#528 Ride the Freedom Train

Flow Dreaming. It's a show where we talk about the power of your mind to change your world around you, to literally affect the fabric of your reality. We talk about this feeling of hope and joy and relief. And that is what being aware of your flow does. It gives you a feeling of power again in your lives. And that is what being aware of your flow does. It gives you a feeling of power again in your lives. Breathe. It is the feeling that you bring forward. It is your emotional connection that really sets the tone for what is going to be happening to you and for you. And you know that feeling, when you touch it, it just spreads through you. I'm Summer McStravik, and welcome to another episode of Flow Dreaming. Hi, it's Summer, and a quick request before we jump into the show. If you like this podcast, the number one reason Flow Dream has grown is because of your reviews. People rely on your opinion, and frankly, they often misunderstand Flow Dreaming. The only way to correct that is through you leaving a few words about the program. So pop over to itunes or your podcast app and write a review. It means so much to me when you do. Now onto the show. Hello, welcome to Flow Dreaming. We have a show today about freedom. Freedom, Freedom, freedom, freedom. So I, you know, I work with lots of people and do events and teach and teach and teach. And because of this, I see a lot of commonalities, a lot of common themes, and I've kind of identified these as patterns over the years, over time. And lately, one of the patterns that I've been kind of zeroing in on, focusing on, just playing with, rolling around in my head, is the theme of freedom, the pattern of freedom, the pattern of lack of freedom, the emotional end point of freedom. Oh, my God. If you're already overwhelmed, keep listening. We use a lot of lingo in Flow Dreaming that is unique to the way we look at the world. Gosh, I guess that's true of many types of philosophies and social sciences. There is a kind of insider lingo, and you will get used to it. Our insider lingo today has to do with the word freedom. Understanding it, looking at it from a perspective of energy, of emotion, of something that you manifest or don't manifest for yourself. Flow Dreaming, yes, is about manifesting. It is about creating. In fact, if you found this show because you thought it was about meditation, Flow Dreaming is not about meditation. It's about how we are able to interact with and guide and shape not just our lives and our futures, but our own reaction, our own place within our lives and futures so that we generate tremendous amounts of happiness, fulfillment, peace, healing, contentment, growth, stability, income, whatever, you name it, throw it in there. So every episode I kind of, you know, tackle a new topic, a new little, you know, side of the prism, the facet of the crystal. And what prompted today's episode was that I realized. I don't know when I realized this. You know, how sometimes things just kind of creep up on you. You're kind of knowing it for a while, but one day it just lands you just. Oh, that totally landed. I got it. It's been there, though. When I decided to become an entrepreneur again, I was an entrepreneur. I had my own business, had several businesses before I went to work for a corporate publisher. And then after that, I went back into entrepreneurship. And when I went back in, it was because I was growing this company called Flow Dreaming. Right, the namesake of this podcast and beginning to teach people how to flow Dream, how to create, how to manifest, how to use Law of Attraction in a way that they had never fathomed before. I was deciding I want to create a life for myself, right? Not just a company. I realized I had full control over the way that I grew this company, what it would look like, what it would feel like. Do I go into an office every day? Do I work from home? Do I have lots and lots of employees? Do I just have a few? Do I interact a lot with students and clients? Or do I stand back and let everything just, you know, come from a website in front of me? All of these choices to make lots and lots of decisions. And where do those decisions come from? They come from your. From my desire to create a way of living. Right? A way of living. And part of, you know, the pressure I think we all face when we're thinking about what do I do for a living? Whether you're going to a job or creating your own job, part of the pressure is, do I do it the way everyone else says I have to do it, or can I do it differently? Will it be successful if I do it differently? Will it be successful if I do it the way everyone else is doing it? So anyone who's listening right now, I don't care if you're selling beaded hair combs off of ebay, or you started your own coaching company, or you have your own multimillion dollar company, or you're working a regular 9 to 5, either in a big shot corporate position or just down at the local five and dime. It doesn't matter, right? It's all in how you are spending your time, what you're receiving back for it. And importantly, the kind of life it is developing and creating for you. The life it's developing and creating for you. So you're not looking at your job as a thing that you go to and give to someone else. Right now. You're looking at your