Picture Love is a place to pause, reconnect your head and heart, and remember that love is something we can choose to notice within ourselves, practice with intention, and inspire others in the process.
Hosted by Kris LeDonne, the Picture Love Podcast speaks to exhausted overthinkers who want to feel clearer, calmer, and more connected to themselves through soul-led conversations, personal stories, encouragement, including guided practices.
Because the world doesn’t need more exhausted people bracing for the next crisis. It benefits when we are steady enough to meet our lives, relationships, and work from a place of love and authenticity, without abandoning ourselves along the way.
The podcast is where Picture Love began, but the conversation has grown.
If you’d like more space to reflect, the Picture Love newsletter on Substack continues the conversation in writing. And if you’re craving real-time connection, Picture Love Community is where we gather live to meditate, reflect, reconnect, and be fully human together.
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Have you ever been told you’re “too much”… too emotional, too joyful, too expressive, too hopeful, too creative?
What if your “too much” was never the problem?
In this episode of Picture Love, I’m sharing the affirmation card that helped me connect a whole string of life lessons—from childhood and teaching, to entrepreneurship, motherhood, surviving the pandemic, and even stepping back into a musical theater audition after more than 30 years.
This is a loving reminder that your joy is not too much. Your creativity is not too much. Your hope is not too much. Your heart is not too much.
Sometimes what other people call “too much” is simply the place where your magic asks to be seen.
If this episode speaks to you, I’d love to hear: What part of you are you done shrinking?
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Welcome back friends, I have so much to talk about today. I hope you can stick with me. I come to discover that creating this deck of affirmation cards for myself has opened up new layers of what I'd hoped only better personally. And this is only the draft copy. So if you're thinking about trying something new that you've never done before, do it. And today I was walking the dogs and I'm like, what do I wanna talk about today? I have so many thoughts and I was having a hard time just organizing. And so, you know, I got this nudge to pull a card. And it immediately focused everything I wanted to share with you Today, it was the connective tissue. It was the mortar of all these loose bricks that made something solid for me! And I'm gonna share it with you. The category is about seeing your "too much" as magic. And the affirmation is: My too much" is a permission slip for others to choose more self-love. And while I hope that's not received as a deflection. For me, it was more of a correction of understanding that everybody's not in the same place at the same time. And each one of us has a different perception of what we see and hear, and think and experience. And that's the beauty of life, right? We all get to choose how we experience things that we encounter. And this was the connective tissue. About times where I've maybe muted myself, muted my creativity or my voice or, but each time, each story I wanted to share with you is an opportunity to look at that and decide, am I gonna be what I really am and my fullest version, or am I going to try to adapt it to meet other people's needs? And yes, those are remnants of people pleasing that I have since worked depth, in depth upon healing. So I'm very proud of the healing that has taken place as I've become more self-aware. And if I were to go in chronological order of these stories, I would say, see, I grew up in New York. And when I went off to college, I not only left New York, I went to a different culture. I went to North Carolina, UNC Greensboro, and I remember the first time I came home after finding a very boisterous vibrant roommate and making some very outgoing music school friends. I started to explore my voice more and got more outgoing about my beliefs and who I am. And then coming home my sister never got to see those changes happening. She didn't see me opening up and she was, five and a half year years younger than me and different stage of life. And her perception of me, I don't even know what it was like for her, how we experience ourselves is not the same as how we observed by those around us. I was so happy to see my sister now in our teen and tween years. We weren't like the huggy, chummy, best friends kind of sisters. We, we were just in different stages at different times and definitely made of different material. And I know you listened to my show, Amy. Thank you for that. And I don't talk about you enough but I'm talking to you. I love you very much. And I don't even think she would remember this experience, but the first time I came home I was so happy to see her. I nearly tackled her with hugs and excitement and overwhelm clearly to my then very, what's the word? I don't know if I have the right word for her, but I stunned her with how I bulldozed her with so much love. Because that just wasn't how we treated each other prior. And it doesn't mean we didn't always love each other, it's just how it's expressed. Right? I don't think I was hurt by it or anything, but I realized, oh. I should probably dial it back if she wants to recognize me. And so that's one of the early versions of my, "too much" that I can recall. And, if we go later in life, I graduated, I'm married and I have children, and I was a teacher, a public school music teacher in New Jersey. Anyway, I recall joining a direct sales company because I love photos, I love stories, and