Latest / Your Money, Your Rules | Financial Mastery, Wealth Mindset, Leadership Principles, Intuitive Decision-Making, Human Design / 201 | Your Best Business Decisions Might Happen Away From Your Business
Transcript
- 0:00Erin Gray: Welcome back to Your Money, Your Rules.
- 0:02Erin Gray: Today on the podcast, we're talking about something that has consistently been and created some of the biggest insights and breakthroughs and moments of clarity for me in my life and business, and that is travel.
- 0:14Erin Gray: And it's not travel as in taking more vacations or booking a trip to find your next big idea, because I don't think it's travel in and of itself that actually does this.
- 0:26Erin Gray: It's never the circumstance that ever creates the thing, although that's what we have been taught to believe.
- 0:32Erin Gray: It's in our thinking and allowing space that we create when we actually travel.
- 0:38Erin Gray: It's the intentions that we set, it's the change of the scenery and the environment that we put ourselves in.
- 0:43Erin Gray: It's the contrast, it's the opportunity to step outside of our normal day-to-day long enough to hear ourselves at a deeper level.
- 0:51Erin Gray: So let's dive in.
- 0:52Erin Gray: A couple of weeks ago, I returned from Rosemary Beach.
- 0:55Erin Gray: It has changed so much in the last 10 years since we visited.
- 0:59Erin Gray: We originally took my daughter when she was three and when she was four.
- 1:03Erin Gray: And this time, my daughter and I, we met our my parents there and just connected and had a good time.
- 1:09Erin Gray: It's such a beautiful place.
- 1:10Erin Gray: It's just right up my alley.
- 1:12Erin Gray: You don't have to rent a car.
- 1:14Erin Gray: You can ride your bike.
- 1:15Erin Gray: You can ride the go-kart.
- 1:17Erin Gray: The food is amazing.
- 1:18Erin Gray: The architecture, it's a beautiful place.
- 1:20Erin Gray: It's lovely.
- 1:21Erin Gray: Like it's so beautiful and luxurious.
- 1:24Erin Gray: Highly recommend 10 out of 10.
- 1:25Erin Gray: Check it out.
- 1:26Erin Gray: Rosemary Beach is just a stretch.
- 1:28Erin Gray: They call it 38.
- 1:29Erin Gray: It's a whole stretch of about 20 miles.
- 1:31Erin Gray: We didn't stay in Rosemary Beach.
- 1:33Erin Gray: We stayed in, I want to say, Seagrove area, but all of it is just absolutely beautiful.
- 1:38Erin Gray: So I want to stress here, as I got so many ahas from my trip that I took, I want to stress that it's not actually about the physical travel.
- 1:50Erin Gray: Although, you know, Dr.
- 1:51Erin Gray: Joe Despenza talks about this, changing environments actually does help because I used to be a person that would take trips and I would have a packed schedule.
- 2:00Erin Gray: I would rush from place to place.
- 2:02Erin Gray: I would bring my laptop because I had to do payroll when I was on vacation.
- 2:06Erin Gray: Had, as in, you know, that's what I thought I had to do.
- 2:09Erin Gray: I just had too much control back then.
- 2:11Erin Gray: And so I didn't actually let somebody else do it.
- 2:13Erin Gray: That's a whole nother topic for another day.
- 2:15Erin Gray: But the running joke, and it's not that funny, is that, you know, my backpack always came with me because and I slowed the TSA line down because I always had to take my laptop out and we always had to like check through all of that kind of stuff.
- 2:28Erin Gray: And I was that person that would come home feeling exhausted from taking a trip, like even more exhausted than when I left, because I felt like I had to catch up on so much that I missed while I was gone.
- 2:38Erin Gray: So it's not travel.
- 2:40Erin Gray: I just want to be very clear that I'm not saying like, go travel, go take a trip, and then you're gonna, you know, that is what's going to create the space for you.
- 2:48Erin Gray: No, it's not.
- 2:49Erin Gray: It is the intention that we set.
- 2:51Erin Gray: It is the allowance of space that we give ourselves as we travel that allows our insights and our ahas and all of the things to come through.
- 2:59Erin Gray: So when I travel now, I travel what I call very slowly, very intentionally.
- 3:04Erin Gray: I come home with pages of notes and ahas and ideas for my business and clients and insights about my life and things that I want to change and simplify.
