Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Avital Miller. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Avital, appreciate you joining us today. Let’s kick things off with your mission – what is it and what’s the story behind why it’s your mission?

GALACTIC EXPERIENCES

We are not specifically recreating sci-fi movies or getting on a rocket to outer space, but creating the ecstatic feeling of an out of this world experience. Our intention is to create parties with a purpose in order to have conscious fun and grow at the same time!

This mission of creating these galactic experiences has five pillars and here is the story behind each one of them:

1. Conscious Fun

With all the meditation sessions, yoga, healing, Neuro-Linguistic Programming that I offer, one of the greatest healing services I could give are opportunities to have fun. When I healed from an autoimmune disorder beyond what was expected I was amused by other stories more extreme than mine, of people healing from terminal diagnoses. I started to interview all different types of health and healing experts with those stories like Dr. Bernie Siegel and put them into my book Healing Happens: Stories of Healing Against All Odds (www.healinghappensbook.com). Many of these experts noticed themselves or their clients healing when they focused on their reason to live; when they made sure to have fun.

Do you ever notice posting the most genius quote on Facebook from the Buddha or Mother Teresa gets some likes, but posting a simple photo of yourself having fun gets exponentially more likes and comments? It is the joy of living rather than the concepts on how to live that attract more magnetism.

The other side of why I enjoy “conscious” fun comes from living in a yoga community for almost seven years. Sometimes we communed in meditation but otherwise we were always visually present with each other when coming together. Upon moving out of the community and going to parties or other fun events, it seemed the people I was around were regularly using outside substances that altered their state of mind. It works for some people but I had trouble figuring out how to relate to them and get to know them. Thus I wanted to create a space where when we come together we stay in our conscious state of mind and get to know each other deeply. (Join us: www.dewdropcommunity.com)

2. Charity

We feel good when we do what we think is good. When we notice the challenges of others, we gain awareness which creates more freedom and wisdom in life. When we take action to help another, we put energy into motion, we work as a team, and we help uplift everyone. Besides the inspiration that joy brings, what if us having fun can benefit others? And what if we can create a cyclical effect so that everything we do comes back around to serve a purpose and help each other creating a win-win life? Thus supporting charities through our events not only is a gift to the people directly donated to but also ourselves and all of humanity.

The Valentine Soiree (www.valentinesoiree.com) last February benefited No Kid Hungry simply because that is the charity the most people involved in the event were inspired by. One out of every six kids in America is at risk of hunger. 11.7 million children in United States may face hunger in the next year. There is enough food and money in the world to feed everyone. We just have to figure out how everyone can access it.

Children’s brains develop between the ages of zero to three. Scientists find that if a child is not fed enough during that time that child can have permanent neurological damage. Teachers notice kids are more alert, eager to learn, engage and participate when they have breakfast. Kids will run the world in the future and we can help prepare them to be great leaders simply by feeding them so their brains function well.
After the success of the Valentine Soiree, I wanted to host another big charity event. With the tradition in the religion I was brought up with to volunteer on your birthday instead of receiving gifts and my birthday being in September, that seemed like a perfect time for another charity event. A friend mentioned how she is involved with a non-profit that supports other non-profits who help prevent trafficking as well as help survivors recover. That seemed like the perfect cause for me to support and the concept was born for our next event called Wow Jubilee (www.wowjubilee.com) with a full dinner and professional dance performances in the center of the Denver Botanic Gardens on Sept 11, 2022!!
Do you know over 80% of human trafficking happens as a result of coercion from a close family member or intimate partner? This is a perfect time for the upliftment of all people to help everyone feel loved enough so they don’t get drawn into that trade nor invest in that trade, so everyone can take a stance to be treated well, and for all to realize how much choice we can have in life. Imagine how uplifted the entire world can be when we just start with helping a few.

3. Community is Key
When I moved to Denver in 2019, alongside creating my Sit and Succeed meditation group (www.sitandsucceed.com), I knew it would be important to cultivate community. Coming together for amazing wisdom and a blissful meditation practice is much more exciting when doing it with friends. Friendship and community is the glue that ties a group together and makes them want to come back.
What better way to develop community than to do so in a way that highlights the interests and careers of the members. Thus every event was created to support the job or hobby of each of the members.
Collaboration is a huge key in this factor. Simply listening to the desires of my clients and partners evolved a holiday fitness program into the Valentine Soiree, a charity event with a fashion show where sponsors get outfits designed and walk the runway, date auction, best entertainers in the area, dance party, escape room, networking event book called Keep Smiling… and 100 people coming together over four months to create this 250 person event!! (Learn more at www.valentinesoiree.com.)

