Beware Outsider Syndrome
In the tarot deck I use, there is a card called: The Outsider. It’s an image of a child looking through a fence at a rainbow hued landscape just beyond his locked reach. When I read the cards of executives, clients, and colleagues, this card often appears, and it’s been weighing on me to write to you about it because I notice most creatives and entrepreneurs have a bit of an “outsider syndrome” that can sometimes serve success, and sometimes dismantle it.
I just returned from a week of work at the Simon and Schuster New York office. I marvel that I’ve been a publisher there for four years—where did the time go? Before I was a publisher there, I was a scout for them—pretty much an Editor-at-Large for new talent. So, all in all, it’s been nearly five years!! When I left the tea company, I had a lot of big plans for my writing. I made a long list of the books that were knocking on the door of my creative womb and began in earnest to get each of them going—but then came this opportunity and it was just too exciting to turn down.
I became swept up into the NYC publishing world. I fell more deeply in love with my boss and her visionary way of moving through the landscape of corporate America. She was my business muse. I used to tell her I couldn’t work for anyone, but wanted to work for her. I became her dedicated pupil, single-minded in learning everything from this mystical genius who seemed to live outside normal perimeters of business. An anomaly in publishing, I’ve heard, Judith focused on her intuition, her heart, and in the power of the Law of Attraction. Her style, humor, and smart rebelliousness reflected a woman who is at home in her authenticity. She brought me into her fold and this nourished the parts of me that had felt like an outsider to my life. I used to call her “My Queen.” And I meant it!
When Judith left a couple months ago, it was a sudden shock to all of our lives. Tears were shed, and suddenly there was a vacuum in my own life that I felt driven to fill. The sparkling parts of my job as a publisher under her care seemed to vanish. The fairy dust had left the building. That’s the thing about people in their own magic, they illuminate the pathway of what’s possible for others. But more than anything, Judith was an integrated outsider—a woman who has mastered a system enough to rebel within it. She brought people into her company through warmth, ensuring they knew she wanted them—she picked people out of the crowd and hired them—making all of us feel like insiders. She’s the one that celebrated when the tea company fired me—by hiring me! I mean, who does that!?
Being picked feels like winning the lottery. When you get picked, it’s like the whole world shifts into seeing you. You feel intimate with the day to day in the same way that falling in love makes the world sparkle and feel inclusive. I remember when a good friend long before I began working there got a publishing deal with Simon and Schuster, she sat in my living room all aglow and beatific. It reminded me of when Gerard told me he wanted to spend the rest of his life with me—there was nothing that could make me feel outside of my life in that moment.
A lot of people pitch me their books. I can’t go to a party or industry event without getting pitched. It makes being social at times very uncomfortable for me. I want to connect on a deep level, and not have any agenda in my interactions, but being a publisher is like being a Hollywood producer—people pin their dreams on you picking them. It’s a form of being seen, or feeling like they aren’t an outsider to their own lives, because so many people feel like one. So many of us are in pain over a dual existence of wanting to be seen and also wanting to express ourselves—our vulnerability, our dreams, our most sacred ideas, all.
But this is where feeling like an outsider to your life gets expensive. You have an agenda to be validated, picked, seen, heard and affirmed, but the problem is you’re looking for it from someone outside you. You’re looking for the agent to pick you up. You’re looking for the publishing deal to validate you somehow. You’re looking for the press hit, or the social likes, or the boss who sees your gifts and talents more than even you do. Then what happens? The boss quits and moves on. The publishing deal doesn’t actually save your marriage or help you feel less insecure. The nod from the agent doesn’t actually alleviate your pain when you’re alone with your own doubts and fears. You realize you are the same. You will never be on the inside of your life if you are expecting someone outside of you to validate it.
What makes you feel inside of yourself? What makes the rainbows shine for you when no one else is around? Who are you when the lights are out, and the dark night fills the sky. Are you a star? Yes, you are. You are literally made of stardust. What could be more miraculous than your human DNA forming from ancient particles of an exploding universe? I mean, let’s just sit with that for a minute.
What does a person look, feel and sound like when they are the insider of their own life? Well, they dance to the beat of their own drummer. They are not derivative, but original. They don’t really need you to tell them they are great. They are on purpose in a way that makes you want to circle them. They are not a gaping energetic hole looking for you to fill it. They are secure, curious, humble, delicious in a way.
The energetics of being around someone in what I call their Original Intent—their destiny—is that you can tell they don’t need you but life will be more fun if you get a moment in their sphere. When you are not feeling like an outsider to your life, when two insiders collide, there is magic, an astronomical energy boost, a dance that may last a minute or five years, but whatever it is, it’s filled with high vibes and possibility. The trick is to become the insider to your life by claiming it.
Judith leaving us was not Judith leaving us. While at first everyone wanted to take it personally, it was not her thinking of anything other than how she can continue to be the insider of her own path, her own trajectory and growth. Pretty badass if you ask me.
When you find yourself wanting to make a scary move, toward more of what you really want, beware the outsider syndrome that makes you dependent on what others might think. From my clients and others, I see the Outsider Syndrome play out when there is an energetic gap in what you are here on earth to do, and what you are actually doing. You’ll know when you’re entirely inside your own life when that feeling of insatiability is quenched. For me, it’s going back to writing. Time and again, when I write daily, even the kids notice and mention that I’m happier, more centered, and they like it.
Take inventory this week of what you deeply desire, and what you’re actually spending most of your time on. The gap between the two is where you get to shift, move and dance—filling the gap with your authenticity and original intention. Make it a game, make it a journey, but make it open the fence to the rainbow hued garden just past the gate.
Love you all,
