Your Blue Flame: Drop the Guilt and Do What Makes You Come Alive

CHAPTER

1

YOU CAN COME ALIVE

My friend slid into the chair across from me at my favorite rooftop restaurant in New York City. Immediately, she leaned forward and said, What happened to you?

I laughed. Good to see you too!

You are not the same person as the last time I saw you, she said.

She was right. A decade earlier, she’d stopped by my suburban Texas home, back when I had three children under age three. I’d forgotten that she was coming over, so I didn’t do the thing where I shove all our messes under beds and into closets to give people a completely false impression of the way we live. A raggedy pile of dolls that had recently been given haircuts by a toddler covered a large, years-old stain on the living room carpet. A pile of electronic toys sat lifelessly because their batteries hadn’t been changed in a year. There were crusty plates on the table from dinner the night before.

The kids had woken up early from naps and immediately started fighting. As I cleared the table to get them snacks, I knocked an open jug of grape juice off the counter. After the purple liquid splattered all over my jeans, the counters, the chairs and then pooled around my feet, there was a moment of ominous silence. Then . . . I lost it. Lost it. I yelled. I babbled. I was on the brink of tears as I shouted into the ether about how ineffective and hopeless my life was.

This reaction to the juice explosion was an explosion of my own pent-up frustration that had been building for a long time. I felt a little more lost and aimless with every passing week. Some days I felt like I was failing in every single area of life. So when moments like this spill happened, I’d often end up having a mini breakdown because I was already walking around in such a fragile state.

Unfortunately, this friend of mine witnessed this particular episode. In the middle of my madwoman’s soliloquy, I looked up and saw her standing in the living room. My three-year-old had seen her approaching the house and let her in when she knocked, which I didn’t hear because I was yelling at the paper towel rack.

So when this same friend recently sat across from me at a rooftop restaurant when we both found ourselves in New York City for work, I understood why she started the conversation by asking what had happened to me.

"I’m looking at the person you are today, and your life is so different from when I saw you back then. You are so different," she said. She thought out loud about what had changed.

Now I had a job as a daily talk radio host on a national network, which is why I was in New York. I had an opportunity to interview someone I’d admired for years, so I’d come to town to do it in person. Listeners of my radio show often invited me to do speaking engagements, which allowed me to meet fascinating people all over the country. I’d fulfilled my childhood dream of becoming a published author. Most recently, I’d become a standup comedian. I was about to head out on a national standup comedy tour that my husband and I produced ourselves. The kids were even more excited about all of this than I was since they often got to travel with me.

Oh, and I’d kept having babies too. I was now a mother of six.

Most importantly, however, was the change in my mentality. I felt powerful instead of powerless. I still had bad days—lots of them—and was still a disaster in plenty of areas. There was still a pile of dolls with toddler-scissor haircuts in the corner of my living room. But underneath the hard times and the daily frustrations was a deep satisfaction. I now woke up each morning with a sense of purpose. I felt as though I was living the life I was meant to live and having the impact I was meant to have.

You are a minivan-driving mom of six kids who lives in the suburbs. You’re supposed to be boring, my friend said with a smile. Yet you seem more excited by your life than almost anyone I know. She thought for a moment, then added, It seems that, at some point, something came alive in you.

Something Came Alive in You

My friend had been in a funk in her own life, and she wanted advice. She wanted to experience the same transformation I’d gone through.

This wasn’t the first time I’d had this conversation. My email inbox and direct messages had echoed with similar inquiries for years. Though the phrasing varied, the questions came down to: How did you make room for your dreams, even in the midst of a busy life? How can I do that too?

The answer is this: I found my blue flame. And I gave myself permission to use it.

I have often wished that every person who asks me that question could join me at that same rooftop restaurant so I could share everything I know over chips and guacamole. Since that might not be possible, I wrote this book.

If you’re in a funk . . .

If you’re stuck . . .

If you’re lost . . .

If you feel as if you have something to contribute to the world that you’ve never let loose . . .

