Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Elizabeth: Hello and welcome to the Intuitive Writing Podcast, a production of the Intuitive Writing Project, a writing-based empowerment program for girls and gender- expansive youth. My name is Elizabeth Perlman and I created this organization twelve years ago because it was what I wanted and needed when I was young—a safe, supportive space to speak my truth and have it heard. But since the girl inside of us always needs to speak and be heard, we also have writing programs for women and this podcast will feature one of my favorite Gen-X writers.
If you are a woman who would like to try writing with us, know that the first class is always free. There are so many things we have to do. We want this to be something you choose to do, purely for the joy of it. Also know that we use the Amherst Writing Method, one of the most nurturing and empowering writing systems I know of. You can read more about the Amherst writing method on their website and in Pat Schneider's groundbreaking book, “Writing Alone and With Others,” but the basic principles and the ones that guide all our classes are 1: everyone is a writer with important stories to tell. 2: everyone has their own unique voice, a voice that needs to be heard. And 3: our voice will grow stronger and clearer, clearer the more it is supported and positively affirmed. As I always tell my students, my hope for you, for everyone on earth, really, is that you always feel empowered to speak your truth and to know that it matters.
Today I'm so happy and honored to be interviewing one of my dearest friends, mentors, collaborators and all-around inspirations, Maureen Brown, who is the founder and owner of reCHIC. reCHIC offers curated designer consignments and gifts from small makers in Orinda, California. Maureen and I met each other 13 years ago through a mutual friend and we're going to give up, get to that in a second. But Maureen was the person who raised her hand when no one else understood the concept. She believed in the Intuitive Writing Project first. Not only did she believe in the Intuitive Writing Project, but she was willing to jump in with me head-first into the deep end and figure out how to turn my, at the time, very little dream into a beautiful, practical, expansive reality. The Intuitive Writing Project has been around for 11 years in large part because of this woman, Maureen Brown, who I'm so excited to talk to today. We're going to talk about writing, of course, but also the benefits of writing in community and building community. That happens not just with the Intuitive Writing Project, but with Maureen's incredible business reCHIC to start us out. Maureen, if you would tell us a little, share an anecdote about your first experience, your first positive experience, writing… when you realized like this is amazing because a lot of people do not believe that writing is amazing?
[00:03:32] Maureen: Hi Elizabeth, thank you so much for having me. I just want to return all those nice things that you said about me just to say that you have been so meaningful in my life, both with writing, but more importantly as a friend. So thank you for having me on your podcast. My first experience with writing came. My first positive experience with writing, I should say came with a writing group with women who followed the Amherst Writers, the AWA method of writing, Amherst Writers and Artists Method, methodology. And I believe it's the only way I could have ever started writing because it is so welcoming and open minded and positive because that is not at all my background, which I always want people to know that writing is accessible for people who don't consider themselves writers. I had a very left brained upbringing and education. I was always very strong at math. I was a chemical engineer in college. So I just kind of jumped into this writing experience mostly because I was tired of thinking of myself as not being a good writer. So I suppose I'm saying all of this just to give a little context to your question in that for me the bar was really low in terms of, you know, wanting to or being able to find a piece of writing by me that I felt good about. I think I would have felt good about just being proud of something and not being embarrassed by it, honestly.
But writing became so much more than that to me. So I think what happened for me in terms of really just understanding the power of writing and how much I loved it and how much it was meaning to me in those moments in this writing group. It was a piece that I believe started with a prompt of just the writing instructor putting a branch on the table. Like this gnarly branch from an old oak tree probably, since we have a ton of those in Orinda. And she basically just said write about whatever this brings to mind. And I, I did what I generally do, which is write non fiction, but I disguise it as fiction. So I may have been writing about the branch, but I was really writing about something really personal to me.
It was not a long piece, it was pretty short. I do find that, you know, I'm not a. I don't use a lot of words, but I was able to really dig deep into what I was thinking and feeling in that moment. So as we always do in the in the writing group, we read our writing out loud if we so chose, we didn't have to, which is a whole other story. I always thought, I'm not going to read this out loud. And then I always did, because I always ended up with something so much better than what I imagined it could be when I started the process. So.
