Permission + a pool day
Greetings from the London Stansted Airport!
I've been in London visiting friends and sightseeing before I head to Scotland tonight for an off-site retreat and a training this week with Firefly (a Leadership Development company that I started partnering with in July!).
I had the most magical, full-permission-granted day on Thursday that I wanna share with you.
I was in Reading, in the UK, a city west of London, staying with my dear friend Claire. Claire is an incredible artist and coach (and leads the most magnificent women's creativity circles).
Claire and I met through a mutual friend a couple of years ago and became Zoom friends.
I got to meet her in person last Summer when we performed together in a burlesque show put on by the lovely [podcast guest star + dear friend] Kellita Maloof in San Francisco.
About a year ago, Claire wrote about visiting a swimming pool in her Glitter and Biscuits blog.
I remember reading her blog and dreaming of one day joining her for a swim.
On Thursday, we did it!
The Thames Lido is a restored ladies bathhouse that was built in 1902. Originally fed from the Thames river, it's the "oldest surviving outdoor municipal pool of the early Edwardian era."
After parking the car, we walked down a tree-lined walkway to the pool entrance and it felt as if we were stepping into another world.
Everything about the Thames Lido was magnificent - from the scent of the rose geranium body wash to the contrast between the dark tiled swimming pool and the brightly painted accent walls.
The sun was out that day (Claire said I "must've brought it with me") and we swam and talked in the "chill and chat" swimming lane away from the more serious swimmers.
We started and ended our experience in the perfectly warm hot tub.
After our swim, we went to the on-site restaurant with Mediterranean tapas, big windows, colorful chairs and glasses, and the most gorgeous paintings on the wall.
We fully indulged in sourdough flatbread, beetroot borani, shaved courgette (zucchini, I think) with feta and mint, an onion dish that looked like a slice of pie, oak smoked chorizo, and lamb merguez sausage in whipped feta.
We topped off our lunch with scoops of coffee and vanilla ice cream.
And we cheersed with our bubbly drinks and soaked up every bit of the experience that delighted all 10 of our senses.
My heart was so happy to be sitting across from Claire in real life instead of in a little Zoom square.
It was a perfect day full of joy, connection, movement, and above all... AWE.
Part of me couldn't believe I was really there that day.
Part of me STILL doesn't.
I just now went to the website to look up when the pool was built and I saw a note that the hot tub is now closed due to a broken chemical pump. (!!)
I'm smiling because our timing was so perfect - relaxing in the hot tub was the best part!
I share all of this not to make you green with envy.
I share it to remind you that a magical, permission-filled day *might* just be closer than you think.
The thing about permission is that it won't come from anyone else.
Not from your boss or your spouse or your clients or your kids.
The email replies and the to do list items will ALWAYS be there (they were certainly there for me on Thursday!).
I know firsthand that waiting until we're done with work before we play is a one way ticket to Burnoutville.
We can choose to give ourselves more permission!
Speaking of permission, this favorite poem comes to mind...
“Growing up, I never knew a relaxed woman.
Successful women? Yes.
Productive women? Plenty.
Anxious and afraid and apologetic women? Heaps of them.
But relaxed women?
At ease women?
Women who aren’t afraid to take up space in the world?
Women who prioritise rest and pleasure and play?
Women who give themselves unconditional permission to relax -
without guilt,
without apology,
without feeling like they need to earn it?
I’m not sure I’ve ever met a woman like that.
But I would like to become one.
I would like us all to become one.”
If you too want to be a more relaxed, permission-giving woman, consider joining my next women's circle. It was designed for a small group of women who want to outgrow the grind of people-pleasing, perfectionism, and proving their worth by how hard they work.
We start on Wednesday, October 23rd and there are 3 spaces left!
Maybe one of those spaces is for you or a woman you care about.
Get all the details about pay-what-you-choose pricing, the schedule, and the syllabus right here.
And whether you join the circle or not, I sincerely hope you can give yourself more permission for rest or pleasure or play.
As you begin this new week, what's one thing you can give yourself permission for?
[even small things count!]
Wishing you ease,
Stacy
PS. If you, like me, can relax exponentially better in water and you're curious about New Mexico hot springs resorts, reply to this email. I want to host a couple of custom retreats in the next few months for women either on their own or in small groups (maybe with sisters or dear friends). If you're into this, let's hop on a call when I'm back from Scotland and we'll design something together!
PPS. For those of you who appreciate the REAL truth just as much as the highlight reel, know that this trip has certainly had it's fair share o' travel hiccups. I've clocked 2 items left behind, 2 bad stains I've tried removing with a hotel sink hand-wash, and 1 pair of broken sunglasses and my trip is just at the halfway mark today.
