Following Your Inner GPS: How Lisa Dunford Dickman Built a Life By Getting Warmer (Part 1)

Following your inner GPS is not a metaphor for Lisa Dunford Dickman. It is the actual operating system she has used to navigate six countries, four languages, 40 plus guidebooks, and a life that most people would not dare to imagine, let alone build on purpose. In this first segment of the Reignite Resilience Podcast's conversation with transformational coach, writer, speaker, and African safari retreat leader Lisa Dunford Dickman, cohosts Natalie Davis and Pamela Cass sit down with one of the most adventurous and genuinely free-spirited guests this podcast has ever featured. 

Lisa's story begins with a fourth-grade report on Hungary and a great-grandfather she never met, runs through a college study abroad program in Budapest in the aftermath of the Berlin Wall falling, detours through a five-year life in Bratislava where she danced on the square the night Czechoslovakia became its own country, lands in South Texas at an engineering firm where she met her husband and found her writing path in the same building, and eventually delivers her to 15 years as a Lonely Planet guidebook author hiking backcountry trails in Zion, communing with polar bears in Manitoba, and doing the Texas two-step in dance halls for work. 

None of it was planned. All of it was guided. Lisa calls it the game of you're getting warmer, a framework for following what feels hotter, moving away from what feels colder, and trusting the inner nudges that do not always make logical sense but consistently lead somewhere extraordinary. She turned down a job at Georgetown University with a free master's degree because it felt icky in her body, and moved to South Texas instead. That decision led her to her career, her husband, and the life she now helps others imagine for themselves. 

This segment also includes the beginning of the Camino de Santiago story: Lisa walking 100 kilometers across Spain completely unprepared, in hiking boots with no training in pancake-flat Abu Dhabi and Houston, and what happened when she decided to walk her own walk at her own pace instead of powering through like everyone else. 

In This Episode: 

• Why Lisa believes the biggest risk is always not doing the thing, and how that belief has guided every major decision of her life 
• The getting warmer framework for following your inner GPS, moving toward what burns bright, and trusting your desires as your God-given guidance system 
• How Lisa went from embassy work in Slovakia to a newspaper clerk job in South Texas to 15 years as a Lonely Planet guidebook author by following breadcrumbs she could not have predicted 
• Why turning down a free master's degree at Georgetown for a job in the sun was one of the best decisions she ever made 
• What the Camino de Santiago taught Lisa about walking your own walk and giving others permission to do the same 

Lisa is a featured speaker at Reignite Live 2027 on January 22nd in Loveland, Colorado, and her Open to the Magic in Africa transformational retreat takes place in November. Both links are in the show notes. 

Connect with Lisa Dunford Dickman:
🌐 opentothemagicinafrica.com
🌐 themorelifelist.com — Lisa's free anti-bucket list PDF
📚 Live Like a Lioness: Reclaiming Your Bright Birthright as a Powerful Divine Creator — forthcoming 
🗓️ Open to the Magic in Africa Retreat: November 12, 2026

Connect with Reignite Resilience:
🌐 reigniteresilience.com 
📧 podcast@reigniteresilience.com 
📘 Facebook | 📸 Instagram | 🎥 YouTube: Reignite Resilience Podcast 
🗓️ Reignite Live 2027: January 22 in Loveland, Colorado 

Subscribe, leave a review, and share this episode with someone who has been waiting for permission to follow what feels warmer. 

Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 3:06

All of us reach a point in time where we are depleted and need to somehow find a way to reignite the fire within. But how do we spark that flame? Welcome to Reignite Resilience, where we will venture into the heart of the human spirit. We'll discuss the art of reigniting our passion and strategies to stoke our enthusiasm. And now here are your hosts, Natalie Davis and Pamela Cass.

SPEAKER_03 3:42

Welcome back to another episode of the Reignite Resilience Podcast. I am your host, Natalie Davis, and I am joined by co-host Pam Cass. Hello, Pam. How are you today?

