This week on Coffee, Coaching, and Calling, Laurel Elders had the pleasure of sitting down with two incredible sisters, Paula Francis and Christine Noyes, who truly embody what it means to answer your life's calling. Paula, the insightful author of 18 Pairs of Shoes and co-founder of Gross National Happiness USA, and Christine, an amazing author and illustrator who shared how her professions seemingly chose her, gave us such a rich conversation about courage, fear, and living in alignment with our deepest values.

The Courage to Say "Yes"

Both Paula and Christine admitted they never quite saw themselves where they are today. Life, as they so eloquently put it, has a way of throwing circumstances at you, presenting these pivotal moments where you get to choose your direction. And it's not always about grand, dramatic shifts; sometimes, it's those subtle nudges that truly matter. The big takeaway here for all of us, they emphasized, is to recognize every single moment as an opportunity to choose happiness, follow our passions, and open our hearts.

Releasing Fear: Your Path to Freedom

We then dove into the powerful emotion of fear. Laurel shared her thought about fear being our responsibility, and how confronting it unlocks our power. Paula’s experience from her 10,000-mile walk across the country, much of it solo, really brought this home. People she met constantly asked if she wasn't afraid, a reflection, she realized, of their own fear-driven lives. Paula discovered that so much of the fear we carry is "made up in our minds – the 'what-ifs' that put hurdles in our way."

Releasing that fear, Paula explained, is incredibly liberating. It creates space for wonderful new things to enter our lives. Christine agreed, highlighting how fear can actually block our intuition. When we let go of fear, our intuition can then guide us to the next right step, the right person, or the next amazing opportunity. Paula's encounters on her walk often proved that the "next place" people feared was welcoming and kind, simply because she didn't carry negative expectations. As she wisely put it, "most people are genuinely kind and generous and thoughtful and loving."

Resilience: Finding Strength in the Unknown

Christine shared her deeply personal story of sudden, drastic change when her husband tragically passed away on an airplane. Her life instantly shifted, bringing immense fear and anxiety. But she emphasized the incredible importance of resilience, asking, "What do you do now? What do you do with that anxiety?" While there's no universal answer, the ability to bounce back, she believes, is something innate within us all.

Paula added another layer to this with a truly powerful story about Lieutenant Colonel Holland Chapman, a Vietnam War prisoner of war for over seven years. Despite enduring unimaginable circumstances, his core message was simply: "Be kind." He found meaning even in a doorknob, symbolizing freedom. This incredible account is such a testament to the depth of human resilience and the profound power of forgiveness, even in the most challenging situations.

Aligning Life with Values: Gross National Happiness

Paula's cross-country walk wasn't just a personal journey; it was a fascinating research project. She firmly believes we should measure success and progress not just through economic indicators like gross domestic product, but by what we truly value. Her work with Gross National Happiness USA seeks to understand if the values driving GNH indexes in other countries resonate here in the United States. She found a surprising amount of alignment, but what really struck her was how often our personal lives fall out of sync with our own declared values. We get so easily distracted by fear, our busy schedules, and the false belief that we have all the time in the world.

Professions That Choose You: Christine's Unfolding Journey

Christine shared how her professions genuinely seemed to find her. Her first calling as a chef naturally evolved from working at her grandfather's restaurant. Later, a job offer in food sales literally pulled her out of the kitchen. Eventually, she and her husband bravely ventured into opening their own business.
However, her most profound calling was becoming an author. This journey was profoundly sparked by the death of her husband. Weeks after he passed, words began to circle in her mind, forming a poem she wrote on her phone in the middle of the night. This poem, "Distance," became the unexpected catalyst. Encouraged by her sister-in-law, she began writing children's books based on her husband's charming pet peeves and his loving nature, primarily so her great-nieces and nephews would remember him. What started as a heartfelt tribute blossomed into her true calling.

This conversation was such a powerful reminder that embracing your calling, confronting your fears, and aligning your actions with your values can lead to such a rich and fulfilling life. It's a continuous journey of learning and growth, showing us that resilience is deeply ingrained within us, and that by letting go of fear, we truly open ourselves up to a world of endless possibilities.
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What's one small step you can take today to align your actions with something you truly value?

