The Loveable Podcast by Dr. Kelly Flanagan

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loveable podcast episode 54 — **The Conclusion to the Loveable Podcast [Loveable 054]** Dec 24, 2018
“We’ve been taught to believe life is only meaningful if we’re getting from here to there—doing a lot, becoming more important, accruing more stuff, feeling safer, and increasing our comfort. Even the good work of redeeming the world can become its own straight line, as we single-handedly try to move the world from Point A to Point B. We pretend life is what it’s not. We need to get real about how this whole thing works. We need to bend our lives back into the circle they already are.”

Here we are at the end of *The Year of Listening, Loving, and Living.* In this final episode, we do more than just sum up the content of this podcast so far; we add one final, invaluable insight to your journey of growth and transformation. And here it is: seeing life as a straight-line is a disease that will keep you ashamed and sick, and experiencing life and growth as a circle is essential to transformation and healing…

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post The Conclusion to the Loveable Podcast [Loveable 054] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 52: Reflecting Upon the Unfolding of Your Truest Self [Loveable 053] Dec 18, 2018

“Your true self folded in upon itself never ceases to be your truest you. Your soul is bigger and more beautiful and more mysterious than you can possible imagine. It has been folded in upon itself by people and by experience and by life. But it need not remain that way.”

One of the most common questions I receive as a therapist is, how will I know if I’m getting better? This is an important question to answer because the answer gives us direction, it gives us hope, and eventually it gives us something to celebrate. That’s the question we answer in Episode 53 of The Loveable Podcast…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

Healing and wholing are the same thing.
The greatest problem in our hearts is not disease; it is disunity.
Your true self is a like a piece of paper folded in on itself by life and by shame; the good news is, it can be unfolded.
Grace does not delight in us despite who we are, but because of who we are.
A sign that your true self is healing and expanding is that your pain becomes a part of what makes you unique, not a part of what makes you bad.
A purpose-driven life is one rooted in the ego and fueled by ambition; a purpose-centered life is one rooted in the soul and fueled by passion.
You probably don’t belong to people who want you to be smaller than you actually are.
You’re not here to be great; you’re here to be yourself.
Experiencing everyone else as worthy is the surest sign that you’ve truly embraced your own worthiness.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 52: Reflecting Upon the Unfolding of Your Truest Self [Loveable 053] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 51: How All This Passion, Pain, and Courage Add Up to Joy [Loveable 052] Dec 04, 2018

“Fear about the future becomes bravery in the present becomes joy in hindsight. Joy is knowing you can be scared and still ride through life. Joy is being terrified and trusting you’ll survive it. Joy is believing in yourself enough to believe you are brave.”

Joy and happiness are not the same thing. In fact, they may be opposites, and the difference between them could make all the difference in your life. In Episode 52 of The Loveable Podcast, we focus on how practicing your passions may not add up to happiness but will almost certainly add up to joy. Because happiness is about things going your way, whereas joy is about trusting you can handle life, no matter how things go…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

Both positive and negative feedback can disrupt the practicing of our passions, because they inflate or wound our ego, rooting us there, rather than in our souls, where all authenticity and creativity originate.
Perfectionism is a highly evolved defense against criticism.
We fear vulnerability will mean we get wounded; usually, it means we get joyful,
Bravery is going one step farther than you think you can.
Courage isn’t going forward without trepidation; courage is going forward with determination, even when we are terrified.
You don’t need to become brave, you need to realize you have already been brave.
Vulnerability and bravery are practiced every day in ordinary life.
To encourage our kids to be brave, don’t teach them about bravery, help them remember times they’ve already been brave.
Sometimes fear is a boundary we need to push through; other times fear is telling us we need to set a boundary in our life.
We stay afraid instead of brave because we never attend to what happened to the things we feared, we just move on to fearing the next thing. Pay attention. You’re brave.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 51: How All This Passion, Pain, and Courage Add Up to Joy [Loveable 052] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 50: The Courage to Fail [Loveable 051] Nov 19, 2018

“Courage is ignoring the jeers and feeling the fears. Courage is returning to the edge of our comfort zone and choosing the place where our fear dwells, because we are worthy of another chance at life. Regardless of what the critics say.”

People who experience success aren’t better at being successful; they are better at failing. They don’t misinterpret failures as a sign that they should be doing something else. They don’t listen to the people who tell them their failures define them. They get back up and try again, believing their passion is truer than their setbacks. In other words, success doesn’t always feel great; more often than not, it feels like failure that didn’t stop us.

In Episode 51 of The Loveable Podcast, we will turn your definitions of success and courage upside down, and cultivate the courage to fail by listening to the right people.

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

A job is not a passion. A job is a place to practice your passion, or a place you are leaving for a new place where you can practice your passion more consistently.
Everyone is making it up as they go. Don’t worry about needing to know the outcome before you get started. The outcome unfolds as you act bravely.
The mindset necessary for beginning to practice our passions: “Learn to be a rookie and love it.”
Fear makes you quiet; defy it by telling someone you trust about it.
Stubborn is another word for courageous.
You don’t have to be over your fear to practice your passion; you have to be sick of it.
Whenever we pursue a passion that is an authentic expression of our true self, we will also experience misfortune, disappointment, and pain. Hardship is not necessarily a sign you should stop.
We are defined not by the criticism we receive but by the courage we live.
Failures don’t have to be conclusions; they can be course corrections.
Impostor syndrome would evaporate if we could all admit we’re learning and making mistakes as we go.
Practice say nothing at all. Defending oneself and justifying oneself are just distractions from the work of pursuing our passions.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 50: The Courage to Fail [Loveable 051] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 49: What to Do When Our Feelings Are Lying to Us [Loveable 050] Nov 12, 2018

“Life is a gift in terrifying disguise, and we are here to open it, until we find the still-quiet place in the center of it, where fear no longer decides.”

In Episode 50 of The Loveable Podcast, we talk about fear. It is an important emotion. It causes us to buckle our seatbelts, run out of burning buildings, and grab our pepper spray when we hear footsteps behind us in a dark parking lot. But in the modern world, our fear has gone rogue. We now get afraid not just about life-threatening situations, but also about life-changing situations. We are afraid not just of dangers, but of opportunities. It’s time to quit letting fear make our decisions for us…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

Practicing our passion is not a leap, it’s a step-by-step process, with each step preparing us for the next one.
To add just a little beauty to the world is reason enough to practice your passion.
Our passion only requires an audience of one, and sometimes, for a little while, that audience might even be ourselves.
If you pay attention to the world instead of the news, you discover that reality is more inspiring than it is terrifying.
Our fear may not go away, but it should be a passenger in our lives, not the driver.
Welcome your fear, listen to it, become familiar with it, then discern whether or not you will continue to listen to it.
If you practice your passion in order to be successful, you will accidentally feed your shame.
Sometimes fear isn’t telling you to avoid something; it’s telling you that doing it is going to feel vulnerable, but you should do it anyway.
The voice of your self-encouragement tries to convince you there is no reason to be afraid; the voice of grace tells you that there are good reasons to be afraid but you will be able to handle it.
Sometimes, fear is telling a half-truth. Be slow. Discern. Listen to the true half. Then quit listening.
Sometimes you will let fear decide. That’s okay. Learn from it. Choose differently next time.
If you have strong faith you might have more fear, because you will live boldly and bravely in ways that challenge you anew.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 49: What to Do When Our Feelings Are Lying to Us [Loveable 050] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 48: The Good Life vs. the Redemptive Life [Loveable 049] Nov 05, 2018

The so-called good life is a hollow promise. It’s empty of the things we desire most, like passion, purpose, and peace. It bores us. Makes us restless. We crave something else. We ultimately crave a redemptive life.

In Episode 49 of The Loveable Podcast, we shift our focus slightly to something that will clarify not what our passion is, but the direction we want to go with it. That something is our pain. This week’s episode revolves around a hard but simple formula: passion + pain = purpose. In other words, when we practice our passion in the service of redeeming our pain, a sense of purpose is almost guaranteed…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

People don’t hold us back from following our passions; we allow them to hold us back. Instead, we need to set a boundary on their influence upon us.
Getting healthy usually means developing a healthy sense of inner authority. When this inner authority comes into conflict with our authority figures, we must enter an intentional process of discernment.
“Sometimes passion needs something to contain it, focus it, and to turn it in a direction that is good, holy, and meaningful. And sometimes that something is our pain.” –Loveable
“Sometimes, redeeming our pain is about coming to value it so much, we let it lead us.” –Loveable
“Where are our most vibrant passion meets our most visceral pain, we discover a sense of purpose.” –Loveable
A sense of purpose arises within us when we face the pain of our story and realize the transformation of it will be the direction of our life.
Transient happiness is a hallmark of the good life; enduring joy is a hallmark of the redemptive life.
As we practice our passions, we gradually discover the pain they are intended to redeem.
Build a life you love rather than living one you tolerate.
When we embrace our pain, we release our suffering, which is for the most part simply resistance to our pain.
The redemptive life makes us an active participate in redeeming our pain, rather than a passive participant in receiving our pain.
You can’t force the redemption of your pain, you can only be faithful to it.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 48: The Good Life vs. the Redemptive Life [Loveable 049] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 47: What a Life of Vulnerability Really Looks Like [Loveable 048] Oct 22, 2018

“We are healed when we reveal our mess to another and put our real self on the line. When we connect in our brokenness—not in spite of it—we discover what makes us messy is also what makes us beautiful. And we give everyone around us permission to be broken and beautiful, too…A world torn apart by invincibility can only be healed by vulnerability and weakness.”

