Alicia M Rodriguez
Alicia M. Rodriguez is a Latina writer and published author who has lived in six countries and traveled extensively. She is gifted with the sensitivity to explore culture, spirituality, storytelling, and magic themes attributed to her Colombian roots and love of Latin American literature. She writes Between Root and Sky on Substack. Alicia lives in the Algarve of Portugal where she runs bespoke restorative retreats. Her morning cliff walks with her dog Sophie contribute to her creativity and happiness.
What my own threshold years taught me.
Hello Reader, My Story I spent years in the world of leadership, achievement, consulting, and responsibility. I knew how to help others think clearly. I knew how to hold complexity. I knew how to perform competence. But there came a time when the life that made sense on paper no longer felt true in my body. That was the beginning of my own threshold. “ To be fully alive, fully human, and completely awake is to be continually thrown out of the nest. To live fully is to be always in...
What writing can reveal that thinking cannot.
Hello Reader, Envisioning a new future There are things we cannot understand until we write them. Not because writing makes us more eloquent, but because it makes us more honest. The page does not interrupt. It does not rush. It does not need us to perform. It waits. And in that waiting, something true begins to appear. Writing is not only for writers. It is a way of listening to the self beneath the surface self. For individuals in transition, writing can become a threshold practice. It...
The Story Beneath The Story
Hello Reader, "There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you" ~ Maya Angelou There is a particular kind of weight that comes from carrying an untold story. It doesn't announce itself. It shows up in the way you go quiet when certain subjects come near. In the half-sentences you've typed and deleted. In the journal entry that begins I've been thinking about writing... and stops there, trailing off into the ordinary demands of a Tuesday. I know that weight. I've carried it...
Clarity does not arrive through pressure.
Hello Reader, Thinking your way through may not work. There is a reason your best insights rarely arrive while you are forcing them. They arrive on walks. In the shower. At the edge of the ocean. In a journal. In silence. In the space after you finally stop demanding an answer. What if waiting for clarity is what keeps you stuck? Clarity is not only a mental process. It is also somatic, emotional, spiritual, and environmental. Clarity comes through action combined with reflection. It doesn't...
The question beneath the question.
Hello Reader, Loving the Questions Most of us arrive at a threshold with practical questions. Should I stay?Should I leave?Should I move?Should I write the book?Should I change my work?Should I begin again? These questions matter. But they are not the real questions, the ones that cut to the core. The deeper question may be: “What am I afraid will happen if I choose myself?”“What part of me have I abandoned in order to succeed?”“What would become possible if I stopped organizing my life...
Before you reinvent your life, tell the truth.
Hello Reader, Is it reinvention or evolving? When we sense change coming, we often rush toward solutions. A new business. A move. A relationship decision. A course. A strategy. A plan. But the first act of reinvention is not planning. It is truth-telling. It's asking the right questions instead of seeking relief from uninspired answers. My clients arrive after striving to build a new chapter from the same old self-concept. They ask, “What should I do next?” before asking, “Who am I becoming...
The hidden exhaustion of being capable.
Hello Reader, Tired from the inside out There is a kind of exhaustion that sleep does not solve. Do you know this type of tired? Many women I know do. It comes from always knowing what to do.Always being the one who handles things.Always being steady, wise, available, and composed. Being the strong one in the group. Capability can become its own form of captivity. For high-achieving women, burnout does not always look like collapse. Sometimes it looks like efficiency without joy. Leadership...
A little shop for writers, readers & notebook lovers
Hello Reader, A quick note — not a full newsletter, just a little announcement from my writing desk. I’ve opened an online shop with inspirational journals, mugs, desk companions, apparel, and gifts inspired by my writing life and the themes I return to again and again: creativity, courage, reflection, love, and the small beautiful reminders that help us keep going. It’s especially for my fellow writers, readers, notebook-hoarders, coffee-sippers, meaning-makers, and lovers of thoughtful...
Stop looking for answers! There's something better.
Hello Reader, For a while now I have been carrying a question. In May I finally said it out loud, on a stage in Lagos, Portugal. The talk is called The Radical Question: Stop Looking for Answers. It's live now. Here's the short version of what I said. We are trained early to move fast and be certain, to find the one right answer and hold it up like proof. That serves us well most days. It fails at the doorways that actually change a life. A diagnosis. A reinvention. A leadership transition....
When was the last time you forgot to be productive?
Hello Reader, An email that changed everything This week I received an email from a former client of mine. She is a superstar in her industry. I have her permission to share this anonymously. It read: Alicia, I don't know how to explain what's happening except to say that I've achieved everything I said I wanted and I feel nothing. Not sad exactly. More like I'm watching my life from a slight distance, like a film I'm not sure I chose. I keep waiting to feel proud. My husband says I should be...