And the feedback from the other women was such an important part of me discovering myself, because I think it's so important to be mirrored in a positive way. And they would kind of find connections between my writings that I never would have seen or reveal something about the writing that I would not have seen myself because it's so personal. So in this particular piece, when I read it out loud, I just remember one woman, like, gasping, like, and then a tear falling from her eye. And I was like, wait, what just happened? Like, really, that meant something to somebody.
And, you know, my writing is not profound in any way, but I think what I learned, that I just needed to use it to really, like, as a tool to understand myself and what I was feeling and how I was responding. Remember, this was to a branch on the table. What that branch was evoking in me, the. The ruggedness of. The ruggedness of the branch, or the fact that it fell from the tree, or, you know, the color, the particular gray or brown of the branch that, you know, there's the tactile. There's just so much when you write that you learn. You can. You can approach these prompts from so many different angles. So, you know, I'm sure I. I connected it to something super personal that I was going through in that moment, and it connected with somebody, and that was a really powerful moment to me.
[00:08:56] Elizabeth: That is such an incredible story. I don't know that I'd heard that particular story about that prompt before, and I love hearing it. It's such a perfect example of the power of writing and AWA and writing in community in general, because I think you would have had a powerful experience writing about the branch in safe space, no matter what. But it sounds like the most powerful part of it was seeing the response it evoked in other people. And I think this is why I love writing and community and why it just feels like the missing piece for women and girls, because alone in our heads, we are so hard on ourselves. We're so critical. We internalize all the negativity in the culture and put it on ourselves. And we do not know what you were just saying about miring. We do not know how profound or amazing we are until we share what's inside of us and we get a response. People laugh, cry, gasp. Yeah, God bless that woman who let herself have an emotional response so that you could see it. And then you can't ever. It's like, you know that expression you can't unsee something. You can't ever see yourself the same way once you've seen your words impact someone, move someone.
[00:10:15] Maureen: Like, yeah, that's, that's true. Like, I think for me, the learning, one of the big learnings. And again, it seems like the learnings aren't really all about the writing itself, but the, the learning for me was that it's important for me to not minimize my experiences and what I am able to share with people. It's important for me to not hide and keep to myself.
And it's important for me to be, you know, brave and take a chance to reveal something personal because those are the things that oftentimes connect with other people and are important to other people. And I can't assume that my experiences are, you know, the same experiences everyone else is having. They're just ordinary. Who would want to hear about them? Everybody already knows this. I'm not saying anything new. You know, those are all, I think for me have always been excuses and reasons to kind of hide behind. So that was a huge learning.
[00:11:30] Elizabeth: That is incredible. And listeners can hear how exceptional Maureen is just in bravely talking about this. And this is why this is the woman who was willing to step forward and be a leader. We talk about service-based leadership and this is such service because it comes from speaking the truth of your heart. And I love what you just said about not minimizing your experiences or assuming that they're nothing special. I think that's what writing does, is it shows us that this is the heroine's journey. We are all on our own heroine's journey. And heroin is heroic. We are all doing something so heroic. And we tend to as women, it is a thing that we all tend to minimize our experiences until you share them with someone and have somebody because you were brave enough to share, say, oh my God, I feel the same, or thank you for saying that because I needed to hear it. And this, you're so brave. I just always marvel too, the beginning of your story, the fact that. Okay, can I just say that you were a chemical engineer by education. How brave for a chemical engineer. Somebody who is so Indoctrinated in logical, linear thinking to open themselves to something really vulnerable and terrifying. I mean, I love writing and I still find it terrifying. So I can only imagine how terrifying it was for you to choose to put yourself a situation that was new and uncomfortable and you were using a completely new muscle. And yeah, being vulnerable, that's amazing. That's what kind of person you are.
[00:13:16] Maureen: You're so brave. Thank you. Well, I suppose it's a good example of following intuition because I really didn't know what I was doing when I was making that choice. I just was at a point in my life where, you know, I had my daughter Hannah, and she loved to write. She was, she's just creative in a lot of different ways and writing and reading is something that she just loves. And I felt so uncomfortable while she was, you know, bringing home her assignments from school.
I felt uncomfortable when it came down to how to support her. I really wasn't sure how you talk to somebody about their writing without it being like, well, you, you didn't put a comma over here or you spelled this word wrong. Like, I didn't know what to say to her. And I was in local coffee shop where they had one of those old-fashioned flyers with the numbers at the bottom, you know, snipped that you so that you could rip one off. And this is way back without, you know, before emails and websites. And I just called this woman, something in her flyer made it seem like, I can do this. And I called the woman and I enrolled and I did it for six years every Thursday. And wow, it changed my life. It really did.