In Episode 48 of The Loveable Podcast, we are focused on the biggest barrier to practicing your passions. It is not lack of clarity about what they are. It is not lack of resources for pursuing them. It is something much more basic, much more common, and much more formidable. It is fear. This week we talk about vulnerability, courage, and what it means to be truly successful in the practicing of your passions…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

Be humble enough to let your life unfold, be attentive enough to learn from it as it does, and be courageous enough to choose a direction, even if there is no guarantee you will head in that direction forever.
Our passion at first may take the form of jealousy about someone else who is practicing their passion.
If you can’t connect with a passion, that’s okay. Take the time to reconnect with your true self and your worthiness, and eventually your passions will surface.
When tragedy strikes, we have two options: get anxious and hold on even tighter to what will eventually end, or accept the impermanence of things and replace anxiety with a healthy urgency about living and loving well.
When we quit investing our time and energy in our invulnerability—our protection and pretending and perfecting and performing—we can become the artists we already are.
Courage is not a character trait; it’s a direction.
Success isn’t trying and winning; success is simply trying, regardless of how afraid you are.
Creation isn’t finished. We are co-creators. Our passions are the brush. The world is our easel.
The people we belong to love us enough to shelter us from unfair criticism, and enough to give us constructive criticism.
When we lack courage to be vulnerable and to practice our passions, we don’t need a group of people to cheerlead us, we only need one person we can trust to en-courage us.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 47: What a Life of Vulnerability Really Looks Like [Loveable 048] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 46: You Aren’t Here to Be More Happy (You Are Here to Be More You) [Loveable 047] Oct 15, 2018

“Life doesn’t have an easy setting. Remembering who you are isn’t an all-or-nothing endeavor. It’s not a pass-fail assignment. The truth is much closer to this: life is like a sieve and everything we do runs through it. If we watch closely, we’ll notice passing through the sieve all those things that aren’t really us. And we’ll notice, captured in the sieve of life, the parts of us that are who we’ve always been.”

We often confuse our passions and our skills, and this week we unconfuse them. A passion is “something we are extravagantly fond of doing.” That is very different from “something we are extra good at doing.” The former produces meaning in our lives, the latter just…produces. In Episode 47 of The Loveable Podcast, we talk in detail about the difference between passion and skill, how you might get more clarity in differentiating the two, and how that clarity can change your life.

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

When you protect the time you have set aside for practicing your passions, you are not being unfaithful to others, you are being faithful to your true self.
If we want to be serious about practicing our passions, there will be some good things—people and commitments—which we have to set boundaries on, or let go of altogether.
Our skills lead to productivity; our passions lead to peaceful productivity.
Our understanding and clarity about our passions never ceases to evolve.
Skill doesn’t generate passion; actually, passion is the fuel that bids skill.
Don’t let others tell you what you are good at; tell them what you are passionate about.
Where skill and passion are both along for the ride, make sure your passion is in the driver’s seat, not your ambition.
Passion does not protect you from hardship; but it does give rise to the joy that sustains you through hardship.
We fully own our passion when we boldly announce it to our circles of belonging.
We don’t become familiar with the many layers of our passions by thinking about them; only by practicing them.
Shame will tell you that you have to practice your passion to be worthy; grace will tell you that you get to practice it because you are worthy.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 46: You Aren’t Here to Be More Happy (You Are Here to Be More You) [Loveable 047] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 45: Why the Most Mundane Life Is Sometimes the Most Passionate Life [Loveable 046] Oct 08, 2018

“Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work.” –Gustave Flaubert

In Episode 46 of The Loveable Podcast, we are focused on taking the space in your life created by last week’s exercise and doing something a little counterintuitive with it—we are going to build some monotony into it. In other words, we are going to focus on building structure around the practicing of your passions. By the end of this episode, you are going to be more motivated to make a habit of doing the things you love.

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

When we quit an activity to free ourselves up to pursue our passions, we are not quitting that activity for a day, nor are we necessarily quitting it forever; we are quitting it for now, for this season in our life.
Adventure is made possible by that which is routine.
We don’t practice our passion after we overcome all of our fears; we value it enough to practice it in spite of not overcoming all of our fears.
The practicing of our passion is built on a foundation of rituals, routines, and rigor that seems very ordinary and unexciting.
You can avoid creative blocks by building creative habits.
In a busy life, little happens unless it is on the family calendar; put your passion on the family calendar.
Make particular time slots in your week sacred, by giving them to your passion.
Calendars are like budgets for your time. Where are you spending your valuable time?
Practicing your passion always leads to feelings of vulnerability and thus always requires courage; tune in next week for that discussion!

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 45: Why the Most Mundane Life Is Sometimes the Most Passionate Life [Loveable 046] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 44: The Beauty of Becoming a Quitter [Loveable 045] Oct 01, 2018

“Sometimes, life gets too cramped to move in any new direction. Sometimes, the direction we need to go is backward. Sometimes, the best thing we can do is to undo the best things we’ve done.”

In Episode 45 of The Loveable Podcast, we focus on quitting some of the things we added to our lives before we gained clarity about who we really are. In this way, becoming a quitter can actually make space for the practicing of our passions. By the end of this episode, you will begin to see more clearly a path toward practicing your passions, because you will be planning to clear that path of debris.

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

A better definition of a meaningful life: “Any life that, on the whole, reduces the overall collective level of misery on the planet.”
Generally, living from our false self adds to the collective level of misery on the planet—it increases loneliness, aggression, and arrogance—whereas living from our soul decreases it, through simple acts of love and acceptance.
Quitting things that are not an accurate reflection of your true self is not about impulsively quitting attachments, commitments, and relationships; it is about wisely discerning how you can begin to transform your life over time, while being sensitive to some of the realities you live within.
You don’t become who you are; you unbecome who you are not.
We wear “being busy” as a status symbol, when, really, it’s probably just a sign that we are living according to a lot of other people’s agendas.
We don’t start quitting things because we know exactly where we are going to end up, but simply because we need to move toward being who we actually are.
You are never too old to start making time for the practicing of your passions.
Wise quitting isn’t about getting rid of stuff that is unpleasant but about eliminating stuff that is unyou.
Books mentioned in this week’s episode include Falling Upward by Richard Rohr, Love Does by Bob Goff, Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by Donald Miller, Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis, The Price of Privilege by Madeline Levine, and The Gift of Failure by Jessica Lahey.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 44: The Beauty of Becoming a Quitter [Loveable 045] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 43: Don’t Do Something More Meaningful (Do Something More You) [Loveable 044] Sep 24, 2018

“If you were given permission to simply be more you, what would you do? Start speaking up? Standing up? Standing out? Walking out? Reaching out? Pouring out? Sitting in? Giving in? Giving up? Opening up? To what? Dance lessons? Photography school? Medical school? Dropping out of school? Starting a band? Starting a business? Starting a movement? Dominoes? Why wait? After all, you weren’t created to be successful. You were created to be you.”

In Episode 44 of The Loveable Podcast, we challenge the belief that what we are passionate about doing must make a difference in the world, that it must matter in some particularly measurable way. By the end of this episode, I think you will be more motivated to begin practicing your passions, not because they are one way to be meaningful, but because they are the only way to be truly you.

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

A sense of meaning is not the reason for practicing our passions; it’s the byproduct of practicing them.
We don’t make a difference by trying to make a difference; we make a difference by becoming different, by becoming someone free to live out our true selves by doing the things we love to do in the world.
Meaning doesn’t flow from trying to be meaningful; it follows from faithfully practicing our passions and letting the meaning take care of itself.
The unique thing about practicing a passion is that the failures you experience while practicing it are worth it.
If people’s responses to our passions are a motivation for practicing them, we will almost never get started.
Encouragement of our passions may come from unexpected quarters; that is one way we gain increased clarity about our circles of belonging.
We don’t practice our passions because we think they will matter—we practice them in spite of the fact they probably won’t matter.
Growing up isn’t about becoming more mature; it’s about becoming more you.
Practice your passion not to get results, but regardless of the results.
Every time we practice our passion we need to ask, is my true self practicing this today, or my false self?

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 43: Don’t Do Something More Meaningful (Do Something More You) [Loveable 044] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 42: Don’t Try to Be More Extraordinary (Try to Be More Human) [Loveable 043] Sep 17, 2018

“Yes, the extraordinary is a gift some of us receive at rare, fleeting moments. But our humanity is the ordinary gift we are, all of us, always receiving all the time.”