If you feel unneeded . . .

If you wonder whether your best years are behind you . . .

If you want to make a change but are exhausted by hustle culture . . .

If you’ve recently found yourself covered in grape juice and babbling incoherently . . .

. . . pull up a chair. Let’s chat.

I’ll warn you right now that I am not a motivational speaker. If you want someone to give you a rousing pep talk about keeping every area of your life on track every day, I’m not your gal. I hit the snooze button at least three times each morning, and the last time I went to the gym I pretended like I got an urgent phone call so it wouldn’t be so embarrassing that I was leaving after seven minutes on the treadmill.

I’m not a lifestyle guru either. I was recently driving through my neighborhood and noticed that some irresponsible person had dropped a pile of trash in the middle of the street. When we got closer, I realized it was our trash. One of the kids had evidently thrown a stray shoe and a couple of torn-up books out the minivan window when I wasn’t looking.

I’m also not a life coach, but if I were, I would be the kind who holds meetings at a bar and gets all my wisdom from whatever show I’m currently binge-watching.

What I am is a person who has battled through guilt and fear and other people’s opinions about how I should be living and came out the other side with a life that I love. I will tell you everything I know about how you can do that too. Even if you don’t have a big family or don’t have kids at all, you will recognize yourself in these pages. While the details of my experience running a household of eight might not sound familiar, the forces that held me back will.

My transformation started when I discovered my blue flame. Now, let’s talk about what that is, and how you can find yours.

CHAPTER

2

YOU CAN FIND YOUR BLUE FLAME

I had just started dating my husband, Joe, when I met international speaker and bestselling author Keith Ferrazzi. He was a friend of Joe’s and would go on to become a good friend of mine, as well as being the officiant at our wedding, but on this day he was an intimidating public figure. I wanted to impress him with my wit and conviviality, so when he mentioned that he was on his way to Renaissance Weekend, I responded enthusiastically. Forsooth! I exclaimed. Ye shall buye passage on a skye shippe and make merriment and drinke ale! When I asked what costume he was going to wear, he just smiled at me in polite confusion. Finally, Joe leaned over to explain that Keith was talking about Renaissance Weekend, an exclusive global strategy retreat for top leaders in business and politics. I was thinking of a Renaissance festival, where people dress up like pirates and wenches and eat funnel cake.

I’ve always been glad Keith didn’t get up and slowly back away from the crazy woman, because it was later in that same conversation that he introduced me to the concept that changed the way I see the world.

He spoke about how grateful he was for his life. He ran a successful business where he genuinely believed in the work he was doing. World leaders sought his expertise. He traveled internationally. He had a diverse network of friends and colleagues who inspired him daily. He got most excited when he spoke of how he honestly felt like he was having a positive impact on the world, and that’s what really mattered to him. The more we talked, the more I realized what an unusual conversation this was. When you ask people how their lives are going, usually they look weary. They sigh. They talk about how they wish their situations were different. Then, in the end, they shrug and say it’s fine and change the subject.

Not Keith. He glowed when he talked about his life.

What’s your secret? I asked.

His answer would change my life: I found my blue flame.

I loved this term. I’d heard it used before, but never with the kind of passion with which Keith talked about it. Something about his explanation made it click for me. I listened eagerly as he said that different people define it different ways, but he thought of a blue flame as your unique way to give back to others. It’s a passion that has been instilled in you that makes the world a better place when you use it.

I went home that night lost in that concept. I wondered what my blue flame was, and I felt like it just might change everything if I could ever find it.

In the almost two decades that have passed since that encounter with Keith, the concept of a blue flame has become a key element of my worldview. After years of refining the definition on the basis of my own experience, as well as a lot of conversations with friends and clergy and expert guests on my radio show, here is how I’ve come to define a blue flame:

It is something you do, and were destined to do, that fills you with energy and adds love to the world.

Let’s break down each of these components one by one.

Your Blue Flame Is Something You Do

Your blue flame is some kind of work you do, and I use the word work loosely. I’m not thinking only of paid work, though some people do have jobs that allow them to use their blue flames. This could be something you do fifty minutes or fifty hours per week.

