Latest / Hurdle with Emily Abbate / #HURDLEMOMENT: How to Live a Life You Love

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#HURDLEMOMENT: How to Live a Life You Love · Hurdle with Emily Abbate

0:02
Speaker 1: Bet you guys didn't expect to see me here on
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Speaker 1: a Wednesday, did you. Emily a body here. Welcome to
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Speaker 1: my new series called Hurdle Moment, in honor of all
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Speaker 1: the small hurdles we're conquering every single day. The goal
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Speaker 1: of this new segment is to give you a little
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Speaker 1: motivation right when you need it on hump Day, in
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Speaker 1: the form of a quickie episode with actionable advice. Maybe
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Speaker 1: there's just something that's been getting at me over the
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Speaker 1: past week that I figured out some sort of solution
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Speaker 1: worth sharing or techniques or strategies. Some of these will
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Speaker 1: be me alone, and then the other ones may be
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Speaker 1: me featuring guests. Who knows. It's all kind of experimental
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Speaker 1: right now, but what I do know is that they
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Speaker 1: will all be less than fifteen minutes, super snack size,
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Speaker 1: easily digestible, and that means that they're the perfect thing
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Speaker 1: to listen to you on your commute or wherever you're
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Speaker 1: going that you only have nineteen minutes. Don't worry, I'm
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Speaker 1: still going to release a new hurdle every Monday, as
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Speaker 1: I always have, but these are just little gems for
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Speaker 1: every Wednesday. This coming Monday. A little spoiler alert Here.
1:01
Speaker 1: I have Diana Trout. She's the CEO and co founder
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Speaker 1: of health Aid and they release their beverage seven years
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Speaker 1: ago this week, which feels absolutely crazy anyway, bumping this
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Speaker 1: up to two episodes a week. Please let me know
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Speaker 1: what you think. And I really mean that. I mean
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Speaker 1: I was so blown away yesterday when I asked for
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Speaker 1: some extra reviews over on the feed. You guys chiming
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Speaker 1: in telling me what you love about the podcast, what
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Speaker 1: makes you feel inspired, And that's the kind of stuff
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Speaker 1: I need to know. I need to know what you
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Speaker 1: like so I can give you more of it. Hit
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Speaker 1: me up on Instagram at Emily Avadi and at Hurdle podcast,
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Speaker 1: and let me know again what you think of the
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Speaker 1: new segment, what you like, if there are certain topic
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Speaker 1: areas or pieces of advice that you're looking for, or
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Speaker 1: things that you're struggling with. I want this to be
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Speaker 1: a conversation. And although it's just me talking to you
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Speaker 1: right now, I promise you it's a two way street.
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Speaker 1: Today in this Hurdle moment, I'm talking about how to
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Speaker 1: live a life you love. Prompted by the small deck
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Speaker 1: of cards I have sitting next to my bed, I
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Speaker 1: was gifted this mantra set, which is what it's called
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Speaker 1: from anthropology during the holidays, and they just have small
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Speaker 1: inspiration nuggets on there to jump start the day, things
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Speaker 1: like daydreaming is a practice or something like it all
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Speaker 1: starts with a little crazy. They're slightly lave saying, but
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Speaker 1: they're also definitely inspiring and they kind of set me
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Speaker 1: off on the right foot. So Monday's card was live
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Speaker 1: a life you love, and it really got me thinking
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Speaker 1: a lot, and I rolled over my bed and I
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Speaker 1: started journaling and writing the things down about my life
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Speaker 1: that I would change, and then I headed over to
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Speaker 1: Instagram and look to see what you guys were thinking
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Speaker 1: about this, and I was shocked that out of three
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Speaker 1: hundred different people that answered the poll I put up
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Speaker 1: in my story, seventy five of you actually said that
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Speaker 1: you weren't living a life you loved. Let's think in
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Speaker 1: for a second. That's seventy five people who were willing
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Speaker 1: to admit that. I can only wonder about the people
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Speaker 1: that were watching the story that maybe just didn't want
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Speaker 1: a way in or didn't feel comfortable doing it. And
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Speaker 1: I appreciated the honesty and it made me really get
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Speaker 1: to thinking. So anyway, in today's episode, I'm going to
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Speaker 1: share with you in exercise that I did last year
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Speaker 1: help me get to a place where I can honestly
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Speaker 1: say that despite the irregular schedule and the late nights
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Speaker 1: and working on the weekends and being the only single
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Speaker 1: one at the table most of the time, and not
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Speaker 1: always being able to fit in absolutely everything I need
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Speaker 1: to do for myself, despite all of the chaos, I
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Speaker 1: have come to love this crazy life that I live.
