Every time I sat down at my desk to complete the next drawing lesson in Drawing From the Right Side of the Brain … something came up.

I didn’t have the right plexiglass frame. There were emails to answer. The lighting wasn’t right. The pencil needed sharpening. The kid was too loud.

For weeks I kept at it, trying to make it happen, trying to break through …

Until this morning, when I finally stopped to listen.

Yes, there are thousands of books and blogs and butt-kickers out there preaching on how to break through resistance, how to eat the elephant, how to write every morning or fight a war to create the art or just do the work.

And yes, I agree that many times, the resistance is from ego, the bitch in the corner, the fearful caveperson inside of us who is screaming at us, trying to keep us from not dying. At the expense of killing our purpose and passion and our changing of the world.

But there is another resistanceish message that comes from an opposite inside of us.

This opposite feels completely different than that ego.

She is a quiet whisper.

She is kind yet direct, accepting yet persistent, understanding yet strong.

She nudges.

Honey, that writing book is not the one that will work for you. I don’t care that it got the best amazon.com reviews or that the big writing schools use it in their courses or those other people said this is the one to get.

You need something more fun. More nurturing. More expansive. More gentle.

That other book … the one you bought and it’s sitting on your floor because it seems too informal and unprofessionalish and kind of weird and artsy? Yeah. Use that one.

Oh, and that drawing pad you bought because it was what the book said to get and what looked the most normal when you were in the art store? Yeah, that’s not what you need right now either.

You need a drawing journal. Something you love. With paper that feels good under your fingers, that’s sized so you can carry it around and draw from anywhere, with a blank front cover so no one is tempted to look at your neophyte drawings.

This morning, I listened to her.

To that little voice of wisdom, who knows what is in resonance with our souls.

She knows what is the right option – when we are trying to think ourselves into a should, when we are really close to the right choice and starting to force it instead of waiting for rightness to be received.

She knows when it’s the right time – when instead of spending months to force a manifesto, we could just wait until it’s ready to be written and spend two hours in a coffeehouse getting the thing done, on a lovely Friday afternoon.

She knows when it’s the right person – when we are trying to twist ourselves into a pretzel for this guy, instead of letting it happen with the guy who thinks we’re awesome, just by being ourselves.

She always knows our truth.

All we have to do is shut up and listen.

–

Do you have a little voice in your head that speaks the truth? How do you tell between that voice and the mean/unhelpful voice of your ego/resistance?

Please leave a message below – I’d love to hear from you!

Related posts:

1. Resistance Is Not Futile
2. The Seduction of the Resistance Monster: Day 6 of Writing Every Day
3. Resisting Resistance

When I was 7- or 8-years-old, puffy stickers were all the rage.

My girlfriends and I would sit and talk and trade and arrange and organize them for hours on end. “Puffy Stickers” became the name of an actual activity, as in, “See ya later, Mom, I’m going to play puffy stickers with Leslie.”

Some were OK, others were good and yet others, very few others, were diamond-like as far as their rare and sought-after status. In my world, those with “googly eyes” were the most important and valuable.

And of the googly eyes puffy stickers, it was The Bulldog that was the “Big Daddy” of them all.

Oh, how I wanted that bulldog puffy sticker.

My mom tried to find it for me (or said she did). But it was nowhere to be found – that’s how in demand it was. And for good reason. It was The Bulldog, googly eyes and all.

So one day, during my regular wheelings and dealings in the world of puffy sticker trading, I told Amy, my friend’s older sister from next door, and her cool older friends (they seemed eons older, they were probably 2 or 3 years older tops) that I was in possession, at my home, of The Bulldog and that I was prepared to make a fair and equitable trade for said sticker and its pack.

Suddenly everyone wanted a piece of me. I liked how that felt in that one moment.

Problem was, I didn’t have the freakin’ bulldog or the equally famous “bulldog pack” that housed it. I simply did not have it.

But I sure did feel cool for a few minutes. It felt good.

But nothing could erase the looming sense of dread beyond that coolness.

The dread was telling me, “This is a lie that you have no way of getting out of.”

And the dread was right.

But I was willing in a moment to pretend I had it because I really wanted that attention from the older girls. Who knows what was going on for me in my life right at that time that was making me crave that, but crave it I did.

I remember vividly is the sheer panic I felt as I walked from Amy’s house to back to mine knowing I had created an entire situation around something that was not only not true but that was an outright, complete, total and inescapable lie.

What a burden on every imaginable level.

