This is all about renewal and creative expansion, a celebratory finale for our first season of Called to Bloom, where I am sharing with you a trick I discovered along the way that always returns me to that playful and infinite source of creative possibilities.

The goal is to open new pathways to explore, nurture, and refresh your creative practice with a new perspective that empowers you to find cues and inspiration in the whole world around you.

What catches your interest or makes you curious? What are you passionate about? What method, practice, study, art form or industry do you know like the back of your hand?

This is all a wealth of inspiration that you can use to inform and transform your creative process as well as what you create. And it's time for you to have this trick up your sleeve now too.

In This Episode, We Cover:

• Discovering the Tool of Creative Translation
  
• A Step-By-Step Guide for How to Use This Trick
  
• Examples & Uses of this Creative Tool in Action
  
• The Origins of This Creative Tool For Me
  
• Expanded Translation Tricks to Try
  
  
  

Links to Connect

Jen’s Nectar & Bloom Instagram: @nectar_and_bloom

https://www.instagram.com/nectar_and_bloom

Called to Bloom Instagram: @calledtobloompodcast

https://www.instagram.com/calledtobloompodcast

Called to Bloom Show Notes:

https://www.nectarandbloomfloral.com/blogs/podcast/my-favorite-trick-to-unlock-your-creative-potential

Episode Sponsors:
This episode of the Called to Bloom podcast is brought to you by the Poetry of Flowers holistic online floral education: https://www.nectarandbloomfloral.com/pages/courses

During busy seasons we can get really out of balance — we get caught up, wound up, overwhelmed, or just spread a little too thin — especially as sensitive creatives who are very in tune with and responsive to our environments. The energy is high in a busy season, expectations are high, timelines can be tight, and we can lose track of our own needs while we tend to the demands and opportunities all around us.

Even when we are doing things we love and value, whether for our businesses and the people we serve or the people we love, a constant state of output and productivity is not sustainable.

What we need are accessible self-care practices that are easy to find, easy to do, and that allow us to return to balance again through simply receiving and through nourishing our bodies and nervous systems so that we can rest and feel refreshed for a new season in alignment.

In This Episode, We Cover:

• Cycles & Rhythms — self-care practices & how they bring balance
  
• Sound & Frequencies — self-care practices & how they bring balance
  
• Bodywork & Somatics — self-care practices & how they bring balance
  
• Introspection & Reflection — self-care practices & how they bring balance
  
• Connection & Community — self-care practices & how they bring balance

Links to Connect

Jen’s Nectar & Bloom Instagram: @nectar_and_bloom

https://www.instagram.com/nectar_and_bloom

Called to Bloom Instagram: @calledtobloompodcast

https://www.instagram.com/calledtobloompodcast

Called to Bloom Show Notes:

https://www.nectarandbloomfloral.com/blogs/podcast/self-care-for-balance-the-renewal-you-have-been-seeking

How do you create a business in a creative field that supports you and is financially stable, at least, and better yet abundantly successful? Are you even allowed to do what you love for a living? How long does it take for this dream venture to become reliable or profitable? And then once you get it going, can you actually count on this creative venture for your livelihood?

In the same breath as you experience those butterflies or that rush of excitement about what you want to step into as your new aligned dream line of work, you're probably also equally dragged down a bit by the heavy but reasonable questions and doubts, including what is the real outlook and viability of this venture?

And can a small business doing something I love become financially reliable?

Many, if not most, designers, as an example, begin purely out of a genuine love for flowers, and a love for the powerful experience of sharing them with others.

Passion is so important for getting anything started — and, we also want to make sure you start and build in a smart way with a good plan, realistic expectations, and a smart approach to finances that helps you get off the ground and carries you into growth and abundance.