[00:14:37] Elizabeth: That's amazing on so many levels. Shout out to Cynthia Leslie-Bole who was the woman we're talking about here? She had Hummingwords… Anyway, she's an amazing AWA writing facilitator. You were with her for six years. And I guess it was in that sixth year I started working with her as a creativity coach because I had this idea for the intuitive writing project that was really afraid. It's like sharing your writing. I had this idea and I thought it was, you know, I was minimizing it or thinking it was weird or stupid and I needed help. So I brought it to Cynthia and she encouraged me and she said, I'm going to help you get the word out. She put out. I made a flyer she sent out to everyone on her mailing list. And you raised your hand as I said, and we're interested, but what I think is so cool, is that you had already taken this enormous leap to do something scary and different to develop a new muscle out of love for your daughter because you wanted to be able to support her better. So, of course, our first conversation, I remember, was incredible. You immediately got it. We were immediately on the same page. You have these amazing business skills, which I do not have. And that's what we're going to talk about next. And that is really what helped take the idea and make it an actual physical thing. We actually had a physical space before the pandemic, thanks to you.
Another interesting connection. After that first conversation, when you said, yeah, we can promote your first class, you suggested intuitively, we should ask the woman who has this store that was also at that time called reCHIC, but you've since taken it over and made it a totally new. Amazing thing. You already were thinking of reCHIC.
[00:16:32] Maureen: Isn't that strange?
[00:16:33] Elizabeth: It was actually next door to where we were eating. We went over and talked to the woman to ask her if we could rent her space for a class. And then I guess it was five years after that that you bought it and started as your own business.
[00:16:50] Maureen: I know. Isn't that funny? Well, Orinda is a small town, I have to say that. But, yeah, we were eating at Bon Thai and walked right next door to reCHIC. And, you know, and I'm there every day.
[00:17:03] Elizabeth: Yeah, but it's, it's all connected. And this is the beauty, like you were saying, intuitive decisions. I was just hearing Kerry Samuels was saying, you know, it’s an intuition if it seems unconventional and like the road less traveled and irrational sometimes. It sometimes doesn't make any rational sense. But if it's irrational, go with it because it'll make sense later. And I think, right, we can look back and like, this led to this, which led to this. But I want to talk about also, because there is, and I hear this every day from either girls or parents. People are constantly telling me that they or their child hates writing. They think it's miserable. They don't see the point of it. Because I feel like what's happened, like so many subjects, that writing has been siloed into this very space. Specific form of writing that's very critical. It's academic essays that really takes the joy out of it. And of course, what we have always talked about is that writing is this tool that can help you with every aspect of Your life, including having a vision for a business and building a business and knowing who you are and knowing what you want.
[00:18:16] Maureen: Yes.
[00:18:17] Elizabeth: So I want to talk about writing as a tool for basically making your dreams come true and doing whatever you darn well please. You don't have to be writing with us or writing on your own. There's a great book, by the way, writing Alone with Others, that is the bible of the Amherst writing method. Whether you do it by yourself or with others. You don't have to be a quote writer. You don't have to be a professional writer. You can be a dentist, you can be a chemical engineer. You can be an entrepreneur.
[00:18:46] Maureen: Yes.
[00:18:47] Elizabeth: Writing is just. It's like that. What's that tool that does everything? The four in one tool or something?
[00:18:55] Maureen: What's that thing, that Swiss army knife? I have no idea.
[00:18:58] Elizabeth: It's the Swiss army knife.
Writing is a Swiss army knife for life.
[00:19:05] Maureen: Yeah.
[00:19:06] Elizabeth: So do you remember? So, okay, let's go back to talking about community building, because this is something you and I both love, and this is partly the genesis of the Intuitive Writing Project is you're a master community builder. You had already built a community as a mom in Orinda, so you basically expanded that community and folded some of that community into the Intuitive Writing Project, and then that community expanded further with reCHIC. But I want to talk about how the experience of building community with the Intuitive Writing Project, it's some point you started germinating the thought for reCHIC. Do you remember when that idea first started popping in your head?
