I have no idea where to start

I have no idea where to start

“Where do I start?”

“I have no idea where to start”

I often hear this from high-achieving leaders and professionals who want to change careers, find purposeful work, or their second or third career.

Is this you or maybe someone you know—a friend, relative, spouse, or coworker?
….maybe someone who just got laid off and is wondering what’s next.

Well, here is where you start.

This is where I start with most of my clients.
This is where I started on my path.
This is why my clients gain crystal clarity, confidence, and certainty about the direction of their careers.

You start with clarifying your own personalized COMPASS to your meaningful work.

We all have one.
A built-in compass to a career and life or purpose, meaning, and joy.
It’s already inside of you.

Do you know yours?

If not, this may be…

…why you are lost or stuck, wondering what’s next in your career or what is the right path to take.
…why you let external pressure, fears, and doubts take a hold of you as you choose your career path.
…why you end up in a career that is draining you and sucking the energy, joy, and meaning out of you.

The good news is that you came into the world with a built-in compass to a career and life of purpose, joy, and meaning. 

When you are clear on your inner compass…

…you know which career and life direction to pursue.
…you stop second-guessing yourself and your career choices.
…you find the clarity, confidence, and motivation to finally take the next step.
…you stop procrastinating on your dreams and envying others who go after theirs.
…you navigate skillfully your career and life.

It’s why I just created a new free report to help you get started on discovering–or re-discovering–your inner compass to your purposeful work. This is for you if you want to bring more meaning, joy, and purpose into your existing or next career.

In this free report, you will discover:

  • your built-in compass to guide you toward your purposeful work,
  • the 4 elements of your unique compass so that you can align your career and life with who you really are,
  • 8 simple tools you can use right away to start uncovering your inner compass.

>> Get Your Compass to Your Purposeful Work 

Enjoy the discovery and keep me posted on what you find!

One of my favorite tools for manifesting & creating

One of my favorite tools for manifesting & creating

Do you wonder what is one of the most powerful tools to manifest and create what you want? 

It’s probably not what you think… Read on as I share about it

A week ago, I felt compelled to have this travel brochure open on the page of Copenhagen, Denmark, in my apartment.

Traveling around the world is an intention of mine. I like displaying in my home things that represent what I want more of in my life, such as the travel destinations I want to visit. However, Denmark and Copenhagen are not necessarily on my Top 5 or even Top 10 lists.

However, I felt a strong pull to keep the brochure open on that page. I was not sure why… except maybe because I loved this pic. My logical mind was saying “Denmark is not in your top 5, you should use a different picture,” my intuition was saying: “keep it there.”

Well, guess what?

Four days later, a past client from five years ago reached out to work with me again. Guess where she lives? Copenhagen! Five years ago, she did my Land the Career You Love 1:1 Program. I helped her manifest her dream to move from the US to Copenhagen to work and live there. She now needs support to reach her next career dream.

You may think this is just a coincidence…

Well, my skeptical mind would have thought this too in the past, until I noticed occurrences like this happening over and over again…

  • That day in Paris in 2001 when I felt compelled to get back home as soon as possible… Thirty minutes after I got back to my Parisian apartment, I received a phone call on my landline (no cell phones at the time!) to offer me a position to work in Montreal, Canada. A month before, my then-boyfriend and I had set the intention to move either to Canada or Australia. This call totally changed the trajectory of my life and started my journey in North America, from Montreal to San Francisco.
  • That time when I felt called to share my phone number in an email replying to an ad for an apartment on Craigslist… I generally would not share my phone number in the first email. Providing my phone number resulted in me getting the apartment of my dreams with a hot tub and a breathtaking view of the Golden Gate Bridge. The landlord called my phone, heard my voice message, visited my business website, thought I was probably a serious candidate, and asked me to visit the apartment that same day. After five minutes of visiting the place, I knew it was the place I had envisioned.
  • That morning, on the doorstep of my apartment in Mountain View ready to leave for work at Yahoo! when I felt a nudge telling me to go and grab my external hard drive… Several hours later, I was laid off from Yahoo! and was able to quickly save the portfolio of my work because I had my hard drive with me.
  • Last month, when I felt called to sign up for several classes on Manifesting, even though my logical mind was telling me “this is not what you need right now; you already know that stuff; why do you want to take these classes?” But something in me felt the pull to sign up anyway. As a result, I discovered a mentor and a program that is EXACTLY what I need this year to achieve my next-level dreams. My logical mind would never have conceived that this is what I needed most.  If I had listened to her and what “made sense” instead of my intuition, I would have passed that amazing opportunity to reach my next dreams.

The list goes on and on… I’ve dozen and dozen examples like these.

What are you listening to when you make decisions?

Your rational mind and what makes “logical sense”
OR
your intuition, your gut feeling, the quiet whisper within?

Well, if you rely mostly on your logical mind and what “makes sense” when making decisions, you are…

  • probably working WAY harder than you could to get what you want,
  • and missing out on many amazing opportunities because they don’t seem “rational” or “reasonable.”

in Western cultures, we give too much power to the mind and what makes logical sense. As a result, we prevent great things from happening in our lives and we make things way harder than they could be.

“The intuitive mind Is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.” ~ Albert Einstein or someone else (uncertain attribution)

This has been one of my MOST IMPORTANT lessons in the past several years, and continues to be. 

