Book Journeys Author Interview – Mar. 2, 2017
Jenn McRobbie with Sandi Phillips Meyler, author of On the Road with Abraham: Master Manifestation and Create a Kick-Ass Life.
“You just have to jump.” ~Sandra Phillips Meyler
Jenn:
Hello, everyone! It’s the first Thursday in March, March second, and we’re back for another episode of Book Journeys Radio. Every week we speak to accomplished authors who’ve gone from just having an idea for a book to a finished book who are out making a difference in the world. And today’s author is unique in that she’s spent years preparing for this book, because her book is part teaching you about deliberate creation and the law of attraction and part a story about what it was like to be On the Road with Abraham, which is the name of the book. So, today’s author is Sandi Phillips Meyler, and again, her book is titled On the Road with Abraham, welcome, Sandi!
Sandi:
Thank you! I’m so excited to be here, thank you for inviting me.
Jenn:
Oh, of course, I’m so glad you could join us, because I’ve been wanting to talk to you more about your book, and doing it in this venue is even better, because we can share some of the knowledge that you’ve gained. I always ask our authors to first start with just a short little description of your book and who your ideal reader is, or who your audience is.
Sandi:
My book is part my personal journey and my husband’s journey in terms of figuring out how to use the Abraham Hicks material to create life that we love, and part of it is tips and techniques to be able to apply the material to your life. A lot of people have studied the Abraham material and not really been able to figure out how to apply it, specifically, to their life circumstances, so my point was … with that and to share some fun and uplifting stories so that you’d come away from having read the book, doing … you’ve been on a fun journey and that you’re more in alignment and ready to work on your own life in a more excited way.
Jenn:
Well, I – I’m imagining that almost everyone listening is ready to work on enjoying their life in a more exciting way, because I know I am.
Sandi:
Nice.
Jenn:
Can you – can you explain to the listeners – … if someone’s not familiar with Abraham Hicks, can you give … a little primer on that?
Sandi:
Well, Abraham Hicks is a company, Esther HIcks is a woman that channels an entity that calls itself Abraham, and so, they describe themselves as “infinite wisdom.” Esther doesn’t really claim to know what or who they are, she just figured, if it helps your life work better and if it feels good to use, then that’s a perfect match, and if not, there’s also other teachers out there.
Jenn:
Right. So, did you study – … how did it come about that you were traveling with Esther Hicks and became – going on the road with Abraham?
Sandi:
Yes. I actually studied for many, many years before I rendezvoused with this really exciting adventure, and so, basically, I think that – … the Law of Attraction teaches that what you focus on grows, and I had just spent so many years focusing intensely on the Abraham material and figuring out how to apply it to my own life. I really – it never occurred to me to work for them, I just listened to their seminars weekly and I heard what a great relationship Jerry and Esther had, they had so much fun living happily ever after, traveling around the world, uplifting everybody who was ready to listen to the Abraham message, and that was really what I wanted in my life, was that, and the Universe – … if you can just get out of your own way, the Universe can assemble … in a way that’ll knock your socks off and in ways that you couldn’t ever have ever imagined, …. I was in Vermont, the Abraham Hicks company is in Texas, the likelihood of me getting a job for them through normal, routine ways of getting a job were slim to none –
Jenn:
Right!
Sandi:
– and it just so happened that my husband, who I didn’t know – … actually, who I met the weekend he got hired out of the hot seat. So, what that means is that Esther goes into the channel – channeling stay, Abraham calls people up to the stage and lets them ask any questions that they want. And my husband was at a crossroads, he was trying to decide whether or not he should keep driving truck or be a professional golfer, and so he went to the hot seat to talk about it with Abraham, and Abraham hired him for Jerry and Esther out of the hot seat.
Jenn:
Wow!
Sandi:
So, it was really fun and … – yeah, it’s a pretty – it’s a pretty amazing set of circumstances, and if anybody wants to hear the segment they can – on YouTube and also on my website, which is ontheroadwithabraham.com, and it’s a really fun segment. ….
Jenn:
….
Sandi:
Yes. And so, Scotty and I actually met that same weekend that he got hired, and then he worked with them for a little while and we rendezvoused again a little bit further down the road, a couple of months after he got hired and we decided that we were gonna hang together for the foreseeable future. I started by just traveling with him, so we could figure out where we were gonna live, and then Esther hired me – actually, she hired me retroactively, after I had been on the road for about a month, just at seminar, helping because I loved being around the energy and … –
Jenn:
Right.
