15:42
15:42

Day 22: The Cathedral Of Your Work

by Jocelyn Bates

Type
Activity
Meditation
Suitable for
Everyone

You have been building something for years. Stone by stone. Practice by practice. Survival by survival. And you've probably never stopped long enough to see it. In this session, we do something simple and radical — we witness ourselves. We step inside the cathedral of everything we've created, learned, survived, and offered, and we let it be enough. Because you can't receive the fruits of what you planted if you keep running past the orchard. Come sit with what you've built. Day 22 of I Am Showing Up For Myself. This is a live replay.

Transcript

Hello,

Welcome back to day 22 of 30 days.

We've been working through grief,

Through the heart opening,

Through the rebel rising,

Through standing on a bridge between worlds.

There's been so many things that have been coming up in my soul art journey.

Showing up for myself in the moment is also about looking back at who I am.

Today's live is going to be really about all the things that we've built that we don't even realize.

All the beautiful stuff that we have going on that we have created.

That we don't take the time to be with and realize how they're connected,

How far they go,

And how much work we've put in.

And I know I'm not the only one.

And sometimes we just have to stop long enough to see it,

To feel it,

To breathe it in.

And to really appreciate.

What we've done,

Right?

Sometimes there aren't people in our lives that do that for us,

And we need to do it for ourselves.

That's what we're going to be talking about today,

The cathedral of our work,

The cathedral of what we've put into this life,

What work we've done,

And work may be different for everyone.

Let's just start by getting grounded.

Arriving,

Just.

If your feet are on the ground or if you're sitting cross-legged like me,

That's totally beautiful.

And we wanna just feel the weight of your body.

Feel the volume of your body,

The bones,

The muscles.

All of it.

And breathe in.

And exhale out.

Inhaling through your nose.

And sighing it out or exhaling however you'd like.

And this time when you breathe in through the nose,

When you exhale and sigh out,

Let everything fall away.

Just let it all fall away.

Anything that you're holding on to,

Inhaling,

Exhaling.

Just allow the falling away.

And I want you to feel into the last time.

That you were seen.

The last time that someone witnessed you,

Like all of you,

Just let that come into your heart,

Into your mind,

Into your body.

The last time you were witnessed,

Not evaluated,

Really not judged,

Someone stood in witness of you.

And sometimes it's hard to find those places.

It's okay.

You might have to go back a ways.

That's all right.

Ah,

When you were just seen.

And just breathe into that.

Hmmmm.

.

.

Feel what that felt like in your body when you were seeing,

You were witnessing.

What did that feel like in your body?

And what if you could offer that to yourself?

That's my question for today.

What if you could offer that feeling to yourself at any time?

Anytime you needed it.

Just breathe that in,

Inhaling.

And exhaling,

Ah.

That's where we're going today.

So I did something the other day.

I wasn't doing it for any reason.

I sat down and I wrote everything that I've built,

Everything that I've done.

I made this list through my life and all of these things that I've done.

And then I sat back and looked at it.

I didn't want it to prove anything.

I just wanted to see what have I done?

Where have I been going?

I'm showing up for myself,

Right?

I am showing up for myself.

Well,

What do I come to this moment with?

Right?

I just looked at it and I want to tell you what was on that list because it matters.

It matters.

I have a list cause I can't even remember all of it.

The yoga ninja tracks and automatic writing courses and nervous system courses and inner child courses.

I've done all of that.

The master EFT practitioner.

I do body scans and inner child work and soul art journeys and nervous system regulation and I build alters and I read tarot and I work in the Akashic records.

I do human design readings and I specifically do human design readings for parents as well for kids navigating.

I do soul pulse sessions.

I wrote a book,

The Midnight Carnival.

It's a beautiful spiritual map and memoir.

I have an audio library.

I've been showing up lives,

Podcasts,

All kinds of things going on.

I have showed up 22 days in a row.

I have birthed three children and I homeschool them.

And underneath all of that,

And here I go with a little bit more,

I have a master's in expressive arts therapy,

Intermodal.

I am a certified holistic health counselor.

I have a BA in integrative learning.

I have a musical theater certification from New York City.