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Speaker 1: So with that, let's get to the first hurdle moment.
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Speaker 1: So before we get going, let me just say that
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Speaker 1: it's totally normal not to love everything about your life.
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Speaker 1: No one does. No one not even please the people
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Speaker 1: that we all admire and we looks like they're perfect
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Speaker 1: on social media and they're drinking perfectly crafted macho LTEs
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Speaker 1: at five point fifteen in the morning and they have
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Speaker 1: a manicure, perfect hair at all times. It might look
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Speaker 1: like they have the perfect life, but trust me, they don't.
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Speaker 1: I'm most definitely not insinuating that my life is all
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Speaker 1: rose pedals and unicorns, either, But what I can say
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Speaker 1: without hesitation is that I love the life that I'm designing,
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Speaker 1: and I'm actively working towards shaking the things that I
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Speaker 1: don't like. I understand that it's my opportunity a keyword,
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Speaker 1: opportunity to craft a life like this, and that sitting
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Speaker 1: around complaining isn't going to really do me any good
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Speaker 1: or change much of anything. And that applies in all aspects,
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Speaker 1: from work to fitness, to my body to my relationships.
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Speaker 1: I uh, just last month, I was trail running in Abiza.
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Speaker 1: I was out there for a woman's run camp with
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Speaker 1: under Armor, and I remember being on the trail and
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Speaker 1: feeling so frustrated and so tired and just so stuck
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Speaker 1: as if I wasn't moving forward at all. And in
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Speaker 1: that instance, it would have been so easy for me
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Speaker 1: just to stop, stop moving forward, go anywhere, complain, But
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Speaker 1: what was that going to do for me? That wasn't
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Speaker 1: going to get me to the finish line. So all
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Speaker 1: I could do in that instant, a lesson that I
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Speaker 1: have learned time and time again is just keep going,
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Speaker 1: accept what's happening then and there change what I can
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Speaker 1: and do the best with what I have. So I'm
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Speaker 1: going to share with you a little exercise that I
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Speaker 1: did in February twenty eighteen that was a big game
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Speaker 1: changer for me. I had recently at the time, gone
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Speaker 1: through a breakup not too long before, and I was
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Speaker 1: about a year into being a freelance journalist, and I
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Speaker 1: felt like I was, I guess, for lack of a
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Speaker 1: better term, in a bit of a brut. It's a
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Speaker 1: list making experiment that I heard about in some self
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Speaker 1: help book I'm sure somewhere or other. So what you
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Speaker 1: do is you get out a notebook or a piece
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Speaker 1: of paper. I would definitely say write this down instead
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Speaker 1: of doing it maybe on your phone or on your laptop.
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Speaker 1: Of course, if you have to, you can definitely start
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Speaker 1: right now by drafting this in your notes. But I
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Speaker 1: would say to cement it all, come home, write it down,
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Speaker 1: maybe put it somewhere where you can see it so
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Speaker 1: then you can go back to regularly and check in
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Speaker 1: on your progress. So anyway, get your notebook out and
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Speaker 1: make three columns. The first column, column A, is things
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Speaker 1: that I love that I'm already doing, or otherwise labeled
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Speaker 1: things that bring me joy. In this column. For me,
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Speaker 1: let's see running often, going to hot yoga on the weekends.