Sandi:
– it was a fabulous opportunity for me to be able to go to the seminars, so she just decided that it was the right thing for me to stay there and to be involved at that level, and so she hired me and paid me retroactively for the time that I had already been on the road, which was really fun.
Jenn:
Wow, that – that makes it even more fun, to be rewarded for what you were just doing, having a good time!
Sandi:
Yes. Yes. Yes. And that … years was like, … it was all first-class travel, all sorts of fabulous interactions with … like-minded others who are on the leading edge of thought, and then, of course, there’s the travel, we got to go around the nation a couple of times a year and three exotic trips a year, so we’ve been all over the world, that has just all – one really fabulous high adventure.
Jenn:
What a great way for you and Scotty to be in your relationship together.
Sandi:
Yes, and if you have the time, I … a million levels of detail about just how beautiful the … was, ….
Jenn:
I can only imagine!
Sandi:
… never have designed myself.
Jenn:
Well, Sandi, why do you think people have trouble taking the lessons of Abraham and turning them into … a daily practice, or something that they can apply to their own lives?
Sandi:
My post on Facebook this morning was a quote from Warren Buffet, and he said, “The hardest thing is figuring out that it’s easy.” And I think … we just think that it’s this hard and complicated and complex thing, and there’s so much Abraham material –
Jenn:
Right.
Sandi:
– that sometimes, it’s easy to look into it and get overwhelmed and not really understand which pieces are appropriate to you, so I think a lot of it is just – … you gotta understand that, you have to understand the theory, and then, once you understand the theory, it’s all just practice and applying it, and so, mostly, people that say, “I’m not getting it” are really getting it more than they think they are, they’re just not realizing how – how really well they are doing.
Jenn:
… that’s probably true for most topics that we try to learn and master, isn’t it?
Sandi:
Yes. Yes. Yes. … we were born to … creator.
Jenn:
Right!
Sandi:
We were born with the capacities, and so it has been trained out of us but it’s … like riding a bicycle, … it’s … this is what you were born to do, and when you do it, it’s easy and fun and exciting.
Jenn:
Wow. When did you decide that you wanted to – … you – you’ve been living this life for years. When did you decide you wanted to write a book about it?
Sandi:
Well, … all along, people have said, “You should write a book,” “You should write a book,” “You should write a book,” “You should write a book.” … many facets of mine and my husband’s life that are really fun and interesting and that have the potential to be helpful to others, so, over the years, I had jotted down things that I … thought – … I had a file that had ideas and things that I would want to include, I knew it would wanna be about delivered creation, but there’s so much, … the whole thing is so big, … the experience is so big, the philosophy of … is so big, in order to try and narrow it down I knew that it was something that I needed a professional to help me do because I write very well but I’m not an author, and so, I knew that I ….
Jenn:
Well, you are now!
Sandi:
Right! Right! Right! I am now, but as a … I was … – I just – it just got … such a big basket, and I knew the whole basket couldn’t fit in one book, so I just … that I needed somebody who was a professional that could help me figure out what is gonna be the most fun and helpful pieces to share with people, and that was Angela and the whole Author Incubator staff are just fabulous at pointing out of you what – what, first of all, you wanna share, and also what’s gonna be helpful to – to people who read your book, so it’s a really fun process.
Jenn:
Oh, it always makes me really happy to hear authors say that it was a fun process, because I know that sometimes, particularly when you’re writing personal stories, like you have, … it’s not always fun.
Sandi:
Well, it was fun overall, but I’m not gonna pretend that there wasn’t any moments that I … I was hanging on the edge of a cliff and – and scraping down the edge of it on my fingernails, … clean up more resistance than I knew that I even had, from … my whole life … around showing up in the world and feeling like my message was important and helpful and those kinda things, so it was fun, but part of the reason I’m able to say it was fun is because I just love releasing resistance and I love the whole process of figuring out where things could be tweaked to have a easier and gentler and more fun-like experience, so this was … experience in doing that.
