Hi Reader,

There are so many ways we quietly abandon ourselves — and don't even realize it.

Sometimes the abandonment feels really small. You yearn to go on a hike but deny yourself because your kids might need your help with something. You know exactly what you want for breakfast, but concede to what your partner wants instead.

And there are bigger ways, too. You know your dream is to become a professional artist, but you convince yourself the ad agency job is the more sensible choice — it's almost like making your own art, isn't it? You dream of living in a new country, but tell yourself it's impossible with all your family obligations. So you stay put, restless and resentful inside, believing you're making the "right choice."

We abandon ourselves every time we deny what we want and choose something else instead.

There are moments when that's appropriate — when your young kids really do need you today, and your needs have to wait a little while. But these quiet abandonments add up.

And here's the thing no one tells you: these choices don't just breed anger, frustration, and resentment. They lead you down a path of ignoring your own dreams for so long that you forget what you wanted in the first place. You can no longer identify your own wants or needs, because you spent so long ignoring them.

I know it sounds dramatic. Drastic, even. These small daily choices to put everyone else first seem so innocuous. Innocent.

But over time, a voice inside starts to whisper: your needs aren't really all that important. Your dreams were too big, too far away, unreachable. And that voice convinces you to let them go — not all at once, but one tiny abandonment at a time.

A few years back, I got on a call with a coach I'd met through an online community. I'd asked a question in the group, and he offered to chat about it. When we got on the call, he asked me:

"What do you want?"

I was puzzled. He rephrased it, gently: "What are you working towards?"

I had just moved to London, was moving my business over from Germany, doing well in the leadership space, slowly finding my footing socially. But when he asked me what I wanted, I couldn't give a straight answer. I had the practiced version — what I'd been saying for so long — but in that moment, I wasn't sure it was actually true, or just sounded good.

I was stumped.

He offered me an invitation — a challenge to get more in touch with asking for what I wanted. Admittedly, it made me blush. But I accepted. Two weeks later we were back on a call, talking about my experiment and finding a better answer to what I really wanted.

And so it continued, week by week, for nearly three years.

That man, Matt Chavlovich, became my coach and one of my closest confidantes. He didn't just teach me his philosophies on life — he helped me carve out my own. To truly see my own gifts, my own light, and show up as a leader in my own space.

It was Matt who helped me understand what happens when we take life into our own hands and create what we've always dreamed of. And the quiet truth of what happens to us when we don't.

So it was incredibly special to have him on the podcast. In this episode of Don't Step on the Bluebells, we talk about his own journey to becoming a coach and the life principles he lives by and shares with the world.

If you've been looking for a new way of seeing your life — a new perspective on freedom and creativity — you won't want to miss this conversation.

​LISTEN HERE​

Hit reply and tell me: what's one small way you've been ignoring what you want lately? I read every response.

With love,

Amanda