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We’re mid-way through my series on anti-planning. 

This series is perfect for you if you bristle at the rigidity of traditional business planning and crave more spiritual meaning in your work. 

If you’re curious about this idea and want to understand if it applies to you, click here to read 4 Signs Traditional Planning Isn’t For You. 

Last week, I discussed the first two steps of the Anti-Planning Process in detail. You can read the entire email here. 

Here’s a quick summary of Steps 1 and 2: 

Step 1. Clarify Your Beliefs  

When stepping away from capitalist business practices, it’s helpful to know what you’re opting into instead. Being an anti-planner doesn’t mean you have no structure. It’s helpful to give yourself a spiritual container to organize your thinking about business. The summary of my personal belief is “One Door Opens Another.” For this step, you’ll want to clarify what you believe and create a simple mantra you can use to guide your business (and life) decisions. Read more about Step 1 here. 

Step 2. Loosen Your Grip  

Now that you’ve clarified your spiritual beliefs about life and business, it’s time to shed whatever old beliefs are keeping you trapped in the rigid mindset of traditional business planning. This step requires loosening your grip on fear, control, and perfectionism so that you can live in alignment with your beliefs. This is internal work, and you cannot skip this step! You can’t change the way you operate your business without loosening your grip on old ways of thinking. Click here to read more about Step 2.

Now that you’ve clarified your beliefs and loosened your grip on fear and control, it’s time to get practical.

Traditional business planning requires setting goals. We look around at what everyone else is doing and try to formulate a roadmap based on what success looks like for other people. We choose goals based on logic instead of intuition. We try to plan our way to a future we can comprehend. 

I don’t want to be able to comprehend my future; I want my future to exceed my imagination. I want life to surprise me. I want to look back a few years from now and say, “Holy shit, I never expected I’d end up here. This is awesome!” 

Let me share a quick personal example… 

A few years ago, I was knee-deep in creating Next-Level Therapist. I was proud of what we created, but it became clear relatively quickly that I was doing what I thought I was supposed to be doing—creating a scalable evergreen online program. 

I was following the roadmap handed to me by well-meaning coaches and mentors who thought it made sense for me to help therapists develop personal brands. It was logical, and I was good at it. 

But I wasn’t happy. 👎

I felt creatively clogged. My head hurt from all of the thinking and planning. I was walking towards the brink of burnout. 

This is when I got serious about anti-planning. 

I realized what was happening and decided to turn the ship around. I decommissioned my wildly successful program with no firm plan for what was coming next. I knew I needed to reconnect with my intuition instead of asking other people to tell me what to do. 

Now, I’m sitting here writing an email series about anti-planning and preparing for the launch of the Deeply Rested podcast, and I’m like, “Holy shit! I never imagined I’d end up HERE. This is awesome!” 

The more I release the need to know exactly where I’m headed, the happier and more creatively alive I feel in my work. I’m living my spiritual belief that One Door Opens Another. 

But that doesn’t mean I just sit back and wait for divine intervention to strike. I’m not a passive participant in my business. I am co-creating my work with the Universe. 

So, if you’re not planning your future based on goals, and you’re not sitting around doing nothing, what are you doing? 

*cue entrance music for Step 3* 

Step 3. Determine Your Focus 

Anti-planning doesn’t mean anti-doing. 

You’re here to do good work in the world. We need you to share your ideas and create new offerings. The more we all share our unique gifts, the better our chances of making this world a better place. 

And you need a cushy paycheck—no shame about that. 

This step will explain how I decide which projects to focus on in my business as an anti-planner. 

I prefer thinking in terms of projects instead of goals. Projects feel creative. They don’t stress me out the same way “goals” do. They’re also more flexible. Goals imply you’re measuring success by a specific outcome, and if you don’t meet that outcome, you’ve failed. With projects, your outcome can be fluid and flexible. This inspires more creativity and flow.  

The key to anti-planning is deciding what project to focus on using your intuition instead of your logical mind. 

Exploitative capitalism wants you to ignore your intuition. The more disconnected you feel from yourself, the more money you spend on solutions, cures, and quick fixes. 

By aligning your business with your spiritual beliefs, you cut out the middleman. Instead of paying other people to tell you what to do, you learn to listen to the quiet whispers of your intuition.  