In Episode 43 of The Loveable Podcast, we are once again tackling the voice of shame, which undermines the practicing of our passions by convincing us that those passions must feel extraordinary, look extraordinary, and produce extraordinary results. By the end of this episode, you are going to be closer to discerning a path forward for yourself that looks ordinary and beautiful.

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

Awareness of our passions doesn’t happen in a moment of epiphany; it dawns slowly, like a sunrise.
We don’t build resilience, self-esteem, and identity through uninterrupted success, but through failures that we learn how to survive.
Quit chasing an extraordinary life; embrace your ordinary one, and discover a better kind of extraordinary.
When we embrace our worthiness, our shame doesn’t die; it goes into hibernation until we begin embracing our passions, then it wakes up and tells us our passions must be extraordinary to be pursued.
There is a simple joy in practicing our passions, not necessarily an extraordinary accomplishment.
Embracing the ordinariness of life might not mean you will do something different with your life, but it will mean that you do it differently.
When someone tries to shame your passion, responding with compassion for the shame out of which their condemnation arises can disrupt the cycle of aggression.
Even when you’re hiding your passion from the public eye, the voice of shame within you is watching and ready to discourage you with a reminder of how extraordinary you “should” be.
Real success is not excitement about what you’ve done but contentment about who you are.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 42: Don’t Try to Be More Extraordinary (Try to Be More Human) [Loveable 043] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 41: How Five Senseless Days Could Make Sense of the Rest of Your Days [Loveable042] Sep 10, 2018

In the words of Frederick Buechner, “Listen to your life. See it for the fathomless mystery it is. In the boredom and pain of it, no less than in the excitement and gladness: touch, taste, smell your way to the holy and hidden heart of it, because in the last analysis all moments are key moments, and life itself is grace.”

In Episode 42 of The Loveable Podcast, we are focused on cultivating a healthy sense of urgency, not by becoming more aware of what we aren’t living, but by becoming increasingly aware of what we are already living, and how precious this one chance life really is…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

Each time you journey through the three acts of your story—worthiness, belonging, and purpose—what you discover about each of them will be different, more challenging, and more rewarding.
A passion may look like it changes over time because we are in different stages of life that produce different insights about it, but really, as we grow, we just discover new angles on it, and a more complete vision of it.
Our thoughts usually revolve around a sense of scarcity; our senses usually reconnect us to a sense of abundance.
Most of us have multiple passions, and at times, they may feel incompatible with each other. That’s okay. Learning how they can co-exist is part of the journey.
Accomplishment is often incompatible with presence; attention to doing is often incompatible with attention to being.
Paraphrase of a great quote: “We cannot be grateful for all things; but we can be grateful in all moments.”
Mindfulness requires patience with oneself; while you learn mindfulness, you also learn patience.
Oftentimes, “success” is a painkiller in disguise. True success is being connected with one’s true self and living in alignment with it.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 41: How Five Senseless Days Could Make Sense of the Rest of Your Days [Loveable042] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 40: How Hopelessness Can Become Our Best Hope [Loveable041] Aug 27, 2018

“Hope can be a beautiful thing, because it gives us direction and imbues our lives with a sense of purpose and meaning. But hope can also be the worst of things, because sometimes we settle for having a direction, rather than walking in that direction. Sometimes, our numbered days are spent hoping and waiting, instead of acting and living.”

In Episode 41 of The Loveable Podcast, we talk about how the thing that is supposed to sustain us, actually detains us. We talk about how the thing that is supposed to inspire us, actually conspires against us. That thing is called hope. By the end of this conversation, you’ll be done with dreaming about what you love to do, and you’ll be more interested in pursuing what you love to do.

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

Fear of success can create as much resistance to practicing our passions as does fear of failure.
Don’t wait for authority to ordain the practicing of your passions. Practice, and maybe someday you’ll earn your ordination.
Don’t just do what you’re good at, do what you love to do, and you’ll get better at it.
Don’t just ask what you want to practice; ask yourself why you are practicing it. Practice it for joy, not gain.
Practicing a passion can be pleasurable; practicing it with the intention of redeeming something in the world becomes purposeful.
There is an important difference between having a direction, and walking in that direction.
Conditions will never feel right to practice your passion, because resistance will always be present. All we can do is get walking anyway, with resistance coming along for the stroll.
When you start practicing your passion, your resistance won’t go away. At first, it will increase. Oftentimes, in the form of shame and self-doubt.
Suffering isn’t necessarily a sign that you’re walking the wrong path; usually it’s simply a sign that you’re walking.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 40: How Hopelessness Can Become Our Best Hope [Loveable041] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 39: The Blessing of Being Unfinished [Loveable 040] Aug 20, 2018

“We have a list of things we think must be accomplished inside of us before we can start taking risks outside of us. We think, Once I’m more confident, I’ll start dating. Once I’m more patient, I’ll have children. Once I’m wise enough, I’ll start a blog. Once my insides look as orderly as everyone else looks on the outside, I’ll follow my heart and my passion and start doing the things I want to do in the world. To live the things we love, we have to live them with our hearts feeling a little unfinished.”

In Episode 40 of The Loveable Podcast, we tackle one of the most common kinds of internal resistance to practicing our passions: the feeling that we are not ready yet, that we have to somehow grow more, be more transformed, feel more like we’ve arrived. By the end of this conversation, you’ll be wanting to get started sooner rather than later on the living of your passions…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

Passion must always be balanced by a paycheck, but too often it gets eclipsed by our pursuit of a paycheck.
Shame operates on the assumption of scarcity; grace operates on the assumption of abundance. Which partner will you choose to dance with?
As our clarity about our passions increases, so will our internal resistance to them.
Clarity about our passions often comes in a quiet moment of surprise.
The secret to practicing your passions is the same as the secret to improv comedy: in the words of Stephen Colbert, you have to learn to love the bomb.
You’ll never be “finished” enough to practice your passions without bombing at least a little, so you may as well start now.
Happiness comes from success; resilience (and thus joy) comes from failing, and then continuing.
Most of us have more than one true passion.
Creativity that is perfect doesn’t exist; creativity that is shared is called art.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 39: The Blessing of Being Unfinished [Loveable 040] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 38: What If a Resurrected Life Isn’t as Impossible as It May Seem? [Loveable 039] Aug 13, 2018

“Sometimes the simplest, most elegant, most life-changing solutions are right in front of our noses. But we can’t see them, because we are locked in to old schemas. A schema is a mental framework that helps organize and interpret information in the world around us. Schemas are essential when we need to act quickly and decisively. But schemas can also be a problem, because sometimes they’re outdated. Or worse, some of our schemas were never correct in the first place…”

In Episode 39 of The Loveable Podcast, we examine the outdated mental rules and practical hurdles that get in the way of us discovering our passions, practicing them, and cultivating a sense of purpose in our lives. By the end of this conversation, you will have greater clarity about what are the actual barriers that stand between you and your passions, and which ones are simply in your head…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

The way to overcome impostor syndrome is not to try convincing yourself that you are not an impostor; rather, try to embrace that we are all making it up as we go.
Procrastination is almost never a sign of laziness; rather, it is almost always a symptom of fearfulness (in disguise).
We need both passion and ambition, but we also need to be sure that our ambition is subordinate to our passion.
Where our passion leads us is relatively inconsequential; it’s the practicing of them that matters most.
Practicing our passion requires embracing our worthiness even more fully, and leaning on our people even more heavily.
The things you are wired to do and here to do and love to are all the same thing. That is good news!
You can ask “What if?” with fear and shame, or with bravery and hope. The former blinds us to possibility; the latter opens our eyes to it.
Asking ourselves both “What if I fail?” and “What if I succeed?” can reveal limiting beliefs about success and failure that are inaccurate and preventing a resurrected life.
Asking “What if?” helps us to become a more objective observer of our thoughts and our inaccurate “mental rules” about life.
A passion is something we are so extravagantly fond of doing that we would be willing to suffer for it if necessary.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

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Week 37: When You Think You Don’t Know How to Live [Loveable 038] Aug 06, 2018

“Sometimes, joy is simply undone things finally lived. We need to keep the door of our hearts open, so we can listen to our urges and our wants. Many of them are trying to lead us into joy. Yet, when we’ve been shutting the door on them for so long, it can be hard to break the habit and keep it ajar.”

We all want to find our passion and discover our purpose, yet many of us have difficulty doing so, and so we think our passions are hide to find. They’re not. They are usually right in front of us, but we simply fail to see them. In Episode 38 of The Loveable Podcast, we will move you one step closer to seeing them, with five familiar questions…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

Pursuing your passion may not involve a huge overhaul of your life; it may just require a few tiny tweaks. The magnitude of change is probably correlated with the magnitude of the false self you have been living from.
The false self robs us of our passions by infusing them with too much ambition.
Discovering our passions is not about arriving at clarity, but gradually increasing our clarity.
The ultimate barrier to pursuing your passion is inside of you. It is called Resistance. It also goes by another name: Shame.
Our passions don’t need to be great; they just need to be lived.
The right action will occur to the relaxed mind.
When it comes to pursuing our passion, the only way to fail is to not get started at all.
Our passions wait on us; it is never too late to discover them.
Maybe our grade school teachers were on to something when they taught us the “Five Ws” of information gathering: who, what, where, when, and why. Who do you want to reach out to? What do you want to do with your life? Where do you want to go? When will you let yourself listen? Why not now?