I used to do slam poetry.

In my 20s.

I've taught in juvenile prisons.

There's so much I've done.

And I listed it all out.

And when I did,

I sat there and witnessed it.

I looked at that list and I was like,

What?

What what have I like this is crazy I have done so much work throughout the years and I've done so much training and so much all of this right but I never let myself witness it hmm right I never let myself witness it I didn't even know all of it was there when I put it together it was pages it was pages and the reason why I never witnessed it and this is this is well I found a big pattern and this is I am showing up for myself I found a huge pattern what I create isn't enough.

I found a belief.

What I create isn't enough.

And so I just keep moving.

I keep doing more.

I keep doing more.

I keep doing more.

I keep doing more.

I keep doing more.

And I never allow myself to sit in what I've created because what I create isn't enough.

Right?

Wow,

What a belief to find.

As I created these lists,

I sat in a cathedral of my own work.

And I'm getting chills thinking about it.

All of a sudden I sat in the cathedral of what I've done and how many people I've helped.

And how many young kids particularly that I helped at a certain stage in my life,

Working with sexual trauma,

Working in the prisons,

Working with moms.

I sat in that cathedral and I just breathed it in.

And I was like,

Wow,

I don't even remember the time passing.

So many women.

Right?

Feel this.

I just sat there and I was like looking at it and I really felt the walls build around me in a good way,

Right?

The walls of this cathedral that I put stone by stone together,

Not even realizing,

Not even taking time to celebrate each move,

Each thing I've done moving because what I create isn't enough,

Right?

That was the belief.

What I create isn't enough.

So I have to keep going,

Keep doing more,

Keep doing more.

Here I go.

Keep doing more,

Keep doing more.

And I finally took that moment to sit in the cathedral of my work.

Some of us have been building cathedrals for years,

Decades.

Some of us are just beginning to build that cathedral of work and we don't ever stop to breathe it in.

To feel,

To witness for ourselves what we've done.

That's where I found that belief.

That's where I found that belief.

I get to work in it.

I worked in it with the Akashic Records.

I'm beginning to work even deeper with it now.

Here's a practice I want to offer you.

Maybe it's once a month.

Maybe it's once a week for you.

Maybe it's once every three months.

Take a moment and write down everything you've done.

As much as you can write it all down,

Make the list and sit with it.

If it's once a week,

If it's once a month,

Once every three months,

It doesn't matter.

Just take time.

Maybe it's seasonal.

Maybe it's the beginning of every season.

You sit down and you make a list of what you've done,

What you've accomplished for yourself.

Even the little tasks.

Like at the end of a month when I write this,

I write.

The house is clean today.

I've been cleaning the house.

I fixed the dryer and I fed the crows.

All those little things,

Even if they don't feel like work,

Are you in your life moving and building your cathedral and you never know what those bricks are that make it.

If you can,

Every month,

Every three months,

Whatever you want to do,

Sit down for yourself and write that list of what you've done.

Sometimes I go so fast because what I create isn't enough.

I go so fast that I have to go back and go through my photos app and say,

What was I doing?

Because things went so fast and I didn't allow myself to sit and take it in.

This is one of the practices.

I started it specifically for different areas in my life.

I've never actually taken my whole,

Everything I've created through the decades and put it down.

I do it for like a month and three months,

But then at the end of the year you can begin to look at all of it together.

Maybe it's the tracks you listen to,

The tracks you recorded,

The conversations you've had,

The photos you've taken,

The courses you've taken,

The courses you've created,

The clients that you held,

Right?

It is,

The books that you read that changed you.

Maybe it's the practices.

Maybe it's you did yoga five times that week.

Maybe it's you actually took a breath.

Maybe you took a bath.

Maybe it's the dream that you remembered.

Give me anything on that list once a month or once every three months.

I prefer once every month.

And sit down and be with what you are creating on a daily basis and see it and breathe it in and feel it and witness yourself.

Really witness yourself and what you've done and what you've created.

I think all women and mothers.

I mean,

Men do,

But all women and mothers need to do this.

We don't realize how many of those small tasks add up to all of these bricks that we're building in our cathedral.