When was the last time you responded to the quiet whispers of your intuition? The little voice that says, “this might sound crazy, but here’s what you should do next…” 

Often, my quiet whisper suggests something totally at odds with what my logical mind thinks I should do. Even though my intuition has never been wrong, I’m really good at doubting her wisdom. My mind is an excellent debater. 

I bet the same is true for you, too. 

Some of my clients feel their intuition as a somatic tug instead of a quiet whisper, like a string anchored deep in their belly tugging them towards the next destination. Their task is to learn to follow the tug, even when they don’t know where they’re being led. 

Intuition invites us to step through the door opening for us now. 

Remember, we don’t find out what’s on the other side of the door until we step through the threshold. That’s scary for the logical mind!

My advice? 

Meet your mind with compassion and gratitude for trying to keep you safe. Then, lovingly, tell your mind to be quiet. We don’t need logic right now. We need heart, soul, and intuition. That’s how we know what project is calling to us now. 

Here are two questions you can ask your intuition: 

→ What am I feeling called to create for free right now? 

If you read my emails, chances are you’re a person who has something to say. You have a mission. You want to help people heal, to mend this fractured world with a little dab of your personal medicine. You want to write, speak, share. 

That’s wonderful! 

Of course, you can’t do everything for free, but your ideas will flow more easily if you give yourself permission to share in some capacity without charge. 

Personally, I’m feeling called to write more newsletters and create the Deeply Rested podcast. My logical mind knows that writing newsletters won’t pay my bills, but I trust that the more good work I share for free, the more doors will open for me when it’s time to sell my services. 

In business terms, the work I feel called to share for free serves as marketing for my paid offerings. It’s a self-sustaining ecosystem. 

Let your intuition guide you. What ideas or offerings are you feeling called share for free? Can you start a blog, record some podcast interviews, make a free guide or video, offer to host a workshop for a local non-profit? The possibilities are endless. 

→ What am I feeling called to offer as a paid service right now? 

Rest assured, your intuition is going to help you make money, too.

When I realized Next-Level Therapist was a creation from my logical mind, I took time to reattune to my intuition. I asked, “What am I supposed to be doing for money right now?” My intuition responded, “Go back to one-on-one work.” 

This was so weird because I’d spent YEARS moving away from the one-on-one model. I made a whole program about it! My intuition wanted me to go backward? Ahh, it was scary, but I trusted the call. 

I’ve been booked with one-on-one mentorship clients since February, and it’s been absolutely amazing. Another example of, “Holy shit! I never imagined I’d end up here.” 

And now, I can feel myself approaching a new door… 

Time will tell what is on the other side. 😉

How are you getting paid right now? Does it feel right? Or do you have a quiet whisper or tug towards something different? Even if it’s scary, get curious about what is calling to you now. 

Take a few minutes to tune into your intuition and ask yourself these two questions:

→ What am I feeling called to create for free right now?
→ What am I feeling called to offer as a paid service right now? 

Your logical mind will probably answer first. Write down whatever your mind says you should create. Then, put your notebook away. 

Breathe. 

Put your hand on your belly, and ask again, “What am I really supposed to be doing right now?” Be patient, and give yourself space to allow a quieter answer to bubble up to the surface.  

Let your logical mind be the last to know the answer.

If you’d like to share, hit “reply” to this email and let me know what projects your intuition is encouraging you to explore. I’d love to know. 

Next week, I’ll tell you about the final step in the Anti-Planning Process: Step 4. Commit to Structure. 

This is when our logical minds get to join the show! Woo-hoo! 

P.S. Okay… I have to call myself out again. 

I’m borderline embarrassed. But my intuition tells me I’m here to share my honest experiences doing this messy work, so here you go.

Last week, I told you that today’s email would walk through Step 3 and Step 4 of the Anti-Planning Process. You might’ve noticed we only covered Step 3 today. When I got to the end, I decided this was enough content for one email. 

It’s funny—when I started writing this series, I thought I’d include all four steps in one email. LOL 🤣

When I decided to break it up, I thought I needed to tell you the plan for the whole series, even though I was creating it in real time. 

That’s a lot of THINKING and not a lot of FLOWING. 

This is a meta-example of why rigid planning and working with the creative flow of intuition do. not. go. together. 

Anyway, hope you’re enjoying the series! 😅