In This Episode, We Cover:

• Increasing Profits and Smart Money Management — 06:00
  
• Mindset and Emotional Blocks Around Money — 07:33
  
• Practical Tips for Increasing Profits — 11:52
  
• Aligning Work with Fulfillment — 15:15
  
• Understanding Pricing and Value — 16:38
  
• Attracting Your Ideal Clients — 23:09
  
• The Art of Knowing When to Say No — 30:27
  
• Getting Paid — 35:10
  
• Building Financial Freedom — 40:14
  
• Conclusion and Next Steps — 49:52

Links to Connect

Jen’s Nectar & Bloom Instagram: @nectar_and_bloom

https://www.instagram.com/nectar_and_bloom

Called to Bloom Instagram: @calledtobloompodcast

https://www.instagram.com/calledtobloompodcast

Called to Bloom Show Notes:

https://www.nectarandbloomfloral.com/blogs/podcast/get-smart-with-money-increase-profits-and-build-abundance

Stepping into a new decade is a rich experience. It feels actually powerful and significant, like a new milestone on the journey of life has just been reached, and like a whole new decade of possibility has just opened up. I've always felt like entering a new decade is kind of magical. You only enter one every 10 years, and you only get another new decade birthday after another entire 10 years have been lived.

In my recent experience, it's exciting turning 40 and I'm happy to report from the other side that I do not feel old or awkward as I might have feared in my 20s. It's weird, but in some ways I feel younger and lighter than I did in my 20s and 30s. And part of that is because I've lived more, I've healed a lot and I've done so much inner work to evolve and be able to step more into alignment.

I've made mistakes and pivoted and rebuilt. I've overextended and course corrected and learned to let things go. I've faced myself and the painful patterns of my conditioning, which is a process that I don't think is ever really finished, but that gets easier as you go along. And I'm still here and still on the journey and still learning and growing, maybe in the best ways yet.

In this episode of Called to Bloom, and as a newly minted 40-year-old myself, I am sharing with you all my best insights, including realizations, mindset shifts, tips, practices, exercises, and guidance for how to thrive in the middle of life and beyond.

In This Episode, We Cover:

• Embracing a New Decade — 00:00
  
• The Truth About Aging — 04:14
  
• Living Longer, Not Just Getting Older — 09:28
  
• Discovering What Really Matters — 12:59
  
• The Paradox of Aging and Growth — 17:44
  
• The Power of Affirmations — 24:33
  
• Living Without Regrets: A Call to Action — 27:25
  
• The Importance of Following Your Passion — 31:42
  
• Cultivating Your Superpower: The Hero Within — 33:17

Links to Connect

Called to Bloom Instagram: @calledtobloompodcast

https://www.instagram.com/calledtobloompodcast

Jen’s Nectar & Bloom Instagram: @nectar_and_bloom

https://www.instagram.com/nectar_and_bloom

Called to Bloom Show Notes:

https://www.nectarandbloomfloral.com/blogs/podcast/turning-40-insights-for-thriving-in-the-middle-of-life

Imagine yourself stepping into your creative space, feeling calm, open, refreshed, and ready. Imagine the light filling your studio or spilling onto your work table and the cool sensation of fresh flower stems in your hands Imagine feeling deeply centered paired with a spark of wonder that draws you forward down the unlit but fragrant path of the unknown. The path of the creative process that we discover anew each time we bring something beautiful into being.

You feel confident, self-assured, and completely okay with seeing what happens as you bring together the elements and layers of your design. You lose track of time. You are transfixed as though both participating in and just witnessing a colorful world of emotion emerge in front of you. This is what it feels like to be in your magic flow.

Now let's be a bit more brutally honest. How did it feel the last time you brought flowers into your space to arrange? What was on your mind? How did your body feel? How did your creative space feel? Did you feel like you had time to explore? Were you agitated and distracted or frozen at times with doubt about your ability, or finding yourself fussing over stems and smushing another flower in here or there in hopes that the shape and overall effect would somehow shift away from what felt to you like a clumpy mess and into some kind of transcendent living art that you had in your mind's eye.

I've experienced it all and over the years I have learned a lot of hard lessons and also honed a set of practices that actually helped me to minimize the chaos and agony so that I can step more easily and more often into my creative process with that shimmery, exciting and somehow also deeply calm experience of a flow state or a magic flow.