You can listen below or on iTunes!

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Week 36: Why Wanting Is the Way to Truly Living [Loveable 037] Jul 31, 2018

“You have things you’ve always wanted to do with your life. Ways you’ve wanted to spend your days. Passions you’ve wanted to practice. Hobbies you’ve wanted to make a habit of. Love you’ve wanted to spread in the form of a vocation. Care you’ve wanted to give in the form of a calling. The things we want most are not, ultimately, material things, but purposeful things—patterns of living that feel meaningful. They are the deepest wishes of your truest self.”

In Episode 37 of The Loveable Podcast, we focus on a question that can begin to clarify for you what your passion is and in what direction your purpose may lie. That question is, “What do you want to do?” We are going to let that question lead us in the direction we are here to go…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

When our people interrupt what we are doing, they aren’t interfering with our passions; they are protecting us from unbridled ambition.
You’ll have plenty of time to save the world when your kids are grown and gone, and if you don’t, you probably have bigger problems than saving the world.
Our people clarify, converse about, and encourage the practicing of our passions.
The good news is this good: the things we are here to do are also the things we are wired to enjoy.
When we worry almost exclusively what we should do, or are supposed to do, shame is probably directing our lives.
A parent’s main task is to raise independent adults, so when a kid’s passion seems difficult to monetize, parents will intentionally and/or unintentionally discourage it.
Our passions cannot be discovered in a week; it takes a lifetime.
Sometimes, passion is not an activity but a way of engaging in all activities.
An impulse practiced repeatedly becomes a habit at best and an addiction at worst; a passion practiced repeatedly becomes a sense of purpose.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 36: Why Wanting Is the Way to Truly Living [Loveable 037] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 35: The Kindness Challenge [Loveable 036] Jul 24, 2018

“Let’s admit it: we’re obsessed with winning. Just look around. Everything has become a competition. Our will-to-win is everywhere, and it’s not going anywhere. But what if we gave it something better to do? What if we all decided to compete at a game called kindness?”

In Episode 36 of The Loveable Podcast, we talk about how to take our instinct for competition, which is usually divisive, and turn it on its head so it connects us in increasingly powerful and life-changing ways. This week’s episode is a dare, a dare to do away with all the conflicting and confusing goals you have in your relationships and to replace them all with one goal, one dare, one challenge that can simplify and beautify every relationship you have…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

We can see and hear our lost loved ones on video, but we cannot touch them. Let’s hold them now, while we can.
Grieving in advance diminishes our regret in hindsight.
Grief is more often a cycle than a straight line. It returns. That’s normal. No need to resist it.
Contemplating our mortality doesn’t end with fear of losing this life; it ends with fear of missing it.
As you practice kindness, you become whole, and you become love.
Kindness toward others begins with practicing kindness toward oneself.
Kindness doesn’t mean having no boundaries; it means setting those boundaries with tenderness toward self and others.
Kindness is the basic instinct of your true self.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 35: The Kindness Challenge [Loveable 036] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 34: Let’s Hold Each Other Like We’re Dying [Loveable 035] Jul 16, 2018

“Sometimes, we fight so we don’t have to feel. Sometimes, we trade jeers so we don’t have to trade tears…and that’s a problem. Because the solutions to our most pressing concerns don’t lie within the heated exchange of our ideas; they lie at the bottom of our grief. If we don’t get better at grieving, we can’t get better at loving and living.”

In Episode 35 of The Loveable Podcast, we talk about how attention to our mortality can radically reshape our reality, making us less reactive and more tender, bringing us peace, and expanding our sense of belonging to include all people…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

Before we share our secrets with trusted others, we must first admit them to ourselves.
In places of true belonging, our people can help us to see the secrets we’ve been keeping, even from ourselves. If we let them.
Grieving our losses ahead of time gives us a chance to redeem them in advance by living a more intentional and loving life.
One natural result of contemplating our mortality is compassion.
Only by going through sorrow about our mortality do we exit our denial, anger, and fear and enter into peace. Sorrow is the doorway.
When we surrender to grief it becomes peace; when we resist it, it becomes depression.
The surest way to develop confidence in your courage is to grieve.
Our mortality is our most fundamental common ground, and awareness of it straightens out our priorities and expands our sense of belonging.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

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Week 33: The Healing Is in the Emptying [Loveable 034] Jul 03, 2018

“True intimacy is not the absence of privacy or the absence of boundaries or the absence of a separate self—in fact, we need to have our own spaces and limits and identity. True intimacy is the absence of secrets.”

The quality of your belonging will be inversely correlated with the size of your secrets. The more secrets you harbor about who you are, what you’ve done, why you’ve done it, how you’re wounded, and so on, the more difficult it will be to cultivate authentic connection and love. So, the challenge in Episode 34 of The Loveable Podcast is this: begin the emptying…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

A useful acronym: W.A.I.T. Why am I talking? Or, where am I speaking from, my true self or my false self? Does this facilitate connection with them (true self), or protection of me (false self)?
Prejudice diminishes as we live less and less from our false self, but it is never eliminated completely, because our true self never completely goes away.
Kids need parents with conflicting strengths. When those strengths cause actual conflict, it is simply complementarity without grace.
To confess secrets is to feel good, healthy, unburdened. Perhaps not immediately, but eventually.
The part of us that most commonly keeps secrets is the little one in us who is trying to stay out of trouble.
When you go to therapy, reveal your secrets, and realize you are still worthy of belonging, it gives you the courage to do this outside of therapy, as well.
Telling secrets may continue to refine our circles of belonging. This is hard. And essential.
There is no detour around risk and vulnerability if you want to arrive at belonging.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

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Week 32: Becoming Students of the People We Belong To [Loveable 033] Jun 18, 2018

“Relationships can grow stale and stuck. Perhaps that’s just the way life goes and the way love ages. But maybe, just maybe, we can fall into love again by learning how to pay attention again—by giving up all of our judgment and assessment and critique and meeting our people in the field of awareness, instead of upon the field of battle.”

In Episode 33 of The Loveable Podcast, we seek love again by choosing to be in school again. Let’s become students of the people we love, curious, fully attentive, ready to learn their every nuance, and cherishing who they are rather than what we would make them into…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

When it comes to growth and transformation, small things make the difference, and the difference is usually small. Be patient. Keep going.
A true affirmation of someone else can only overflow from our own sense of worthiness.
Every good lesson must be learned over and over (and over) again.
Even when we don’t feel loveable, it is important to act as if we are loveable.
Certainty may be the greatest barrier to curiosity.
We cannot force anyone to become curious about us; we can only cultivate curiosity about them, and invite them to do the same.
We’re wired to notice what is wrong with our people, but with careful attention and curiosity, we will become aware of what is beautiful about them, too.
One of the best ways to practice curiosity is to clarify the meaning of the words our people use.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

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Week 31: Turning Pro at the Art of Loving [Loveable 032] Jun 11, 2018

“You have a relationship gift. Something you are naturally good at. A way of loving that no one else can do in exactly the way you do it…You can stop being humble about it. You can stop suppressing it and burying it. You can stop being an amateur at it. Own it. Claim it. Inhabit it. You can decide right now, here, today, that you are going to become pro at that particular act of love.”

In Episode 32 of The Loveable Podcast, we uncomplicate love. For a week, put aside all the marriage blogs you’ve read, relationship books you’ve bought, love promises you’ve been made by the experts. Simplify. Focus on practicing one act of love with the people you love, and build your belonging now.

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

The successful negotiation of conflicting boundaries is essential for healthy belonging.
Growth usually follows a painful pause in your life. Be patient. Learn from the pain. Then move forward.
You are not here to love all people in all ways; you are here to love the people in front of you in the way that you love best.
There’s a difference between nurturing others and pleasing others. The former is a way of connecting, the latter a way of protecting.
The mutual willingness to self-examine is essential for true belonging.
Belonging is not an empire (vast and grand), it is a well (narrow and deep.)
Being loveable is not a feeling you have within you, it’s a fact that’s always true about you. When you don’t feel loveable, you remain loveable.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

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Week 30: Letting Grace Show Us How to Love [Loveable 031] Jun 05, 2018

“Relationships do not thrive on big things; they thrive upon small things done every day. They don’t thrive necessarily on doing new things; they thrive upon doing old things we used to do and quit doing somewhere along the way. And, if we can set aside our ego for a little while, we don’t need anyone to tell us what those things are. We already know.”