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Speaker 1: I love to write, talking to people and hearing their
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Speaker 1: stories and when it makes sense, helping them, share them,
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Speaker 1: spending time with my family and friends, cooking, wearing my robe,
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Speaker 1: aron the apartment, Okay, stuff like that. The next column
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Speaker 1: things that I love that I don't do often. Okay,
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Speaker 1: So from a work standpoint for me, that would be
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Speaker 1: something like listical posts. And I feel like, sometimes when
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Speaker 1: you're inside the bubble, you have these jargony terms, and
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Speaker 1: listical is definitely one of them. So think of a
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Speaker 1: listical post as something like ten squat variations to build
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Speaker 1: your butt or other content that just feels like I
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Speaker 1: don't really get to flex any of my creative muscles.
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Speaker 1: From a personal standpoint, I would say something that I
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Speaker 1: don't love that I was doing often at that time
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Speaker 1: was dating. At the time, I really didn't feel fulfilled
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Speaker 1: by the New York dating scene, and I was trying
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Speaker 1: so hard to force myself to go on dates with
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Speaker 1: guys that I'd be connected with from a friend or
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Speaker 1: maybe I met them on an app, and it felt
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Speaker 1: so dreadful and bothersome, and that I could just be
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Speaker 1: doing something a little bit better with my time. And lastly,
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Speaker 1: the third column, things I'm not doing that I would
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Speaker 1: like to so again, column A Things I Love that
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Speaker 1: I'm already doing Column B things I don't love that
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Speaker 1: I do often and call them C things I'm not
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Speaker 1: doing that I would like to for me at the time.
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Speaker 1: For Colum C, it was definitely travel more. I tried
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Speaker 1: traveling a lot when I first went freelance and I
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Speaker 1: didn't have to show up at the same office every
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Speaker 1: day from nine to five, and I actually found it
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Speaker 1: super overwhelming and really hard to keep up with a
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Speaker 1: steady workload. So that was definitely in this column. Also
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Speaker 1: in this column more public speaking, including live events. I
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Speaker 1: really wanted to take this community that I was building
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Speaker 1: online and bring it more face to face off of
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Speaker 1: social media and get a lot of that genuine, human,
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Speaker 1: feel good interaction. Okay, so by this time now you
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Speaker 1: have your three lists. The next step is to look
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Speaker 1: at those lists and make some sort of action plan
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Speaker 1: on what you can do to move things from columns
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Speaker 1: two and three into column one. You know, one of
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Speaker 1: my favorite quotes is a dream written down with a
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Speaker 1: date becomes a goal. A goal broken down into steps
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Speaker 1: becomes a plan, and a planned backed by action makes
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Speaker 1: your dreams come true. And that's so true. You know,
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Speaker 1: we can have all of these goals, but unless we're
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Speaker 1: kind of willing to look at them, break them down,
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Speaker 1: give them some sort of timeline, make them smart, little
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Speaker 1: refresher course. Smart stands for specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and
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Speaker 1: time bound. When you make smart goals, they're easier to
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Speaker 1: go after. So that's what I did. If I wanted
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Speaker 1: to write less listicals, for example, I'd have to get
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Speaker 1: better at managing my time so that I would program
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Speaker 1: in blocks to sit down and do more research, which
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Speaker 1: would then help me pitch outlets better. So that means
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Speaker 1: that the first thing I could do was start programming
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Speaker 1: in two one hour blocks each week exclusively for researching
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Speaker 1: and writing longer pitches. And I didn't want to just
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Speaker 1: throw them in anywhere in my weekly schedule. I wanted
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Speaker 1: to put them in the place that I thought they
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Speaker 1: would make the most sense. So that means I put
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Speaker 1: one on Monday morning, when I'm a little scatterbrained and
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Speaker 1: serving the internet, and then another on Friday, when I've
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Speaker 1: totally checked out. So these are just two easy things
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Speaker 1: that involve researching kind of searching around and can really
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Speaker 1: be done what I might not have been otherwise as productive.