"The good thing about a skeptic is that they consider all possibilities." - Thomas Mann

As I sat before my mentor, Sandy, as she looked at me inquisitively.

"I'm a Type Five." I reported with frustration in my tone.  

She could sense my tension and waited patiently for more. 

"I just don't think people can be boxed into stereotypes. People have free will, and everyone on this planet is 100% unique. I believe typing people limits them and could even be used to cast false judgment." There I said it. I was against personality typing.

"Ah." She nodded. "It's not that your concerns don't have truth to them. At what point does any asset become a liability?" she asked me.  

That was an interesting question. True to my Type 5 "Investigator" and truth-seeking nature, I went home to investigate my skepticism.

That was over a decade ago. Looking back, what fascinates me most is a bigger truth about personality typing. However, this truth did not find me through any logical or neatly packaged conception that would have been my preference.  

I sat meditating one morning a few weeks after fervently rejecting being typed. That morning a bigger, more meaningful truth came to me.

"It is not the person that is predictable, but the ego is."

This actually made a lot of sense to me. Studying psychology, I learned how the ego is developed as a defense mechanism response to keep up physically and emotionally safe. 

These defenses become patterned responses. We call these our defense mechanisms or conditioned ways of being. Not to be confused with the hard wiring we are born with, which is captured in personality assessments like MBTI, DISC, and Strengths assessments.  

While our hardware is captured through some assessments, the Enneagram captures our software. Software is a program that runs. We have egoic programs (aka defenses and conditioning) that run in the background. 

However, unlike a computer that is unconscious, we can gain consciousness of our conditioned responses and evolve out of egoic ways of being.  

Part of the contribution the Enneagram gifts us with is a path of integration out of ego and into the essence of who we are without our defenses and conditioned ways of being. 

We can view any personality assessment as a pathway to understanding:

1. our hardwiring (how we are born) or
2. our ego responses (defenses we develop). 

These can be shortcuts to our self-understanding when used as an asset to personal growth. However, they can also be used negatively to judge ourselves or others. That is the tipping point into the liability or pitfalls of personality assessment. 

They can also become a liability if we believe they are the truth of who we are. While they can illuminate aspects of ourselves, our true potential at the end of the day is defined by us, not any tool for self-reflection.

The Course in Miracles teaches us we do not have to learn through pain alone. We can equally learn through love (think positive affirmation versus negative). I now celebrate the opportunity to learn through positive pathways and self-awareness to evolve out of ego and into a new possibility of my choice.  

In this regard, the truth really does set us free. When we are no longer bound and constricted by our past conditioning, we access new possibilities that exist within us.

Notice the list of who and what we are- potentials and all- is longer. Yet, we often can default to spending more time in the false.
 
How can we live powered by our wholeness, our truth and our authentic value?  How can we lead without power leaks, inwardly equipped and self-empowered?
 
Through integration.
 
Through integration, we begin to weave the truthful elements in and release the false. We learn how to expand by:

• Engaging my vision.
• Inviting my Highest-Self to take reins.
• Honoring my values and value.
• Including my strengths and gifts.
• Growing in my competence and self-trust.
• Recognizing my potentials.
• Listening to the wisdom of my discernment.
• Stepping out of judgement.
• Choosing my inner narrative.
• Discerning my ego as an aspect, not a fact.
• Embracing my inner virtues.
• Investing in my self-worth.

 
How can we begin to integrate these higher aspects? There are a few approaches to consider. The options include: spiritual development, self-discovery, self-awareness, self-coaching, stepping into therapy or hiring a coach. There are many paths to the top of the same mountain. Just ensure you are on a path that won’t take you in circles and that does indeed lead to the apex of YOU.
 
There we have it. Gaining our personal power is living and leading through the wholeness within. This process includes identifying and releasing any self-deception that has formed like a plaque over our potentials over the years. As we integrate, we expand our Integrative Intelligence. The wisdoms embedded within the concepts of Integrative Intelligence are the birthplace for elevating our fullest potentials.

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