In Episode 31 of The Loveable Podcast, we shift our focus from cultivating new places of belonging to reviving the places of belonging we already have…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

When you ask for help and you are specific about what you need, more often than not, you will discover that others are eager to help, because you are giving them a chance to be fully human.
It is a part of normal, healthy development for adult kids to seek places of belonging outside of their family-or-origin.
In a place of true belonging, you can worry someone and they will still want to be with you.
The voice of grace within us first teaches us we are loveable, and then shows us how to love.
Sometimes, relationships heal most quickly not when you do something new, but when you rededicate yourself to doing the things that worked before.
Suffering becomes tolerable, perhaps even peaceful, when we know we are not alone in it.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

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Week 29: Embracing Your Limitations and Being Embraced by Your People [Loveable 030] May 22, 2018

“To live from our soul—the great, powerful, divine thing at the center of us—is, paradoxically, to become aware of our dependence on other souls. When the bad stuff happens, it’s a chance to rely on the good stuff in other people. And the people who bring the good stuff are the people we belong to.”

We find our places of belonging when we ask for help. However, in order to feel safe, be independent, and appear strong, we resist asking. In other words, to ask for help is to invite belonging, but we don’t send enough invitations. In Episode 30 of The Loveable Podcast, wetalk about the limitations of our independence and the rewards of having the courage to ask for help.

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

True belonging may not be possible apart from the passing back and forth of grace.
The people we belong to are the people who show up in our time of need, no questions asked.
The people we belong to don’t show up for a crisis and then disappear; they linger, lovingly.
Asking for help earlier in a time of need lightens the burden on everyone involved. Ask early. Ask often.
Belonging is a paradox—it is the place where you feel safest, so it also becomes the place where you take the biggest and scariest risks.
Letting go of the people we wish we could belong to always feels like grief.
As we grow, our growth includes grace for those who aren’t growing at the same pace we are.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 29: Embracing Your Limitations and Being Embraced by Your People [Loveable 030] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 28: Learning How to Take a Compliment [Loveable 029] May 15, 2018

“Once upon a time, before our wounds and our world made us forget, we knew the good things about us were true. We believed them so thoroughly it didn’t hurt to hear them spoken to us.”

In Episode 29 of The Loveable Podcast, we focus on the art of receiving compliments. You see, for most of us, the problem is not that we are given no affirmation; the problem is that we have difficulty truly receiving the affirmations we are given. They roll off us, like water off a duck’s back. Here, we talk about how to absorb them, take them in, and allow them to remind us of our worthiness…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

Loneliness cannot be eliminated, but it can be shared, and thus dissipated.
Certainty is a method for staving off feelings of loneliness, but it leaves us feeling more lonely than ever.
In our circles of belonging, we can trust compliments are sincere, because they’ve been preceded by sincere challenges.
Oftentimes, compliments challenge our perfectionism—we don’t believe we should receive them until our performance is perfect—but true compliments are not about our performance, they are about our person.
When someone affirms us, they are not telling us who we always are, they are telling us who we truly are.
Sometimes what is being said about us is truer than what is being said within us.
You can’t force belonging, you can only invite it, and every affirmation is an invitation.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

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Week 27: The Essential Building Block of Belonging [Loveable 028] May 07, 2018

“When our egos lose, our hearts win.”

In Episode 28 of The Loveable Podcast, we dive deep into the topic of empathy, including how essential it is for true belonging, and the five barriers to cultivating it and communicating it. It’s time to exchange protection for connection. It’s time to quit living from your ego and to start loving from your heart…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

In places of true belonging, you do not necessarily agree with the opinions of others, but you do honor the personhood of others.
In order to cultivate true belonging, you must replace certainty with curiosity, because curiosity drives out all judgment.
Belonging is cultivated during the hard and messy times, and it is ultimately felt when that hard labor eventually produces fruit.
Empathy is a gift to the other, and the gift we receive in return is a growing sense of belonging.
Hurry is the enemy of empathy.
When empathy is used for protection rather than connection, it is called codependency.
Empathy creates space for pain to exist, without pressure to immediately fix it.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 27: The Essential Building Block of Belonging [Loveable 028] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 26: The Opposite of Loneliness [Loveable 027] May 01, 2018

“The world we live in is aching with loneliness. Yet, we are rarely aware of it, because in a loud and crowded world, loneliness has a thousand busy disguises.”

In Episode 27 of The Loveable Podcast, we discuss how our mass connection culture produces fake news and fake belonging, we explore the necessary requirements for true belonging, and we identify the one word that will help you build true belonging over a lifetime.

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

For true belonging to happen, the only requirements are an awareness of our shared humanity, and a willingness to reveal our shared humanity.
The people we belong to not only tolerate our growth and transformation, they encourage it.
The core reality of our existence is wholeness and belonging; our task is to become aware of this.
You can’t find peace by seeking it, but by cultivating the conditions that give rise to it.
Belonging can be created in any moment when someone is truly seen and heard.
Belonging does not require total transparency; it requires total presence.
Belonging can be found in a moment, but it requires a lifetime to build.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

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Week 25: The One Sentence That Can Change Your Love and Life [Loveable 026] Apr 24, 2018

“I’m not going to worry very much about offending people anymore, which means I need you to tell me when I do, so I can think about it and decide if I need to apologize.”

This is the one sentence that can change the way you love and live. In Episode 26 of The Loveable Podcast, we explore the fine line between empathy and codependence, and how healthy emotional boundaries, rooted in our sense of worthiness, can help us to stay on the right side of that line.

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

The dark night of the soul only leads us somewhere if we bravely continue to walk through it, one step at a time.
Sometimes we aren’t afraid of rejection, we are exhausted by it. But if we hope to find belonging, we must keep showing up, no matter how weary we are.
Just try to fail a little better next time; it takes the pressure off.
Empathy becomes codependence when responsibility for cultivating belonging is not shared in the relationship.
At first, worthiness gives us the courage to use our voice; as we mature, it also gives us the courage to hear when our voice has been hurtful.
There’s a difference—a huge one—between speaking your mind and speaking your heart.
Your true self is naturally caring and compassionate.=

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 25: The One Sentence That Can Change Your Love and Life [Loveable 026] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 24: The Other Most Important Thing to Look for in a Best Friend [Loveable 025] Apr 17, 2018

“Your time on this big rock is limited, so it is probably a waste of your time to spend it trying to convince people who cannot see the goodness of your heart that it is, indeed, good.”

Finding true belonging is not just about finding people, it is also about letting some people go. In Episode 25 of The Loveable Podcast, we explore the always complicated and often painful process of giving up on belonging with some people, so we can go build it with other people.

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

You matter, your needs matter, and even your wants matter.
Cure is fixing brokenness, while care is abiding in it, and sometimes care is even more healing than cure.
People who will not embrace your true self are not bad people, but they are bad for you.
The most painful part of finding true belonging also yields the greatest rewards.
The people we belong to can’t read our mind, but they do trust our heart.
The secret to marriage is not the pace of growth, but faith in the desire for it.
Cultivating true belonging always requires grieving the loss of the belonging we want but will never have.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 24: The Other Most Important Thing to Look for in a Best Friend [Loveable 025] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 23: The Most Important Thing to Look for in a Best Friend [Loveable 024] Apr 10, 2018

“Belonging is built on bravery.”

Most of us, when we are looking for someone to belong to—whether in marriage or friendship or anywhere else—look for someone who seems either perfect, or a perfect fit. Neither exist. In Episode 24 of The Loveable Podcast we explore what else we might look for in our relationships. Hint: it has to do with blindspots and brokenness and bravery…

Here are just a few of the takeaways from this week’s episode:

Finding true belonging is not about total authenticity, but wise authenticity.
When you understand how the ego works, you can understand how your teenager works.
You can’t see the true self in anyone else until you have first embraced it within yourself.
Pursuing and distancing behaviors in relationships are very different-looking methods of anxiety management.
If you don’t have a growth mindset, it is impossible to find true belonging.
Ultimately, we hunger for connection, not perfection.
Marriage is two people working on their own self-becoming, right next to each other, with each other, for a lifetime.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 23: The Most Important Thing to Look for in a Best Friend [Loveable 024] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 22: Putting Stories Before Opinions [Loveable 023] Mar 26, 2018

“Every opinion is a story in disguise…Every belief is a story fashioned into a worldview.”

Episode 23 of The Loveable Podcast is all about opinions, opinionated people, and how to go deeper than our opinions in order to form true belonging. We wear our opinions like armor, and this week we’re going to talk about how to take a little more of that armor off, so we can truly connect.

This week’s episode explores the following topics:

Having patience with ourselves, as our tolerance for vulnerability ebbs and flows.
A powerful example of how true belonging is built.
The key principle that guides all graceful boundary setting.
The difference between having an opinion and wielding an opinion.
Why debating our opinions is best saved until after discussing our stories.
A litmus test for true belonging.
How cultural trends are promoting truer belonging between parents and children.
The importance of curiosity and surprise when discussing our stories.
How to believe your opinion is universally true and still cultivate belonging rather than division with it.
A practice for cultivating storytelling rather than opinion-giving.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

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Week 21: Finding the Fear Underneath All the Fury [Loveable 022] Mar 20, 2018

“Anger isn’t an inherently bad thing. Anger becomes a destructive thing when we allow it to become a reactive thing instead of harnessing it as a guiding thing.”

