You Win Some, You Lose Some, You Win Some More

“All right, Mr. DeMille, I’m ready for my close-up.”
-Norma Desmond

It’s Summer 2011. The headlines in the Hollywood trade paper Daily Variety announce the record breaking ratings of an unscripted home improvement program on the Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN).  SoulSpace is the new gospel of home design. And it gets better:

Biggest premiere in the history of basic cable.

Xorin Balbes is the newest star to emerge from the House of Oprah.

An overnight sensation (20+ years in the making).

This is my Sally Field moment.

You like me.  You really, really like me!!

I am a STAR. Oh yeah, we’re helping people and that’s nice and all but…

I AM A STAR. Important. Validated. I’m on TV bitches.

And…SCENE (insert dramatic hand gesture here).

Yesterday, May 26, 2010 I got word that the next phase of my SoulSpace journey, the television show that I believed was the essential next step in my plans for global transformation, would not be happening (at least not with the network I hoped for in the form I had imagined). The folks at OWN could not have been nicer but ultimately it was not the right fit for them.

When I first got the news it took a moment to process. “This can’t be right”, I thought. I knew “for sure” that I had found my TV home, the place that would give me the platform to share the SoulSpace process with a world-wide audience. Things always work out my way. I waited all this time and now…this?  Nada. Zilch. The Big Zero (as opposed to working with the Big O)

Who or what was to blame? Were we there too early? Too late? Was the whole SoulSpace process built on a faulty foundation that would now fold like a house of cards from the crushing weight of my own heavy heart? Could I possibly be any more melodramatic?

A. LOT. TO. PROCESS.

So I allowed for the opportunity to feel sorry for myself. I downloaded and debriefed with my inner circle of friends and colleagues. And I realized that a big part of what I was feeling was about the projection of my own ego and the desire to be a star.

But then I remembered the client assessment with Rachel and her husband Andrew. I recalled the tears in her eyes as she told me how a horrific incident in her childhood still consumed her life — and the trauma was reflected in the choices she was making in the relationship with her stuff and what she was still holding on to.

And I thought about Sarah and her daughter Zoe who were having a hard time defining boundaries with each of their things and living like two young girls instead of a mother and child.

Oh, that’s right. This is about them.

It’s about doing good work. It’s about walking my soul’s path and helping people transform their homes so they can transform their lives. I don’t need a TV show for that. I’m writing a book. I’m launching an online DIY destination. I’m using every means at my disposal to assist others as I believe I am called to do.

It is important to me that I taste and embrace this bitterness. That I savor the disappointment. And to be honest I sort of feel a little ridiculous that I’m even upset about something so inconsequential.

In the weeks and months leading up to yesterday I gave some thought to how I would react to the final decision, whichever way it went down. What I came to realize is that I would place no conditions on the outcome or how I was feeling; whatever was meant to be would be.

Excitement. Disappointment. So much of it is just an unfulfilling projection anyway because the moment is defined by so much more than the decision. It’s largely defined by the state of mind that exists when the decision is handed down.

Was I pure of heart? Had ego blinded me to the true purpose of my soul’s work?

Last night I pulled a tarot card and got:

ADVENTURE

The essence of the card deals with walking in the unknown and trusting life. Like a child. Innocent, open and vulnerable. This specific card also reminds us that searching and putting ourselves out there helps us grow — and can in fact guarantee growth. To face insecurity and to accept the challenge of the unknown is the only way to grow.

Now I’m free. And the adventure is just beginning. We’re talking to other networks about a home for the show and even exploring the possibility of self funding it. But I’ll do my best to place no expectations on it and allow it to unfold as it so desires.

In the language of television –

STAY TUNED.

Your fellow traveler in every medium,

XB