I’m someone quite rational; this is how I was raised. Reason is highly valued in France. Remember this is the country of Descartes: “I think therefore I am.” I’ve led a big part of my life following reason over intuition and gut feeling. However, over the years, I’ve learned that the more I follow my intuition, the easier I create the things I want in my work and life.

It is a continual learning in surrendering to deeper knowing than the rational mind. However, the more I trust this inner knowing—like in the instances I shared above—, my intuition, my gut feeling, my instincts, however you want to call it, the more magic happens in my life and the easier things come to me. The things I attract as a result are way BETTER than what I could have conceived if I had followed the logical steps dictated by my rational mind. 

Such as:

  • the perfect work situation to move to Montreal, Canada. 
  • my dream apartment in the San Francisco Bay Area at a reasonable monthly rent, compared to the current market.
  • the perfect mentors to help me unlock my next career and life dreams. 
  • an amazing immigration lawyer to help me get a US working Visa better than I could have imagined.

If things feel consistently hard in your life, it could be because you are overthinking and over-relying on your rational mind. Obviously, this is not the only piece of the puzzle, but I see so many people discounting their inner knowing and true desires on the altar of seemingly “reasonable decisions that make sense.”

It is not because our Western societies overemphasize rational intelligence as a decision-making instrument, that this is the most effective tool to get what we want in our lives.

My experience is actually showing the opposite.  

If this is new to you, I encourage you to start practicing with small things, without major consequences.

  • When facing a decision, notice when you feel an internal conflict or feel torn. It may be your logical mind conflicting with your authentic desire. What one is saying? What about the other?
  • Practice noticing the nudges of your instinct, gut feeling, or desires.
  • Be careful when you hear yourself or a well-intentioned friend saying something like “You should do this or that.” Be wary of the shoulds. Most of the time, they come from your rational mind and fears. Shoulds” and ‘haves to” are not an effective compass to get what you truly want. 

I’ve learned that if I’m strongly called to do something, I don’t need to know the why or if it makes sense. I do it, like opening up the travel brochure to the page of Copenhagen.

What are you called to do that you may stop yourself from doing out of “shoulds” or’ seemingly ‘”reasonable” arguments?

It is TIME

It is TIME

“anything or anyone
that does not bring you alive
is too small for you.”

~ David Whyte

As we transition into a new year, It is time to let go of the things that don’t bring us alive and step into the ones that do.

What are you letting go of? What are you stepping into?

It’s TIME.

Have a blessed holiday season,

Isabelle

P.S. Here is the full poem.

Sweet Darkness
by David Whyte

“Listen
When your eyes are tired
the world is tired also.

When your vision has gone,
no part of the world can find you.

Time to go into the dark
where the night has eyes
to recognize its own.

There you can be sure
you are not beyond love.

The dark will be your home
tonight.

The night will give you a horizon
further than you can see.

You must learn one thing.
The world was made to be free in.

Give up all the other worlds
except the one to which you belong.

Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet
confinement of your aloneness
to learn

anything or anyone
that does not bring you alive

is too small for you.”

Listen to the poem here.

You are invited!

You are invited!

🔥 YOU ARE INVITED! 🔥

I look forward to giving this talk next Friday and you are invited!
as well as people you know–spouse, relative, friend, coworker-who may benefit from it. Please share this email broadly.

🔸 Are you a high-achieving professional, manager, or executive who has realized some success but is bored and lacking passion for your current role or industry?
🔸 Do you want to infuse more purpose into your career but can’t figure out how or even what your purpose is?
🔸 Do you long for more meaningful work that allows you to make a contribution, maybe leave a legacy, but you can’t figure out what it is?

If you answer yes to any of these questions, then this interactive talk is for you!

In this presentation, you’ll learn:

✅ The #1 key factor to aligning your career with your life purpose with total clarity and certainty.
✅ The four elements of your unique career blueprint that will unlock your most purposeful work, and the confidence to go for it.
✅ The five steps to go from bored and trapped in your career to thriving in a career you absolutely love that allows you to live your purpose and make the difference you are here to make.

I look forward to seeing you on the call!

Isabelle

To attend, simply join the Zoom meeting by entering the Zoom meeting ID: 829 8569 0187 and the passcode: mindful

If you or someone you know attend, let me know so that I can say hi!

Update: If you missed it the session, the replay is available here.

Multicultural background? This is for YOU

Multicultural background? This is for YOU

** For you or someone you know ** 

Do you have a multicultural background?
Are you first or second-generation immigrant or expat?

Do you want to find a meaningful career that makes a difference….or infuse more meaning and purpose in your current career?

If so, this interview is for you. (Even if you don’t have a multicultural background, you’ll benefit from it.)

I had the privilege to be a guest on this globally top-ranking podcast to chat about one of my favorite topics!

“Finding a Meaningful Career as a Multicultural Leader”

In this interview, I share:

  • How the conditioning of my native culture influenced my career path and how it probably did for you too.
  • How to free yourself from your cultural conditioning, and preconceived notions of success, to create your own meaningful career path.
  • A powerful visualization to help you discover your purposeful work. I did it live with Tayo, the host!

Listen to the interview on Apple Podcasts or YouTube.

Happy listening!

Isabelle

I also encourage you to check out this brilliant podcast, As Told by Nomads., by Tayo Rockson, This is the podcast our multicultural world needs more than ever.

“Featured in Entrepreneur Magazine in 2019 in the Top 25 Business Podcasts for Entrepreneurs, As Told By Nomads with Tayo Rockson features interviews with global nomads, Third Culture Kids, and entrepreneurs discussing what it takes to be global leaders.”