[00:19:53] Maureen: Well, I think it. I do remember the moment when I found out that the woman who owned it wanted to move on because she had other interests and her daughters graduated from the local high school and she was ready to just do something that she had had on the back burner for a while. But I would say, you know, it is one of these things that is just kind of a confluence of multiple things that you don't even know are related to each other. It was obviously the practical consideration that there was a store that gave me this opportunity that already existed that I can start. I already knew a space. It already had a name. It already generally did what I wanted to do. But years before that, I just decided, I'm going to just shop secondhand. You know, that was something that was, that had nothing to do with what I was doing at the Intuitive Writing Project or what I was, you know, maybe doing in other aspects of my life. But it was just important to me. You know, after realizing that I didn't want to be a chemical engineer professionally, I, I did computer programming and then I got into merchandising at Banana Republic. I always loved fashion and I loved merchandising because it's a very right brain, left brain kind of job. You have to have the creative vision and love just the touchy feely nature of the product. But you also, you're running a business and you're responsible for the bottom line. You have to be comfortable with numbers and reports and, you know, methodologies and so, so I just, you know, obviously that has something to do with why I'm doing what I'm doing now, but, but that interest in fashion and just being a consumer and witnessing what was happening in my life and in the community and in the world around fashion, I just decided I'm going to shop only second hand. And what else? I think that it was just in my life.
[00:22:02] Elizabeth: Well, what was the name of that? At one point, like maybe at six months before or even a year before you started reCHIC, we had a event at a very beautiful secondhand curated fashion.
[00:22:19] Maureen: Oh, yes.
[00:22:20] Elizabeth: What was that called?
[00:22:21] Maureen: They're not in business anymore, but okay, yes, they had an interesting business model where they, everybody donated items to them, they sold them, and then the proceeds went to the charity of choice of the, of the consigner or of the donator, whatever you would call that person giving them their clothes. But yeah, you know, it's, it's not an easy business, it's a tough business, but it's, it's an industry that needs to figure it out because we have a huge problem with, you know, the mass amounts of clothing in the world. I heard recently that there are enough clothes in the world to clothe the next five or six generations of people. Like, enough clothes so that none have to be made for 100 years.
[00:23:10] Elizabeth: What! That’s horrifying!... But, yeah, I feel like it feeds into the fact that you are a community builder. You have the left and right brain. We’ve talked about this a lot, that you're both linear and logical, obviously, because you can do math and engineering and you're also really creative, intuitive, empathetic. You have both hemispheres, you have the, the everything you need to be successful, and that is why you're successful. So I feel like reCHIC brought in all of your interests, the part of you that likes doing business and building community, but you want it to be meaningful. And I think that's something that you're. Everything you do has a lot of layers and depth to it. You're not. You're a very. You're a deep thinker and a philosopher. We've had so many great philosophical conversations over the years. And I think, reCHIC, the business model that you have created, it is. I know that there are others doing it, but like you said, it's a heart. You guys are definitely pushing up the mountain because society is just. What is it? Fast fashion. That's the word.
[00:24:27] Maureen: Yeah. There's a lot. Yes.
[00:24:30] Elizabeth: And fast fashion is the. The most. It's sort of like junk food. It's so easy to get something sugary and full of chemicals. In fact, it's super cheap and easy to access junk food. And it's the same with fast fashion. And so I feel like the business that you've created is visionary because it's actually remedying a huge cultural and environmental problem, but you're doing it in a way that really focuses on personal relationships and helping women feel safe and supported in this space.
[00:25:05] Maureen: I think I gave myself a lot of leeway, you know, in terms of all the things I didn't know, but I was. I was going to take those first few steps anyway. So, you know, like, I committed to taking over the lease, and I committed to the consigners and the community.
And all I knew is at that point was that I wanted to make secondhand shopping pleasurable and beautiful and, you know, to smell good and feel good. It's all those things I wanted it to be, that it the opposite of everything people hate about secondhand shopping about or even about consigning. You know, women who like to consign their experiences range from, you know, being fine and good to awful with some ways that consignment stores do things. And I just didn't want to do any of that. And so I really just went into the space again. This is where I think the writing helped and the confidence I built with writing, just believing that if I build something that is 100% reflective of me and what I would want and what I believe in, then it will resonate with other people, too, and it will be different than anything else out in the world.
[00:26:36] Elizabeth: Yes.
