News from Jules | 08.31.20 | This Wild Ambition

one lesson about integrity every week

I have a vague memory of a mouthful of thick, chalky dust. But, I was 4, just about to turn 5, that summer of 1987. So, the photos are much clearer than the memories. 

After a week camping in the woods, I hiked 6 whole miles beside my Mom down from a lake in the Wallowa mountain range. My first hiking personal record. Of course, with those little legs, it probably took six hours, or more! And then in the home stretch, my tired legs tripped on a root. I face planted on the trail. In the photo, I am covered in dust from head to toe. No smile. Just a hardcore hiker’s stare.

As soon as I could hold my head up, I was in my parents’ pack and outside — rain or shine, hot or cold. 

Growing up in the outdoors, I knew it wasn’t easy, it took work to be out there. Bugs, cuts, splinters, sunburns, fatigue, rain — a lot of it sucked. And then there were breathtaking rewards like lakes, wildflowers, mountains, fresh air, space. All together, it added up to adventure. Or so I thought. But, I was missing the point. 

It wasn’t just about the adventure, the thrill and the challenge of outdoor recreation. I was being actively raised to have a relationship with nature. What I now see as one of the greatest gifts a parent can give, besides life, safety and love. 

And in this relationship with nature a connection to my own spirit, and thus my own sense of spirituality. 

Just as my parents had grown theirs after they uprooted from Boston and transplanted to Oregon in 1972. Immediately falling in love with Mt. Hood and everything at the next level, they spent the next six years before kids seeking their highest potential — physically, mentally and spiritually. 

They may have felt the same awe as I do now:

  • Being dwarfed by giant Sequoias and Redwoods in old growth forests.
  • Seeing Mt. Rainier peaking out from the clouds in the distance.
  • Sitting beside the lapping waves, always ebbing and flowing as they touch the rocky shore.
  • Watching hermit crabs tickle an anemone while crawling around a tide pool. 

This profound thought has echoed with me for weeks: Nature just knows. It just is. It just exists. None of it has an “identity.”

None of it is studying career and life discernment workbooks, wondering how to live out its calling. This “enlightened” human thing some of us do. It makes this thing we hold so sacred, our individual identity, seem well, mundane. 

Yes, every part of nature has beauty, purpose, meaning of each its own, though its significance is not in simply being, but in contributing to the greater whole. 

Today is my birthday. A day some cultures see as an opportunity for a fresh sense of identity. More than a marker of years, it represents a self-identified mastery of being. Just so, a few years ago I started using my favorite nickname, Jules, all the time. 

Personal, loving, connected. It felt more “me” than Julie ever did.  

I’ve spent my life seeking personal significance through my own self-expression. Ironically, as I’ve settled into being Jules “full-time,” I’ve released some of the need for a distinctive identity. 

Today I am humbled by the bigger quest: Becoming one with all — mind, body and spirit aligned within. And without. Not just relating to nature, but being as an equal and raising our children to live this way from the start. 

This is where my heart is at as I enter a new year: with wild ambitions of living more deeply in harmony with nature, with all others, and with my own nature. And intuiting how to make these truths more accessible to all. 

May you feel peace this week by treating every day as a fresh start. 

Love,
Jules


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News from Jules | 08.24.20 | Don’t Underestimate Yourself

one lesson about integrity every week

Sometimes there is a thin line between complete certainty and debilitating doubt. Last week that line was a slippery, wet log as wide as my hiking boot across raging rapids. 

We were about 20 miles into the 45-mile Timberline Trail trek around Mt. Hood. We had already completed many of the 30 or so water crossings. Yet again, I poked my trekking pole into the water to gauge the depth, took a deep breath and repeated a mantra that is a running joke with my friend so made me giggle:

You got this, girl. 

It was only a few steps. It lasted maybe 15 seconds.  

But I paused in the middle of the log because I sensed doubt in my tired body and the risky situation. Uh oh. And I simultaneously felt my center of gravity intuitively brace with certainty in my abilities. 

