Big Life AND Soft Life: Sammie Fleming on Ambition, Pancake Mornings, and Following the Call

Send Mara a quick text love note here!Welcome back to Even Here, Even Now! I have been wanting to have this conversation for a while, and I am so glad Sammie Fleming finally made it onto the podcast. She tuned in from her beachside town in New Zealand, which meant we were on opposite ends of the world, me absolutely dripping sweat and her wrapped up against the cold with multiple coffees. Sammie is a coach for devoted space holders who are here to do deeply integrity-filled work in the world and want to do it with their whole heart. Over the past decade she has guided more than 1200 clients and facilitated hundreds of sacred circles, workshops, and retreats around the world. Her work is about helping space holders cultivate grounded confidence and rise into the next evolution of their soul work in full alignment with their values.Our conversation was organic in the most wonderful way. We began with the very real and unglamorous reality of meeting your needs when you have small children and a full business and broken sleep, and what it looks like when the big stretch is carving out seven minutes to lie on the floor of your office and listen to a song before going back inside to your family.And then we got into the tension between a big life and a soft life. Can those things can coexist?! What does it means to swap the word "or" for "and" and let both things be true at the same time? Sammie's answer is pancake mornings and big stretchy projects. Long slow Sundays and the call that will not leave you alone.We also talk what ambition actually is when you strip away what you were taught to want, how finding your thing completely changes your relationship to excellence, divine responsibility and what it means to be brave enough to follow the call even when it makes no logical sense, and what the next five years might look like when there is finally a little more breathing room.If Sammie's work is calling to you, her program Gather is open right now through July. It is a 12-month journey for devoted space holders who want to build extraordinary space holding practices and become extraordinary practitioners. You can find out more at sammiefleming.com/gather.xMaraMy BEST tools, matched to exactly what you need. Take the [free] needs quiz: needsquiz.com