[00:26:36] Maureen: So I just try, even now, six years later, I just try to just stay in my lane, you know, not worry too much about what everybody around me is doing. And I just try to take one step at a time because it's very overwhelming. There's so much I could be doing. And there the problems are complex in terms of how to make the business profitable, how to solve the environmental problem. They're huge. And so I am just trying to do what I. What I can do, what I can impact in my small way. You know, I don't want to minimize what I'm doing either. I just want to stay focus to what I can actually do and then believe that it will make a difference. And it may make a difference in ways that I can't even predict. Right. That's the. That's kind of the beauty of the creative process, is you just put your heart and soul into it, and then what comes out of it is sometimes unexpected, and that's the beauty of it. And I would say the community building and the connections. For me, it fits into that category because by nature, I'm an introvert, and I very much have that nerdy, math, engineering, introverted side to me. But I also love all the women that I've met and all the events that I do and the community that I build. That has been such an unexpected pleasure of this store and the meaning that it brings to people in the community and how much people, you know, tell me they love having us, me in the community, both for, you know, the consigning, whether they're a consigner or they're a secondhand shopper or both. I have a lot of women that are both, or they just love the gifts for hostess gifts and. And birthday gifts and holiday gifts. But it's just, you know, I think it's added something to our small town that I'm really proud of.
[00:28:46] Elizabeth: This is so moving. I hadn't quite connected this dot before. Every time I talk to you, I have some like, aha. I just realized that you built your business based on the philosophy of Amherst Writing and the intuitive writing project, which is express what is authentic and true for you, declare what you know to be true, put what is true for you out into the world, and trust that what is most personal is most universal. People will be moved by it and love it and value it as they need to. And it's really like letting go of expectations, letting go of what we think it should be. So much of business, I think, is, you know, you should have a very objective goal and meet this specific goal. And this is. It's a like, business as art, business as poetry, because it's like, this is what's in my heart. This is what I believe. I'm putting it out there. I'm going to let go of what all, you know, what I think it should be or what I. Some specific objective and trust that people will find what they need there and they will get. I will be contributing to the larger story of the world, basically. That's what your business does.
[00:30:01] Maureen: That's exactly right. And I think that, you know, there's. There's days I wake up and I will say to myself, what am I doing again? What am I doing? Oh, I have a consignment store. I like, look at people's clothes all day and pick out the ones we're going to sell and you know, like, what am I doing? Like, like, I, I question. I question that. I think I'm questioning the meaning of it when I do that and the meaning of it in my life and also the rationale and also an element of what does this say about me and what do the people in the community think of me.
[00:30:38] Elizabeth: Yeah.
[00:30:39] Maureen: But then I always just go back to like, that idea that you said that I don't, don't question it. I, I don't know. But I do know I wake up every day wanting to do it. Right. So instead of questioning the why, just accept the motivation that comes with it and the, the pleasure and the joy and this just satisfaction of doing. You know, I still just like when I was in merchandising in the 90s, now I'm dating myself just, you know, touching and feeling the product and like the tactileness of it and the, the color and the merchandising the store so it looks good and the candle that we burn and the, and the music that we play and the, the bags that we give at checkout to make sure that the experience is just as good as any store you're going to go into when you are shopping new. You know, I just, I get so much satisfaction out of all of that. So I just try to accept it and not question it and just keep going with it and, and you know, allowing it maybe to reveal itself of what it's doing for me or for the world or, or maybe it won't. Like, I, maybe I'll never wake up and be like, aha, this is why I've been doing this for six years or ten years or however long it ends up being. But I'm okay with that. You know, I think it. Maybe it does take some humility to just kind of wake up every day and do it anyway and not necessarily need an end. You know, obviously I need financial solvency, too. There's that very practical aspect of this. So that's. That's important, and I. And I make sure that that happens. But as far as, like, that deeper meaning and connection and feeling like I am spending my time on the most important thing in the world, and I don't know if I'll ever feel that way. So I just try not to look too far ahead, try to just not question why I'm motivated to do what I do and just keep doing it.