scrapbooking became an expression of my love. And I had an upline who was a marketing major. I was a music major. Okay. So she had a very much a business mind, and I had very much a creative heart mind, and. She wanted to collaborate on a project. She too much", and she kept looking at it sideways. These were displays that she wanted to have at her event, and I don't know why I was doing that work for her event, but anyway. I realized that she wanted me to reduce my creativity to a duplicatable formula, something that looks consistent. Every example looked like another, I think it was like a 12 month project where January. Had its own color palette and everything, but the same formula that goes with February and then when you get to March, it's the same formula and everything is straight and nothing is on angles. Everything is, I am, I sound mocking, but this is my inner child saying, who put baby in a box? I didn't see the problem back then. I was just trying to solve the disconnect in how she saw the project, how I saw the project. And looking back, I'm like, why was I working on that project in the first place? You ever been in those reflections? Anyway, I realize that my too much was my magic and it didn't fit her vision and that is TOTALLY OKAY! But back then I was trying to change the way I did things to please somebody else. When in fact, perhaps that somebody else could have taken a few ideas considered. Maybe self-love means I accept other ideas to add some more seasoning to my formulas, my recipes. Anyway. There is no resentment. I just see it for what it is, and it's a lesson that I love carrying forward. So when somebody's asking for my help or something, now I have the presence of mind to say, let's give this a shot. Let's see if this works. But if it doesn't, I'm not gonna ask you to change for me, and I'm not gonna change for you. We can learn from each other, but we don't have to change for each other. We can find new things that come from combining ideas if both sides are available for that. And let's just see what works. Because not everybody resonates with somebody else. That's why you're listening to the show and maybe not your neighbor anyway. Then a happy version of my "Too much" was. When I first moved to New Jersey and I had several interviews with different school districts, but the first one I went to hit the nail on the head and I actually canceled my other interviews. And Paul Visi oli was the principal. He drove me over to the other school to do a demonstration lesson in front of a live classroom of full of fifth graders. Yeah, that's how I learned. You don't say y'all in a classroom full of fifth grade jersey kids. That was fun. But anyway, the happy story is I did get the job, canceled my other interviews because it just felt so right. And Paul Visioli has retired since, I left the district. And I will forever remember this happy thing about our work scenario. Where I was teaching initially had many performances. I would literally do 19 musicals a school year between two different elementary schools. And that job was my child until I had children. But I digress. Paul Visioli I have so much gratitude for the way he saw my teaching style, my conducting style, and he, later on, I'd say I'd been teaching there for maybe about a year when he started to realize that I'm such an animated director. That he stopped standing or sitting in the back of the auditorium to watch the kids. He would sit up front in the front row where he would watch the kids from the side and he could watch me the same time because I was a downright clown. Anything I could do to make the kids smile, open their mouths and sing bigger work together. Like I had to literally be like a live puppet in front of them so that they would be able to step to the right all at the same time and so on. So that's where my joy shined through in my teaching days. But Paul Visioli, he saw my, my too much. You know, there were comments from staff who thought I was a little crazy, and that's okay. The music teacher is supposed to be a little crazy, right? And. I really felt seen and validated. Thank you Paul. Those are some of the fondest memories I have being seen as a music teacher. Now, if I fast forward, I had long since left the classroom and was very much on my entrepreneurial path when a certain pandemic hit the world and I was raising two teenagers. I had one at junior in high school and one coming up as a freshman during. And I remember being out on a walk just trying to breathe deeply, no mask, you know, on my own, me and Beasley. And I'm walking around the neighborhood and this thought was given to me. I literally feel like an angel just stuck it in my head. And the thought was, what if I could. Not only stay steady, but what if I could feel good in spite of the chaos around me? What would that be like? Who would benefit from it? And I felt like it was just, that thought was a gift given to me. That is how I survived emotionally COVID. And I noticed an immediate shift in my family. I didn't have to change what I said or did. It was just my energy shift that lightened the house. And I don't even know if my kids and my husband are even aware of that. I talk about it a lot outside of the house, but that realization during COVID was. What if I could feel good? And that meant tapping into my "too much". That meant tapping into my joy and. My joy is never too much. Your joy is never too much. It's just can some people stomach it? If they can't tolerate it, they're not gonna stick around or they're gonna give you resistance If, if they are, or maybe they'll actually catch on. Who knows? But I'm so grateful that I got that "think bigger, feel bigger" thought. it was such a gift. And that really became the magic that