That inner place where movements emanate from, hence “being centered,” so said my yoga teachers. I think my exact thought that moment was, “Oh yeah this is the balance that I’ve been practicing in yoga class.”

Two more steps forward and I skipped off the log onto the other side with relief, and even a little glee. 

Every part of me had been training for moments like this. I was thoroughly prepared. Not just physically. Mentally, and especially spiritually. I could trust my vulnerability and my strength.

My doubt switched to confidence as I drew from everything I had been taking for granted. 

I started training to summit Mt. Hood in September 2019. Each week I practiced yoga, ran and danced to get fit and agile. But as soon as COVID-19 hit Oregon in March, my mountaineering school was canceled. #HoodorBust, I kept training. Every Saturday during quarantine I loaded up my backpack with dumbbells and hiked a trail with as much elevation as I could find in the city. In May, I knew it wasn’t going to happen in 2020. Like so many others have this year, I pivoted my goals. I loved doing the Timberline Trail in 2017. So, instead of summiting Mt. Hood, I would climb around it. 

And, it was a huge success! Of course, there were mishaps and challenges, blessings and adaptations. That’s all part of the adventure.  

We ended up covering 15 miles, 18.5 miles (a hiking personal record for me) and then 11 miles — finishing a full day ahead of schedule!  

I’m nursing two blisters and still slow on stairs, but otherwise I feel awesome. 

Yet, I spent the days before we departed worried whether I could do the trek at all due to my aching right leg and the rainy forecast. I had a stomach ache and a headache the day before. Where did this doubt come from?

I was intimidated. I was uncertain. And I forgot. 

Not only about how experienced and strong I am, but a backpacking truth: all resources are precious.

One is always careful with water, with food, with fuel, not wasting a bit. Just so, dwelling in doubt is like leaving a camp stove on when the water is already boiled. One is sacrificing energy — not only from one’s future needs, but one’s highest potential. 

Makes me wonder what other potential I’ve squandered — or left untapped and untested. Where else am I underestimating myself? 

May you find stability this week by completely believing in yourself. 

Love, 
Jules


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News from Jules | 08.17.20 | Finding Peace of Mind

one lesson about integrity every week

As soon as the trail disappeared, I had that sinking feeling in my stomach. Distracted by my lurking hunger and the lowering sun, I trudged ahead even though none of it seemed right. But, those women said they stayed here the night before. And hadn’t I backpacked here years ago? Just get down to the lake. It’s too late to turn back now. 

Was this my gut talking? Or my ego? 

I tried unsuccessfully to stay present and clear-headed as I crunched through the burnt debris and charcoaled trees down to the lake below. It only got more eery once I reached the barren lake and pitched my tent. Besides the tadpoles, it was just me and the wind. Until I heard a branch crack, then huff-huff-huffing seemingly right outside my tent. 

This was when my confusion about the whole trip turned to terror. Sometime before dawn the fear gave way to the exhaustion and I awoke with the cold Gerber knife still clutched in my fist. I’m still convinced there was a mountain lion on the prowl that night.

Whether a big cat was there or it was just my wild imagination, I came away from that backpacking trip with crystal clarity. 

This was not the point. 

I come to the outdoors for peace of mind, not for more stress. 

As I set out last week on my own again, I set myself up for success differently and I was rewarded. When I rolled over and looked out the mesh roof of my tent (without flynet!) in the middle of the first night, I saw a shooting star! I woke up the next morning, after 12 hours of sleep, feeling refreshed and delighted to explore the Oregon coastal trails accessible from the campground. 

What was different this time? Besides everything?

I focused on maintaining balance. 

Matching my needs to the reality at hand. Keeping choices simple. Choosing the easiest option. Making slight adjustments. Staying unattached. But, knowing the objective. And staying true to it. 

Balance seems to be part of a continual state of flow, of being — living at its richest. And it’s not only achievable when one’s retreating, for instance from the distractions of the city to the simplicity of the woods. In fact, it’s the exact opposite of escape. It’s resisting the denial that you’re right and the world is wrong.