Later, when the girls came knocking on my door (literally), I told my mom to pretend I wasn’t home.

I didn’t know how to keep the lie going. But I had to do something.

The thought of keeping it going was overwhelming.

Of course it was overwhelming.

Because living a lie is an exhausting lose-lose proposition.

Always.

Without exception.

Timeline is debatable (sometimes the part where you feel amazing about the lie lasts longer than a few minutes), but the ultimate lose-lose is a definite.

There was no bulldog with googly eyes.

There would be no bulldog with googly eyes.

I was telling stories and making deals (with myself and with others) based on the existence of something that did not exist.

And now it was time to pay the price.

Chances are that in your life, you have faced a “pay the price” moment too.

Man, that moment can feel like sheer hell.

And in that sheer hell lies a decision about the rest of your life. About the quality of your life. About who you are and who you will be and how you will live. About what will happen the next time the lie seems easier than the truth.

So while the Bulldog With Googly Eyes incident eventually blew over and I made it out physically unscathed, the mental toll of lying outright, of involving others in my lie and of being trapped in a lie I had no clue how to get out of was heavy. Like I-still-feel-it-30-years-later heavy.

And for good reason: You and I are not wired for or equipped to live in a way that is not congruent with the truth.

The “easy way out” option is not a plan or a way of life. It is just a quick fix that sometimes isn’t even so quick and rarely, if ever, really fixes. The easy way out, whether an outright lie or something else, could be something like:

• Staying in the marriage/relationship that you know in your gut isn’t feeding your soul.
• Sticking with the dead-end (but safe!) 9-to-5 and letting someone else ride the entrepreneurial roller coaster – and take your dreams with them.
• Settling for toxic or energy-sucking or mediocre friends who suck you dry and come back for more.
• Existing day-to-day with habits and acts that don’t serve you while telling yourself that it is OK and all in the name of being “responsible” or a “good friend” or an “attentive parent” or something else that makes a good enough excuse for you.

Each of us – including you – has had our own “Bulldog with Googly Eyes” incidents. You may not have outright lied like I did, but you have allowed a lie to gently guide your actions or thoughts or plans (or lack thereof).

The opposite of truth is not necessarily a lie….the opposite of truth – of your truth, of my truth, or any truth – is something that is not 100% wholly and entirely the truth. So any absence or blurring of the truth is as non-truth as is a lie.

Now that you are thinking about a non-truth in your life, the question becomes, what are you going to do about it?

For today, right now, perhaps recognizing it and acknowledging it is enough. And that is great!

For some of you, that may not be enough. You may want to slay it and move forward without delay. You may want to tell the world about it through your blog or twitter or via some other means because you cannot live another moment the way you were before.

Or, you may want to keep it to yourself and just do what you need to do to turn it into a truth.

Regardless of your specific path after your Bulldog Moment, living, knowing, speaking, being and owning your truth is both the most excruciatingly difficult and the easiest-peasiest thing you will ever, ever do.

So what’s it going to be?

Feel free to continue as you were….that is your choice. But for heaven’s sake, call a spade a spade. Truth is truth: Your body, your mind and your soul will tell you all you need to know about whether you are living yours.

In the meantime, I am still desperately seeking the Bulldog Pack. With googly eyes. Let me know if you see it.

About Allison Nazarian: Allison tells people she is an “empire-builder by day (and night) and a Mom by night (and day).” Originally from the Washington, D.C. area, Allison is a walker, reader, football fan and someday-bookstore owner who lives in Florida with her son, daughter and Black Lab. Here’s what Allison says she does: “I use words to help people make money, make meaning and make sense.” Find her at www.AllisonNazarian.com

Related posts:

1. A Live Your Truth Moment from Carley Knobloch
2. You Allow The Moment.
3. Do You Deserve to Live your Truth?

As some of you know, I could tell stories for hours, and while a few of you may find that entertaining, a neverending story might be okay for an autobiography but just aint going to work for a series of blog posts.

But here’s the thing – the important story is not my entire journey. That’s not really how I got from there to here.

Life comes down to just a few moments in time.

A few particular milliseconds where I came to a profound realization about life or myself or how the world really works. Where I did something scary. Where I made a choice.

And that is life. Everything of who we are, what we are doing with our lives, who we love and hate and cherish … it all comes down to a very few particular moments in time, where we made a decision on which path to choose.

And on that note, here are some of mine.

#1 – I Can’t Live With Inconclusive.

