[Susan Friedmann]
Welcome to Book Marketing Mentors, the weekly podcast where you learn proven strategies, tools, ideas, and tips from the masters. Every week, I introduce you to a marketing master who will share their expertise to help you market and sell more books.
Today. My special guest is Dr. Pamela Moss. She is the author of the number one international bestseller, the Sole Guide to a Magical Life, and she's also the host of the blockbuster show. For over 15 years, she has used her proven soul alignment system to help entrepreneurs worldwide align your mind so that you can accomplish any goal. Pamela, what an absolute pleasure it is to welcome you to the show. And thank you for being this week's guest expert and mentor.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
I'm so delighted, Susan. It's such a joy to be with you and to have a rich and amusing and fun, wonderful conversation that I hope will make a difference for our listeners.
[Susan Friedmann]
I know we will. So let's talk about this. Aligning your mind. I know I said that in the introduction, but what exactly does that mean?
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
I love that question. Well, most of the time when we have a goal, we go at it with our conscious mind. We do the steps we know to take, we just keep pushing ahead and we run into inner resistance. We feel upset about it, but we don't really know what to do about it. So basically, aligning your mind means getting all parts of you, not just your conscious mind, but your subconscious mind and your superconscious mind, which you could call higher guidance, all aligned so that you can do what you've set out to do.
So, for example, if you're trying to get your book out in the world and you're having some inner resistance to doing that, which we'll be talking about, that usually comes from the subconscious mind, and you want to align your mind so your subconscious mind is no longer resisting, but actually supporting you to get out in the world and to get your book out in the world. So that's what I mean by aligning your mind. To have all of you on board with your goal instead of part of you sabotaging it.
[Susan Friedmann]
You've just opened Pandora's box here. Okay, let's just go down this road with the subconscious mind and the resistance that you talked about, because, yes, you're absolutely right. We produce the book. We've written it. It's our baby. We bring it out into the world, and then, oh, my goodness, I've got to actually share it with people.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Yes.
[Susan Friedmann]
Then I suddenly freak out.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Yes, because it's so vulnerable. Like you said, it's our baby. It's the best parts of us. It's what we deeply desire to share with the world, and part of us is terrifying. We are going to be judged for it. If we're not good enough, who do we think we are? Like, there's a whole bunch of fear around taking this tender, beautiful thing that comes right out of our heart and got all of our wisdom and experience and just exposing it to the world for judgment. We want it to be seen. We want it to be visible, but we're also scared on a deep level about that.
[Susan Friedmann]
So let's go down that because what is it that yes, you talked about being judged and that this terrifies us. And I know having grown up having this judgment and criticism, and for me, it's very personal. Yeah. How do we even recognize that and admit it and then do something about it? Because obviously, until you're aware of something, you can't do anything about it.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Right? Yeah. So the first step, as you said, is basically to become aware. And you can become aware that they're self-sabotage if you're procrastinating on doing the things you said you were going to do if you're hesitating to take the next step forward if you find yourself forgetting about marketing your book.
All those are different forms of resistance, really. And the way that you can move through resistance is actually to stop putting your fingers in your ears and I don't want to hear it, but actually turning around and listening to it.
And specifically what I recommend you do is have a dialogue, a written dialogue with your resistance. And it might sound something like this like you write in your journal or whatever your name is, followed by a colon. And you can write something like, I'd like to speak to the part of me that has the most resistance to me putting my book out there.
Are you there? And then on the next line, you write the word partly because you don't know what to call it. And you put a colon and you listen to is there a response to Are you there? Maybe you have an emotion, like a sinking feeling in your stomach. Maybe you feel some sadness. Maybe you hear words like, I am.
What do you want? Whatever the response is. Or maybe just you notice there's something there. There's some kind of presence there when you ask to speak to that part of you with the biggest resistance and just notice that there's something there, and write down whatever you get, which might just be like a little sadness and anger. Question mark.
Or maybe the words are maybe you are like, of course, I'm here, or whatever it is, just write down whatever you get. And then the next line of this script you're writing in conversation with the subconscious part of you is you actually want to start to get to know this part of you. Like you want to know what its job is. How does it help you? You might be talking to your inner critic or you might be talking to your image protector. You could be talking to I don't know.
There are all kinds of different parts of us that we typically have that are not necessarily on board with our conscious desires. And the first stage in a conversation to get permission from this part of you to move forward is you get to know the part of it. You ask these questions like, what's your job?
Do you like your job?
How do you help me?
What do you do?
What do you want from me?