And when you do that list,

Don't analyze it,

Don't judge it.

Just put it down.

Let your pen go,

Right?

And that way we don't bypass.

We're like,

Look what I built.

What I create is enough.

What I create is enough.

In just 30 days,

Look what I did.

And then we begin to work with that belief.

I wrote this down,

Because you can't receive the fruits of what you've planted if you keep running past the orchard.

You can't,

It's so true,

You can't receive the fruits of what you planted if you don't stop and sit in the orchard for a little while.

So that's my little practice I wanna give to you,

But we are gonna do a practice together.

But I wanna take you somewhere,

So I want you to close your eyes and just get comfortable.

Feel your body,

Feel your breath.

Just feel the inhale and the exhale as they come in.

And as they go out.

Just feel it.

And I want you to imagine a building.

Imagine a building.

It can be any building,

Any structure,

Any materials.

It might be a cathedral.

A library could be a lighthouse,

A treehouse.

Whatever comes to you,

Just trust it.

Imagining that this is the structure of everything you've built.

Everything you created.

Everything you learned,

Everything you survived.

Everything you've offered.

Everything you've birthed.

It's all here in the walls of this building.

In the floors of this building,

In the light that comes through if you have windows.

Take a breath and step inside this building of yours.

Feel the scale of it.

Feel the depth of it.

It's okay to be surprised by the size of it.

Might you slowly walk through this building.

And you can notice.

Colors,

Textures,

Symbols.

Things.

There might be people in it.

You can notice sounds.

Do you hear your footsteps in this building?

Or maybe there's music.

Maybe there's the sounds of nature.

What does it smell like in this building?

What do you feel as you walk through it?

What's the quality of light in this building?

Where does it come from?

And just notice how it feels to be inside something that you built.

You didn't rush past it.

You didn't bypass it.

Inside it.

You can be present here.

Take it in,

Breathing in.

And breathing out.

And find yourself in the center of this space.

May you just find yourself to the center of this space.

And just stand there.

And feel just for a moment.

What it is to be someone who built this space.

Not someone who's trying to prove themselves.

Not someone chasing the next thing.

Because what you create is enough.

To stand in the center.

And let it be enough.

And breathe that in,

Inhaling.

And exhaling.

One more deep breath in from this space.

And exhaling it out.

You know you can come back here at any time,

Any time you need to be witnessed.

You need to be seen.

You can do it for yourself.

And when you're ready.

You can open your eyes or you can keep your eyes closed while I read some questions.

But where in your life are you running past your own orchard,

Moving so fast to the next thing that you never stop to receive the fruits of what you've already planted?

And what would it mean to slow down enough to witness yourself?

I offer to you to take the time to write down everything you've created,

You've learned,

You've built,

You've survived,

Or you've offered in the last year,

Or maybe even three years,

Or maybe the last decade.

Don't edit.

Don't minimize it.

Everything.

Just write.

And then stop and look at it.

What do you find there?

What is one thing on your list?

One thing you've created.

You've offered,

Right?

You've survived.

What is one thing that you have never properly let land?

What would it mean to let it land right now,

To feel?

The depth of that thing.

My friends,

You have built more than you know.

You have built more than you know.

You have done so much work.

You have stone by stone built your own cathedral.

You survived more than you give yourself credit for.

You've offered more than you realize.

And I am showing up for myself is noticing and witnessing that in your life,

In your own soul.

Yeah,

That feels good,

Right?

You know,

Allow yourself to see what you've built,

My friends.

It was already enough.

You are already enough.

So I am showing up for myself.

That's my journey.

This was my insight.

And it was a very emotional day when I did this,

When I sat down and wrote everything out.

And I hope that you give yourself the opportunity to do the same.

And really sit with your cathedral,

Whatever your,

I call it my cathedral,

You call it your treehouse.

Or whatever your light has,

Whatever you want to work with.

And take some time in that.

Really sit with yourself and be in that space of what you built and what you created.

Thank you so much for coming along today.

Namaste.

© 2026 Jocelyn Bates. All rights reserved. All copyright in this work remains with the original creator. No part of this material may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner.

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