job as something you've created that you're giving to yourself. And maybe you had a hand in this, a partnership, because you've got a boss, perhaps, but you're still creating this for you. Maybe you have a little less control over the say of it, but you are still, you have more control than you think. This all has had me thinking a lot lately. Do we create freedom for ourselves or do we create slavery for ourselves? Slavery of our time, slavery of our talent. Slavery inside our own minds. Not to anyone else, but our own minds. Being the jailer, being the mean and nasty taskmaster. Here's what I mean by this. So, you know, I grew this company, Flow Dreaming into a pretty beautiful and healthy business. I grew it over years and years and years. And last year, no, was it last year? Now I'm losing my mind a little bit. 20, 15, 18 months ago, some of you know, I was diagnosed with stage two breast cancer. And I looked at what I had built and I thought, now if I built this right, this company should offer me exquisite freedom. If I didn't build it right, all I've created for myself is a very sure long term job. And I rolled that around in my head for months. What have I made? Because you see, I had to really put it to the test. When you're going through chemo and radiation and doing all of your alternative therapies, you discover whether you have freedom from or not. Now, fortunately, I discovered I did have freedom. I did. Somehow I had managed to build that in. I could excuse myself for weeks at a time and still see this beautiful thing that I had built flourish. Even if you're working for somebody else, your position should be flourishing. It should be integrated into the company. It should be necessary. It should be something that helps really support it. Yet if you need to step away from it, you should be able to do that. You should be able to take your two week vacation. You should be able to take those days off when you need them. If you have done a good job with your position, you can do that. If you've done a poor job with your position, you've made yourself so valuable you can never not be there. Do you know where that comes from? Fear. It's fear, it's lack thinking. If I do too good a job, if they discover they don't need me, then they'll fire me. I need to make myself necessary all the time. And here you find people then who are never taking a break. They can't go away. They're the only ones who know how to do something, who the boss relies on. The only ones. Which is really great for your inner self and your ego and all that. But what have you created for yourself? Have you created freedom or have you created a lifelong job? Now, I'm not saying that you have to create freedom. I'm asking you today, this episode, just to look at this, evaluate in your own life. Because like I was saying in the start, most people I talk with, one of their emotional goals in life is freedom. We all want to feel loved, adored and cherished. We all want to have time, freedom, money freedom and inner freedom to be and explore what we are. Right? Those are the big three freedoms. I noticed, however, that I didn't totally create freedom for myself, not completely. In many ways, I have also created a lifelong long term job because I'm still the face of flow dreaming. I'm still the person that you listen to. I'm the figurehead. And I know how and why I did this, because a lot of my own personal mentors, that's what they did too. Louise Hay, my old boss, she wrote some books and she began to teach and she became that figurehead. Everybody wants to listen to her, they want to hear her. She became the face of her company, Hay House. Obviously, though, at a certain point she realized she had just locked herself into a lifelong job. If she stopped teaching, if she stopped going on the road, if she stopped writing books, well, she couldn't. Everybody needed it. Everybody needed her. Till she made that beautiful choice and said, well, now I'm going to start publishing other people's books and promoting them and I'm going to grow my vision of helping people, teaching people how to love themselves. I'm going to grow it into something where other people can now contribute to that too. This has all got me thinking. What do I need to do to create increased freedom for myself? Time freedom, freedom in my future, Freedom to come in and be with you and share and write that crazy, fabulous new book. That's what I'm looking for. What are the things that are preventing me from feeling that freedom? Okay, now this is where I'm using me to be instructive to you. I'm able to write down a list of things That I quote, unquote, have to do and can't not do, can't let go of, can't avoid, must follow through all the time on Rat in a Wheel. Round and round, round, round we go. I know that you have a list like that too, and it's a list that keeps you from being free. Here is the caveat. I think I feel that having a kind of beautiful balance between the two is ideal. I want to feel necessary. I want to feel a part of things. I don't want to be the person who steps back and watches somebody else run everything and take it in God knows what direction and you know, fully starts to not even feel like me anymore. I don't want to do that. You don't want that for your job either, where you're just completely being