Jenn:
That – no, that – that’s such a wonderful way to explain the process, Sandi, because it’s – I think it’s hard – it’s hard for people listening to us to – to understand just how much transformation happens, when you come in with an idea and leave with a published book.
Sandi:
Yes. Yes.
Jenn:
So – I – I – I’m so glad that you explained that to people, and that … how – how that process worked for you. Because it’s – it’s not always fun, but overall, it’s all about becoming that person who wrote a book, right?
Sandi:
…. Yes. Yes. Angela … that all the time, that … the person that – that got this book done … is focusing this way, …? … she gives the analogy, if you’re … Georgia, and you wanna go to Canada, stop telling me you wanna go be a California, because it’s gonna take you a lot longer ….
Jenn:
Right. And you can do all of the things, right? … you could write the tomes of knowledge that you’ve gained about Abraham, but if you were to do that, then you’d spend a lifetime writing instead of changing lives, like you are now.
Sandi:
Yes. Yes, my first outline that I submitted for approval was … the equivalent of an encyclopedia set.
Jenn:
And how did Angela respond to that?
Sandi:
Well, she threw … all of it out except for about five lines and said, “Here, this is what you need.”
Jenn:
I love that. Well, once you had a topic picked out, though, was it hard to focus, because … when you have so much knowledge about a topic, it’s hard to sometimes drill down to, really, the meat of it. Did you have any trouble with that process?
Sandi:
Sure. …. Well, that’s really what Angela – Angela’s expertise really shines in. Well, … shines in a million different ways, but this is one way that she’s really, really powerful, in terms of giving you the framework, in terms of how to figure all that out. … she basically just has you write it all down, each piece on a card … and then put all that on a spreadsheet, and then mirror the process for looking at the spreadsheet and going, “Well, these are all the things that are in common,” and … “This means that this chapter would be five hundred and forty-seven pages, so that whole thing has gotta go ‘cause it’s …,” …?
Jenn:
Right!
Sandi:
So – yeah, that is what – I knew I wasn’t gonna be able to do that piece by myself, and that is one of the reasons that the Author Incubator, I think, is so powerful, is because it helps you – … even when you can’t see where the power of your message is gonna be … the highest, Angela is very good at seeing that vision and helping you – helping you to craft it.
Jenn:
Oh, that’s so true. That’s true. Di – did you ever try to write a book in the past, or was this your first go at it?
Sandi:
Well, like I said, I had files – I had files.
Jenn:
Right.
Sandi:
… what my next book is, and I started trying to pull together all my thoughts and ideas about that, and that was what I thought my first book was gonna be. So, … answer is both “yes” and “no.”
Jenn:
Okay.
Sandi:
…, yes … I knew I was compiling information for one or several books, I think there’s actually gonna be several, but no in that, I – I wouldn’t really have sat down and said, “I’m gonna do this all by myself,” because I don’t ….
Jenn:
Right. Yeah. It – it doesn’t make sense to – when you know that there’s a system out there, especially now, … for you to go and try to go it alone, I suppose.
Sandi:
…. Yeah. Yeah. Angela’s book is very good, and when I first read it, I was thinking that I could use just the book, but really quickly found out that I – I had enough going on that I wanted more support than that.
Jenn:
Well, speaking of a lot going on, did you – I speak to a lot of authors that – who basically have had … huge life upheavals or – or big life changes when they’re in the middle of writing, and then they somehow overcome those to still finish their book. Did you … have any big events like that, that happened while you were writing, or were you able to … focus for that time?
Sandi:
Well, yes, … honestly, more than one. … Angela tells us about that ahead of time. “That’s what’s gonna come up, you’re gonna have trauma that’s gonna tell you, you can’t get this done,” and … she talked about the people that have overcome things that are significant and – and – … one of the woman who wrote about cancer, … she was writing about her experience while she was getting chemotherapy.
Jenn:
Right.
Sandi:
And every time I was I … something and said, “Oh, my God, this is – this is too big for me, I can’t do this and that,” … I just stopped and took stock of … what I have really going on, maybe feeling really big, but compared to having to be in chemo all week, …? I’m … in good shape, … . You can use comparison to hold you down or you can use comparison to help you move forward, and I just – … I know I have a tendency to use comparison to hold me down, so part of what I set my intention to do was to make sure that I was using comparison to support my process, rather than the opposite of that.
