An Interview With Claire Lautier: Creator of “From Burnout to Bliss”
So, in March 2020, France went into Covid pandemic lockdown with a curfew. Nobody was allowed to leave home without an official reason and curfew started at 18:00. (I’m quasi-French now. I don’t say 6pm anymore).
This situation lasted months, and I found myself – like everyone else – stuck at home. But in my case, totally alone with crappy wifi, spotty cell phone reception, and no TV. I felt completely cut off and scared, like the civilized world was ending and Mad Max was coming.
I felt so on edge, I slept on the couch in the living room. Totally didn’t need to but somehow it felt better sleeping closer to the front door. In case I needed to make a run for it I guess, though where, I don’t know. Crazy..
Out of the blue, this email lands in my inbox about a free webinar, Standing Firm While Your World is Shaking. I signed up, and that’s how I met Claire Lautier.
I know I’ve just returned to the interwebs after a six-year hiatus and haven’t yet talked about my journey adapting to life in rural western France, but it’s January 2022 as I write. We’re all starting a new year and facing so much change. It seems like now is a good time to introduce you to Claire, even though this is only my 2nd blog post. (I’ll tell you more about life here at the Mill in my next post.)
If you don’t already know her, Claire is a life-changer. She coaches thousands of people all over the world on how to live by design, not default, and build your dream life. She hosts a podcast called The Grace Space, and teaches personal growth courses such as DreamBuilder and From Burnout to Bliss.
Taking her courses helped me reset mentally and find stability - even in the midst of so much change. I found myself able to move forward with purpose and clarity - on who I want to be, how I want to live, and what I want to contribute.
So in case you’re in the same spot as me, you know, feeling apprehensive and unsure about the future, on edge about stuff you can’t control, blocked somehow from moving ahead because you’re coping instead of living the life you want, then stick around and meet Claire. Because if you’re anything like me, you’d much rather be advancing with confidence into the next chapter of your life, feeling at peace within yourself, than suffering under a burden of pain.
I invite you to watch the interview with Claire and read the Q & A below. I hope you find it helpful!
And in case you’re wondering, Mill on the Rock and Claire have a wellness retreat planned at the end of April (2022), based on her Burnout to Bliss course. More details coming soon.
Q & A with Claire Lautier:
What simple techniques do you recommend for people when they start to feel overwhelmed by so much change and uncertainty?
First of all, I think it’s important to realize that there’s always a space of calm and peace within us. So no matter how chaotic or how much turmoil and uncertainty we’re facing, there is a space within us that is always peaceful. The degree to which we experience stress and pressure depends on how much inner spaciousness we have or don’t have, and so it’s going to become absolutely essential and non-negotiable to find that inner spaciousness within.
What’s a really simple technique to find that spaciousness? Not everybody knows what that even feels like. So how do you tap into it?
The simplest approach is to stop, hit the internal pause button and take three conscious breaths. It interrupts the pattern of whatever negativity you’re feeling and brings you back to Center. You’ll see how quickly and easily you can shift your own state and start to feel more inner spaciousness and more peace. And when that happens, it’s empowering because you realize you can do this any time you want.
And in doing so, you start to take back your power, from where you’ve given it away to the world, events, situations, people, etc. Because you’re actually the one who determines your state at any given moment, that power belongs to you and you alone.
Those breaths, that pause, gives you distance between reacting to something and choosing to respond from a place that’s more centered and more grounded. In that centered space, you’ve surrendered – not in the sense of giving up or giving in – but in the sense of acceptance. It’s a very powerful state when we get out of our own way – out of the way of our ego - and allow all the help, solutions, inspiration, intuition, ideas that we’re looking for come through to us, just not from the intellectual thinking mind but another dimension if you will.
What daily rituals do you recommend for people to stay positive? For example, is it important to set an intention?
Intention is a really powerful practice. It’s a powerful way of directing your power of thought constructively. And you’re doing it consciously. It’s the opposite of compulsive negative thinking that takes hold of you.
A daily practice of any kind (e.g., setting an intention, listing gratitudes, journaling, breathwork, yoga, meditation) can bring you back into harmony with the flow of life. When you set your intention for the day and keep it in the forefront of your mind, it stimulates the reticular activating system in your brain, which is the function of consciousness that begins to recognize everything out there that’s in harmony with the intention that you’ve set and brings that into your experience and into your awareness.
Intention as a practice is an extremely powerful way to raise your own awareness. The more you keep that intention in front of you, and the more you sincerely set that intention, the more you’re going to start to notice things that are in harmony with your thinking and your intention.
It’s a really great feeling.
I recommend that every person have some kind of practice, and it doesn’t matter what that practice is, but it gives you a way of aligning yourself so that no matter what occurs in your day, you’ve started yourself off with the best possible trajectory. And if you’re consistent, it will start to bring a sort of order and harmony in your life on a more prevailing basis. And the wobbles and things that appear to go wrong won’t freak you out as much.