Instead there’s an attuning with reality — with things exactly as they are — that makes you feel connected to it all. Even when it’s unpleasant. 

Not mountain lion unpleasant. More like when my first month of income from Oregon unemployment checks matched my actual expenses in June within $10. Literally a balanced budget. Living lean isn’t exactly fun, but this alignment was delightful. 

Or like this week’s forecast of rain right in the middle of the four-day, 40-mile Timberline Trail trek that friends and I have been training for all summer long. 

Your head stays clear and your heart is unburdened. Not just peace of mind. Peace of heart. 

Life goes on, easefully. 

May you relish in saying yes to what you know, not just to what you want, this week. 

Love,
Jules


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News from Jules | 08.10.20 | Your Mission(s) in Life

one lesson about integrity every week

Then, what exactly is the point of life?

The answer was so plain and simple, I remember stopping in my barefoot tracks and smiling as I turned to look out at the sea through the wind whipping my bangs and ponytail. 

Our purpose is to live in harmony with nature. 

Really? That’s it? I might have even said out loud. Then, what am I so distressed about?

The first time I truly posed that question to the universe was on a personal retreat to the Oregon coast after I was laid off from my “dream job.” I had just turned 28 years old. I had completed graduate school a year before, for exactly this type of job, based on the talents and skills I had thoroughly evaluated, and thus invested in. I thought I was following my calling and I felt like I had completely failed.

The HR person was right. There was a “lack of fit” — not just at that company, but in my life. My greatest failure back then was misalignment. 

Since then, I’ve studied many books about finding your calling (here’s a list of my favorites) to figure it out. And, boy was I wrong.

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about the mind-blowing idea that Richard Nelson Bolles humbly tucked into the Epilogue of his classic job-hunting book, What Color is Your Parachute?Here he describes our three missions in life in great detail. Wait, there’s not just one?!

He instructed readers to translate his Christian thought forms into their own. So, in my words, our three missions in life are: 

  1. Live in harmony with nature, 
  2. Live in harmony with other humans,
  3. Live in harmony with our own nature.

Most of us, myself included, easily spend most of life doing it backwards: self first, then others, then nature (which is synonymous with “something greater” or “God” for me). I mean, it just sounds backwards, doesn’t it?

Greater, others, self.

Completing these missions—in that order—takes a lifetime of effort. Not just during one Sabbatical. 

Easier said than done, for sure. 

As I head back out on the trails in a few days, I’ll be attuning even more to the world around me to find my connection to everything that feeds my compassion for others and fuels my soul. Alignment starts from the center. 

May you embrace the greater, others and yourself this week. 

Love,
Jules

P.S. Listen to “A Missional Life: Your Calling” podcast episode for Suzy Silk’s reassuring pep talk about how far you’ve already come. 


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News from Jules | 08.02.2020 | Follow Your Must

one lesson about integrity every week

There really wasn’t any sound at all. Just the sun inching out from behind Mt. Hood and casting a dusky haze like a natural snooze button over the forest, the highway, the nearby town of Government Camp and tiny Mirror Lake right below me. 

As I sat there listening, the nothingness slowly filled with answersAs it always does.You know these kinds of answers.

It’s more of a feeling than a thought. Like knowing a truth. And once known, can’t be unknown, just ignored.

Perhaps this moment was why it was an immediate “yes” when my friend texted about going backpacking, even though I had barely been off the mountain for 24 hours. Or why my body woke up as the first bird chirped and scooted me up the trail by myself, even though my phone only had 10 percent battery left. 

It was what must felt like. Just like Elle Luna describes about her own journey at The Crossroads of Should and Must (and in her book that I’m currently rereading).

All the tough, real deep questions I’d considered over the past few weeks, even during the two miles up to the top of Tom, Dick & Harry Mountain that very morning, came back to what I had discerned many times before.

Nuts and bolts stuff like family, kids, nature, writing, teaching, retreating and ultimately, what I was put on earth to do in this lifetime — to make spirituality accessible to all*.  