SPEAKER_02 3:51

I am fantastic. This is two days in a row for Natalie and I. We were recording yesterday after having seen each other. And I feel like we talked about absolutely everything, but I'm sure there's other stuff we can do. There is always more. I will say I'm I fall is my absolute favorite, favorite, favorite time of year. And it's so funny because I was listening to one of our past guests, Tona. Her whole theme was about when it's becoming fall, but it doesn't feel like it outside, which it does not in Colorado right now when we're mid-80s. Oh, I feel like it's totally fall right now. It's like it's eight. It is so flipping hot right now.

SPEAKER_03 4:36

I want like sweater weather. You can feel it in the air. You can feel it coming. Like even today, like the sun, well, at least where I'm at, the sun hasn't come out yet. And it's just like a little bit of a, yeah, no. I have no sunshine in my You are 10 minutes away from me. Yes, exactly. Pam and I l live 10 minutes away from each other. We definitely experience two different climates. It's so strange.

SPEAKER_02 5:00

It is, it is totally, to me, it's not quite fall yet. It needs to be in the middle of the day. I need to be able to wear jeans and a t-shirt or jeans and a sweater or whatever. And it's not quite there yet, but it is.

SPEAKER_03 5:11

I'm gonna tell you, just drive south. Just drive south for 10 minutes.

SPEAKER_02 5:16

Bring the sweaters. It'll be it'll be perfect. But I'm already putting up my my fall decorations because um I feel like it's it's fall. After Labor Day, I think it's fair game.

SPEAKER_03 5:26

It is officially fall. It's a bittersweet for me because I too love fall, mainly. I mean, again, it's it's Virgo season, so I too love fall. And if if you missed that, listen to the last episode. We go we dive into that. But it's also bittersweet because I know right around the corner from fall is winter. And we don't like winter.

unknown 5:45

There we go.

SPEAKER_02 5:47

Anywho, we don't love winter, but I will have to say this last year where we got no snow and it was unseasonably warm, which led to a very dry spring. I don't want that again. I don't so I'm just gonna put into the universe when I'm going to be out of town during winter so that the snow can come then. Yes and then when I get back, it can melt and everything will be beautiful. So there it is. Put that out there.

unknown 6:12

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 6:14

Oh my gosh, we have a guest today. We do. I'm so excited. Yeah, so excited. And this guest is gonna be one of our speakers at our event in January 2022. So if you've not signed up, sign up.

SPEAKER_03 6:26

No, no, no, no. It's 2027. Toy27! Oh my gosh, I said 2022. We just went back in time.

unknown 6:35

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 6:35

Hello, my name is Kim. Okay, 2027. It's on the 22nd of January. That's correct. You got it. Okay. We got this. We're we're we're we're firing on full solution. We're firing now. So today we have Lisa Dunford Dickman. She is a transformational coach, writer, speaker, and African safari retreat leader, a former Lonely Planet Travel writer and author of more than 40 guidebooks. She has lived in six countries and speaks four languages. Lisa is the creator and leader of Open to the Magic in Africa, an intimate sea to Safari transformational retreats in South Africa, and author of the forthcoming Live Like a Lioness, reclaiming your birthright as a powerful divine creator. I am so excited. And when I read your bio earlier, I was like, I was there when you came up with that name for your book because we were in the bookwriting retreat. So oh my gosh, so excited for you to be with us today. So I'm gonna pass you the baton and have you kind of share what got you to where you are today with these retreats. And Natalie and I are gonna do one of these retreats one day. So I'm just in the universe.

SPEAKER_01 8:01

I'm I'm all here for that. All here for that. Love it.

SPEAKER_02 8:04

Love it. Love it. Well, welcome.

SPEAKER_01 8:06

Thank you. And I'm so glad to be here with you both. It's such a joy.

SPEAKER_03 8:10

So excited. So excited to learn about you and your work and share that with the listeners. Yeah, you you all just strap in. I think it's gonna be a good one.

SPEAKER_02 8:20

It's gonna be a really good one. Yes. So tell us how you got to the place where you started doing. Well, first of all, you lived in Six Country, you know four languages, and now you do these incredible retreats. That's not something you hear people do. So how did you get there?

