Déjà Vu All Over Again

To borrow from Yogi Berra, this has been a week of déjà vu all over again...sort of. Sort of, because although, on the surface it has been a week of reruns, digging a little deeper reveals it to have been more time warp than time travel.

Five years ago this week, like now, I found myself at L.A.'s Conscious Life Expo​, signing books and promoting my coaching services for writers. Five years ago this week, like now, I made a side to trip up to Ojai, in the hills above Ventura. Five years ago this week, like tomorrow, I will be returning to New Mexico via Sedona.

Of course, nothing has been exactly as it was five years ago, nor could it be.

Take my trip to Ojai, for example, which was to have focused on a return visit to Meditation Mount​, where I had such a transformational experience in 2010. Unlike five years ago, the property is now closed to the public on Mondays and Tuesdays, so no Meditation Mount!

The energy of this year's Expo, too, was different for me...although I can't quite touch what that difference was. And if, five years ago, I returned through Sedona to see my daughter, she's now in L.A. and a teenager – a very different parental experience!

Five years ago, my Expo experience sparked a move to L.A. and what I expected to be a powerful outward expansion of my work. Instead, my L.A. experience turned out to be the trigger for a return to New Mexico and a five-year period of personal and creative retreat, one from which I'm only now retreating – just as I find myself in L.A. for another Conscious Life Expo.

What does it all mean? Of course, my mind longs to make sense of the many parallels and synchronicities of the past week or so. And some sense may emerge in the days ahead. Or not.

All I can do is revel in the wonderment of what feels like a new turning point – even if I can't yet know what that turning point – and remember my own Rules #2 and #3 for Living a Creative Life:

Rule #2: Be In The Moment

What works for you today may not work tomorrow or ever again, so you might as well live in the present moment. Focus on now — on the breath you are breathing and the word you are writing. The next will always come if you don’t worry about it.

Rule #3: Listen To Your Heart 

Your heart speaks with the voice of God and the voice of your Muse (or whatever you call that divine/creative/infinite intelligence we all carry within us). Listen and trust that intuitive voice with neither judgment nor censorship. It’s wiser than you are and knows, better than you ever will, both the story you are living and the story you are writing. 

• Read more about my 2010 Conscious Life and Ojai experiences in Acts of Surrender: A Writer's Memoir

• Watch for a new book, still untitled and in its early stages, which will expand on the 13 "Rules" for Creative Living I outline in both The Voice of the Muse: Answering the Call to Write and Birthing Your Book...Even If You Don't Know What It's About