carried me through. I won't say I didn't experience loss like everybody else. I will say it made me stronger to help those that I love deal with their PTSD literally and different challenges that came up during that process. So that's where my too much was my magic. Still serves me today. Every time I tell that story, it just refreshes it. It waters the roots of the branches and the leaves and the buds and that the birds come sit on. And I'm so grateful for the gift of that thought. And it just, it never ages for me. It just roots deeper. Now. There are times where my perceived "too much" is repelling people that I truly love. There are times where my optimism or enthusiasm is perceived as just plain offputting. And I try not to shove it down somebody's throat. I'm not gonna tell you how to feel. I'm not gonna tell my kids how they have to feel. I tell 'em all the time- I will never tell you how to feel. I will tell you I love you. I'll share my feelings. I hope the best for you, but your emotions and your thoughts are really your business. But there are times where my optimism has actually shut doors. I look at it as protection. I also look at it with a little bit of sadness because there are people who I was truly trying to give the gift of hope and love to, who just could not receive it. Their hands were not open, their hearts were not open at the various times, and I was perceived too much. And I had a few hurt feelings here and there. But looking back. Putting in the context of my too much as a per permission slip for others to choose more self-love. That's that is where that comes home for me. Because nobody has to perceive my magic as wonderful. You know, it's just like the dessert menu. It's not for everybody. So the last thing I wanna share with you is the newest, so new it's going on right now, and the outcome I don't know yet, but I'll get to the point. For years I have been missing being in the cast. Literally it's 30 plus years ago when I was last on stage in a cast of a musical. Musical theater has been such a joy for me. I keep talking about auditioning again. And auditioning for the sake of finding an opportunity to story tell with a group of people in a beautiful, beautiful, magical way. And I love to do it when there's music involved. And I opened up the website for the local theater and sure enough, auditions were last night. Yes. So I literally had a six hour notice to either try or wait for the next time. So I tried! I did! And. I'm so proud of me because I've been saying all along to my kids, 'cause I have a dancer, choreographer and I have a musician, who teaches and performs. And I'm like, what if auditioning became fun instead of stressful? So I drank my own Kool-Aid and I went with the intention of, okay, maybe making some friends. Some theater friends if I get a part that's fine, but my goal is to have fun in the process. And I did. As a matter of fact, I got there so early 'cause I was not sure about parking. I was number six and we were all in a small room, not on a stage singing for each other. So it was very intimate and I definitely had thoughts about, all right, how much is too much? And then again, this is theater, so too much doesn't exist. Big, honest, authentic. Here's a chance to open the heart up wide open and show my magic Well, I'm proud to say I was the first person to make the director smile. Yes, I did jumble up my verses like scrambled eggs. But I stuck with it and I sang anyway and I had fun! And I made some friends and I did not audition for a part. I auditioned for an ensemble because I figured after 30 plus years, that's the kindest thing I could do for my nervous system- is to have less pressure and more fun, and get used to the theater and get used to like how it runs. And is this where I want to invest in, in maybe a more a principal role at some point? So it felt really good. And will I get a part? I don't know. But I'm so proud of myself 'cause I did what I set out to do. I let my "too much" out. And it made the guy smile and that felt good. And he did smile a few more times that night. I was one of close to 30 auditionees, and I left there feeling very accomplished. So it might sound like a yay me story. It is. But in that room, there were people who were scared and closed, and then there are people who are wide open and letting their too much out "stage size" in a small conference room and they are the ones that made all of us smile the biggest. They did, it was an undeniable community theater experience. We had first time auditionees, we had people like me coming back out of retirement, so to speak, and we had kids in high school. We had kids working with vocal coaches. When I say kids, I mean anybody younger than me. And I would say I'm one of the oldest who was there. Maybe two people older than me, possibly, but it doesn't matter. That's something I love about community theater, so I'm very, very grateful that I opened up to it. I will go back and again. There are other auditions coming up, and if I don't get a part in this show. I might consider volunteering in the box office or with props or something like that just to get involved in and really make some friends in the theater. So I let my magic out of the box and I've decided it doesn't belong in a box anymore. If people don't like it, they'll move on. And those who need that spark, they'll either join me or pull up a seat. Anyway, don't let anybody tell you your too much, is too much. Just take that as a sign that maybe there's a spot where they're kind of closed off and that's their choice. But don't let anybody make your too much put in a box. Let your magic shine, whatever that is. Thank you for being here with me. I'll see you next time. Bye-bye friends, keep Picturing Love.