SPEAKER_01 8:37

Well, and sometimes I say I speak five languages if you count Texan, because sometimes I have to translate for my husband. You absolutely do. That's fine. I'm a naturalized Texan, not a native, but sometimes I do have to translate for him when we travel abroad. Yes. I love it. I love it. But I've always, I obviously wouldn't have said this as a child, but since a young age, I've really seen adventure and risk differently than other people. The biggest risk seems to be not doing the thing. Not in like, like, so I knew that I wanted to study abroad junior year in college, and I had my heart set on Budapest, Hungary, because my great-grandfather had come from there. I didn't know any of the no one in my family knew any Hungarian at the time, and now I do speak, that's one of the languages I speak. But I just knew I was going. Like I'm gonna go. But this is this is still pre-Berlin Wall falling.

SPEAKER_04 9:37

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_01 9:37

And so how am I gonna go to Hungary? Yeah. But I just knew from being a little kid, like my fourth grade report was about Hungary. My, you know, I have my my grandparents' friends' tchotchkis, like the embroidered things in on my bookshelf still today. The year before, so 89, when the wall fell and and the country started toppling, I was the after that I was the second class to study abroad in Budapest. It seems like the water I swim in. Doing big things that seem big to other people don't seem big to me. Like that just seemed like the most natural thing. I'm going to go to a foreign country where I speak none of the language whatsoever, and I'm going to just be fine. And it was so eye-opening. Like it was so it's really hard to be small-minded when you travel, which is one of the things I love. Because don't you see the way that other people in the world work and they're they're doing just fine, not doing it my way. Yes, exactly. And we all want the same things. We all want to take care of our family. We all want to like fulfill that yearning for purpose. We all want to like have fun. You know, and we're just not that different. But there are very different ways to go about it. And I've just felt like more alive when I traveled. Like every nerve ending was on alert. And even tasting bread was different. Well, to be fair, their bread is different from Wonder Bread, which I grew up with.

SPEAKER_04 11:13

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 11:14

Yeah. Very different. Very it occurs to me now that is not what bread is supposed to taste like. Bread is not supposed to taste like Wonder Bread. But like it was eye-opening, like revelatory to me. Like the bread and the language and how musical it was and the people and the different way they saw the world. I would get scolded for sitting on the concrete because my ovaries were gonna freeze. Like it was cold outside and I had wet hair, and my ovaries were going to freeze, and I was not going to have children. Now, it does come to pass that I chose not to have children, but it was not related to the wet hair incident.

SPEAKER_03 11:55

Oh my gosh. And also, people pay good money for that. So that I mean, if this if there's a thing I do that on purpose.