[00:32:55] Elizabeth: I mean, that is intuitive business. We have the Intuitive Writing Project, which is writing what intuitively just pours out of you whatever it needs. And try not to judge it, try to let it be what it is, try to appreciate what it is. And I feel like this. You're describing intuitive business. You are guided to do this work. You love it. And, you know, it's often irrational on the surface, it often looks like the things that are most intuitive because they are coming from a different part of our brain, a different. There's actually the rational brain. I share this statistic all the time, but it's relevant to this conversation. The rational brain apparently can process about 40 bits of data per second, which is really fast, and that's great. But the intuitive brain processes 40 million bits of data.
We can't even… there's no way we can wrap our head around what that even means. But what I understand that to mean is that there is so much more input and so much more synthesis going on. When you have an intuitive feeling, it's sort of beyond what we can rationally understand. So our job is just to trust it. And that's what you do. You trust. This idea feels intuitively right. And we could probably, in a whole other podcast, we could come up with a list of a hundred rational reasons this is so important and aligns with your values. But it's just. The synthesis is, I love this and I want to keep doing it. And you learned that from writing, from trusting? I did, yes.
[00:34:34] Maureen: That's something. Trusting that something super personal to me is going to resonate with other people. That's. That's probably the biggest thing I need to always trust. And I have to say, as you were speaking, it made me realize that, you know, working from an intuitive place is hard to explain to people sometimes. It can confuse your friends and family. But I have been lucky enough to have a husband and children and friends who have been so supportive of this endeavor. They all think it's great, you know, that I'm doing it and. And I'm. I'm very lucky because that's just. It would take so much energy to constantly have to explain, explain yourself and have to justify. Right. Like, that's the problem. I think sometimes when people are working from an intuitive place is, feeling like they need to make sense to everybody else, or there's people that are important in their lives that have to be on board, that they have to, you know, quote unquote, convince people. And so that's kind of a tough spot to be in, and I maybe had to do a little bit of that. But all in all, I've just been really lucky that I've just been able to do it in the way that I have with the support that I have.
[00:36:03] Elizabeth: I feel like, to go back to Cynthia's class, I feel like the foundation was there. The foundation for your business was in that writing class where you basically built up this muscle. And this is the muscle, of course, you and I would like to build up in all women and girls is that muscle of trusting your own expression, trusting your own, your intuition, your idea, your impulse, whatever comes out of you trusting that, like there's something there. It's maybe even more. It's definitely more amazing than you think it is, but there's a lot of reasons it's important that it needs to be expressed. So you built that muscle. And I think that once you. Once we as women learn to trust it just enough, other people will trust us.
[00:36:49] Maureen: Yeah.
[00:36:49] Elizabeth: I think usually when you get kicked back and we've both had to deal with some kickback with different things, it's usually because we're doubting ourselves. And the minute you stand behind it and you're like, no, this is right. I do think this is the right thing to do. It's amazing how then everyone joins you.
[00:37:08] Maureen: Yes, for sure. And you just reminded me that you asked a question a little while back that I don't know that I answered about academic writing. And yes, I'm sorry, I don't remember exactly how you framed it, but it's like, what. What do we tell parents and children, you know, these young girls, young women? I think that. I think that maybe we have answered that question as we have been talking in that, you know, academic writing is very, you know, results oriented. There's so many rules around it. I think kids are learning how to do what they need to do to get the grade that they want to get to get in the college. They want to get into. It's so all the objectives are so outside of themselves and are so exterior focused. Whereas the Intuitive Writing Project is so much more in about one's interior mental, well-being and interior health and knowledge of oneself and understanding of one's emotions and then accept, you know, all the things that we've talked about, the acceptance, the understanding, the trust, the humility, the doing it all in community. So you have that confidence and those connections, I mean social connections we hear in the rise of smartphones and things are so, so important that kids don't get enough of.
But then, you know, I think we've also spoken to then the fact that, well, not only will this make young children, young adults, better writers, so those college essays are going to be better and their writing grades will be better, but they can transfer all of their knowledge about writing to other aspects of their lives. Like I have done with reCHIC. Like I don't think there's any creative process that a person goes through that doesn't have kind of the same.
The same needs or the same like you need to have clarity, you need to have courage. You need to have an ability to recognize your intuition and at least balance that with rational thought. You have to know what you want, not just what other people are trying to understand about what you want, you know, but you have to know what you want. So there's just so many things that you learn with writing that are transferable and will be throughout your entire life. Not to mention, you know, just relationships too. Right. So it's not just what you're going to do and be when you grow up or you'll use these skills, but it's in your everyday relationships because when you know yourself better, you can relate to other people better and have stronger, more honest and authentic relationships.
