This week I’m thrilled to introduce you to my dear friend, Kitty Cavalier. She’s babysitting my blog while I snuggle with my new little peanut, Penelope.

Kitty is an expert seductress. But this doesn’t mean she’s a manipulative vamp trying to pull men into bed with her.

It means she knows how to co-create with Life to spread and enhance beauty, fun, pleasure, and love everywhere she goes.

Not only does she teach this in her online courses, coaching, and private retreats, she also practices it in her own life. (That may sound obvious, but it’s amazing how many teachers don’t actually practice what they preach. Kitty is not one of them.)

In her transparent post she shares how she used her own medicine to get out of $40K of debt.  The story inspired me to take a closer look at my spending and what itch I’m trying to scratch with my purchases. I know it will do the same for you.

Then, be sure to listen in to the audio Glimpse TV episode I recorded with Kitty this past fall.  The conversation is juicy and it’s the perfect opportunity to learn even more tools and tricks for using the sacred art of seduction to create a life that you truly love.

And now, I bring you Kitty Cavalier!

 

June of 2013 was a month of massive change in my life. My relationship of 11 years with the man who was my husband- crumbled before my eyes in one day. I had recently left my six-figure job to focus entirely on my business.  In the blink of an eye I was suddenly living alone for the first time in my life and had no reliable source of income. During those summer months, I walked around like a cartoon character who had just been hit by an anvil falling out of the sky. A haze of pain, confusion and fear blurred everything within my sightline.

Fortunately, I had $35,000 in a savings account once my husband and I spilt our finances. It didn’t take long, however, for that $35,000 to drain from my account and $40,000 in debt to take it’s place. “You’ve got to spend money to make money,” is what I told myself as I completely shut down my consciousness around spending.  I bought self-development courses, new clothes, redecorated my apartment and made massive investments in my business and brand. I spent thousands on take-out as I re-learned how to take care of myself as a single person. I got a dog.

Some of these investments were wise and grounded (like the dog), but most were physical manifestations of a woman who felt lost, wounded and impulsive.

One day, I looked around my apartment taking inventory of all the new things I had collected. It looked very pretty, but it felt very sad. I knew in my bones that my divorce was a necessary re-invention, and I thought if I could make myself look like the woman I wanted to become – a mature, successful, grounded, sovereign woman – I could speed up or maybe even bypass altogether the growing pains that came with actually having to grow up. Then, the truth hit me like a ton of bricks: regardless of who I was trying to become by overspending, the woman I was actually becoming was a woman $40K in the hole.  And with every $30 take-out order or new throw pillow I thought would “complete the look”, the reinvention I so longed for was being driven further and further away. Feeling hopeless and helpless, I finally turned to my one true spiritual home: Seduction.

“Seduction?” you might be thinking, as you envision me donning a red dress and high heels, hitting the bar at the Carlyle to lure a wealthy businessman into my spiderweb.  But that is not the side of seduction I am speaking of.  That kind of seduction, rooted in manipulation, exploitation, and ultimately fear, is the shadow side at play.

The type of seduction I am talking about is what I call Sacred Seduction. Sacred Seduction is a practice of attraction through authenticity.  It is magnetism over manipulation, instinct over impulse.  It is listening to the desires that seduce you to your core, the ones that feel like they are pulling from a place so deep that it is a power beyond you, and, no matter how vulnerable or uncomfortable it makes you feel, heeding that call.

When I approached my financial situation through the paradigm of Sacred Seduction, I realized that what had been seducing me into debt was a period of “conscious unconsciousness.”.  I knew I was digging a hole that would be hard to get out of, but the pain of stopping my spending felt worse than the pain of continuing it at the time.  Now, a new desire was pressing forth in me like a green shoot emerging from dark soil.  It was a craving for stability, security, and most of all, self-respect.  When I really looked within, I finally realized that nothing I could buy would ever come close to the satisfaction that financial security made me feel.  {TWEET IT}

 

When something would then flash before me begging to be purchased – whether it was a fancy bag of veggie chips or an entrepreneurial retreat in the Caribbean – I would close my eyes, pause, and feel.  What was really seducing me here? What itch was getting scratched by the idea of making this purchase? When I slowed down to feel, I would realize that the thing that was actually seducing me most was my power.   And once I felt that, the impulse to buy became easy to abate. (Nice try, veggie chips.) I call this practice “Seductive Restraint”, which means practicing restraint with the intention of bringing that which we truly want closer. Different from restriction, which is often rooted in control, restraint is a practice of surrender, just like Sacred Seduction itself.

Today I beam with pride to tell you that I am just a few months away from being completely debt free, and my business is absolutely thriving. But the pride I feel now does not come from having a dramatic before-and-after story. It is the pride of a woman who has slowed down to feel the swells of seduction within her, and no matter how uncomfortable it was, surrendered to their ebb and flow like a mermaid does the tides.  It is the pride of a seductively sovereign woman.  It is the pride of a woman who is living her truth, and who has walked the winding labyrinth all the way to the center, where I found the woman I always wanted to become.
Check out my recent interview with Kate where we talk about Sacred Seduction and what role it plays in our every day lives!

Over to You:

How does this new take on seduction resonate with you? When you look through this new paradigm, can you see Sacred Seduction at work in your life? I’ll be keeping an eye on your comments and would love to hear what you think.

For more inspiration to bring more Sacred Seduction into your life, click here to check out Kitty’s book, follow her on Instagram and head over to www.kittycavalier.com/glimpsetv to claim a special free gift just for readers.