SPEAKER_01 12:05

It's true. I just felt like my world opened up. And I'd always, I mean, I'd always we'd moved around a lot growing up, and that made my sister more of a homebody, but it made me more adventurous. So I studied abroad junior year in Budapest, and then after I graduated from school in DC, my degree is in international affairs, and I wanted to work abroad, but you couldn't get international jobs without experience, and you couldn't get a job without like, and vice versa. Like you couldn't get the job without experience or experience without the job. So my boyfriend at the time and I decided we needed to go get some. We're gonna go get experience. And we moved to Slovakia because, you know, and we were very 20 years old, 20-something years old at the time. That seemed like a compromise. I had studied in Budapest and Hungary, and Slovakia used to be a part of Hungary, and he'd studied in um St. Petersburg, and he spoke Russian, and nobody wanted to admit they spoke Russian, but they all did. So we decided Slovakia was a Koknormize, and we chose Bratislava because Prague was overdone. Too many people had been there and done that, apparently. Overdone. Yes. Oh my gosh. And so we moved to Broadway, and we ended up, we ended up being there. It was Czechoslovakia at the time, and we ended up being there and dancing on the square when it became its own country. Wow. Like they waltzed at midnight. I mean, we were packed in there, so waltzing was kind of very limited. But they played a musical waltz and we kind of shuffled around to usher in this new country. Wow. You know, and it was amazing and challenging to find work and to do odd jobs and to follow the breadcrumbs. I see life like a game of this will be my next book. Life is like a game of your getting warmer. Because you go towards what's hotter, you go towards what's burning up, and you go away towards what's colder and what's freezing, and that's how you create your right life. And so I kept following that path, and I liked the writing and the job, and I did some freelance reports and I did some voiceovers on some documentaries, and I ended up working at USAID in the embassy in the Agency for International Development. And I worked there for two years and had an amazing experience. And again, like there's just a sense that there's no time like the present. There's never gonna be another time where I could just pick up and move. And over the years now, what I've learned is that that's not true. There will always be another time. There will always be another opportunity. And sometimes sometimes, you know, this is a podcast about resilience. Sometimes the times are gonna be tough. And there is always going to be another opening. There is always gonna be another. There is no time like the present to do this. Like to say hell yes to what your heart is calling you towards, to what you really desire. So many years flash forward, I did the embassy gig. I decided what I liked in the job was writing, and I went home to uh ostensibly get a degree in journalism. But really, I decided I was going to live in the sunshine. Bratislava had been kind of gray for a few years and it was a little cold, and I don't love the winter, just like y'all. And um, so I moved to South Texas. I knew one friend from the embassy who had retired, which again apparently that was my criteria for moving to a new place was I knew one person, and it was Sunday. At least one person, all you need is one. Yeah, and I'm like, okay, and I could be live in the sun for a year, establish residency. But instead, the following the breadcrumbs led me to I was taking classes on my lunch hour, doing editing classes, and working in an engineering firm that let me take those classes. So that's why I was working for them. And it turns out the one of the engineers at the firm was married to the vice president of human resources for the local newspaper. And so I got an introduction, I had an informational interview, I I just went in to say, Am I taking the right classes? Am I on the right track? Yes. And I was hired as a clerk. Oh my gosh. Wow. And not only did I find my writing path at that job, I found my future husband. And we've been together for, you know, we'd been married 22 years now. So, like, but I wouldn't have said that my destiny, like I already spoke Slovak and Hungarian, which nobody at the engineering firm knew. And they had no idea that I was like on this track to be a writer, to be an editor. I was just, I was just there. And it was so interesting that as you're following those pieces, right? And there were challenges. Part of the reason I wanted to live in the sun was I left the boy in Slovakia that I went there with, and that was very traumatic. We had, you know, joint property and joint bank accounts, and we'd lived together for five years, and so we owned cart, you know, like we had everything. It was a marriage and everything but name. And so that was hard. And my grandmother had died, and like I wanted to live in the sun for a while. And I wanted people not to expect anything of me. So I didn't tell people I spoke other languages, I didn't tell people I'd lived in other countries, and yet, still, because I'm following those breadcrumbs, I'm tuning in and I'm trusting, like, it doesn't make sense. I was offered a job at Georgetown working in their foreign exchange department, and I could have gotten a free master's degree and would have been speaking Hungarian and Slovak, and it felt icky in my body. It just felt icky. And uh and talking to the the gal who offered me the job felt not good. And when I and and so that's when I picked up and moved to Texas, because that's what felt hotter, and then and that trusting that intuition, that inner guidance that we all have is probably how I've gotten where I've gotten. It's like trusting that inner guidance. Like, okay, it makes absolutely no sense to turn down a job at Georgetown University. None whatsoever. Like, none. Like, not even to me. Not even to me. I'm like, no, that's like sounds like my dream job. You couldn't have said, no, instead, I'm going to move to South Texas to live in the sun and work at a random engineering firm where I will meet my husband and get put on my career track to be a newspaper editor.

SPEAKER_04 19:10

There you go.