Here’s a quick tip: When you start a practice, you might notice a feeling of obligation, so make it a celebration for yourself. For example, I have a corner of my room that I make as beautiful as I possibly can, so that when I get up before the sun rises – even when I don’t want to get up – I remember, this is my morning celebration. A time I have all to myself that’s sacred.
What does living by design mean? When aren’t we living by design?
We have two choices. We can live by design, or we can live by default. Living by design is a choice you make when you’re willing to accept the responsibility you have in your own life for how you live every day.
It doesn’t mean planning out every aspect of your day or trying to control everything. It means taking responsibility for the power that we have. Each of us has the power to live consciously and to make choices and to make decisions that will bring us into harmony with our higher self, with our destiny, and everything that does that – that aligns us with our higher self - feels good and wonderful.
The other choice, the alternative to living by design, is living by default - the state that most of us live in until we become more conscious. When we live by default, we’re defaulting to our programming. In the absence of a decision, a conscious and clear choice of how we’re going to live, and who we’re going to be, we default to our programming, our conditioning. We get programmed by the time we’re seven years old. Our environment also conditions us like our parents and influences that are part of our lives growing up.
This unconscious programming is running the show for most people and so we have a distorted view of things without even realizing it. It’s only pain and suffering that drives us to begin questioning that programming - if we’re lucky - and that’s when we start to have a chance to extricate ourselves from that programming.
Until we’re living by design, we’re living by default. We’re defaulting to our conditioning because we think that’s the way things are, but it’s not the way things are – it’s the way WE are. There are other choices and ways of seeing things, and so when we begin to live by design, we begin to make choices and take responsibility for how we want to feel and who we want to be, and how we want to live in this world.
What does “notice what you’re noticing mean”? And why is it important? When should you “notice what you’re noticing”?
“Notice what you’re noticing” is a term that I learned from one of my mentors – Mary Morrissey – a great thought leader – it’s her way of bringing attention to the power of awareness that we have. It’s one of the most important tools we have to become more conscious.
So, if we want to change anything in our life, we have to start noticing or being aware of what’s going on inside. What are the thoughts going on inside my head? What are the feelings being generated by those thoughts?
The alternative is not noticing, not being aware, and so, you can’t give something the space to be there. And because of our conditioning, we suppress accordingly and selectively. It’s a survival technique. I’m gonna do whatever’s gonna help me survive, that’s gonna get me love, attention - whatever it is I need. I’m gonna shove down whatever’s coming up. It just happens. It’s not a conscious choice.
When you start to become more conscious, you start to notice the things coming up, what you’re thinking, you start to notice how you’re feeling, your reactivity, how you get triggered by things. That’s good!
When people start noticing what they’re noticing, and stuff’s coming up, they get dismayed and distressed about the those things. They think, “this isn’t good” or “this is bad” because maybe they have an idea that they should be more spiritual. No; don’t worry about it. It’s the first step, and without that, we cannot become more conscious.
So, once you notice what you’re noticing, then it becomes a question of just accepting that thing - whatever it is - without trying to change it or wish it was different or judging yourself for it. What we’re doing, little by little, is dismantling the mechanism of the ego.
How does the kundalini yoga portion serve the process of the Burnout to Bliss wellness retreat? Can anybody do it?
The Burnout to Bliss online program and retreat are designed to help people come back to Center, to come out of a stress response and into a relaxation of the nervous system, back to a place of calm and peace. We work gently with intention and with affirmation in Burnout to Bliss to start to have a sense of how we want to feel.
It helps people who are completely frazzled, overwhelmed, burned out, and stressed to the max. It helps them come out of that state when you’re just in that fight, flight, or freeze modality of existence, where you can’t be creative or find solutions.
The online program includes a 40-day practice of a particular kundalini yoga kriya, breath awareness exercises, and meditation, along with spiritual lessons that we learn every week.
Anybody can do kundalini yoga when you practice under the auspices of a qualified teacher. It’s the yoga of awareness. It gently awakens the dormant spiritual energy that everyone has within them. It opens the heart so that you can perceive things differently. It also conditions your nervous system and your glandular system and creates resilience. It strengthens your immune system. I believe that it’s the technology that we need right now.
I guide people through a process of letting go of beliefs that create distortion and suffering. What’s revealed in that process is your natural state, which is bliss. It’s not something we become because it’s already inside us. I just help you get there. And you begin to be carried to your destination in an effortless, graceful way, with a lot more peace in your life.
And kundalini yoga can help you do that in a very short period of time. It’s a powerful technology and it’s not using anything other than what you already have within yourself and the body’s innate capacity to heal itself and bring itself back into balance or homeostasis.
