After whipping my smoothie together, grabbing my gym stuff, tossing a green juice in my bag, scanning the NYTimes on my iPhone and ordering a latte – to go – it’s only 7:30am.

Me, you, and who else?

Then there’s my kid, who is vexed because she isn’t sure what to declare her major in, and she’s still in high school.

And my only-just-graduated nephew, who feels under the gun to write the next great American novel.

We live in a world of instant, immediate everything.
We keep going faster in order to go even faster.

In this goal-oriented, production-focused, instagrammable, patriarchal culture, we are taught that it’s all about results, results, results. We want outcomes, people, and we want them now.
Exhausting. And so much pressure.
And what’s worse? It is so not feminine.

Culturally we have not been taught to encourage or respect the native indigenous growth cycle, or gestational cycle, of a desire.
Some desires seem to happen almost instantaneously.
But other desires have their own timeline and cannot be squeezed out quickly like a tube of toothpaste.

In fact, pushing too hard for results can destroy a desire.
The most truly deep, magical, soul-shifting and profound desires require somewhat longer gestation.

Desire, she begins in the imagination. She is fueled by your enjoyment of the thought of her, your gladness at catching glimpses of her, and your continual delight at imagining her coming to fruition. Your desires are executed by taking very small, deliberate baby steps in the direction of her fulfillment.
With no judgment, and no timer.

Very often, a desire is just the tip of an iceberg. It slowly expands into something greater, bigger, and more powerful than you could have ever even imagined at the beginning of the journey. Very often, when a desire pops into your soul, heart and mind – it is the inauguration of an adventure of such epic proportions that if your life were a film, it would be like Star Wars, and you would need 8+ full-length features to tell the whole story.

The nature of the feminine is cyclical. It takes one little ovum 28 whole days to ripen and get ready in the ovaries, then to burst forth and travel down the fallopian tubes, for its shot at fertilization in the uterus, or getting shed in menstruation. And those 28 days are a drop in the bucket of the 280 days that it takes to make a baby.
Or the 640 days it takes to gestate an elephant.

The nature of woman is to want to be the housing for the gestation of creation in so many different forms. Whether it’s bringing a new life into the world, or an idea into the world, or a book or a business or a poem or a work of art or an ambition.

The problem is, none of us were taught how to withstand the wait.
Or – lawd have mercy – savor the wait.

And if we do not enjoy the gestation of a desire, it not only slows down the progress of the desire, but it makes life very frustrating and unhappy.

So, how do all of us fast food-raised, text-happy, amazon.com-loving women slow the fuck down enough to enjoy the adventure of our ever unfolding desires?

For you, for me, for Hillary Clinton (who, politics aside, has not given up on her desires, no matter what), and for all of us speed demons who are on the adventure of making our dreams come true, whether we know it or not…here’s what I want you to hear:

You were born to gestate, and anything you can conceive of is on its way to you, as long as you think so.

By the way, this is why the School of Womanly Arts Mastery Program exists. I’ve watched more desires take root and grow to fruition than I can count, every storyline as brilliant and unique as the woman who lives them. It’s what I live for.

For today, to help remind you how to gestate, when you just want it all yesterday, here’s a 5-part mini-roadmap to live by.

1. Celebrate the simple enjoyment of having your desire. Allow yourself to feel turned on and excited as you imagine living your dream. Really. I mean it. Feel turned on as you imagine what you want. It’s like pouring fuel onto your dreams. Like meditation, this requires daily practice.

2. When you get impatient, take a break and give yourself 21 days of no action towards your desire. Your job during those 21 days is simply to pay honor and tribute to the creative source that you are. YOU are the gestator. She who creates.

3. Don’t keep your dreams to yourself. Tell everyone you know about the wonderful desire you are gestating. Don’t feel embarrassed because you don’t have a result yet. Intention is everything. Brag about it. You are a woman in the process of living her dreams and creating her destiny.

4. Gather a community of women to support your desires. Be willing to teach people how to encourage you on your way to living your dreams. Guide the people who criticize you or tell you that you can’t do what you want, to applaud you and cheer for you instead. Explain that whenever they say, ‘rock on’ or ‘you go, baby!’ they are fertilizing your soul.

5. Every day, take another baby step forward. You got this. You were made for this.

I know, I know, everyone around you has made New Year’s resolutions, and has signed up for the next 10-day detox, and they all want to know what your quick fix is going to be.

But, in the comments below, I want to know:

• What are you gestating?
• What wonderful big giant baby are you creating over the next decade or so?
• Or, what elephants have you brought to life?

 
xo,