SPEAKER_01 19:11

You couldn't have, you can't make that up, right? You just are trusting. So the what's next? So there's been a long history of trusting that internal guidance, being willing to take big steps, take big bold steps that seem challenging to other people, but seem kind of to me like the water I swim in. And it took me a lot of years to even know that people thought it was strange that I pick up and move to foreign countries. Like that was just what I do. So after years of working at the newspaper and working my way up from clerk to uh Sunday Homes editor to special sections editor, I was restaurant reviewer. I never did get the journalism degree, and it didn't matter because I had the job. And I was really enjoying it for several years when it seems like have y'all ever gotten to a point where you feel like a calling for more? Like you know, more is possible, right? Yes, you're not even sure what that means. Yes. Like, but I feel like more is possible. And it often comes with a wake-up call. Like it often comes with like a health diagnosis or a close relative or friend dying, or things getting really heavy in the business you created. And you're like, oh wait, if more is possible, then why am I not going for it? Like, what is holding me back? And so I quit the newspaper to turn freelance and struggled at that for a while, struggled at that for a while. Tons of query letters going out, nothing coming back, like crickets with the rejection pile. And eventually I followed that tune and interest, that intuition, to a conference in San Francisco at this bookstore called Book Passages. My chosen path was magazine article writing, feature writing. Because that sounds flashy, right? That sounds good. And uh they were like, but you put guidebooks as your second choice. Would you be willing to do that? And I'm like, and I got that ping again. I thought, oh, wait, that's getting warmer. That's what I'm supposed to be going towards. And I would never have known it. I was like, okay. And they dropped me in the thing and they dropped all of us in the middle of San Francisco and had us write sample chapters. Which that was out of the blue. As part of the interview process, or you're already on? I'm in a workshop, like I'm in a book passages conference in the middle of the conference. They pick you up and put you in the middle of San Francisco for the day and say write about it.

SPEAKER_02 21:59

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 22:00

That's hands-on. That is the actual hands-on. So not so not expecting that, right?

SPEAKER_01 22:06

Had no idea what I was. And that's often, I think, one of those when you have this call, like when you're following it, you have to know that you can't know what to expect.

unknown 22:18

Right.

SPEAKER_01 22:18

Like you're like, okay, this is the way I'm supposed to be going. And I don't know why. Like, and if you had told me they were gonna drop me in the middle of San Francisco and make me write a chapter that day, I would have been like, uh nu-uh, uh. That's just not so fun. Yeah.

unknown 22:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:38

And I came in second. The person who won first is still a friend of mine, but she got it like an airplane ticket around the world, and I got a $50 book gift certificate with Steve.

SPEAKER_02 22:49

Very big difference.

SPEAKER_03 22:51

Difference, right? I feel like second place was worthy of a little bit more than that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:56

I'm not the halfway around the world, a ticket like halfway.

SPEAKER_01 23:00

Right? Yeah. He used to let you be seen here somewhere. Somewhere. I mean, anywhere. Yes. It was very funny. But in the end, she and I both got jobs out of it. That was the step towards me getting applying and getting accepted as a Lonely Planet author. And at that same conference, I wrote I met Photos editors, so I edited something like 20 Photos books. And then I wrote Lonely Planet Guidebooks for 15 years. Wow. Wow. And I traveled all over and I got to, you know, two-step in Texas dance halls, and I got to commune with polar bears up in Saskatchewan or Manitoba. And I got to um write about Hawaii and Slovakia and Hungary, of course. Because and again, with you can't when you are guided by something greater, when you're tuning in in trust, like there's a plan that you can't see.

unknown 24:01

Right.

SPEAKER_01 24:02

Like, and you can only see it in retrospect. I couldn't have said, I'm going to study abroad in Budapest and learn Hungarian, and then randomly decide to move to Slovakia after college, and so therefore learn Slovak. And that is going to be the selling point 10 years later for me writing for Lonely Planet. Yeah. Like, because I know these two countries and languages so well, and that's not a skill everyone has.

SPEAKER_04 24:26

No.

SPEAKER_01 24:26

People often ask me how I got to Lonely Planet, too, right? But all I can say is you need to tune in and trust and follow those nudges and follow that guidance and not have to know why. I think that's one of the things I would tell listeners is if you can let go of the needing to know why or needing to know how, you can get so much farther than you dream.

SPEAKER_02 24:55

I think that is such a powerful lesson because so many of us. Us don't do things. I mean, you said something in the beginning. Your biggest risk is not doing it. Yes. Absolutely love that. And I think a lot of us play it safe because we don't know why or how, instead of just believing that this is what I really want, this is the vision I have for my life, and just trust that things are going to happen. I just need to tune into them. I need to recognize them. And I Natalie and I talk about this all the time. Like I have the universe tell me things all the time. And a lot of times I don't listen until I get like pushed off a cliff. And I'm like, oh, I hear you now. And so now I'm way more when when multiple things happen, I'm just like, this needs to be investigated because there's something that's supposed to happen, and we don't necessarily need to have the clarity. We just have to have the trust that it's happening for a reason because whatever we're doing, whatever the frequency we're putting out there is attracting what it is that we want.