told by other people what to do and how to do it and you've got to show up and you've got to do everything. Yes, you've made yourself invaluable, but gosh, at what price? You also want freedom. Back and forth. It's like a ping pong. I know maybe I'm losing you a little because I'm going back and forth in my mind as I'm kind of riffing, you know, thinking about it right now. I would like to be able to step back for weeks or months, dig into a book, do something else. But I don't want to let go of a beautiful vision of the, of the pieces and parts that I love and enjoy and the connectivity with you and the teaching and my me school students. So I want a freedom based job where I can jump back and forth between either camp whenever I want. So you might be listening to this and thinking, yes, summer, sure you can do that because you've done this and you've built this and you've got all these special extra advantages, blah, blah, blah. No, no, no, no, I haven't. I've just been thinking about this and I'm wondering if you've been thinking about this. So, for instance, you know, the way that I run Flow Dreaming is I have a virtual staff. I refuse to get an office space because I don't want to be beholden to driving in every day, getting dressed and going through traffic and, you know, busying myself and then not being home when my kids are home. And I don't want to do that. And that means that my employees don't do it either. They have enormous freedom. They work when they want to work, around their schedules, around their kids and all of their other Obligations. They work a lot and they work hard, but they have enormous freedom in how they work, how long they're working for, and all kinds of other things that creates more of a balanced life. So I'm wondering, have you put any thought into this? Do you have a job that makes you invaluable, or do you have freedom? Or do you have both? Because a lot of times when people, in particular entrepreneurs, create jobs for themselves, create companies for themselves, they don't end up creating freedom. They create in inner slavery. I can't stop. I've got to do everything. I'm behind on everything. I'm going to work 50 hours. I'm going to work 60 hours. I'm going to work 70 hours. Believe me, I know the pressure. I get caught up in it myself more often than I even want to admit to you, but I do. That's not what I'm building my life around. And fortunately, there's this piece in me that always pulls me back and says, summer, summer. You really are trying to build freedom, Time, freedom, emotional freedom, creative freedom, freedom to be yourself, financial freedom. You ever wonder why that word so popular, financial freedom, what does it mean? Some people thinks it means that you have a couple million in the bank and you never have to work again. I know people who have a couple million in the bank. You know what they don't have? Financial freedom. It's one of those weird things. Even though you get what your initial goal is, you suddenly feel like, no, that's still not quite enough. I need more. I need more. I'm not free yet. I'm not free yet. You end up realizing it's not the am of money in the bank that's creating your freedom. It's that own little click that has to happen in your head. And most of us don't reach that because we're running on scarcity. We're running on lack. We never have enough. We need more. We need to shore things up. We need to get ourselves dug in even more, more valuable, more time, put in more, more, more. So financial freedom for most of us doesn't mean a few million in the bank. Financial freedom for most of us means a peaceful feeling inside of our minds that we have enough income, enough money to last us as long as we plan on living. It might mean a few million now. It might mean 10,000amonth. It might mean you've built something so safe and solid that it's just going to keep generating for you. It might mean that you've worked yourself up so beautifully in Your profession, that your retirement is assured. These are all different forms of financial freedom, but the real piece of it is in your head. I'm free now. I don't ever have to worry again. That's where we get into flow dreaming. Just feel that for a moment. What if you could feel right now, I am free. I have time, freedom. I have emotional freedom, meaning I can be myself and I have financial freedom. I am free, absolutely secure and free. Notice how security and freedom go together. They're like best friend emotions. Feel them. You don't have freedom if you don't feel security, you don't. If you have freedom without security, you don't feel free, you panic. Too free, too free. If you only feel security without freedom, you might find yourself in one of those, you know, hamster, hamster ball kind of, you know, jobs, freedom and security, best friends, partners, yin yang, you feel both. So to draw this back to the theme, whatever you're building right now, whether it's an entrepreneurial company, whether it's a better position for you in a, in a workplace, are you developing both security and freedom? How can you develop both security and freedom? How much freedom do you need? Sometimes you don't need a lot of freedom in a day. You're like, no, I'm very happy to work eight to five. My freedom's on the weekends. Or I'm loving working eight