What are your goals, your needs, that kind of stuff?
Then the second step is to actually get the concerns that this part has. So you can really just ask it. You can say, so what are you so worried about?
If I actually get my book out there, what are you worried is going to happen? Like, what's the worst-case scenario? And you really dig into the worst-case scenario instead of ignoring it. It's already playing in the background of your head, right? You actually ask yourself, what is the worst-case scenario?
And you can just keep asking this part of you and it says, well, then you'll be alone. And what's the worst thing that happens then? Well, then you will be hungry and homeless. What's the worst thing that happens then? Well, then you're just going to go jump in a river and die.
What's the worst thing that happens then? Oh, maybe you go to heaven to start over, I don't know, whatever the conversation is. But you just ask questions until either you can't get anything worse or just start going around in the loop. And then after that, after you've gotten the concerns of this part of you which might be like, you're going to look bad or who do you think you are?
Or whatever it is, then after you've gotten those concerns, the next step is to negotiate. And by negotiating, I mean you want to see what conditions this part has to allow you to move forward. And believe it or not, the conditions it has will actually make it feel safer to move forward. Because it's your inner protector. It's trying to keep you safe. It's trying to make sure you don't make a fool of yourself, don't lose your money, don't whatever it's afraid of.
So when you ask for the conditions, it might say something like, okay, I will let you move forward so long as you check in with me every day. Or I'll let you move forward so long as you make sure this never happens. Or if this happens and you stop or whatever, this part of you will have some kind of conditions.
And if you can agree to the conditions, if you can negotiate an agreement between the two of you, then you can ask this part. Will you now give me permission to move forward? Now give me permission to make my book visible throughout the world or whatever your goal is. And if you've done this work properly, this part of you will say yes, and you will feel a shift within you as you've received permission from the part of you that was holding you back and that now is willing to let you move forward.
And this whole process, by the way, I have in a gift which I'm going to share with you, which is called the inner wisdom treasure chest. And this particular process is called dialoguing with subconscious parts. It's a really powerful way, whether you believe in it or not, it's a very powerful way to create new agreements with yourself that allow you to move forward where you've been stopped.
So that's a summary, basically, of how you can actually listen to your resistance in a way that's really helpful instead of making you feel bad and actually can move you forward where you've been stopped.
[Susan Friedmann]
Oh, my goodness. I love that. I absolutely love that.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
You can do this, right? The dialogue. Yes.
[Susan Friedmann]
Having that dialogue and writing it down and listening. I think that listening to our body listening, as you said, to that subconscious mind, which often there's so much noise, not only in our own heads but we're surrounded by this noise. It's often difficult or challenging to actually do that.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
It is until you sit down to do it. Like if you sit down with your journal or your diary or notebook, and you just start writing dialogue. This is me, Susan. I'd like to speak to the part of me that has the biggest concerns about me. My book really becoming known worldwide. Are you there? Hell yeah. Who do you think you are? Whatever it is, you just have a dialogue back and forth and see if you can create an agreement to move forward.
[Susan Friedmann]
And all of this you write down, is that correct?
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
You write it all the down. The reason you write it all down, you keep it very clear, like when it's you talking and asking a question and when it's you listening and the part is talking. And you do that because it's very helpful to do it in writing because when it's all on your head, you can't really easily sort out the different voices or the different parts of you. There are different responses. So writing it down as a written dialogue makes it a lot clearer to listen and a lot easier to discern what that part needs for you to move forward with confidence and freedom.
[Susan Friedmann]
I love the idea of the conditions, and negotiating these conditions.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Yeah.
[Susan Friedmann]
So if you do this, then I will do that.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Exactly. And you want to keep your promise to yourself because if you break your word to yourself, represented by this part of you, it will sabotage you ten times worse than before. You don't want to do that. You want to definitely make an agreement that you can and will honor and remember because that's how you build your integrity with yourself.
[Susan Friedmann]
So talk to us about that aspect. If we do rather we don't keep our commitment to ourselves. And you said that will sabotage us even more, talk to us more about that whole thing.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Sure. I'm going to speak partly from my personal experience, and also from working with others, but I certainly have plenty of personal experience with this.
So for example, I remember when I was writing my book and the latest book, and I had an agreement with myself that I was going to spend 2 hours a day, that's it, 2 hours a day I was going to sit down and write. Did I honor that every day? No. I ended up having dialogues actually with the book itself. And it was really funny and wise, but also really pretty biting.
