READY FOR THE NEXT LEVEL?
I had a wonderful time at Norwescon this last weekend. I've been going for 40 years, and the last couple of Plague Years were difficult. The hotel contract forced them to do a convention last year, but I sure wasn't going. This year, with things easing and a solid vaccination and mask policy in place, it felt like a great idea.
Sunday, I was having lunch with an old and dear friend who asked me how I was. Without thinking I said "Next Level."
We were both delighted by that spontaneous response, and she asked me to explain.
Well…if I looked at the three major arenas of my life, in all of them I've finished major "Hero's Journey" cycles that place me in new and unexplored territory.
FAMILY: My son has graduated high school and is no longer a big kid. He is now a very young but very real MAN, with an actual business. And that is different territory. T and I are doing great.
My MARTIAL ARTS training has finished an entire cycle of seeking rank or validation. Now, I am looking forward to going to Manila in '24, just for the sheer pleasure of fulfilling a childhood dream: training martial arts in Asia.
My CAREER has changed. Novels are now for fun more than career. And we have our feet firmly on the lower steps of the next "flight of stairs"--while simultaneously realizing I have no interest in trying to "get to the top." Get into the top 10%? Sure! The top .001? I think not. Those are people either more monomaniacally focused, have put far more of their lives there, or have both of those things PLUS extreme luck. I wish them well: I’m not playing that game.
My TEACHING survived the writer's room. My usual pattern is to work on my teaching business when the writing slows down. Then when things pick up, the business is neglected. This time, I maintained my actions throughout…maybe no more than a "3" on a 0-10 scale, but I never got a "zero" and that's all you need, really. And now, when I finish teaching a Tai Chi class at a convention, I have a way that serious students can continue to work with me. The FIREDANCE course (Tai Chi plus affirmation, visualization, modeling and emotional flooding) is actually functioning, and becoming a repository of all the basic teachings from an entire lifetime of study.
I made it to the next level, and the connection between all of these things is FIREDANCE, the morning ritual that is the ONLY thing I do daily (possible exception: joint mobility). Drawn from a dozen different cultures of philosophical perspectives, it is amazing. The "Blessing Dance" is the version I perform daily with Tananarive, and the "Family Meeting" is the version we do with Jason, bringing him into the family culture. I haven't quite gotten him to do an independent version…but we're getting there: his "changes" function in that way, NLP "swish" patterns teaching him how to control his own emotions.
At Norwescon I had a chance to talk to many writers, listened to their issues and the primary ones were fear, discipline, and focus. And whenever I talked to them, I asked myself: Could FIREDANCE help them? And the answer was "yes" even though I did all I could right then and there, to help them on the spot.
If they wanted more? Invited them to the FIREDANCE shows on Saturday (you can get on the list at www.stevenbarneslist.com). If they needed more? Dealing with stress, fear, lack of energy or self-confidence? I was able to offer them what might be the only self-improvement program specifically created by a writer FOR writers, even though it has expanded far beyond that one occupation. It is now for ANYONE who wants a high-energy creative life with health, success, and passion. And we created a $10 discount for Norwescon students that I now want to share with you: go to www.firedancetaichi.com and enter the code NORWESCON45.
That code will be good until midnight tonight, and I hope you will ask yourself if YOU want to get to the next level of your life, and if the approach I've been discussing touches your heart. There are other paths, and I hope you find what you need in life to live with joy and service. If this calls to you, I promise to do everything in my power to be worthy of your trust, always.
Namaste
Steve