to five because I'm absolutely retiring at 59 and a half and I'll never work a day again. Whereas I know you entrepreneurs might have worked till you're 80. You know what, your freedom can take different forms, but are you building both? If you close your eyes right now and feel yourself both free and secure, go into that emotional state, what's it like? Have things changed? Does it feel different than where you're at right now in your life? If it's a different feeling than what you're feeling right now, then it has become a goal. Then it's something that you're desiring. If you're closing your eyes and you're feeling it, you're like, yeah, but I feel this way all the time already. It's not a goal. You've already done it, you've made it. Kudos to you. Congratulations. And I mean that. Something that people take their entire life to learn sometimes. So when you flow dream, how can you create this freedom and this security? How is that done? Well, you know, you go to a business coach, they're going to give you a whole bunch of things to do on a paper and Say, do this, do this, do this, do this. If you go to a career counselor, they're going to say the same thing. Do this, do this, do this, do this, do this. Come to me. If you're studying energy, if you're studying flow, if you're studying how your future gets woven and put together, if you are studying how to be a co creator in the world, then you're looking at this from a different perspective, which is I'm going to go in and I'm going to flow dream every day. I am secure and I am free. I'm free and I'm secure. I'm secure and I'm free and I'm free and I'm secure. Whatever has to happen in my life, whatever adjustments need to be made so that I have both freedom and security, they are being made and I am following and I am doing whatever is called on me to do to reach that. Whatever that looks like, whatever that feels like, as long as it's feeling good, I'm doing that. That's something that I want. I want to embody that. What do I need to do, Flo? What actions do I need to take? How do I need to start thinking? How do I need to start making different decisions? Those are all things that you will flow dream around. So what's flow dreaming? What's this little magic piece I keep talking about? Tell you what. Oh, perfect timing. I'm gonna go take a glass of water and we're gonna take a quick break and when we get back, I am going to drop you into flow so that you can experience both freedom and security and understand how they go together. And I'm gonna tell you what flow dreaming is very briefly and how you can make this happen for yourself, what you need to do. So stay with me and we'll be right back. Hi, it's summer, but on break and I know that some of you are still wondering why, what is flow dreaming and what is mi School? Because I refer to both of these quite a bit in my podcast. Me School is a transformational program. It's a gorgeous and deeply revealing, empowering online school worldwide where I teach you how to remodel your life in any way you choose using the technique of flow dreaming as well as a bunch of other deeply powerful life changing processes. So me School is either enrolling or it's accepting names onto the wait list. And that means that I'm accepting students who work with me for the year. And you can learn how to do what I do in life the way I Think the way I build things, make things, heal things. Everything I talk about you will learn directly from me how to do. You're going to create some amazing things. My MI schoolers. Their lives change way beyond the norm. And you don't even have to be a superstar when you go in. Some of you are, and you're ready to go bigger, play in that bigger field. And some of you are just saying, hey, help. What's next? Where should I go? And both are fine. Both are great if you're ready to go big. But you know that you need to deepen your own spiritual practice and your personal growth because that's where it all comes from, right? Then this is where you need to be. Your life only grows as big as you do. So here's what to do. Go over to flowdreaming.com and click on MI School. And during these enrollment periods, you can actually set up your a free phone call with me or my staff and we'll talk about it. Is it a fit? Is it interesting? During wait list times, we just put you on a list of people who've expressed interest. So we can notify you as soon as the doors open. All right. I look forward to hearing from you and even more to getting to know you as one of my personal students in May school. Now let's get back to the episode. All right, my dears, you guys ready? So when we drop into flow, right? It's a specific technique and you can learn the technique for free. I actually created a set of materials that I keep intending to, you know, make a product and actually sell it, but I keep giving it away. They're on my website. Flow dreaming.com flow dreaming.com. it will teach you how to do this. It is not meditation or hypnosis. You use your emotion, you get into flow state and you daydream. So if you don't know how yet to do it, just play along with me. Just let yourself go. And if you do know what you're doing, then come on and enjoy yourself. I also want to mention you can find at this shop, flowdreaming.com a number of pre recorded flow dreams for you to