In Episode 21 of The Loveable Podcast, we focus on what to do with the anger around us and the anger within us. How do we know when anger is healthy versus unhealthy, and how do we relate to it in a way that produces wisdom and connection rather than pain and aggression?

This week’s episode explores the following topics:

The importance of practicing vulnerability in safe spaces.
How creating a dialogue with the little kid inside of you can help you to overcome fear and increase your tolerance for vulnerability.
The difference between courage and foolishness when cultivating belonging.
What it looks like when the true self in you sees past someone’s anger and instead sees their true self.
Why hurting people hurt people.
The essential difference between forgiveness and reconciliation.
How the concept of ego helps us to disrupt negative escalation in communication.
How to progress through our various layers of protection to reconnect with our true self.
Why releasing our false self feels like a grieving process.
A practice for disrupting patterns of anger in relationships.

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 21: Finding the Fear Underneath All the Fury [Loveable 022] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 20: What to Do with Your Walls [Loveable 021] Mar 12, 2018

“Walls are everywhere in our world…We build them so big they are the only things we create that can be seen from space. It’s like we’re advertising to the universe, ‘Walls matter on this big, spinning rock!’ But perhaps the biggest walls, the most important walls, are the ones that cannot be seen at all…the walls we erect in our minds, build around our hearts, and place firmly between ourselves and other people.”

In Episode 21 of The Loveable Podcast, we discuss the necessity of heart-walls, but also the essentiality of using them wisely, so they lead to love and belonging, rather than disconnection and loneliness.

This week’s episode answers the following questions:

What do heart-walls look like? What do healthy walls look like?
How can I be intentional about monitoring how and when I’m protecting with my heart walls?
Why when I act strong and needless and wantless, do I end up even more lonely than before?
Does the risk and vulnerability of cultivating true belonging ever go away?
How can I increase my comfort with vulnerability and decrease the chances that I will keep myself hidden and protected?
How do we discern when it is healthy versus self-sabotaging to protect ourselves with our heart-walls?
What should you do in marriage if spouses have different levels of comfort with vulnerability?
How can I engage with the little kid inside of me who is still in charge of my walls?
What can I do this week to take one small step toward healthier walls and productive vulnerability?

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 20: What to Do with Your Walls [Loveable 021] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 19: From Limping Lonely to Loving Together [Loveable 020] Mar 06, 2018

There are two kinds of loneliness. The first kind is a natural and inevitable part of being human—it exists because you exist. The second kind of loneliness, however, is a loneliness of our own creation. And that’s good news, because if we can create it, we can also uncreate it.

In Episode 20 of The Loveable Podcast, we talk about the thing within us that creates the second type of loneliness, and we begin to explore what we can do about that thing, so that we can finally be together.

This week’s episode explores the following topics:

Why not distinguishing between our two kinds of loneliness inadvertently makes our shame and loneliness worse.
Why nonlonely people don’t really exist.
How to take responsibility for our own role in creating our own unnecessary loneliness.
A thorough exploration of the false self in each of us, which backfires, creating more loneliness.
Why compassion for our own false self is the only path toward living from our true self.
How to minimize loneliness in the midst of depression.
Why true belonging is built not around perfection but around repair.
A powerful tip for building belonging in marriage—and it’s simple!
What healthy emotional boundaries look like.
A practice that will prepare you to break the habit of protecting that keeps you lonely.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “What to Do with Your Walls.”

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 19: From Limping Lonely to Loving Together [Loveable 020] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 18: A Kid Named Lonely [Loveable 019] Feb 27, 2018

“Places of belonging are not meant to be places where our loneliness is taken away. They are meant to be places where we reveal our loneliness to one another…Once you have made your loneliness available to one of your people, you will no longer need to eradicate it. You will be able to touch it without fear and despair. You may feel hopeless to fix it, but you will be filled with the hope that comes from being joined in it.”

In Episode 19 of The Loveable Podcast, we begin the months of loving by talking about loneliness and how to transform our relationship to it, so all of our relationships can be transformed by it.

This week’s episode explores the following topics:

How the inward journey of embracing our worthiness lays the foundation for the outward journey toward true belonging.
Why cultivating belonging always entails risk, fear, and vulnerability.
How normalizing our loneliness by sharing it helps to diminish it without having to eliminate it.
Why circles of true belonging must shrink before they deepen.
The idea that circles of true belonging are organized around a shared sense of worthiness rather than shared interests.
The reason it is so important to begin relationships from your true self, rather than projecting a persona.
Why people may respond in both good and bad ways when we begin revealing our true self.
A practice for disrupting conflict in marriage and relationships in general triggered by disputes around loneliness.
Why it is important to be aware that our loneliness has been with us forever and did not originate in our current relationship.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “From Limping Lonely to Loving Together.”

You can listen below or on iTunes!

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Week 17: The One Illusion We Cannot Afford to Believe In [Loveable 018] Feb 20, 2018

“Experiencing our worthiness does not lead us to believe we are self-sufficient; it helps us to be at peace with the knowledge that we are insufficient. We are interconnected. Interdependent. As big as a limitless soul, but as small and as fragile as a human body.”

In Episode 18 of The Loveable Podcast, we focus on the truest fruit of embracing our worthiness: embracing the worthiness of everyone else as well, and remembering that we are all ultimately connected.

This week’s episode explores the following topics:

How to relinquish our attachment to mental narratives that keep us miserable.
Why allowing ourselves to feel sadness and pain paradoxically produces energy, creativity, and joy.
The importance of asking for a mentor or guide if venturing into our emotions becomes overwhelming.
How embracing our own worthiness helps us to raise kids who have a resilient sense of worthiness.
Why life is about connection, not competition.
A challenge to identify the people in your life who have been the voice of grace to you.
A practice to cultivate awareness of, and gratitude for, your connection to others.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “A Kid Named Lonely.”

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 17: The One Illusion We Cannot Afford to Believe In [Loveable 018] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 16: The Fear (and Joy) of Removing the Masks We Wear [Loveable 017] Feb 13, 2018

“Grace is what happens when someone or Someone sees through our many masks, recognizing and celebrating the innocent little one that still resides beneath all of our disguises…Grace is the assurance that everyone is of equal value and equally worthy, so all you have to do to be loved is show up.”

In Episode 17 of The Loveable Podcast, we focus on naming the masks we wear, and daring to take one of them off.

This week’s episode explores the following topics:

How the counter-intuitive choice to be uncertain can reduce our stress, decrease our conflict, and increase our self-esteem.
The importance of building margin into our schedules—room for imperfections and mess to happen—so you can take the time to learn from mess, pain, and disappointment.
How practicing vulnerability is similar to learning how to drive.
Why self-acceptance cannot be a group effort and the harm we do to our relationships when we try to make it so.
How to have grace for yourself when you “relapse” into looking for your worthiness in your relationships, rather than in your self.
The dangers of successfully wearing a facade or persona.
Why Halloween is sometimes more grace-full than Christmas.
What Jesus shows us in the last week of his life about how to find belonging.
A practice for identifying our masks and removing them.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “The One Illusion We Cannot Afford to Believe In.”

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 16: The Fear (and Joy) of Removing the Masks We Wear [Loveable 017] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 15: The Mess Will Set You Free! [Loveable 016] Feb 06, 2018

“Ann Lamott once wrote, ‘The grace of age is radical self-acceptance.’ Life is messy and we human creatures are messy. Life isn’t about eliminating the mess; it’s about embracing the mess.”

In Episode 16 of The Loveable Podcast, we focus on accepting our messy selves by first accepting the chaos of everyday living. It’s fun and it’s freeing. Come and embrace the mess with us!

This week’s episode addresses the following topics:

How to de-escalate conflict with vulnerability, and how to be wise about where we invest our risk and vulnerability.
Why humor reconnects us with our true self.
How vulnerability about your own mess invites connection, reduces loneliness, and thus heals fear and shame.
The importance of not comparing your healing journey to anyone else’s.
A practice for embracing your belovedness in the ordinary moments of everyday life.
How changes in mommy blogging reflect our decreased exposure in social media to the normal mess of life.
A redefinition of the concept of mess.
Permission to feel messy without needing to explain it or fix it.
More than ten practices for embracing mess with joy and fun.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “The Fear (and Joy) of Removing the Masks We Wear.”

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 15: The Mess Will Set You Free! [Loveable 016] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 14: The Life-Changing Difference Between Shame and Guilt [Loveable 015] Jan 30, 2018

“Guilt is shame redeemed by grace. Shame tells us we are lousy; guilt tells us we did something lousy. Shame whispers, “Your mistakes define you,” but guilt proclaims, “We are defined by redemption, not by transgression.”