Recently, a fellow floral designer reached out to me and asked this question: "Do you have a kind of method when it comes to designing? I'm trying to figure out that ~ magic flow ~ to centerpieces still." I love this question. And as I pulled my thoughts together to answer her, I realized, I bet you could benefit from hearing this too. And now in this episode of the Called to Bloom podcast, I am sharing all of my tips, insights and steps for finding your magic flow in your design work too.

In this episode, we cover:

• What is a Magic Flow and Why Do We Want It
  
  
• Overcoming Barriers: What Gets in the Way, and What We Can Do
  
  
• How to Holistically Prepare for Creativity
  
  
• Specific Design Process Tips and Protocols
  
  
• The Art of Surrender and Acceptance

Links to Connect

Called to Bloom Instagram: @calledtobloompodcast

https://www.instagram.com/calledtobloompodcast

Jen’s Nectar & Bloom Instagram: @nectar_and_bloom

https://www.instagram.com/nectar_and_bloom

Called to Bloom Show Notes:
https://www.nectarandbloomfloral.com/blogs/podcast/how-to-find-that-magic-flow-in-your-design-work

What if I told you that there exists an incredible system for improved health, wellbeing, creativity, and business success — one that personalizes wellbeing and success to your body, your personality type, and your current season of life? What if I told you that this system meets you where you are, is gentle and super accessible, and is able to meet and support you at any stage of career or season of life?

This is not a whimsical pie-in-the-sky fantasy. It’s also not a health trend or fleeting fad, and it’s nothing you have to buy. This is an ancient, holistic system of health and wellbeing that completely reshaped both my business and my personal life for the better, and it is a healing science that impacted me so deeply that I was inspired to pursue two certifications in it, first as a Holistic Coach and then a Health Counselor, because I wanted to learn everything I could to be able to live its benefits myself and to share share it with you, my fellow creative who is inspired by nature and called to create.

The system that has had such a huge impact on my life and work that I am sharing with you today is called Ayurveda, and I am going to guide you through the key concepts and tools that I have found to be most helpful, effective, and transformative for the better in my business and in my life.

I am SO excited to share this episode with you on a topic that is so near and dear to my heart and one that has been such a huge source of supportive guidance as I have ridden the waves and gone through pivots, growth, burnout, big lessons, and aligned expansion inherent to the journey of creative entrepreneurship and floral artistry. I can’t wait for you to have these tools in your self-care and creative repertoire too!

In this episode, we cover:

• What is Ayurveda — its purpose, origins, how I discovered it, and what I loved about it from the beginning

• Life-changing essentials of Ayurveda — key concepts & what I have found to be most useful, helpful, and transformative

• How to discover your constitution and understand your nature — personalize and optimize your health and happiness

• How the framework of Ayurveda can help improve both creativity and business, and how it guides what is optimal for you in floral design
• Where to start & how integrate these resources with ease to optimize your creativity, work, and wellbeing

Links to Connect

Called to Bloom Instagram: @calledtobloompodcast
https://www.instagram.com/calledtobloompodcast

Jen’s Nectar & Bloom Instagram: @nectar_and_bloom

https://www.instagram.com/nectar_and_bloom

Called to Bloom Show Notes:
https://www.nectarandbloomfloral.com/blogs/podcast/the-holistic-system-that-reshaped-my-life-and-business

The crazy thing about burnout is, you don’t see it coming. Suddenly you don’t just feel creatively empty, disinterested in the work you do, and sometimes even a little angry or resentful without really knowing why, but you also feel like the bottom dropped out. You feel caught totally off guard, leaving you thinking: What just happened? We were cruising along! We were firing on all cylinders! We were having the season of our lives!

Everything seemed fine, and then WHAM! You feel exhausted, angry, inexplicably moody, completely drained creatively, and like everything everyone wants from you is either infuriating or completely overwhelming. Making decisions you know are not that big of a deal become agonizing dilemmas, and worst of all, your efforts to just GET THROUGH IT seem to only make things worse.