SPEAKER_01 26:00

100%.

unknown 26:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:01

And what did Oprah say? The universe you'll get your attention first with a feather and then with a brick.

SPEAKER_02 26:07

Yes, that's me. I get hit in the side of the head with a brick and I'm like, oh, I got it.

SPEAKER_01 26:11

I got you. So I did that for 15 years, and it was amazing. And I would hike up to the top of Observation Point in Zion National Park. Actually, I hiked down. I found a back, there was a back road trail. You can drive up, and then you can, it's through the backcountry, so it's not super well marked. And I've I've got my I'm not a wayfinder, but I've got my like topographical map and my compass. And I don't have like a sat phone or a, you know, I'm like, but I'm like, okay, I see that little cliff right there, and I see that little chain. I'm like, okay. So I hike the back and I put notes on my car. Like, if I if I don't come back, this is where I was intending to go, but I'm gonna do this. I want to do this. This is exciting and fun. And and so I hike the backcountry, and you hike down 400 feet to the top of observation point instead of hiking up 3,000 feet like most people do.

SPEAKER_02 27:14

Oh, see, that's a way smarter way to do it.

SPEAKER_01 27:17

And isn't that like a metaphor for life, right? Yeah, like how are we taking this hard way on our own instead of listening to that guidance and following, like, oh wait, there's this other way, and we could just hike down. And I one of my favorite pictures ever is of my feet overlooking this huge gorge. Like, and I thought, somebody paid me to hike here.

SPEAKER_02 27:42

Yeah, how pretty amazing.

SPEAKER_01 27:43

How deaf and awesome is that exactly, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 27:48

That's your reality. Like, that's your that's your career. Like you get to have these fabulous experiences in the name of your profession, your career, right? Like, that's yes.

SPEAKER_01 27:59

And I got it by playing a game of you're getting warmer. You're getting warmer. Yeah, you know, and like, oh my god, this is so amazing. But I think that's another thing that I'd like listeners, if and if they take away anything, is that there's a power to awe. Yes, yes, there's a power to wonder, to connecting to that oneness, to being like, oh my god. And we can all connect to it because we all have something amazing in our life, and we can connect to nature in the forest next door to us. It doesn't have to be Africa, although the magic's a little closer to the surface in Africa. I'll I will admit that. It is available, however, in our forest. Yes, and like that connecting to that wonder and that oneness is part of the process I now as a coach help people with to use that to shift things. But at the time I didn't know it. At the time, I was just like, this is my life. And I I still love that picture because like we go through those moments and we don't always see them in the moment. Like years later, we're like, oh, that was momentous, or you know, that was pretty cool, or but at the to be so present that you're seeing what's awful in your life, even if you want to be going somewhere else, even if you're that's not your ultimate destination, is so powerful and available in any moment, right? Even though it seems impossible at times. Well, and I think all the stuff is happening.

SPEAKER_02 29:34

Absolutely. I think it's that that mindfulness, that presence. It's you know, being fully present in whatever it is you're doing, where most of us are thinking about what's that next thing I need to do? I need to get to this, what's on my to-do list, blah, blah, blah. And just like just being fully present, that's when you see things that you miss and have been missing for years. And it's so powerful when you slow down enough to see the wonder and beauty around you. And I think it just makes you want more of it.