In Episode 15 of The Loveable Podcast, we are focusing on clarifying the difference between shame and guilt, because it is the difference between a redemptive life and a hidden life…

This week’s episode addresses the following topics:

Why maintaining a false self requires so much energy.
How life experiences such as aging, suffering, and loving all pave the way for letting go of the false self.
Why parents “worry from their wounds” and how our own pain can be redeemed in the way we parent our kids.
A discussion about how to balance your true and false self in the workplace.
Several practical examples of the difference between shame and guilt.
Why embracing our mistakes from a place of worthiness helps us move on, leave regret behind, heal relationships, act with dignity, and live redemptively.
A challenging practice to help you begin leaving your mistakes behind.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “The Mess Will Set You Free!”

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 14: The Life-Changing Difference Between Shame and Guilt [Loveable 015] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 13: Embracing Your Valuable Flaws [Loveable 014] Jan 23, 2018

“Perfection is overrated. Competition makes us common. The game is over. You are here to be unique. You are here to be you. Enjoy the freedom of that.”

In Episode 14 of The Loveable Podcast, we focus on not just accepting, but embracing, our quirks and flaw and idiosyncracies and wounds and weirdness. When shame tells us that our uniqueness makes us stand out and makes us odd, the voice of grace responds, “Yeah, and you’re beautiful and beloved.”

This week’s episode addresses the following topics:

Why grace embraces us not in spite of who we are but because of who we are.
A heartwarming story that illustrates how grace “returns us to ourselves.”
The role that embracing our imperfections plays in receiving grace.
How grace can transform any shameful thought with one six-word phrase.
How hearing the voice of grace restores our sense of playfulness.
Why hearing the voice of grace is a prerequisite for finding true belonging.
How failing can help us to embrace our worthiness.
Why discussing grace in community makes us more aware of the voice of grace within us.
An exercise to help us overcome the self-rejection of our most unique and valuable parts.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “The Life-Changing Difference Between Shame and Guilt.”

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 13: Embracing Your Valuable Flaws [Loveable 014] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 12: The Voice of Grace [Loveable 013] Jan 16, 2018

“Grace isn’t just acceptance of the status quo. Grace contains the status quo—all of our struggle and pain and mess—and embraces us and values us anyway. Grace demands that nothing be changed for love and connection to happen, and that kind of love has power.”

In Episode 13 of The Loveable Podcast, we talk about how to listen for the voice of grace within us and, perhaps even more importantly, how to recognize it once we’ve heard it…

This week’s episode addresses the following topics:

Why trying to be happier doesn’t work, but trying to be human-er ultimately makes us enduringly happy.
One key difference between the concepts of sin and shame.
Why you might need a media detox and what media is doing to deprive you of one.
The value of identifying a handful of practices from the podcast and practicing them regularly.
Why discovering our worthiness isn’t about trying harder but, rather, about listening more closely.
How grace can transform us without trying to change anything about us and, indeed, because it doesn’t try to change anything about us.
What it looks like to listen for the voice of grace inside of us and why hearing it there is essential for the health of our relationships.
How to avoid turning the concept of grace into an excuse for abusive behavior.
Six hallmarks of the grace of voice, so you can recognize it when you have heard it.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “Embracing Your Valuable Flaws.”

You can listen below or on iTunes!

The post Week 12: The Voice of Grace [Loveable 013] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 11: Choosing Which Voices to Listen to Around You [Loveable 012] Jan 02, 2018

“Maybe growing up and growing healthy is as simple as discerning which voices to allow in, and learning how to keep the rest of the voices out.”

In last week’s episode, we began to focus on the voice of shame all of us hear on the inside of us. Now, in this twelfth episode of The Loveable Podcast, we talk about what to do when we hear that voice on the outside of us, too, coming from the people around us.

This week’s episode includes:

Several personal examples of small and ordinary but powerful ways to redeem the painful and frustrating parts of our story.
A conversation about how to handle shame messages when they come from family and friends, especially during the holiday season.
How to set assertive boundaries from a sense of worthiness, rather than aggressive boundaries from a sense of defensiveness.
What it looks like to digest criticism through the filter of our own worthiness.
Why it is important to limit the shame you expose yourself to from others while you work to heal the shame already inside of you.
Why shame keeps us small and how our lives become bolder when we quit listening to it.
Three visualization exercises that will help you begin to develop healthy emotional boundaries.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “The Voice of Grace.”

Change happens incrementally, and the changes discussed in this episode will add up to big growth and transformation over time. You can listen below or on iTunes.

The post Week 11: Choosing Which Voices to Listen to Around You [Loveable 012] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 10: Why Shame Is the Beginning of Your Story (Not the End of It) [Loveable 011] Dec 19, 2017

“There is a place inside of you where a better voice is telling a better story about you. Let the next chapter of your story be about listening for that voice.” In Episode 11 of The Loveable Podcast, we define shame, describe how it can be recognized in our experience, and explore how the concept of story can become an essential tool for transformation…

This week’s episode includes:

A conversation about how to recognize the signs that you are growing and healing.
A parenting discussion about how we accidentally show kids they are not worthy of help, and the importance of humility in parenting and dialogue with our kids.
How to be peaceful, even when you’re angry, scared, or sad.
Some helpful ideas for questioning the social narratives that keep us anxious and ashamed.
The key difference between being “broken” versus “blocked.”
Ways to recognize both subtle and intense signs that you are feeling shame.
The importance of sharing your experience of shame with others.
An exercise you can do that will help you envision a life more free from shame.
A discussion that cautions us against believing we need to live an “epic” story to be good enough.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “Choosing Which Voices to Listen to Around You.”

This is one of the most encouraging and hopeful conversations you’ll hear about shame and healing. You can listen below or on iTunes.

The post Week 10: Why Shame Is the Beginning of Your Story (Not the End of It) [Loveable 011] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 9: What to Do When Your Heart Feels Like a Jungle [Loveable 010] Dec 12, 2017

“Embracing your worthiness is up to you and you alone—we cannot truly receive love until we have embraced that we are worthy of love. However, we all need someone to walk with us as we do so. We don’t depend upon this person for our sense of worth, but we can lean upon them when the going gets tough.”

In Episode 10 of The Loveable Podcast, we talk about what to do when the healing journey gets a little too messy to walk alone…

This week’s episode includes:

A conversation about how to learn from your pain, attend to your anger, and short-circuit your panic attacks.
A discussion about how emotional pain expresses itself in the body, and how practices such as yoga can help us to relearn our relationship to it.
Another way to approach prayer, especially when your praying feels unhelpful, or even counterproductive.
An encouragement about the cyclical nature of healing and growth.
Why asking for help is an expression of a sense of worthiness.
How to find a good therapist when you don’t know where else to look.
A helpful (pun intended) list of reasons we resist asking for help, and even resist receiving the help we’ve already asked for.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “Why Shame Is the Beginning of Your Story (Not the End of It).”

You don’t have to do any of this living and healing and transforming alone. I think you’ll find here the encouragement to believe that and act upon it. You can listen below or on iTunes.

The post Week 9: What to Do When Your Heart Feels Like a Jungle [Loveable 010] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 8: The Small Gate and Narrow Road Back to Your True Self [Loveable 009] Dec 05, 2017

Emotional healing and spiritual growth are not about eliminating our pain; they are about approaching our pain. Rather than moving away from our pain, we learn how to move toward it, enduring it, learning from it, transforming it, and eventually moving through it, to where we find our true self.

In Episode 9 of The Loveable Podcast, we talk about pain and playfulness and everything in between…

This week’s episode includes:

A case study of how to observe our thought stream, rather than getting swept away in it, and an example of how this can expand our experience of the present moment.
The connection between shame, playfulness, and our true self and how to use playfulness to disarm our shame.
How embracing our worthiness can quickly lead to becoming less lonely.
A better, healthier way to relate to “the future.”
The difference between reacting and responding, and how to cultivate wiser responses.
Suggestions for increasing the frequency and regularity with which you become mindful of your thought stream and practice observing it.
Reflections on how faith can fruitfully evolve over the course of a lifetime.
A discussion about why moving toward our pain rather than away from it is healing.
How attending to our pain can improve our civic discourse.
A practice for using your body to practice approaching your emotional pain.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “What to Do When Your Heart Feels Like a Jungle.”

Everything about this episode is counterintuitive, which is why it feels so helpful! I hope you’ll check it out. You can listen below or on iTunes.

The post Week 8: The Small Gate and Narrow Road Back to Your True Self [Loveable 009] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 7: You Are Not Your Thoughts (You Are the Observer of Your Thoughts) [Loveable 008] Nov 21, 2017

“This is the promise of your pain: to relate to it properly, you must learn how to observe it, and as you learn to observe it, you begin, for the first time, to fully inhabit the soul within you that is doing the observing. This week, begin to inhabit your soul once again. Welcome home.”