Even though I felt “off mission” at the moment, I realized how many of my choices have been actualizing the calling. I noticed how imaginary the hurdles of money, time, space and vulnerability that Elle mentions truly are. I saw how “close to the trail” I am (so close). 

So, the real question: what needs to be different this time? 

I have to own it. It has to be more important than all the shoulds.

Yes to must. And no to everything else. 

I sat in my tank top, leggings and sandals basking in the warm, reassuring feeling beneath the rising sun for a lot longer than expected. It was alluring — savoring the truth in all its ease, all its perfection — part of me wanted to stay there forever. But, I had already been there long enough. 

And, at that moment, I must return to the campsite before my friend started to worry and my stomach got hangry.

May you do exactly what you know you need to this week, no matter what. 

Love, 
Jules

*As poetically described by Tiff, one of my friends and kindred spirits, who I think of as a real-life Ms. Frizzle. 


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News from Jules | 7.27.2020 | Get Fear Out of the Way

one lesson about integrity every week

The first two weeks of this new interim state of unemployment, I did life maintenance: iPhone fixed, car detailed, checkbook balanced, direct deposit set up for unemployment benefits. 

Last week, I started doing spiritual maintenance. 

I retreated by myself to the woods. 

I read 48 Days to the Work You Love in the hammock in the evenings, then reflected during my rigorous daily training hikes. Dang, this book goes real deep, real fast:

  • If your job changes, does your purpose change? 
  • What have been the happiest, most fulfilling moments in your life? 
  • If nothing changed in your life in the next five years, would that be okay? 

No. It wouldn’t be okay. 

How come? Because I’m off-mission.

Slightly, but enough to make life a lot harder than it needs to be. Sacrificing energy from my deepest needs to simply making do. 

Take one of my hikes last week: I wanted to finally reach Barrett Spur, an 8,000 ft. rock outcropping on Mt. Hood’s north face, which I have camped below many times. About a mile or two in, the trail was completely obscured with snow. Options included: turn around and attempting a different time, go up the snow using crampons for the first time and follow GPS along the trail or bushwhacking the ridge along the basin. Even though there wasn’t a trail to follow, choosing the third option seemed less risky and less scary. It also took HOURS to cover a couple miles and depleted enough energy that I almost turned around at the trail junction, instead of proceeding to the Spur summit. 

My fear was getting in the way of my goal. Not only achieving the goal, but in the simplest way possible, with energy to spare.

I only made it to the top because a kind, older man came along. He was also pooped, but way happy to lead the way having done the Spur many times before. 

This is why I’m rereading this book. This is why I’m training to summit Mt. Hood. This is why I’m being intentional about this time-off as a Sabbatical instead of just “funemployment.” I sense I’m not fully delivering what I was put on earth to do in this lifetime yet, even though work – my job, career and even vocation – has taken up so much of my time. It has also taken a disproportionate amount of energy and sacrificed other parts of having and sharing a full, integrated life with a family of my own. 

I want to level up. Not accomplish more things, but break through the fears. Learn balance, gain accountability, act selflessly. 

It has been a beautiful life. Just harder than it needs to be. 

I’m close to the trail, but not on it. That is what needs to change in my life over the next five years. 

May you notice extra efforting this week, and adjust accordingly.

Love, 
Jules


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News from Jules | 07.20.2020 | Carpe Diem

one lesson about integrity every week

After nearly two years of working hard on programs for Nike, the California Association of Resource Conservation Districts and Stanford University, I find myself among the unemployed masses of COVID-19. One of the lucky who is already receiving unemployment insurance benefits and still has group healthcare coverage.

I’m choosing to see this time as fulfillment of the 2020 sabbatical goal I set years ago. Sure, I’m not lounging on a beach in Kauai as I had imagined, but it is a gift of time regardless. And since I have no idea how long it will last, my mantra is: Carpe Diem.

Living every day to the fullest.

A lot like my weekly Sabbath practice actually. And yes, Aha! moment — Sabbatical and Sabbath are from the same root!