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Speaker 1: So when I was doing this exercise last February, I
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Speaker 1: made the goal that by April, the end of April,
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Speaker 1: I would be sending more of these pitches and really
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Speaker 1: checking in with myself on these two days a week
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Speaker 1: where I was giving myself that hour, and it's definitely
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Speaker 1: something I accomplished and something I stick with still to
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Speaker 1: this day. Something else, for example, if I wanted to
10:08
Speaker 1: involve more public speaking in my life, i'd have to
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Speaker 1: talk to people, and not just like public speaking talk
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Speaker 1: to people, but talk to people who I follow that
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Speaker 1: do it regularly. Because it's not like I could just
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Speaker 1: show up one day and get a high paying gig
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Speaker 1: talking about me. So I reached out to people I
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Speaker 1: admire who made a career or supplemented there nine to
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Speaker 1: five with this, and then scheduled coffee meetings. And that's
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Speaker 1: actually the exact same tactic I used when I started Hurdle.
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Speaker 1: I reached out to podcasters that I knew in the
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Speaker 1: New York City area, begged them for their time and
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Speaker 1: asked them if I could buy them coffee, and then
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Speaker 1: was able to sit down with them for forty five
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Speaker 1: minutes or an hour and just rack their brain and
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Speaker 1: ask all the questions and learn from people who are
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Speaker 1: already doing what I wanted to do and talk to
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Speaker 1: them with an open mind. And I think that's a
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Speaker 1: huge problem actually, that some people just have too much
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Speaker 1: pride to ask for help. But it's so awesome what
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Speaker 1: can happen when you support other people. It's so awesome
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Speaker 1: the opportunity to learn from other people and then do
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Speaker 1: what we love. Anyway, again, do I love everything about
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Speaker 1: my life? Of course not. The simple realization that I
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Speaker 1: have the power to change the things I don't love
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Speaker 1: is really special. And sometimes I guess we just feel
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Speaker 1: trapped by the circumstances that are beyond our control. And
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Speaker 1: that could be something as simple as finances that are
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Speaker 1: keeping you in a certain job that you're not entirely
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Speaker 1: obsessed with. I know, a deeper issue for me at
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Speaker 1: one point. Obviously, my weight was a struggle for me
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Speaker 1: in college and it was definitely definitely something that was
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Speaker 1: preventing me from loving the life that I was living.
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Speaker 1: But the scariest part, every single time, without fail, is
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Speaker 1: just starting. And sometimes you just need that little extra
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Speaker 1: push to hop on over the edge. So again, these
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Speaker 1: lists can be that push for you to reiterate you
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Speaker 1: have options you always have options. You don't need to
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Speaker 1: just settle. So again, the three lists that you should
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Speaker 1: be making three columns. Callum A things I love that
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Speaker 1: I'm already doing, Colin B. Things I don't love that
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Speaker 1: I do often, and call them see things I'm not
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Speaker 1: doing that I would like to be doing. Remember, you
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Speaker 1: have options. You can do this right now, start it
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Speaker 1: right now. And maybe these lists aren't something that just
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Speaker 1: flow out of you freely in ten minutes. Maybe it's
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Speaker 1: something you work on over the course of the next week.
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Speaker 1: But what I can say is that this is the
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Speaker 1: first part. This is the tipping point, and you get
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Speaker 1: to decide that you are going to make a change,
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Speaker 1: and that's it. Please let me know how you like
12:34
Speaker 1: this kind of content. Make sure to tag me on
12:37
Speaker 1: Instagram at Emily a Body at Hurdle podcast and leave
12:40
Speaker 1: a review in the iTunes store by clicking the description
12:43
Speaker 1: to this episode. I want to interact with you. I
12:47
Speaker 1: want to see your lists also, so make sure to
12:50
Speaker 1: take a picture of those, tag me in them, and
12:53
Speaker 1: let's get this conversation going. Remember you're worth your own investment.
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Speaker 1: Let's do it together. Bertle Conquered. Catch you guys next time.