Jenn:
Wow, that is super powerful, Sandi. I had not thought about it that way, about how we so often use comparison to – to squash our energies or our excitement about something, but instead, we could actually flip that on its head, right?
Sandi:
Yes. Yes. … it goes back to the same thing that I work with people around, it’s just about the definition of what you’re applying to whatever it is that you’re looking at, …. You can look at it and …, “Oh, this happened, and I’m gonna stay stuck in this event for my whole life,” or you can look at it and say, “It’s happened, and I’m gonna – I’m gonna take the bounce from it,” … it’s like the pulling back of the rubber band on the slingshot, … –
Jenn:
Right!
Sandi:
– we’re gonna get that really fast and fun ride.
Jenn:
Wow. Well – … a lot of people are intimidated by the “group” aspect of – of writing a book, because I think they’re using – like you said, they’re using comparison to keep them down, instead of to lift themself up.
Sandi:
Yeah. Yes. But … it’s the way you do everything is the way – … the way you do anything is the way you do everything, and so, … if you – if you have the book in you, and I think mostly we know it when we do, but if you feel like you have the book in you, then that’s really the opportunity to use your experience to gain those working skills, … and they’ll serve you for all of eternity, this lifetime and any other after.
Jenn:
Right. So, what’s the best thing that’s coming out of having your own book?
Sandi:
Well, my own personal satisfaction of what my – what my personal reach is. My dad was an educator, and he had a big vision, and anytime they would have him speak at commencement or anything like that, he would talk about the ripple effect of an educator, and mostly people who are educators … didn’t use that understanding to help bouy them in their – in their dark moments.
Jenn:
Right.
Sandi:
And so, I always felt like … if I’m helping even one person by writing the book or by doing the coaching or – … I used to say I’d be happy to go all around the world and give everybody in the world one free session, because we make such significant gains, often, in one session, ….
Jenn:
Right.
Sandi:
And so, … the upliftment of the plan is so important right now, there’s so many energy that are moving upwards right now, and a lot of us – … sometimes it’s easier than others to keep up, … any place I can help in that upliftment of the plan is – is a huge personal satisfaction to me, and so, the – my reach is significantly expanded by – by everything that’s happened as a result of the book. And – and I anticipate it will continue to grow exponentially.
Jenn:
Oh, I love that. And I – I anticipate it will grow for you, also, because that’s what you’re attracting into your life, right, Sandi?
Sandi:
…. Yes. It’s the story that I tell, and so, the universe says, “Okay, here you go!”
Jenn:
Right! It – this is what you’re deliberately creating, I suppose, is the real term for it, right?
Sandi:
Yes, exactly. Exactly.
Jenn:
Well, what was different about this process than you expected? Was there – was – did everything … go the way you thought it would, or were there surprises along the way?
Sandi:
Oh, God, nothing went the way I thought it would. I – I had no idea I was gonna fall down emotionally, so many times, and if I had know that, I might not have been so open-armed and excited about it all, but … the fact that I was open-armed and excited about it all made me know that – that I was moving in the right direction, and I know that, even though I fell down all those times, I got back up, … and – and when you get back up, if you’re doing the work, then you’re leaving the baggage behind every time you do that, one little piece at a time, and so –
Jenn:
True.
Sandi:
– literally and figuratively, I lost about thirty-five pounds, so far, in the process.
Jenn:
Lovely! That’s a good side effect.
Sandi:
Yeah! Yes, it’s been very fun.
Jenn:
So, what’s the biggest thing that you learned about yourself, while writing this book?
Sandi:
If I had to say one thing, it’s the knowing that my message has value.
Jenn:
Aw. Oh, Sandi, I love that! That makes me so happy to know that you know that now.
Sandi:
Aw, thank you. That’s powerful, very powerful. ….
Jenn:
It is, and I – and I –
Sandi:
It’s the difference between being – being pulled and knowing that I’m the driver. Does that make sense?
Jenn:
Oh. It does!
Sandi:
Yeah.
Jenn:
What a great visual. When you said that, it just – it – the two images of hailing a cab and then actually driving it. ….
Sandi:
….
Jenn:
You are now – you are truly the creator, … the attractor who’s bringing these things into your life.