Perhaps I will get 7 more weeks to focus on studying, living, being, growing before launching to the next level. Wouldn’t that be amazing? 

So far, I’ve had two full weeks to rest up and reset on basic needs. Now, I’m ready to dig in. Yesterday, I started studying 48 Days to the Work You Love. Reading this book after job loss in 2010 changed the way I approached my job, career and calling over the last decade and was an integral part of learning faith. Instead of just reading it, this time I’m actually doing the daily assignments. 

To hold myself accountable, I’ll be blogging and sending these weekly updates as a way to process life and share what I’m discovering. 

Do you enjoy feeling inspired? Are you curious about what I’m learning? Yay! Me too.

Then keep reading. Oh and follow instagram too for fun pictures! 

If you haven’t missed these weekly emails and/or your inbox is too full already, now’s a good time to unsubscribe (click link at the bottom). 

May you notice the hesitant moments this week and go for it anyways. 

Love,
Jules


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News from Jules | 10.15.2018 | Go Ahead and Pick the Low Hanging Fruit

one lesson about integrity every week

Now, I can see how September’s fullness was only the transition, the ripening as we move into a new season.

I traveled for work and family trips, worked several gigs and kicked off a new consulting project, as well as moved from the cottage to a house.

But, instead of leveling off, everything is picking up. 

After all of that extra efforting, how could there be more?

Especially as important things, like my writing practice and blogging, fell by the wayside (as I thought it might, but hoped it wouldn’t).

How will I get back to my norm?

I wonder as I sit down at my desk after weeks away from my own rhythm.

Funnily, I notice the tree outside of my second story office window in the new house is changing—not only expressing autumn, but also all seasons in a sense. 

Some branches are already bare, a preview of winter.

Some branches are full of green leaves, holdouts from the summer foliage.

Though most are in transition making their way from green to red. Eventually to brown and on the ground.

Just so, life feels full and ripe.

As if we are not only harvesting the abundance of this one new season, but of them all.

And in a way, we are.

A tree can not bear fruit without seeds.

A seed can not sprout without compost.

We are harvesting the before, the start, the middle, the right now.

Maybe that’s why life feels so ripe?

So ripe it must be plucked. Right now.

We must “Carpe diem.” 

For me, that has been opportunities showing up almost daily that are an instant, yes! 

Free tickets to lectures, getting introduced to new colleagues, impromptu paid facilitation gigs, invitations to meditation classes, teaching a live version of the Sabbath course.

At moments it has felt like too much goodness. And then, I remember that there are seasons we sow and seasons we reap. It’s all part of a greater cycle

This is the season for seizing. 

Because just like fruit, just like flowers, just like everything, there is too ripe.

The moment does pass.

Especially if we get stuck in overwhelm, focusing on the everything, instead of what’s at hand.

A wise person (probably a Buddhist) once said:

While many things may be at hand, see only the task that is.

What task is at hand for you?

What is hanging right there before you?

The low hanging fruit, literally.

Go ahead. Pick the low hanging fruit. All of it. 

And what does not come to be, what you aren’t able to pluck—to harvest—in time, let that pass with just as much zeal.

This is where we find balance. 

Remembering this is a time of abundance—both in opportunity and distraction.

The one is almost placed into your hand. The other requires effort to reach.

You’ll know which is which.

May you savor the juicy possibilities that present themselves this week. 

Love,
Jules


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News from Jules | 10.08.2018 | What Are You Harvesting?

one lesson about integrity every week

Looking ahead to this week, as well as the whole month of October, there is so much.

So much it won’t fit on my weekly chart.

There are sticky notes hanging off the sides. Uh oh.

But how could that be? September was my big month.

I traveled for work and family trips, worked several gigs and kicked off a new consulting project, as well as moved from the cottage to a house.

Now, I can see how September’s fullness was only the transition, the ripening as we move into fall. Now is the time of harvest. 

My first instinct is to reduce, reschedule, remove.

And yet.

