Off the Beaten Path: Mercury Retrograde, the Fire Horse Year, and Living in Your Zone of Genius
This morning I did something a little different. Instead of recording on my deck or sticking to my usual walking path, I wandered off the main trail into the wild prairie down by the lake. I found a little log to sit on, watched tadpoles and fish jump in the water, and realized something important before I even started talking about today's topic.
So often the peace we are seeking is right off the main road. We set goals, we chase a number on the scale or a rank in our business or a sales target, and there is nothing wrong with goals. But the way we think we are supposed to get there is not always the way that actually works. So many times I reach my goals, just not in the way I expected, because I chose to listen to my intuition and step off the well worn path instead.
That is exactly what is happening right now. We are halfway through Mercury Retrograde, the planet of communication asking us to look at how we express ourselves, how we show up in relationships and contracts with ourselves and others. We are also heading into eclipse season, and all of 2026 has been a Fire Horse year inviting us into a new identity and a new trajectory.
So many of us are feeling irritated, exhausted, not quite ourselves. And so many women are quick to blame it all on hormones and perimenopause. After 15 years in the wellness space, I will tell you hormones are part of it, but a huge piece of our exhaustion comes from something else entirely: we are not operating in our zone of genius.
In this episode I walk through the four zones from Gay Hendricks' book The Big Leap:
- Zone of Incompetence: things we are simply not good at and should not be spending our time on
- Zone of Competence: things we can do, but that do not light us up
- Zone of Excellence: things we are really good at, almost on autopilot
- Zone of Genius: where we come alive, where work stops feeling like work
I share why so many women, especially entrepreneurs and light workers, get stuck in the competence and excellence zones instead of the genius zone. Part of it is that getting paid for something that feels this good feels foreign. Part of it is not knowing how to let support in, so we end up doing tasks in our zone of incompetence instead of asking for help.
I also get personal about my own month: feeling depleted, wondering if it was "just my hormones," and then realizing I had been spending too much time in admin, content, and email funnels instead of the one on one coaching and content creation that is my actual zone of genius. A conversation with a mastermind sister helped me see it clearly.
Journal Prompts for This Week:
- Where have I been spending most of my time and energy this month?
- What are the excuses I keep telling myself for why I cannot live in my zone of genius?
- What is one task I could hand off or get support with so I can spend more time in my zone of excellence?
- If I stopped standing at the edge and went all in on my dreams right now, what would that look like?
Mentioned in this episode:
The Big Leap by Gay Hendricks: https://www.amazon.com/Big-Leap-Gay-Hendricks/dp/0062141090
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