During the summer between Sophomore and Junior years in college, I conducted a environmental chemistry research project funded by NSF and Monsanto on how pollutants bond to coal filters. Spent 10 weeks running experiments, hours stuck in the university basement with the NMR to test how the molecules were bonded to each other, making graphs and analyzing data.

And what was the result?

Inconclusive.

After 10 weeks of my life, the data said nothing.

We didn’t know if the bonding was tight or not, if there was a flaw in the experiment or the testing or the analysis. And my supervising professor wasn’t upset or surprised. He expected it. He’s been working on other aspects of the larger project for years. For more than a decade.

And that’s when I realized I couldn’t take it.

The average PhD in Chemistry takes 7 years. I would be 30 before I’d even start my post-doc work, even more time before I’d get a tenure track position at a university.

And as much as I loved teaching in the organic chemistry labs, as much as I had thought of myself as a scientist and professor for my entire life – wanting to be a physicist when I was a little girl, inventing my own science projects as a kid, reading theoretical physics books from the adult section of the library for fun, my favorite teachers always were in science and chemistry and math, triple majoring in Chemistry / Biology / Environmental Studies at college – this was not what I was meant to do.

The traditional “get a PhD & be a professor” route was not for me.

And soon after that I got the idea for law school (but that’s another story).

#2 – I Can’t Watch People Get Screwed.

Before the class even started, I heard the horror stories about the capriciousness of this new professor. And after a few weeks in Environmental Chemistry class my senior year, I was mortified that someone this incompetent could teach at my university.

The other professors, including the head of the department, sympathized but didn’t think anything could be done, since the professor had a 2 year contract. But unlike the rest of the students who just sat around the coffee house complaining, I decided to do something about it.

I was not going to let me and my fellow students get screwed.

So I scheduled a meeting with the Dean of Academics to discuss the problem professor.

He listened to my complaints and told me in confidence that the school’s attorneys didn’t think they could get rid of her since she had a contract.  At that, one eyebrow went up on my face. Because there’s always a way to get out of a contract – especially if the other side breaches the contract first.

As I looked around his office for inspiration, I saw a copy of the employee handbook for professors on the Dean’s table and asked if I could borrow it.

The Dean got this freaked out look on his face, not knowing what I had in mind but also not having a reason to say no – and let me borrow the handbook.

And with that I had the information I needed to use the system.

I wrote a letter to the editor of the newspaper listing the grievances of the students in the class (the letter was modeled after Luther’s 95 Theses), signed by every student in the class. The paper had its biggest distribution ever. Huge buzz on campus, including multiple people asking us to retract. We retracted nothing. It was the truth.

And I started the process for a formal hearing to review her work, under the terms of her contract & the professor/employee handbook. That hearing resulted in the grades of everyone in the class being changed two letter grades higher (my grade went from C to A-) and her being fired.

After that extravaganza, I was sitting in the Chemistry department chatting with three of my professors. And, to my surprise, they all agreed – none of them would have thought of it. Meeting with the Dean, the letter to the paper to alert the entire campus (and alumna & the trustees) of the situation, challenging her competency under the rarely-used official process – none of them had known a way to get rid of her.

And that’s when I realized that most people just go along with what they are told.

They suffer silently. They watch while people get screwed, and just think that nothing can be done.

But for some reason, I can’t do that. I’m different.

If I see people who I consider my responsibility getting screwed, I’m going to find a way to do something about it. Even though that makes my life complicated and stressful and never easy. I can’t help myself.

BTW, I consider that my first successful lawsuit. And, one of my most important. Even though I was not yet a lawyer.

(Part 2 coming soon)

Thanks to Chris Guillebeau for asking me my story over coffee at SXSW and telling me that I needed to share that story with you. Chris, you rock.

Related posts:

1. EPW’s Tattoo Adventure in Florida
2. Why I’m Not Setting Goals or Picking Words for 2010

Are you stuck? Got writer’s block? Unable to take action?

There are tons of guru’s out there who will teach you how to overcome or breakthrough your resistance so you can make a big decision or take big action.

But today I have another take on resistance … instead of trying to “resist” your resistance, look at it as a message from yourself to help you make decisions & take actions more aligned to your purpose & your truth.

But to use resistance as a tool you have to answer the big question … is your resistance coming from your soul, or from your ego?

Related posts:

1. The Other Kind of Resistance: Listening to the Quiet Message From Your Soul
2. Resisting Resistance
3. The Seduction of the Resistance Monster: Day 6 of Writing Every Day