4. Uplift The Local Economy
Coming out of a pandemic I wanted to make sure we find ways to help each other prosper and create our own thriving economy. Through each big galactic experience, we have created many other events and opportunities to help each other network, gain exposure, share our gifts and support each other.
We have the most unique sponsorship programs where sponsors are getting more than the value they are investing. Besides a thank you and tickets to the event, each sponsor gets to creatively share their products and services. For the Valentine Soiree many joined at the level to get full outfits designed, learn how to walk the runway and walk it! At the Wow Jubilee some sponsors will get gifted angel wings and an angel fantasy photoshoot in the Botanic Gardens! There are also gifts many people in our network are giving back to the sponsors like massage, swing lessons and yoga! This gives everyone a chance to expose more people to their strengths.
We have a digital platform for team members to network and even have team parties! Each collaboration has been created out of having conversations with many people on what their goals and needs are. When we work together, we can create so many ideas and uplift both our financial and emotional economies!

5. Creativity and Expansion
If we were meeting together just for charity, we could raise a bunch of money and call it a day. Last November I attended the Tony Robbins Unleash the Power Within event where he talked about how good is not good enough. Great is not good enough. Amazing is not even good enough. To really thrive today we have to be OUTSTANDING.
Many of us can agree Walt Disney is outstanding in the amount of success he has had with his creations and amount of impact. At Disney World something energizing is happening every few minutes. Whether going on a ride, seeing a show, eating international flair, a parade coming through the streets of your favorite characters, or a phenomenal light show every night of your most cherished Disney movies. Not only do my parties seek the level of OUTSTANDING, but they include lots of surprises and creativity thus helping ourselves expand through the inspiration at the event.

A party is still a party, yet the experience can feel even more galactic when we inspire conscious fun, support charities, cultivate community, uplift the local economy, and open space for creativity and expansion.

Avital, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Many people are curious for what reason a former Microsoft program manager is involved with healing, speaking and events. It’s personal. Microsoft is a great company but it did not feel like it was for me. I transitioned into being a yoga instructor, teacher trainer, and fitness director teaching 25-30 classes all over town! I was known as the Energizer Bunny!

That was until I started having issues with fatigue, my hair falling out, and my muscles turning to fat. I was getting weaker than my students and wondering if I would be out of the job. I turned flush white while teaching a spinning class and my students told me I needed to go to the emergency room.

The doctor diagnosed me with an autoimmune disorder called Hashimoto’s thyroiditis and Hypothyroidism. They gave me a large dosage of medication, recommended a handful of supplements and sent me out the door saying that was it for life.

As if this was an arranged marriage, I figured I better learn a lot about these diseases if I am going to live with them for the rest of my life. I started to read books, search the internet, visit all types of medical practitioners including studying 1-1 with an Ayurvedic doctor in India. All of that helped me feel balanced on a daily basis which was my first miracle.

The next thing I did was start to meditate. After a couple months, surprisingly, I did not feel well. My doctor ran some tests and then told me I was overdosed on my medication. We lowered my medication, I felt better, I continued to meditate and then I did not feel well again. We lowered my dosage again as if I was going from medication to meditation!

All of a sudden I started meeting people who were given terminal diagnoses years before and were perfectly healthy at the moment. Being fascinated by their stories and that maybe fatal pronouncements do not have to be our fate, I interviewed all kinds of health and healing experts with stories of healing from terminal diagnoses that they saw repeated in their clients and put them in my book Healing Happens: Stories of Healing Against All Odds.

The book has won four awards, hit Amazon bestseller, and I took it traveling around the world speaking on the success strategies as they relate to all areas of life. I have also kept adding more tools to my bucket with certifications on how to lead meditation, energy healing, and neuro-linguistic programming. (Learn more at www.avitalmiller.com.)

Denver kept inviting me here to speak and I had a great time on my visits so I moved here a couple years ago. It has been exciting to develop community here to lead in person and online group and individual programs on how to be happier, more energetic, having a healthy lifestyle and discover true success.

How do you keep your team’s morale high?

All the way back to high school I started to be put into leadership roles and sent to trainings on how to be a leader. My leadership roles include being a program manager at Microsoft, lead coach for Success Resources America, sales and marketing director for Crystal Clarity Publishers, yoga and fitness teacher trainer, fitness director, as well as running my business today and developing community.