Like if you continue to not do what you said, I'm just going to go away and let somebody else write me. That's what it told me. So what you've already got in your book, written, the concern, instead of getting it out, is really getting it out into the world now that you've got it ready for other people to read. And for that, the interpretations are often pretty nervous because they're afraid you're going to take this tender, beautiful thing you've created and put it out there and be judged.
And that would be terrible if you were judged, and you would just crawl back in your cave and never write again or whatever. Or they're also afraid that maybe being judged is like the big fear about why we don't want to step forward into complete visibility. Like here I am with my gifts. Don't you love me?
We don't really want to do that usually because there are parts of us that have concerns, we're going to look bad, we're going to fail. We're going to have people who think, who do you think you are?
The conditions are what make it safe because the conditions really are the container. So that part of you doesn't have to worry you're going to look terrible. Or if you do, it's going to be okay. The right people will still get a lot out of what you're putting out there. You're not going to be for everybody, but you will very much be for some people. Whatever the conditions are that you come up with, they are what make it safe to proceed, or at least safer. Because it's always going to take a lot of guts, right, to put out your baby in the world and to say, this is what I'm about, this is what I've learned, this is my experience and wisdom. Do with it as you will.
[Susan Friedmann]
I know that one of the things that you talk about too is this whole idea of the imposter syndrome. So how does that play into what you're talking about here?
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Oh, it's very precisely relevant. So basically, the imposter syndrome is another word for that is who do you think you are? It's basically the idea that we're playing with the big kids, but we're not really a big kid, and we're presenting ourselves as whatever. We're presenting ourselves as a healer, as a wise person, as an expert, or whatever.
But there's a part of us that thinks, who do you think you are? That gives us a sense that we're an imposter, we're playing a role that we don't really deserve, and that other people are going to find out, and they will not be kind about us pretending to be bigger, more important, or more experienced or whatever than we are.
So, imposter syndrome stops a lot of people from doing the things they really want to do, because to begin to do anything you really want to do, you have to step into the unknown, right? Like, to get your book out there.
The whole journey to get your book out into the world is stepping beyond your comfort zone. And when we step beyond our comfort zone, that's what activates our inner protectors to say, Whoa, Nelly, I don't know. I don't think you're going to do that unless you go through me.
And we make conditions that are much safer. It's also the case that when we step out into the world in a bigger way, we often run into what's called our upper limit problem. Like, we're afraid we're used to only having a certain income or having a certain amount of attention or having a certain amount of people that we know. And putting a book out into the world has the potential to be a lot more of all those things, right? And that makes us scared.
Like, basically it's very common to like, once we push up against that upper limit of what we are comfortable receiving, we tend to back away without even knowing that we're doing that or things in our life start falling apart.
And this may sound dire and gloomy, I'm not saying it happens all the time, but when we really push against our upper limits, there are parts of us that push back and they resist sometimes really strongly, and things can go in a not a good direction when that happens unless you understand what's happening unless you understand, oh, I'm hitting my upper limit.
So, what I need to do here is I need to expand my capacity to receive at this level, to be known at this level, and to know that I really do know enough and am enough. I'm not an imposter. I may not have as much experience as so and so or may not have written as many books as somebody else, but I have something to contribute. I know that. I do.
And it would be a crime for me to withhold it from the world when there are people who are waiting for it.
So, the imposter has to come to terms with the fact it takes guts to put yourself out there. It just does. But it's worth it. When we expand beyond the limits we thought we had, we experience such joy and liberation because we freed ourselves from limitations in our programming that we don't have to have.
[Susan Friedmann]
And I relate to that because there's this whole idea of fear of failure, but there's also the opposite of the fear of success.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Absolutely.
[Susan Friedmann]
And this is where you're right. This upper limit comes in that, oh, I don't want to be too successful because of whatever it'll do to my ego or et cetera.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Exactly. The people we loved, maybe loved ones, will be kind of proud of us and kind of resentful jealous, or whatever.
[Susan Friedmann]
Yes, I saw that with many of my speaker colleagues who had four full family lives. They were very successful speaking engagements around the world, a couple of hundred a year, and from a financial standpoint, they were doing incredibly well. However, their family life was in Shatters, in shambles. And I was like, I don't want that to happen to me.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Absolutely. And that family life being in Shatters is actually a function of the upper limit way to create homeostasis. Yes. If you're going to go way beyond the finances and stuff you've known before, something's got to get weaker and worse because you can't have it all. It's some kind of idea that it's not safe to have everything, that you have to sabotage yourself in a different area of your life. If you're successful in one area that doesn't make conscious sense, but to the subconscious mind trying to keep you safe, it makes sense.