Sandi:
Yes. Yes. But it doesn’t mean I never get out of alignment, … in some ways, I get out of alignment and it hurts more because I’m summoning and slowing so much more energy –
Jenn:
Right.
Sandi:
– because having released all that resistance, … all that energy is now moving, so – so, sometimes, resistance seems like it hurts more, but I understand that those are just the last vestiges of … whatever piece of baggage I’m letting go right now.
Jenn:
Right. Well, and like you said, we all get out of alignment. And so, what do you do to help yourself … re-orient and get back on track?
Sandi:
Well, appreciation is always key, and understanding that … I think is really important, but then, there’s – … there’s the real basic things like self-care, … I read and write and journal and meditate and walk and do yoga, … all of those things – well, yoga, I do most days but I never go a day without meditating and I never go away without journaling. A lot of times I’ll wake up and I’ll think that there’s something wrong with whatever it is that is the detail of what’s going on, and so I don’t actually allow myself to go into my day from a place of non-alignment.
Jenn:
Wow.
Sandi:
So, sometimes, my morning process … take longer than others and if I know I’m having a rough time I’ll just get up hours earlier, if that’s what I need to do, because if I have a coaching appointment at ten o’clock and I’m feeling … out of alignment, then I just gotta give myself the time that it takes so that I can – I can be in alignment for people, ‘cause if I’m not in alignment, then I can’t help anybody.
Jenn:
You know, that’s such a wonderful lesson, Sandi, that I think we all forget, is that it begins with us, right? And we can’t share our lessons and the things that we’ve learned or – or help people along in their journeys until we’ve gotten ourself – ourselves to a – o – on solid footing.
Sandi:
Yes. Yes. Yes. But I – … I think, one of the things that people tend to misunderstand is that “on solid footing” part. … Abraham jokes at us, and they say, … “You want your alignment to be an event like a college degree, or like you have it and … hang it on the wall and you have it forevermore, but it’s not like that.” It’s ….
Jenn:
… it never goes away, right?
Sandi:
Right. Right. Right. Right. But it’s really more like walking a tightrope, …? You just keep making balances, changes here and little adjustments there and … when the wind comes up you’ve got to walk a different way, than … it’s not and stuff like that, and so – yeah, very powerful.
Jenn:
That makes so much sense. I’m getting super sad, though, because we are already nearing the end of our time, Sandi!
Sandi:
Well, that was so quick!
Jenn:
It was! I could talk to you for hours. But I always ask, at the closing of the show, for our authors: imagine that there’s someone sitting out there, listening to us talk right now, and they believe they have a book in themselves, but they are just – they can’t pull the trigger. So, what advice would you give to that person to encourage them to get on the road with writing a book?
Sandi:
So, I have to tell this great story that she had her five-year-old granddaughter and they were at the top of this really, really, really huge slide that they needed to use grain bags to slide down the slide on, and Kate … and Esther gave her just a little, tiny push from behind and Kate went “Whee!” And down she went, so … that same thing, is that you just have to jump. You just have to jump, because this is the question: if you’re on your deathbed, will you be sorry that you didn’t write the book? Absolutely.
Jenn:
Right.
Sandi:
If you’re on the deathbed and you wrote the book, even though things might have been different or harder or whatever than what you had anticipated, you will at least have been true to yourself by – by just getting in there and doing it and seeing what happens, …. The worst thing that happen are the things that we don’t do, and so, even though that may be scary, you just gotta believe in yourself enough to get somebody else to push you down the slide, no, whatever it is, …?
Jenn:
Right! That’s such a good visual, though, I love that visual of sitting at the top of the slide and being intimidated, just that small, little push is just enough.
Sandi:
…. Yes. Yes.
Jenn:
So, if you loved that story that Sandi just told, hop on Amazon right now, search for On the Road with Abraham, download it and start reading, and you, too, can be on your road to deliberate creation of your life and attracting all the things that you love. If you want to find Sandi online, it’s really easy to find her, ontheroadwithabraham.com. Sandi, it has been a pleasure, thank you so much for joining me on the show today.
Sandi:
Thank you, it has been a pleasure, and I appreciate the invitation, and to everybody out there, you can do it. Just do it.
Jenn:
All right! You can do it, just do it, there’s nothing else we can add. Thanks so much and I hope to hear or see more people next week on the show!
Sandi:
Thank you.