SPEAKER_01 30:02

And isn't it when you get those messages too?

unknown 30:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:05

Isn't that what 100%? Yes.

unknown 30:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:09

And then you can hear, and then you're like, oh, wait, okay. You're getting warmer. So you're getting warmer. That's it. Exactly. Exactly. So I did that for about 15 years, and eventually it became kind of I'd explored all the places I love so deeply. I've always been into personal growth, person, like my own growth, my own spirituality, and but all those books, everything I read, every course I took, it didn't feel related to a work in the world. It felt adjacent until then. And then I was like, you know, I want more. And I have that calling again, right? Wait, this has been great, and I want more. And people argued with me, they're like, no, you have a job that everybody loves, and everybody, you like your faces in books, you could point at your book on the bookshelf. Like, why would you want to stop that? I'm like, because it doesn't feel aligned anymore. I want more. And the biggest risk is in not doing the thing.

SPEAKER_04 31:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 31:15

So I started my life coach training. There were so many serendipitous magical moments. Like, I did my life coach training, and I was Martha Beck life coach adjacent for a long time. I had a lot of friends who were Martha Beck life coaches. And I can't even tell you how anymore, other than you're getting warmer. But somehow I made friends. Like I I read her books, I went to a conference, I made friends, I took their programs, I met their friends, and I walked the Camino with another the Camino de Santiago, the pilgrimage route in Spain. I walked the last hundred kilometers with a group of Martha Beck coaches or adjacent people. And we totally did the Camino light. We walked every kilometer of it, but at the end of the day, we'd get in a van and go to a hotel. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 32:11

Sounds like my kind of walk.

SPEAKER_01 32:13

Yes, exactly. I'm like, I walked every one of those. I have the like blisters and scars to prove it. And I slept in a comfortable bed. I ate good food. No need to set up a campsite for me. I need to go to a no need to carry it on my back. No need to carry it on my back, you know. And but they said to me, So when are you gonna start your life coach training? And I hadn't intended to be a life coach, but I wanted what they had. They had this peace and this alignment, and I knew that they had done their own inner work to be able to help others. Yeah. And I was like, Well, I won't, I want that. So I'll probably go to the training, but it'll just be for myself. This is not a career change. I'm you know, that's it's not. And they're like, Well, when are you gonna start training? And I'm like, and I meant to say January, and I said September. And I was like, Oh, okay, maybe I'm starting in September. Who knew? Yes, yep, and so I was going through the training and I was still writing, I wasn't doing as I wasn't doing the big guidebook assignments anymore, but I was still doing little writing assignments. So I went to this writing retreat. Oh no, rewind, I forgot an important part. So after the Camino, like I had not trained at all for walking a hundred kilometers for in six days. Like, and I lived at the time in Pancake Flat Abu Dhabi, and I alternated it with time in Pancake Flat Houston, Texas. Yep. And so if I did walk, it was like 30 minutes in a mall on the street ground. Exactly. Not prepared at all, not prepared at all. And it was a big deal to me to do it anyway because I haven't always done things that I'm not sure I will succeed at. Right? Like we want to know we're gonna succeed.

unknown 34:13

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 34:14

And I was not at all sure. So it felt like a big win. Like going on this trip is a big win because I don't even know if I might have to get in that van the first day. I might not be able to walk every kilometer, you know. Like I might not be able to, literally, like literally. I'm like, okay, but I'm okay with that. So this is a win when I take the first step on this trail because I'm willing to fail. Yeah. I'm willing to be not perfect. I'm willing to try. And so they said, Oh, go at your own pace. There's no hurry. And I like asked them at least five times. Do I need to be anywhere at such and such a time? No, you don't need to. And so I know I have this tendency. I can push myself really hard the first day, and then the next five I won't be able to move. So, like, rather than overdoing it and over functioning and overworking, I was like, okay, I'm gonna take my time. And it was so hilly. It was so hilly. And it was like the first day was like completely uphill. Yeah. So my legs were burning. I was like, holy shit. And I don't look like I'm in bad shape. So people are like, oh, were you just stopping to write? I'm like, no, I'm just waiting until my legs worked again.