So. Right. Do. There's the whole chapter in the Intuitive Leadership about the. What is it the one with the needs where you believe that everyone. Not about your need or somebody else's need. It's. It's about knowing that everybody's needs can get met. If you can talk about conflict on a needs level. Right. You can figure out a way that everyone. Yeah. What you were about to say.
[00:40:48] Elizabeth: Yeah, it's such a funny word. They call it. They abbreviated it NVC for short because it's the. The long word is Nonviolent Communication, which of course came from Gandhi's nonviolent resistance, which is a very old throwback. But you got it. Exactly. It's connecting to what you're needing and being able to articulate what you're needing and helping the other person articulate what they're needing. Because we never conflict at the level of need. We all need the same thing. It's absolutely 100% possible for all of us to get our needs met if we know what they are and if we can ask for them. And that's a big thing with girls and women is we're always trained to sacrifice ourselves and to not be aware of our needs, focus on other people's needs.
And I think that's exactly to your point. Writing does that. Writing helps you. I mean, most of the time when I'm annoyed and I sit down to write, I don't even know why I'm annoyed. And then I start writing and I realize, oh, I needed this or this or this. And then all I have to do is realize what I need and I can have it. And I think that's what. That's what part of goes back to reCHIC is realizing you always knew. I think from the very beginning, we talked about you, always. You are a businesswoman and you wanted to create your own thing. And over the six years you were with Cynthia writing you, I feel like you found your voice and you developed that self-trust muscle. And then you continued to develop it with helping me build the Intuitive Writing Project. And I feel like that just being around women who are always saying to you, trust yourself. God, that's the greatest thing I think we can say to each other. Trust yourself. If you have. You think it's a crazy idea, go look deeper. Because it may not. It's probably not crazy at all. Trust it, Go with it. I support you. And then. And now you're living it now, every day.
[00:42:41] Maureen: Yeah.
[00:42:42] Elizabeth: Like you said before, there's always a lot of people who have a lot of different ideas how you should do things. And you still have to come back. You have to make the decision at the end of the day what you're going to focus on and. And staying true to your vision. So I feel like you are a living, walking embodiment of living intuitively intuitive writing and intuitive business. Okay, this is our last question.
[00:43:09] Maureen: Wait, I have to say. Can I interrupt you?
[00:43:10] Elizabeth: Yes, please.
[00:43:11] Maureen: You're making me realize that. Yeah, so are you. Like, I. I think my time at the Intuitive Writing Project, one of the reasons that was so important is I got to witness you bringing to life your intuitive writing project is your creative brainchild. Or. Yeah, that's probably the wrong word. Like Heart child.
[00:43:37] Elizabeth: I love it.
[00:43:38] Maureen: It's just. It's so unique to you. But, God, I. If I. If everybody could do it, I think it would be a better world. Like, it's just something that is such a gift to the world, what you have created. So you were my inspiration in that. In the sense that I got to see somebody who did something so specific and personal to yourself. Not even just. I don't think. I don't. We haven't talked about this, and I just need to say this for anybody who's listening. The Intuitive Writing Project has content layered over the. The writings. So the writing is a tool. But you are also. You have so much content in these classes. And I'm most familiar with intuitive leadership because that one's the one that we. That's the. The first, you know, first class. That. That was the first creation. But there's the. The NVC communication you mentioned. There's stuff about. Well, first, you start with all the What is intuition and how do you feel it and how do you listen to it? And there's body image. There's social media.
[00:44:50] Elizabeth: There's healthy boundaries.
[00:44:52] Maureen: Healthy boundaries. There's. So you are these girls things they never. Or, Sorry, I shouldn't say girls. Right. Like, you are teaching these children everything that they don't learn in school, but they should know to lead a healthier life. And. And then the writing becomes almost secondary, even though that's what we're focusing on is the writing itself. The writing is a way for them to synthesize the information and. And, you know, it's the tool.