Here are three things that have been really helpful for me in managing a team and maintaining high morale:
1. Be Clear Upfront
After you have a lot of experience in leadership, you can see what is repeatedly challenging for people working with you. I noticed some people thriving when working with me and some feeling miserable.
I set a high bar and have a lot of experience to draw from where I regularly can see what else can be improved in my team member’s work. Some of the people take my feedback and ask what else they can do. Others seem to have not heard my compliments and felt like what they were doing was never enough. No matter which of my many communications strategies I have learned that I tried with them, they never seemed to be happy and we would usually part ways.
Every time I communicate the following when I start a new business relationship, I notice us thrive together:
1. I set a high bar. I have a lot of business experience and want what I do to reflect my personality.
2. That means I may have a lot of feedback on what we can transform as we create things.
3. It can be easy to feel like you have never arrived or what you do is never enough. To feel successful in working with me, I feel you need to be able to hear my praise and look at the feedback as opportunities to grow and learn in your career.
That example automatically weeds out people who are still working on their confidence or do not want to put a lot of effort out and instead turns into a positive what is beneficial about this opportunity. Be you and find the people who are a right match for you. What expectations can you set from the beginning and what potential challenges can you reframe to be an advantage?

2. Listen
It is actually really simple to find out what someone’s needs are, goals, interests… and then really fun to come up with creative ways to support that. Ask questions and listen. Have regular check in’s with the people you work with once a year or every few months to make sure the work they are doing matches their personal goals and how you can support them in their next steps. This is how a holiday fitness program became a charity event called Valentine Soiree with a fashion show, date auction, all sorts of entertainment, the most creative sponsorship program and multiple events and collaborations. I simply had meetings, listened to what people want, and then we brainstormed what we can create together. And then once again we all thrive together!

3. Set a Common Mission
Taking the listening one step further, if you focus on your common mission whether in business partnerships or romantic partnerships, personal challenges are much easier to overcome as you are working towards something bigger than the two of you. Make sure people are not doing something for you or simply for their own personal gain but because you all believe in the purpose behind the work you are creating.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

A One Woman Campaign Against You’ll Never

In my life have often seen something spectacular be born out of my biggest challenges. One of my mentors calls me a one-woman campaign against “you’ll never.” Every time I was told I could not do something, what kept me going was doing what made me happy regardless of what was possible.

Growing up I was held back for my lack of writing abilities. I had to be taken out of class in elementary school to meet with a special English tutor. My grade school equivalency exam results for math were consistently 99% which was the highest you could get. Grammar was consistently about 55%.

I worked hard throughout high school and got my final high school SAT exam results up to 85% for grammar and kept my math score at 99%. I really wanted to study psychology in college but my mother encouraged me to do engineering because I would get better grades and it was a more dependable career. Seemed like sound advice to me back then. I did not know about following your passions yet.

In my thirties I found myself as the Sales and Marketing Director of a book publishing company, yet I was told I could not write. As I was promoting other people’s messages the desire to share my own grew stronger. In 2018 I made the leap and published my first book Healing Happens: Stories of Healing Against All Odds (www.healinghappensbook.com). It hit Amazon best-seller even before launching and won four awards!

During college I also majored in dance just to make sure I could take dance classes. Halfway through freshman year my ballet teacher pulled me aside in the middle of ballet class to tell me I would never amount to anything. Two weeks into my unplanned trip in India I was performing a lead Bollywood dance role as entertainment for the Miss South INDIA Pageant in front of thousands of people and nationally televised!

When I performed salsa in Santa Barbara I was on the cover of every magazine and newspaper. My brand new salsa company beat out the best companies in town for slots in the more competitive shows. I did not know my dancing would amount to anything, but I did it because I love dancing. It makes me smile. 😉

Being among a minority of women who graduated with honors from engineering at Washington University in St Louis, I was the only person to be hired to work at Microsoft from my class. And I was offered $20,000 more per year than the other starting new graduates and that was in 2001! Who says women need to get paid less?!

I healed from an autoimmune disorder beyond what was expected which was also what lead me to write my book Healing Happens and speak around the world.

I used to be shy and in junior high school was one of the main kids chosen to be teased. I lived much of my adult life as a recluse. Upon moving to Denver in 2019 I really wanted a social life yet had trouble relating to many of the people I met. Despite the fear of taking on such a big task, that drove me to start my own community which lead into the Valentine Soiree, a 250 person charity event!! (Join us at www.dewdropcommunity.com)

There are certain things we can choose not to listen to, follow our heart and see the amazingness that can unfold.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.avitalmiller.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/avital.love/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/avital.miller.5
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/avitalmiller/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/AvitalMiller
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/Thedanceintodivinity
• Other: https://linktr.ee/avitalmiller

Image Credits
first image of me in the red dress with audience behind me: Ken Rochon me holding Keep Smiling card: Tobias Sands