SPEAKER_03 35:32

But it is a very humbling trail. So thank you. That's that's what I'll do. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:37

And there were so many lessons. Like I came in like hours behind everybody else, and like the restaurants weren't open anymore. The guy who was driving around giving you bananas missed me because he didn't even know I was so far behind. You know, and I got there. My technical pattern would be shame, right? Oh my god, I held these people up. Oh, I misunderstood something. Yes. And especially with the like, well, were you just writing? Why? What took you so long? What took you so long? Like, well, I they told me to walk at my own pace. So that's what I did. Because I wanted I wanted to be able to walk the next day. Yes. And I like the next day, it was amazing. People came. The 70-year-old guy came up to me and was like, Thank you so much. My wife has been so hard on me, and she was so afraid I would be last. And you were so far behind me. Oh wow. Wow. Like you gave me permission to walk my own walk, and somebody else came up and was like, Can I walk with you? Their pace was too punishing. And like I gave people permission to go walk their own walk, right? And it was such a magical experience. And as the time went on, I actually got stronger. I watched the people shut down, like get closed, pull their little hood up, put their headphones on, and power through.

unknown 37:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:04

And I kept saying, God, I can't do this, but you can do this through me. Like I I cannot do this. But I'm not gonna give up till you tell me to give up. I'm gonna keep going. And so many magic. I mean, stereotypically magical things happen. Like I sat down, it was raining like a soft mist, and I sat down on the trail, and there was no one around me, no other hikers, no anything, and I just started sobbing without having any feelings whatsoever. Like I didn't feel sad. It was like I was feeling the tears of the pilgrims for the past thousand years.

SPEAKER_02 37:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:42

Like I didn't have any stories. I didn't have any, I just was sobbing. And a flight of like a flock of doves flies overhead. Like, like it, you couldn't have written, it's like a like you couldn't have what you wouldn't believe it it was written in a book.

SPEAKER_04 37:57

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 37:58

Yeah. Or my like I was struggling. This was not an easy walk. I was thank goodness there was an orthopedic surgeon on the trip. She was advising me how many Tylenol versus ibuprofen I could take and when I could alternate them. The little support guy was sewing up my blisters, and when we stopped for our water breaks, he was like helping me take my pack on and off and lifting my little ponytail up and peeling my banana for me because I had no energy, like at the brakes. I was, I just like was laying on the ground. And he's like peeling my banana for me. Wow. It was so sweet, and I was so supported. And everybody contributed to helping me get there. Somebody, you know, the marathon runner gave me magnesium. Somebody else told me how to walk uphill zigzag. The the or one of the organizers held my ponytail and peeled my banana and sewed up my little tiny toe. Like he's like literally sewed up my little blister on my toe for me. And it was so magical. And like the second, the last day, I'm like, okay, I'm doing this. Like, I can't, I couldn't go. I like lost my sunglasses. And I'm like, no, I'm not buying more because I can't take the extra steps to go walk to that store over there. Right. Right. No extra steps. Don't need them. I'll walk with my sunglasses. And like, and they're like, okay, we're gonna go on a side trip to the something that used to be on the original Camino, but they they hundreds of years ago they moved the Camino to go through the town so that businesses would be supported. But it used to go through this estate that's been in this guy's year family for 400 years. And I'm like, okay, well, that's gonna be it. Those extra steps are gonna do me in. Like, I'm not gonna be able to finish. Okay, because the next day was the finish. I'm like, okay, well, I'm going on a magical adventure to this estate that's been in this, why not? Okay, so I don't finish, right? Yeah. And I go and he he tells us about this incredible tree. And now I feel like I'm making it up because I have since Googled what trees grow from the inside out. Because he's like, it grows from the inside out, and the newest growth is on the edge instead of the like it's opposite from the I can't find such a tree. Yeah, I can't find such a tree, but we all hugged it, and we all sat there and felt the energy running through the roots, up through us, up through the crown, to the heavens. Like my right foot had hurt so bad. I was like, that's it. After this, I'm getting in the van. There's no choice. And my husband was so supportive. I'd call him at night crying. I'd be like, Am I done? He's like, I don't know when you're done, but you'll know, but you're not there yet. Okay, okay, I can do this.

SPEAKER_00 40:49

Thank you for joining us today on the Reignite Resilience podcast. We hope you had some aha moments and learned a few new real life ideas to fuel the flames of passion. Please subscribe on your favorite streaming platform, like or download your favorite episodes, and of course, share with your friends and family. We look forward to seeing you again next time on Reignite Resilience.