

If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough. ~ Meister Eckhart

Those two words are often bypassed in our busy lives, as if those around you should know that you’re grateful.

But they are two very important words that go beyond merely being polite.

Thank you really means: “I see you. I see you seeing me. We see each other.”

This is what thank you means to me.

Right now, I want to thank you for being here, for reading what I write, for sending me your comments, feedback and messages on Substack or by email or in many other ways.

So often I wonder if what I write actually makes a difference. And then I receive a message telling me that it did for someone.

If you are that someone, I write for you.

So from the bottom of my heart, thank you, thank you.

In gratitude, please accept this token of appreciation. It is a small e-book called, “Notes to Myself: How to Journal.”

Journaling has been part of my life since I was a child. It helps me process my life and gives me a safe place to go with my thoughts and feelings. It refines my intuition and nurtures my creativity.

Use this button to download the ebook and learn how journaling can become a mindfulness practice that you will enjoy and that will help you make sense of your life. 

DOWNLOAD THE E-BOOK HERE

Photo by Daniel Andrade on Unsplash

From Trauma to Treasure

For Someone Awakening to the Trauma of His/Her PastA Poem by John O’Donahue

Everyone experiences trauma in their lives. There is no escaping it. Trauma can show up through micro-aggressions or through events that challenge our very survival. How we deal with trauma will determine the course of our lives.

It takes courage, and support, to move from “trauma to treasure” as I call it. In my own story in The Shaman’s Wife, I experienced traumatic events that I managed to survive and spin them into wisdom to serve others.

This poem by John O’Donahue, one of my favorite poets, from To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings, speaks to the journey we must take to weave a new tapestry of our lives that includes our wounds turning them into forgiveness for past aggressions. It is truly sacred work to “be blessed with a compassionate guide who can accompany you through the fear and grief until your heart has wept its way to your true self.”

For everything under the sun there is a time.
This is the season of your awkward harvesting,
When the pain takes you where you would rather not go,

Through the white curtain of yesterdays to a place
You had forgotten you knew from the inside out;
And a time when that bitter tree was planted

That has grown always invisibly beside you
And whose branches your awakened hands
Now long to disentangle from your heart.

You are coming to see how your looking often darkened
When you should have felt safe enough to fall toward love,
How deep down your eyes were always owned by something

That faced them through a dark fester of thorns
Converting whoever came into a further figure of the wrong;
You could only see what touched you as already torn.

Now the act of seeing begins your work of mourning.
And your memory is ready to show you everything,
Having waited all these years for you to return and know.

Only you know where the casket of pain is interred.
You will have to scrape through all the layers of covering
And according to your readiness, everything will open.

May you be blessed with a wise and compassionate guide
Who can accompany you through the fear and grief
Until your heart has wept its way to your true self.

As your tears fall over that wounded place,
May they wash away your hurt and free your heart.
May your forgiveness still the hunger of the wound

So that for the first time you can walk away from that place,
Reunited with your banished heart, now healed and freed,
And feel the clear, free air bless your new face.

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10 Lessons for Being Fierce: For Women

Many years ago I was invited to walk through the Ecuadorian rainforest with a family of shamans. That day was the beginning of a long journey I chronicle in my memoir, The Shaman’s Wife: A Mystical Journey of Surrender and Self-Discovery.

Here are 10 Lessons I learned during that walk that helped me become fierce in my life and leadership. They are lessons for women, so if you are male, you may still learn from these lessons, but know that the original intent was to support women’s experience in life and leadership. (27 minutes)

Holding the Center When the World Feels Broken

Why Your Inner Growth Matters in Times of Chaos

“Why should I care about personal development when the world is going to shit?”

 It was over a glass of wine – ok, a few glasses of wine- that she asked me that question. It was the end of a stormy day. The evening had started well, with a beautifully presented dinner, and now we were relaxing over the last bottle of wine.

Our conversation detoured into today's politics. We are both American by birth, although I consider myself Colombian by heart. 

"I didn't vote for him. He's destroying everything. I hate what's happening. I just want to stay home and pull the blanket over my head," she said with a twinge of despair in her voice.

"Why the F*%# should I care about growing or evolving when the world is shit?"

There it was. THE question that I had asked myself a few days previously when I was walking the beach. At the time, I didn't have an answer. Tonight, I did.

"I'll tell you why. Because it's not about a THEM out THERE. It's all about YOU and how you want to show up. You wake up every morning and look in the mirror. Tomorrow, look into your eyes and tell me what you see.”

“When I look, I see someone who is tired. Somedays, I see someone who is angry. On other mornings, my eyes are sad and grieving. I am all of that. Every day, it changes.”

“But after a hot shower and a walk outside or a slow cup of coffee looking out at my garden with my pets next to me, I relax into my heart, and I understand that I can be the eye in the storm. I find peace in the quiet. I reconnect with who I am and how I want to express that because my job is to reveal that space to others.” 

"Alicia, don't you get tired of teaching about conscious leadership and leading an intentional life when the person on the other side of the screen lives in such chaos and works in toxic systems?” She asked.

"That is precisely why I have my quiet mornings and start by being in nature. Nature is what it is. Sometimes, it's brutal. Storms destroy cities. Fires devastate large swaths of land. People lose their houses and sometimes their lives. It's the force of nature, and it hurts.”

“Then, like nature, we recover. We rebuild. We move from death to rebirth constantly. We begin to ask better questions. My job is to help clients, to help myself, ask different and difficult questions that startle us out of complacency, and remind us that everything is iterative, not linear. Life is a series of cycles. The essential part is to hold the center. To stand in who you are and what you believe is the only way to weather the storms of our times.” 

“So, no, I can't change what happens in politics, the economy, or global issues, but I can stand with someone in the middle of their storm and remind them of who they are.”

“And that is why we should all care about our evolution of consciousness. Personal, leadership, and spiritual development matter more now than ever."

I watched as she took a deep breath, her shoulders dropping and her face's tension released. It wasn't resignation. She was looking inward and recognizing herself.

We finished our wine, walked outside, and gave each other a long, luscious hug and kiss on the cheek.

Then we walked back into the storm.

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 Photo by Jigar Panchal on Unsplash

Wonder is How I Understand My World

Why Art, Nature, Music and the Unknown keep me wondering and wandering

“Wonder is a complex feeling that creates a heightened state of consciousness and emotion. It’s akin to curiosity, but it’s more expansive in scope and contains attributes of surprise and joy. It has been defined in scientific literature as our innate desire to understand the world, which simmers inside each of us waiting to be ignited. Wonder often seeds our curiosity.” From the book Your Brain on Art: pg 174

I’m naturally curious and intuitive. I feel my best in nature, especially near the ocean. When I’m home working, I often play music and get up and dance, just because it feels good.

In a world that seems to be driven by technology and where most people no longer say hello with their heads buried in their phones, I often feel like an anachronism.

I love to greet people with a smile or a simple “Bom dia.” It’s returned, and in a moment, we each made each other’s day.

Beauty by the ocean.

I don’t want to lose my sense of awe and wonder, and I don’t want you to either. When I feel like I may be getting too serious, I go to nature with an intention or focus. I may decide to notice the color green, yellow, or purple that day. I take photos with my phone and return to write about what I observed. It brings me back into a state of gratitude, presence, and creativity.

If you feel like you’re stuck at work or in your writing, try choosing a focus and go out and look for it. Photograph it. Then, write about or paint or draw it. I promise it will inspire you, and that stuckness will dissipate.

Don’t forget to smile at others, too. That will fill up both your cups!

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