I mainly use the word work to distinguish your blue flame from your role in your relationships. In my circles, it’s common to hear women say, My blue flame is being a mom! It’s a sweet sentiment, but you can’t have a blue flame of being a mom any more than you can have a blue flame of being a cousin or a niece. These roles are about relationship, and your blue flame is a specific creation you’re meant to add to the world. I would suggest that the role of mother (or father or any other intimate relationship) is too sacred to conflate with the work that comes with it. A man can be full of love for his kids while experiencing mixed emotions about the daily grind of keeping the house running.

When my friends say their blue flame is being a mom or a dad, they’re initially expressing the happiness they derive from having kids. Very often, when they dig a little deeper, they find that there is also some kind of work they do as part of their parenting that they deeply enjoy—and that is their blue flame. When they draw out that distinction between the blue-flame work that excites them and the relationship to their children, it can help them find fulfillment in all seasons of life. For example, a woman who thinks that being a mom is her blue flame might feel lost when her kids grow up and leave the home. But if she knows that the work that filled her with the most passion when the kids were little was home organization, she’ll find a way to continue to share that blue flame with new people when she’s an empty nester.

Your Blue Flame Is Your Destiny

In her book The Path Made Clear, Oprah describes becoming cohost of a TV talk show and interviewing a guest. She says the interview itself wasn’t glamorous, but as she spoke with her interviewee, I felt lit up from the inside, like I had come home to myself. When the hour ended, there was a sense of knowing resonating within my heart and radiating to the hairs on the back of my neck. My entire body told me this is what I was supposed to do.¹

Notice she didn’t say this is what she wanted to do. She said it’s what she was supposed to do. She goes on to describe the work she’s done from there as a calling, not a job. This is the language of destiny. In order for someone to be called, something or Someone outside them has to do the calling. When Oprah speaks about her work, she speaks as someone who understands that the path she’s been put on is not entirely of her own choosing.

One of the ways my understanding of a blue flame has evolved since I first encountered the concept is that I have come to think of it in spiritual terms. Back when I was suggesting pirate costumes to Keith, I was an atheist—I’d been an atheist all my life. In the years after that, Joe and I went on a spiritual journey that led us both to Christianity. Those beliefs have deeply influenced my understanding of what it means to have a blue flame.

When I was an atheist, I knew that writing was my blue flame. I’d started and stopped a bunch of writing projects, but none of them felt like they were going anywhere. This passion wasn’t bringing the spark into my life that I felt it could and should. I was searching for all the answers within myself and was getting increasingly frustrated that I couldn’t find them. After my conversion, when I prayed for direction about what I was destined to do, instead of just thinking about what I personally wanted to do, I suddenly received clarity.

I felt moved to start a blog. I set up an account on one of the free blogging platforms to tell humorous stories about my new-found faith. It was as unglamorous a calling as it gets: I didn’t do any fancy formatting and didn’t even use my real name. I had maybe a dozen regular readers. One time I got in a days-long, heated philosophical debate with someone I knew only by his screen name, SirMeowsAlot74. Yet I felt a sense of purpose when I did this work, even though it didn’t come with an impressive title or income.

Years later, that blog led to my first book contract, which led me to meet the folks who hired me to work in radio, which led me to standup comedy. I couldn’t have seen how it would all play out at the time. I just had a sense that, as simple as it was, blogging was the work I was meant to do at that moment. It felt less like I had come up with this plan on my own and more like I was discovering a map that had already been drawn for me by Someone else.

Your Blue Flame Fills You with Energy

That day my friend found me babbling and covered in grape juice, I was overwhelmed. Just doing the basics to keep up with three kids in diapers drained me to the point that I spent most days running on empty. When I was first inspired to start that blog, I hesitated. I believed the conventional wisdom that says that busy people, especially women with young children, should not add any extra work to their lives, in order to conserve their energy.

My whole life changed