And yet, each project, each task, feels true, aligned, necessary. Ripe.

And so, like the winemakers and farmers I’ve seen in the Columbia River Gorge over these last few weeks, I know they must be harvested.

But what, I’ve been wondering?

What am I harvesting?

For the last two weeks since the autumn equinox on Sept. 22, I’ve been holding this question.

Meaning to sit down with a cup of tea and write out a list of all the stuff showing up right now, I figured then I could answer this question.

Then, while savoring my second Sabbath in the new house in a new neighborhood, it hit me: I’m harvesting the intentions I planted in spring and bloomed this summer

This felt like a simultaneous “Duh” and an “Aha.”

Ah yes, all the “stuff” (e.g.: projects, friends, stuff-stuff) showing up right now is simply manifestations of my deep intentions for the year.

What I knew I needed on the path forward, in this learning journey

Deep community, prosperity, intimacy, rhythm, to name a few.

These intentions have not been neglected or forgotten, though I have been at risk lately of distraction from the “what” showing up, instead of remembering the “why.”

Right as they are coming to fruition.

We can not be distracted by the harvest—the hectic gathering of the crops—as the reason for the season. 

Just as Sabbath is the yin of rest to the yang of effort in the rest of our lives, fall is a season of balance relative to the greater cycle, to the whole.

A season for extra efforting—from our intentions, not just because—to fulfill the current growth cycle.

Nothing more, nothing less.

What have you planted?

What are you harvesting?

May your yields be true, aligned and necessary this week. 

Love,
Jules


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News from Jules | 08.27.2018 | A Little More Effort Than Expected

one lesson about integrity every week

This spring, life has taken a lot of effort.

Actual exertion of physical healing, plus emotional and mental stress.

Plus, perhaps even more effort to try and stay centered amidst it all.

After such a chaotic May, June and July full of one mishap after another—I’d had enough.

Sure, most incidents were beyond my control and simply accidents, but if I was attracting any of that negativity and hardship to me it was time to change my magnetic field.

Drama-free was the intention I carried into August, my birthday month.

I would start this next year off on the right foot, not the wrong one.

And, drama-free it has been.

Simply because I wished it so?

I doubt it.

I have been choosing the path of least resistance. Choosing easy. Choosing effortless. 

Listening to my body and letting my intuition guide me to the simple yeses and the clear no’s.

When I have sensed resistance or extra effort, I pay closer attention to see how I can ease up.

So many opportunities have arisen in just a few weeks. So many yeses. It’s actually been feeling a bit too abundant.

Is there such a thing?

Yes, too abundant means too much of a good thing.

This starts to feel like overwhelm and saturation.

Who decides what’s just right and what’s too much?

We do.

To each their own, as the yogis say.

Yin is a style of yoga that’s typically slower and more restorative. Just right usually happens through ease.

I’ve found it a wonderful class to take on Sunday nights, kicking off the week after an equally restorative Sabbath.

“Well, this is taking a little more effort than expected,” my yin yoga teacher remarked with surprise last night during class.

Instead of simply melting into the suggested pose, I could feel my muscles engage a bit just as she did.

Sometimes just right requires some effort.

But, we can still approach it with ease.

As effortless as August has been, September is looking effortful.

Looking like it will take a little more effort than expected. Especially to stay centered amidst it all.

This is typical. There’s usually a shift from the summer rhythm into the fall schedule.

And yet, I’m still a bit surprised.

Technically, summer extends all the way until Sept. 22, but the flurry of the new school year seems to stir up energy for all of us.

Given the opportunities of the last few weeks, now I’ll be traveling for work and my family is taking a trip. I have new gigs as well as new projects kicking off in September. And, I’m moving!

Sound familiar?

Well, probably a different list. But a list, nonetheless.

So, what do we do when life is taking a little more effort than expected?

Do we lean in and effort harder?

Do we take a nod from yin yoga and effort easefully, with the least amount possible?

I suppose, it depends.

What feels right to you?

May your just right be just right for you this week.

Love,
Jules


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