“One of my favorite parts of this group is you and the way that you lead and the way that you inspire … everytime I talk to you, I feel better. You always make me feel like I can conquer what I need to conquer and it’s like no big deal.”  – Heather Dressel

On this episode of the Plan Simple Meals Podcast, I’m really excited to talk with Heather Dressel about her family, her business and her experience during FLOW365.

Heather has an 8-year-old daughter and an 11-year-old son. She’s been a stay at home more for ten years, and this is the first year she said she can do something for herself. And she’s doing something really exciting—starting her own business, called Divinely Sensitive. In addition she moved to a new state recently.

In the midst of all this change, she was resistant to committing to a full year process, here’s what happened when we met in person:

I just had this knowing … this feeling that we were going to work together … When we started talking and you told me about this program [FLOW365], there was like a ping in my heart that was like, “Ooh, you need to get her information and stay in touch with her. This sounds something that it could be really great for you.

Heather’s FLOW Situation

Heather needed to focus on healing from serious chronic illnesses and disease and learning about foods that make her and her family sick. She is transforming from full time mom to a business owner. Over the past couple of years, she’s had really amazing spiritual awakening and she’s settling to this new home. That’s food, lifestyle, om and work right there.

She says, “I had so much going on, I needed support, I needed a system, a gentle, ever changing, forgiving structure that would inspire me to show up to be my best self in all of those areas.”

Why Planning Matters

I always loved the idea of planning. Planning looked like tons of notebooks and lists floating around my kitchen and everything scattered. As much as I love order and planning, I just never really found a way to make it work for me and I still struggle with consistency, but I’m definitely getting better since I started FLOW.

Just Show Up

You show up when you show up. “It goes totally in alignment with what I’m trying to do with my entire life to let go of the perfectionist and just show up and do the best I can in that moment.”

Key Tool: Braindump

I always say there is magic in writing things down. It helps us really be focused on our goals but it also lets us let go of trying to hold all the information in our heads. Heather says, “Just the braindump alone is super helpful for me. If I fully get to that, it’s like I’ve let everything out, I’ve looked at it, I’ve read it, and it kind of sits with me.”

A braindump, or as I like to call it a Master List, can be super helpful, but for Heather, they used to be overwhelming. Here’s what changed:

A huge shift for me was doing this dump list and then breaking it down in the back of the journal to the food, work, om and lifestyle. I’m a really visual person and so seeing everything in the way it’s organized in the journal is a lot less overwhelming for me than looking at pages and pages and pages of list.

And what’s on our list can change season to season. Right now I might be really focused on work, but in a couple of months I might feel pulled to really reconnect with my food. But when you see it written down, and you don’t put it on your calendar it isn’t going to get done.

Key Tool: Week at a Glance Pages

The FLOW planner has a number of sections, and Heather’s favorite is the Week at a Glance page: I never took time to think about how I wanted my week to feel. Who has time to think about that? It’s just revolutionary for me. What is my vision for the week? What do I want to receive this week? What do I want to give this week? It’s just give deep meaning to your week which is so awesome.

Key Tool: Big Rocks

Imagine a jar that you need to fill with sand and rocks. If you put the sand in first, there is no room for the big rocks, but if you put the big rocks in first, the sand flows around it. We use this practice with planning by choosing the three big things to focus on each week. Heather says, Even Superwoman can only do so much in a day. It's definitely helped me scale back to the point where I can feel successful. I don’t have huge lists that like at the end of the day, I’m like, “Great. I have 70 things on my list and I only got two done.” As opposed to “There are the three big things that need to happen this week. Let’s break it down and figure out what has to be accomplished to get those done.” That’s been a huge shift for me.

FLOW Changes

Food: My kitchen feels a lot less like a prison than it used to.

Lifestyle: Settling into a new home

Om: Making sure spiritual practices don’t get lost in the shuffle—creating an altar with Goddess statues and crystals that are meaningful to her goals, listening to music and chanting to connect with her love of singing and with her body

Work: Creating time for starting a new business

Big and Little Shifts from FLOW 365

I definitely feel more organized because I allow myself to take the time that I need to plan without feeling guilty. That was a huge shift for me. I felt guilty sitting down and taking time out to plan anything that wasn’t like what I’m buying at the grocery store or something directly going to affect my children or my husband or my life like that.

I’ve seen my life as very small. I was thinking very small.

I feel like FLOW365 has opened me up and really inspired me to understand that I don’t have to be perfect, but I still can accomplish all of the things that I want to accomplish.

“One of my favorite parts of this group is you and the way that you lead and the way that you inspire … everytime I talk to you, I feel better. You always make me feel like I can conquer what I need to conquer and it’s like no big deal.”

We also talked about:

• How being a mom and dealing with illness or a chronic condition can be more work than a job
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  
• Needing to take care of yourself as a mom before you can help your kids
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  
• Learning to make changes that we know will have impact—for Heather it’s putting her food down about gluten because of how it affects her and her kids
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  
• Having best days and “just need something” days with spiritual practices
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  
• Letting go of perfectionism and finding what you need each day
• 
  
• 
  

BIO

Heather Dressel was a stay at home mom for years before launching a Divinely Sensitive. Heather is a highly sensitive empath herself, and launched her business to lead a community of women who identify as highly sensitive or empaths or both. Divinely Sensitive provide resources and support as they learn to honor their unique sensitivities and unleash their superpowers. Heather is currently active in FLOW 365.

LINKS

• Divinely Sensitive
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  
• Instagram @divinelysensitive
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  
• Facebook page, Divinely Sensitive
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  
• The Highly Sensitive Person by Dr Elaine Aron
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  
• Highly Sensitive Person website
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  
• Podcast with Sarah Jenks
• 
  
• 
  

Doable Change from this episode:

Make a dump list. Take a piece of paper or a blank spread in your journal and divide it into four sections for food, lifestyle, OM (spirituality and self-care) and work. Dump all the things in your head that you have to do or want to do into those sections. Just getting it out of your head makes a difference. You can relax a little more. You can see where you are out of balance. And you can see what you can start to focus on.

We do this practice every 90 days as part of FLOW 365. FLOW 365 is a high-end, yearlong program that helps entrepreneurial moms make time and space for clean food, joyful home lives and meaningful practices — alongside work, of course! It is designed to help you increase productivity without decreasing joy.

It is such an important part of my own practice that it is built right into the FLOW Planner. The FLOW planner helps you fit food and the other things that “matter most” into your day. By scheduling food tasks, exercise, your big dreams and downtime along with appointments and work and getting the kids to and from activities, you can love your life more and be present in the “flow.”