Beginner’s Mind

Shall I tell you about one of the greatest fears in my life? It’s to feel boxed in and get bored. To stop growing and to run out of firsts – in my job, in my marriage, in my life.
 
 
Luckily, in the last couple of months, I have been busy with a lot of “firsts”:
 

• I took a salsa class with Tobias. Actually, I have done a lot of salsa dancing back in the days, but dancing for the first time with your partner who is just taking his first salsa steps forces you to let go of your expectations and embrace this new beginning. It was a really interesting challenge to let him take the lead, and the course definitely felt a bit like couples therapy for us and our friends 😉

• I also get to organize the first Product Academy Summit which was definitely not on my roadmap for this year, but suddenly emerged as an opportunity when two of our wonderful alumni took the lead. We just released the tickets and are running this event almost completely via asynch Whatsapp messages. Definitely a first for me…

• Aaaaand my dear friend Arjanna and I just released our brand-new podcast project “Living the Unseen” – where we explore the topic of spirituality and talk about our own spiritual journeys in public for the first time. There is so much taboo around this topic in our rationally dominated world that I only shared my thoughts and experiences with very few friends so far. However, it seems like there are many more of us out there, finding a very personal way to connect with deeper aspects of our being.

 
All these new beginnings have giving me the opportunity
 

• to really feel «scited» – both scared and excited (thanks, Glennon Doyle for the neologism), which serves as a great compass in my life for doing something that truly matters to me;
• to work with my saboteurs: My perfectionist keeps showing up bashing me for imperfect audio quality, background noises, grammar mistakes I keep making in English… you name it;
• to drop my obsession about outcomes and just do some things for the sake of the experience, without any specific goals I’d like to reach;
• and to learn something really new (like picking a jingle for your podcast 😉

I just love the state of a beginner’s mind: it’s like having a blank page ready to be filled, it sparks my curiosity, gives me a chance to be humble, creative and present. 

When was the last time you did something for the first time?


Lots of love,
Tanja

This text was first published in my though-letter Tanja’s Butterflies (march Edition 2024 – Part 2). If you are interested in receiving the next editions in your inbox including additional resources such as inspiring quotes, books and more, you can subscribe here.