Burnout is a very real and very challenging state for creatives and entrepreneurs, and I think that we need to bring awareness to why it happens and to share remedies as well as prevention plans so that we can return to a healthy and harmonious creative flow in our work and services.

Today’s episode is devoted to acknowledging, understanding, and recovering from burnout, and also implementing preventative practices to avoid burnout in the future. We will be diving into what burnout is and how to spot it coming, understanding why burnout makes us feel stuck, what to actually do (or not do) to effectively recover from burnout, what you can do to help yourself return to your creative flow, and how to mitigate or avoid burnout in the future.

If you’ve been through it, and are excited to learn some new and nourishing tools to support your recovery and return to feeling inspired, or if you’re in the thick of it, either feeling those early hints that your creative energy is maybe a bit depleted or fully knowing that you are running on fumes, I’ve got your back. This episode is full of real tools, perspectives, and practices to help you through it with grace and big relief.

In this episode, we cover:

• What is burnout, and how to spot it coming

• Why burnout makes us feel stuck

• How to recover from burnout

• How to return to feeling creative and inspired

• How to avoid or mitigate burnout in the future

Called to Bloom Instagram: @calledtobloompodcast

https://www.instagram.com/calledtobloompodcast

Jen’s Nectar & Bloom Instagram: @nectar_and_bloom

https://www.instagram.com/nectar_and_bloom

Called to Bloom Show Notes:
https://www.nectarandbloomfloral.com/blogs/podcast/recovering-from-burnout-how-to-get-unstuck-and-reinspired

This episode of the Called to Bloom podcast is brought to you by the Poetry of Flowers holistic online floral education: https://www.nectarandbloomfloral.com/pages/courses

I never would have guessed that after building a floral design studio from a complete career pivot, and finding real success doing weddings and events, that I would find myself feeling unfulfilled and out of alignment. What do you do when you build your dream, you’re doing it well, everyone seems to like that you do it, and everything looks perfect from the outside, but you find yourself in agony inside without any way to explain it? Something is out of alignment, and when it comes to creative entrepreneurship, with the amount of effort and output you need to put into this business and brand experience, if the effort is not also filling you up, it’s time to restructure and realign.

In today’s episode I’m sharing advice, insights, and experiences from my own real, and not just a little bit vulnerable, story of how I hit a wall and had to rethink and reshape everything. Through the uncomfortable but utterly necessary process of reckoning with myself, who I truly am, and what I am truly here to do, even if it didn’t make sense on paper and seemed absurd after all the effort I’d put into building the first iteration of my business and brand, the truth is that I was able to build a brand I truly love and that is more successful and fulfilling than if I had stayed where I was.

What I learned is that what can feel safe and sensible can actually become a self-limiting cycle that can drain your energy and creativity faster than the corporate hustle or stifling job you escaped to start your own venture in the first place. The remedy? Transformation and realignment, and I am here to tell you that the gifts of that process are far greater than any of the discomfort it takes to get there. Plus I’m here for you with the lessons, tools, and perspectives to support you as you step out of feeling confined and out of alignment and into your true zone of genius.

In this episode, we cover:

• Advice and insights about transforming a small business into an authentic brand you love

• Aligning your passions and interests into your brand experience so that your work fills you up while it serves and delights your clients

• Jen’s own story of building a successful wedding floral design business, finding that something was out of alignment for her and hitting a wall

• How Jen discovered a way to build a more fulfilling, sustainable path forward as a business owner through shaping an authentic brand in alignment with her truth

• Signs to know you are in need of a pivot, how to get clarity, and where you are headed

• The process of stepping into your zone of genius

Called to Bloom Instagram: @calledtobloompodcast

https://www.instagram.com/calledtobloompodcast

Jen’s Nectar & Bloom Instagram: @nectar_and_bloom

https://www.instagram.com/nectar_and_bloom

Called to Bloom Show Notes: https://www.nectarandbloomfloral.com/blogs/podcast/how-i-transformed-my-floral-business-to-align-with-my-true-calling

This episode of the Called to Bloom podcast is brought to you by Tarot of Flowers — your floral oracle for inner guidance in the language of flowers.