In Episode 8 of The Loveable Podcast, we begin to talk about how to move through our darkness. And into the light…

This week’s episode includes:

A summary of the first six weeks of the podcast and a context for what is ahead.
A reminder and encouragement about the cyclical nature of growth and becoming, as described in Loveable.
A helpful way to decide whether or not a job is right for you, especially if you are on the fence about it.
An encouraging reminder that your circles of belonging will likely shrink at first, as you begin to embrace your worthiness.
Identification of a number of thoughts and phrases that can serve as “red flags” that you are experiencing, and perhaps even being guided by, shame.
Why a healthy mind and heart begin with a willingness to experience the full range of human experiences and emotions.
Why it’s impossible to stop your thoughts and what to do about that.
How the practice of observing your thoughts can make you a more light-hearted person.
How to embrace the rhythm of observing your thoughts, feeling a sense of peace as a result, and then falling back into old habits of identifying with our thoughts.
What it means to feel at home in our own soul.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “The Small Gate and Narrow Road Back to Your True Self.”

As I mention in this episode, I think the practice discussed here can be a game-changer for most of us, as we seek to embrace our worthiness and discover our truest self. Don’t miss it! You can listen below or on iTunes.

The post Week 7: You Are Not Your Thoughts (You Are the Observer of Your Thoughts) [Loveable 008] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 6: Unbecoming Who You Are Not [Loveable 007] Nov 14, 2017

“You already are what you are becoming. You don’t build what you are; you chip away at what you are not. We are, each of us, like blocks of wood, and becoming our true self is the gradual process of carving away the excess and steadily becoming more and more the shape of what we already are.” In Episode 7 of The Loveable Podcast, we talk about how to do so, and it begins with answering three very specific questions…

This week’s episode includes:

How to respond to the “gap” between who you want to be and who you are (hint: it has to do with grace).
How to handle relationships with people who are either unable or unwilling to connect with you or accept you for who you are.
What to do when you’re not quite ready to engage with one of the exercises from this podcast.
A concrete example of one way I’ve embraced myself by unbecoming who I am not.
How to know who you belong to (hint: it has to do with grace again).
A discussion about how to set healthy boundaries.
Permission for this process to take time.
All sorts of discussion and resources for navigating relationships between introverts and extroverts.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “You Aren’t Your Thoughts (You Are the Observer of Your Thoughts).”

If you struggle with how to be your true self in relationships, and if those struggles have led you to hide valuable parts of yourself away, and if you want to wade into the sometimes messy but ultimately liberating process of becoming your truest, worthiest self in relationships, don’t miss this episode.

You can listen below or on iTunes.

The post Week 6: Unbecoming Who You Are Not [Loveable 007] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 5: Letting Go of the Solution to All of Your Problems [Loveable 006] Nov 07, 2017

What is the only thing worse than not getting what you want? Getting what you want. Because after you get what you want, you will probably realize it wasn’t the hoped-for solution to all of your problems. And then what? In Episode 6 of The Loveable Podcast, we talk about our search for a solution that doesn’t exist, letting it go, and then what…

This week’s episode includes:

A review of last week’s practice, especially the importance of adopting a word or phrase to be mindful of and to anchor us on our journey of becoming.
Why we search in our relationships and accomplishments for a solution to our shame that does not exist.
A totally new angle from which to view the creation story in the book of Genesis.
How to challenge the sense of duty and obligation that might be keeping you from changing old habits and patterns of searching.
How friends, family, and other places of belonging can hold us accountable for not searching for our worthiness in external activities.
The value of retelling your life story through the lens of your search for worthiness.
What will take the place of your search for worthiness, once you have called it off.
How to deal with regret about all the time you’ve spent searching.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “Unbecoming Who We Are Not.”

Several participants in the discussion reported a sense of relief and lightness after having it. I hope you’ll feel the same way after listening to it! You can listen below or on iTunes.

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The post Week 5: Letting Go of the Solution to All of Your Problems [Loveable 006] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 4: Self-Acceptance Is the Foundation of All Self-Improvement [Loveable 005] Oct 31, 2017

What if all our efforts to improve ourselves are actually keeping us stuck, because, sometimes, self-help is just cleverly disguised self-rejection? And what if, sometimes, self-acceptance is the most helpful, most transformative thing of all? Welcome to Episode 5 of The Loveable Podcast, in which we read and discuss Week 4 of Loveable’s companion book, which is available nowhere else…

This week’s episodes includes:

Me admitting that I woke up feeling insecure and anxious about recording the podcast episode.
A fruitful conversation about what to do when your shame decides to visit you once again.
The important distinction between our inward journey and our outward journeys.
Why our culture of inspiration is really a cleverly disguised culture of self-rejection.
The key difference between being inspired to change yourself versus being inspired to accept yourself.
How self-acceptance ultimately leads to wiser and more peaceful change.
The reason the first three weeks came before this week’s topic and practice.
A challenge to quit consuming self-help for at least one week.
A recommendation about what to replace self-help with once you’ve taken a break from it.
How to help thoughts about your worthiness descend from your head to your heart.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “Letting Go of the Solution to All of Your Problems.”

I began this conversation with anxiety and ended it feeling very peaceful. I think you will feel more peaceful after it, too, and I hope you will feel a new, better kind of inspiration. You can listen to the episode below, or on iTunes.

The post Week 4: Self-Acceptance Is the Foundation of All Self-Improvement [Loveable 005] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 3: Replacing Suffering with Presence [Loveable 004] Oct 24, 2017

What if pain is an inevitable part of being alive, but suffering is not? And what if you could begin reducing your suffering right now, with a few simple practices? Join us for Episode 4 of The Loveable Podcast, as we read and discuss Week 3 of Loveable’s companion book, which is available nowhere else…

This week’s episodes includes:

The important distinction between our inward journey and our outward journeys.
Why it is so important to experience the contrast between mindfulness and clutteredness.
What to do when a performance mindset interferes with mindfulness practices.
A new and more useful definition of suffering.
An exploration of one of the insidious reasons people are reading less and less.
Resources for creating a to-do list that, paradoxically, creates space for you to just be.
The reason whatever problems you resist in the present moment become more of a problem.
Practices for removing digital clutter from your life.
Ideas for removing obligational clutter from your life.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “Self-Acceptance is the Foundation of All Self-Improvement.”

Friends, this conversation will plant good seeds in you that will continue to bear fruit going forward, in the form of increased presence and peace. Check it out. Listen to the episode below, or on iTunes.

The post Week 3: Replacing Suffering with Presence [Loveable 004] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 2: Rest Is Revolutionary [Loveable 003] Oct 10, 2017

Welcome to Episode 3 of The Loveable Podcast! Join us, as we read and discuss Week 2 of Loveable’s companion book (which is available nowhere else). It was another great conversation, this time about why most rest isn’t very restful at all…

This week’s episodes includes:

A conversation about last week’s mindful breathing practice.
Resources for honing your breathing practice and making it a habit.
A redefinition of rest as an inner condition, rather than a set of outer circumstances.
An exploration of the reasons we don’t take advantage of opportunities to rest.
Practices for resting in the quiet spaces of life.
Practices for cultivating a restful mind even amidst the busyness of life.
A crazy idea about how to dramatically increase the odds of restfulness in your home.
A teaser about the next episode entitled, “Replacing Suffering with Presence.”

Friends, these conversations just keep getting better. I’m thrilled for you to hear this one. Listen to the episode below, or on iTunes.

The post Week 2: Rest Is Revolutionary [Loveable 003] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

Week 1: Doing Is the Enemy of Becoming [Loveable 002] Oct 02, 2017

This is Episode 2 of The Loveable Podcast, and the first week of our on-line book club! We got together on Facebook Live, read Week 1 of Loveable’s companion book (which is available nowhere else), and had a great discussion about it. You can hear it all in this week’s episode…

In this week’s episode, you’ll find out:

The secret to discovering your truest, worthiest, most loveable self.
The reason we forget who we are.
The reason we fill our lives with so much doing and activity.
A practice for creating more space and stillness in your mind and your life.
The challenges inherent in that practice.
How to give yourself grace as you seek to establish new and healthy habits in your life.

Friends, already this is the most helpful book club I’ve ever been a part of. Now, you can join it too, by listening to the episode below or on iTunes.

The post Week 1: Doing Is the Enemy of Becoming [Loveable 002] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

An Introduction to The Loveable Podcast [Loveable 001] Sep 15, 2017

Welcome to Episode 1 of The Loveable Podcast. In this introductory episode, I give you a behind-the-scenes glimpse at my story, share details about the podcast, narrate the introduction to Loveable’s companion book (which is available nowhere else), and tell you how you can participate in future episodes…

The two deepest desires of every human heart are to love simply and live fully. So why do our relationships remain so complicated, and why do our lives sometimes ring so hollow? Because neither love nor life can be truly embraced until you, and only you, have embraced your truest, worthiest self.

In my book, Loveable, I explore how embracing our worthiness is the foundation upon which we can find true belonging and live a purposeful life. Loveable has been described as “a handbook for how to be human.” Now, in this podcast, I want to give you the tools for living fully into who you are and why you are here.

I’m excited to tell you all about it and to share with you the introduction to Loveable‘s companion book. Listen in!

The post An Introduction to The Loveable Podcast [Loveable 001] appeared first on Dr. Kelly Flanagan.

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