practice with, play with. And if you're looking for one around this theme of freedom and security, I don't have one yet. At least as of this taping. That's precisely on this. So you're going to have to kind of pull a couple of together. A couple of them together. I would pull together a money based playlist, probably one about your career and Then I would also pull together something that has to do with change and transition. Right, Change in transition. Because change in transition is usually what's leading you into freedom. And we often get afraid of that. So you want to get very comfortable with that. Like, oh, you're my best friend. Transition. You're leading me into freedom. I love you and I am not scared of you. So those are my recommendations. Go to the shop and pull some out for yourself and start playing with them. All right, go ahead and close your eyes. We want to take a nice deep breath and relax. I like to sigh. You can sigh loudly. You can take a deep, yogic breath. Shoulders should drop, your jaw should release. Your brow needs to relax. And you find yourself drifting, just drifting in the waves like you're a little spot of sunlight drifting on the ocean, rippling over the current. Feel rocked and feel held. Feel how this ocean is going someplace. It has a direction, tides, currents. You don't fight it. Why would you? This is natural. This is you. This is correct. You release into it, into this path of goodness, of perfection, of divinity, your divine soul, your divine purpose. Let go. Let go and drift. Drift and allow an image to appear in your mind. There you are at work. Does it matter if it's your current work, future work, perhaps, but you're working. You see yourself as if there's two of you. Look at you working. Look how happy you are. Look how you're grinning and you're smiling. Look how enthused you are. You're very happy to be here. You're happy to be doing this. You know, at any time. You can get up, go home, go anyplace, do whatever you feel like. You could not be working at all if you didn't want to. You could be retired. But you're loving the way that you're spending your time. You have tremendous security. You have so much security. No matter what you do, you're secure whether you're there, whether you're someplace else, whether you're shoveling the hours in or taking time off to daydream about how you'll make your work better. You're so secure. You're secure and you're free. You're free and you're secure. And you realize these two were men together all along. They're never fighting each other. Where did that come from? From that's made up thoughts, made up story. These two go together. The more security you have, the more freedom you get. The more freedom you get, the more secure you know you are. Notice how they're building off of each other and helping each other notice that. How beautiful. You have both. Why don't you? Why not? Who says you can't? What? You have old life experience that says you can't. You let go of that. That was your old life experience. Just because it was true then doesn't mean it will continue to be true. Things we experienced in the past don't always happen again in the future. Thank goodness. And so you let go of that old thought too. You're free and you're secure and you offer this to flow. You acknowledge it. In Flow, you are free and secure and holding that feeling. You find yourself watching this daydream dissolve. And now you've become aware again of who and where you are. And now you open your eyes. And that was an example of a very brief flow dream. Sometimes in the show here I make them only a few minutes long. Typically when I record them in the shop they're 10 to 15 minutes. But a Flow dream can be any length at all. As long as you're getting to the core feeling state and you're getting to that sense of alignment and beautiful flow, you have opened the door of connection to the universe, to non physical and to your future. That's manifesting, that's co creating. And on that note, I've got to wrap things up so I hope to see and hear some of you on my Facebook page. I do have a group called I love Flow Dreaming. You have to be invited in, but if you go ahead and submit a request, I think I'm probably going to accept you. So go look it up on Facebook and you can also follow me on Instagram at and Twitter. I've been getting out there so hopefully I'll see and hear back from you and you can let me know if you enjoyed the program or not. All right, love you guys and I'll see you all again next week. All right, that wraps up our episode today. But before you go, two things. One, you can get the Flow Dreaming app in the Google, Amazon or itunes app stores. It allows you you to search and sort to mark your favorite episodes. It's completely free to download and it gives you access to the latest several dozen of these episodes as well as to the premium episode library where there are more than 400 episodes that date back 10 years. The app's free, so go download it now at Flow Dreaming in the app store on your mobile device. And last, if you love my show, I'm going to give a shout out to my mom's podcast. It's called the Dear Venus show, and she's an amazing intuitive and a medium and super, super funny. Search the words Dear Venus in your podcast directory or online and that way you can find her too.