[Susan Friedmann]
Yes. And I've experienced that, so I'm totally in agreement with this. Now, you talked about earlier, you've got the conscious mind, the subconscious mind, and then the superconscious mind. Let's touch on that. That sort of intrigues me. The whole idea of something super. What does that actually mean?
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
I love the question. Yeah, well, we don't often talk about the superconscious mind, but what it is basically, in a nutshell, is the aspect of us that can connect to higher guidance, to greater wisdom beyond what we know personally, but from the collective field. And if you don't believe in things like what I'm talking about, that's okay. But we all have access to knowing that goes beyond the knowing of our own personal experience. Universal wisdom, you could call it. And as we get older, we have more access in a general sort of way. And the superconscious mind is that it's that which knows not just more than we know but has access to all there is to know.
[Susan Friedmann]
Why do we have to wait until we get older for this?
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
That's a good question. I think when we're young, we're so busy just running around proving ourselves and thinking about ourselves, and, me, we're just not ready to do it. I don't know. I haven't got a good answer. I think more and more young people actually are tapping into that. The whole of humanity is actually having more access than we used to.
And I believe that's because we're entering a time when we're all trying to cocreate the more beautiful world that our hearts know is possible. We want to do our part to help that. And we're tapping into higher wisdom, even if we don't realize we're doing that, because that's what's needed now. That's just my philosophical understanding of what's going on.
[Susan Friedmann]
Well, yes, people do want that, and very much this idea of co-creating and making the world a better place. Absolutely, as you rightly say, tapping into this universal wisdom and the whole quantum physics field. Yes, I mean, we can get very into that, which is not what the purpose of this is at this point, but it's fascinating. I love that material. I can eat it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
I love that. Me too.
[Susan Friedmann]
So another component of what we've been talking about is procrastination. So let's put that in perspective with all the things that you've been talking about here, Pamela.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Sure. So procrastination is just a form of self-sabotage, right? It's like I say, I'm going to do this, I really want to do this, and then we don't do it. And a lot of times we just sort of, quote, unquote, forget to do it. When we forget to do it, it's because our subconscious mind is just sort of pulling us under.
So it's a kind of self-sabotage, basically, to forget to procrastinate. It's denying your own power. Basically, we procrastinate when we don't trust ourselves. I don't think I'm going to do it right, or I can't do it perfectly, and if it's not perfect, I don't want to do it or people are going to judge me, or just all the things that are going on in the background. That's what makes us procrastinate.
Sometimes we just say, I'm totally overwhelmed. They don't even know where to start. There's always like it's like climbing a mountain. If you look at the whole mountain at once, like, oh my God, it's so big, I can't possibly climb it. But of course, the way that you climb any mountain or get out of
Overwhelm, is just to take one step forward and another step forward and another step forward. And for procrastination, we're just not taking any steps forward. I'll do it later. We say tomorrow, I'll start tomorrow. But these are always really just sabotaging ourselves because the only time anything really happens is now.
[Susan Friedmann]
Or you can say, hey, I tried that. Didn't work.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Exactly. That's another way to procrastinate and sabotage yourself. And there's always more than one way to do anything. So if you tried it and it didn't work, there's probably another way.
[Susan Friedmann]
Something that you mentioned earlier that I want to tap into is the idea of all of this being a crime that you are denying others wisdom, to discover treasures for themselves, but they can do it through you.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Exactly. Yeah. I just want everybody to just take a moment to reflect. You have spent years developing yourself, becoming the expert, the health, or the wisdom keeper that you are. And if all that wisdom is not transmitted to other people, it's like it's for nothing. You don't get to be the vessel through which it comes through if you don't get your book out there in the world.
And that's a crime, because you've spent so long developing yourself, tuning into the particular station that is your wisdom and your expertise, and nobody else is talking about it in the same way you are. And the voice that you have that some people will only hear it from you and your voice.
So, it really is a crime against humanity to put it rather strongly, to not put your book out into the world and get it into as many people's hands as possible. Because there are people literally waiting for you. Your particular energy, your particular way of speaking, your particular wisdom, the particular way you outline and explain things, they're waiting for you to be able to receive it. And that's why you're I mean, maybe it's putting too strong a point on it, but I believe you're here for that. That's your contribution to making the world a more beautiful place.
[Susan Friedmann]
Yeah. And there's this element of selfishness as well. It's all about me because I feel that I'm going to be judged or criticized versus being your reader-focused, your client-focused, where it's what's great for them, what can I give them, what's my gift to them?