[00:45:24] Elizabeth: It's the tool….And it is. That's, I think, what is so cool about everything that you're saying, this whole conversation. It's writing as a tool. It's obviously, I do identify as a writer. I love writing. If I could write all day long, I would. That would be great. But I don't. For me, there's. I feel like there's two different types of writers. There's writers that are always cultivating the craft, which is beautiful and important, and that is a different kind of writer. I use writing as a tool to understand myself and figure out how to live and how to be, and that's. That is accessible. I feel like using writing as a tool, that's the one that can beat. Anybody can do it. You can be interested in. You can be an Olympic swimmer, and you can use writing as a tool. Anything that you're interested in. And ultimately, for Women, of course the big thing is trusting ourselves, which is, it's such a cliche. I say it all the time, but I can't. You know, it's my greatest challenge in life is trusting myself. How many times I've come to you and been like, I don't know, what should I do?
And the answer is like trust yourself. But I want to get other people to tell me what to do. It's so ingrained in us. So my last question for you, I mean, you know, we always, I always want to talk to you for 500 hours, but I'll let you go after this question is what advice would you give to your younger self or to any young person who either just wants to do, wants to write more and is a little afraid of it or is just trying to learn how to trust themselves more, that is struggling with self-trust. What would you tell to maybe your 14-year-old self?
[00:47:20] Maureen: That's a good question. I think that, I think I would, I think I would tell myself when I was 14 that what I had to contribute to the world is important and even if I don't know what it is yet and that's okay and it evolves and changes but I think, you know, to understand what that contribution is that's unique to oneself, it's just so important to understand oneself and to have not only the clarity but the, your boundaries and the understanding of where you end and other people begin and just, just to have that clarity of what you can influence and what's your responsibility and you know, as a way to do what's right but also as a way to protect yourself or care for yourself might be a better way to say it than protect. I don't want to imply you have to close yourself off but just, but just really value, you know, what you are going to bring to the world and you are no less important than what somebody else is going to bring to the world.
That writing is just such a great way to figure that stuff out, develop that sense of yourself. Maybe start to think about what it is that you love or just see what, just have fun with, have fun with, have fun with the writing and see what comes up. And I think that, I guess if I were to tell my 14-year-old self is stop saying you don't know how to write. Stop saying like you're not a writer. That's maybe that's the biggest one is yeah, one of the things Amherst writers and artists believe is everybody is a writer. And if you're writing is the same as Talking. Talking is just your writing voice in. On the air, right? Or. Yes, in the air. In the airwaves.
[00:49:42] Elizabeth: Yes.
[00:49:43] Maureen: I guess that's another thing I would tell women that are 14 that I definitely did not tell myself is that don't hide your talents and your contributions because. Or don't think because you don't look at something the same way somebody else does that you're wrong about it.
[00:50:00] Elizabeth: I love that. Don't hide. Don't hide your talents. This is what we do as women. And by the way, this is why we as women love female communities, because it feels safer, I think, for us, just from the historical context of not being safe, it does feel safer for women and girls to be able to speak their truth and express what is true to themselves in a female community. Yeah, this is.
[00:50:29] Maureen: That does not mean that it's any less powerful. In fact, I think it can be even more powerful and more successful. Like, this is not to mean women need to give up their power. They need to step into their power, you know?
[00:50:44] Elizabeth: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:50:46] Maureen: Yeah.
[00:50:46] Elizabeth: And the power is inside of us. So this is what we need to be. I just feel like I cannot hear it enough. It's the obsession of my life to talk about trusting ourselves, because there is. Everything in the culture at the moment is pushing us to focus externally. On what. On these outer things. And what we're saying is, no, the answers are inside of you.
[00:51:11] Maureen: Yes. Yes, they are. And then. Yes, and then they will make the external.
[00:51:19] Elizabeth: They make change.
[00:51:21] Maureen: They change the external.
[00:51:22] Elizabeth: Right.
[00:51:23] Maureen: Like they change the external. They. They. They change what you think is important, how you relate to it, what you let in, what you ignore, what you create. Yeah. It's so important.
[00:51:36] Elizabeth: I am so inspired by you, Maureen. I. You're one of my favorite people to talk to. I hope we can keep having these conversations likewise, all lifetimes.
[00:51:47] Maureen: I. I think we will. I think we will.
[00:51:50] Elizabeth: Thank you for your time, for your wisdom, for. For shining your light, for not hiding, for letting your authentic, true nature and your vision be shared with the world. You are such a gift to everyone.
[00:52:06] Maureen: Thank you for having me. Oh, this was really enjoyed it. I love talking with you.