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Yes. And when we're in that place of being generous and giving to others, it takes us out of our ego place of what are people going to think of me? And if I look back on this whatever, it takes us out of that place of
self-judgment and worry and concern. Being generous and giving our work to the world makes us feel stronger and better and bigger because we are actually doing what we're designed to do, as opposed to closing ourselves down and shutting ourselves off from that source connection that we have our own personal version of that. I really do believe that it's just a terrible waste to not get your work out in the world.
And I'm telling it to myself now too because my publisher was publishing the second edition of my book and they went bankrupt and all the money I raised to do the second edition is gone. I was kind of like so deflated I put it on the back burner. But I'm talking about it now. I'm like, I will not be deterred. This book is the second edition and I need to get it out in the world.
[Susan Friedmann]
Hey, we can help with that.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Thank you. I will be talking to you about that.
[Susan Friedmann]
Yes. Now I think you hit the nail on the head. The fact is, this is why we're here. The gift that we can give the world, how we can help others, how we can be generous with what we have to offer. Often authors say to me, well, I don't want to give this away for free.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
They don't understand. My dear people, you want to be super generous with your book, because your book and your generosity would attract the people who will then want to work with you. It would be asked backward to keep it all to yourself, so nobody knows about your treasures and your jewels and your insights. You want to display them so people can go like, oh my goodness, I want to eat at your table, I want my food back.
[Susan Friedmann]
Very much so. Well, Pamela, I know that our listeners are chomping at the bit to find out more about you and your services. So take that away, and let them know.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Oh, sure, yeah. So, it's my great joy to help people connect their own inner knowing and to free themselves up to just fully give their gifts to the world. And basically, the way that we do that is I have a sole alignment system where we remove all of your resistance to showing up as the leader that you are, to being generous with your gifts, and attracting the audience that you really want to attract, that you are here to make a profound difference for.
So that is the work that I do. I have group programs and one on one ways I work with people to get you out of your own way. And it's really my joy because I know that when I help you liberate yourself, you will liberate many more people. Like, it spreads out, like this ripple of goodness around the world.
So, there's really nothing more important than setting you free to share your gifts with the world and make the difference you were born to make. So that's what I love to do.
My Inner Wisdom Treasure chest is a free gift to you. It contains a number of really powerful processes to remove resistance, get clarity, and be able to move through things where you've been stopped before. That's my Inner Wisdom treasure chest, and Susan is going to put the link to that there.
And if you're curious about removing your resistance and really fully stepping up to be the leader that you are here to be, I'm happy to have a conversation with you to explore what's needed. I call that a sole alignment assessment where we just see what you need to really be completely out of your own way and standing in your power and making the difference you were born to make with your book and with everything that comes from it.
[Susan Friedmann]
I love the idea of just getting out of your own way because I think we create these stumbling blocks for ourselves so many. Yes. So as you said, I'll put all of this in the show notes so that people know when they've got a link to your website, especially for that nice gift that you have.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Absolutely. The inner wisdom treasure chest. I think you'll find it very helpful.
[Susan Friedmann]
Excellent, thank you. And we send off Pamela with a golden nugget. If you were to leave our listeners with a golden nugget, what would that be?
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
What's coming to me is the golden nugget is actually you. There you are in your beauty and your power and this little, small, little nugget sort of hidden away. And what really wants to happen is that golden nugget wants to come out and be polished off and held up as a beacon of light because that's who you are.
You're here to be a beacon of light. And when you let that light shine, many people will be uplifted, be helped, be saved, even you could save from whatever they're struggling with, whatever you're an expert in. So you are that golden nugget. Your book is the representative. It's also a golden nugget and if you don't let people see them, they're going to miss the golden nuggets.
[Susan Friedmann]
How inspirational. Oh, my goodness. And what I can see is this lighthouse where you're shining your light and people are coming towards you.
[Dr. Pamela Moss]
Exactly. That is really what you're here to do, is just unashamedly, courageously, boldly, be fully and truly you, and just let your light be seen so the people who need that can know where to find it.
[Susan Friedmann]
Oh, this is beautiful. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom. We could go so much deeper with this. We'll have to have you back and I will get into this in greater detail. Thank you. Thank you all for taking time out of your precious day to listen to this interview and I sincerely hope that it sparked some ideas you can use to solve books. Is wishing you much book and author marketing success.
Here's how to get your copy of Dr. Pamela's Inner Wisdom Treasure Chest of transformational tools