- 3:12Erin Gray: And I always say this, but I feel like I receive like six months worth of coaching in a week worth of travel.
- 3:18Erin Gray: I up-level so much.
- 3:20Erin Gray: I let go of pieces that no longer serve me.
- 3:23Erin Gray: And I really truly feel like I either assume a new identity or let go of my previous identity, however, you want to frame that.
- 3:31Erin Gray: But I think that this idea of traveling or what if travel, you want to insert the word space, is something that we as founders are desperately craving and that we need to embody on the regular.
- 3:44Erin Gray: Because I think as founders, we're constantly receiving input emails and messages and Slack and notifications and client needs and team needs and family stuff.
- 3:54Erin Gray: And just think about all of the areas of your life where you feel needed or that you need to respond.
- 4:00Erin Gray: This endless list of things of people that are asking for you and for your attention.
- 4:05Erin Gray: And when we're surrounded all by all of that, if we aren't fully anchored in, it's easy to lose that connection with ourselves, or it's easy to, you know, not necessarily be as connected as we want to be with ourselves.
- 4:19Erin Gray: And what I have noticed about travel is that the noise gets quieter.
- 4:24Erin Gray: It's a space that I intentionally set for myself.
- 4:27Erin Gray: Like the intentions that I set before I take a trip are to create more space.
- 4:33Erin Gray: And I use that word intentionally, intentionally, because it is really important.
- 4:37Erin Gray: Like if you just decide to take a trip and you just think that, you know, you take yourself where you go and you think everything's gonna change, it's not because you're bringing yourself where you go.
- 4:46Erin Gray: It is the intentional sitting down before a trip, deciding, okay, how do I want to slow down even more?
- 4:53Erin Gray: How do I want to connect to myself even more?
- 4:55Erin Gray: How do I want to hear myself and listen to my intuition?
- 4:59Erin Gray: What do I want to come through?
- 5:01Erin Gray: Like God speak to me and tell me what are the things that I haven't been allowing the space to hear right now, allow me to, you know, allow that to come through.
- 5:10Erin Gray: And so setting that intention to reconnect, you know, with what I already know, to be still long enough to hear the wisdom that is asking to come through and to let go of the parts of me.
- 5:22Erin Gray: Like one of the things that I said at Rosemary before I went, I was like, I want to let go of the things that no longer serve me.
- 5:28Erin Gray: I want to let the old, and I think I said something like, I want to leave the parts of Aaron there that no longer serve her anymore.
- 5:34Erin Gray: And that like is, you know, any type of resistance or slowing me down that isn't helpful, like, let's let that go.
- 5:44Erin Gray: And I think some of the, I'm gonna name three lessons here, but I think one of the biggest lessons that travel has taught me is that clarity isn't something that we need to go out and find.
- 5:56Erin Gray: You know, I think we're in such a consuming world.
- 5:58Erin Gray: And that's not how clarity comes.
- 6:01Erin Gray: More often, what I have seen for myself, for clients, is that clarity comes when we allow the space to feel into and to receive the messages that are asking to be heard.
- 6:13Erin Gray: Think about how often that we try to solve for problems, right?
- 6:17Erin Gray: By gathering more information, or we listen to, you know, we get in our heads and we're in, we get out of our bodies and we're we get into that like pushing energy and forcing, like we want to try to figure it out, you know.
- 6:28Erin Gray: So we listen to another podcast or we take another course or we read more books, or you know, we ask our entrepreneur friends, like, what do they think that we should do?
- 6:37Erin Gray: Like we're constantly taking energy, trying to figure out what it is when actually what we need to do is go within even more.
- 6:45Erin Gray: We need to slow down, we need to really get more still and quiet and ask and talk to God or whatever your relationship is, and and really ask for the support and allow the clarity to come versus trying to push and force it.
- 7:00Erin Gray: And I don't think any of us need any more information.
- 7:03Erin Gray: Although that's what a lot of people try to sell us.
- 7:06Erin Gray: I think we need a lot of room for integration and for reflection.
- 7:10Erin Gray: I think we need more room to actually process everything that we already have within us, everything that we've already learned, everything that we already know.
- 7:19Erin Gray: What I call like allowing the dust to settle, you know, like, or like the sand to settle, I should say, you know, in like when the ocean and the tide like stirs up that sand and it takes a couple of waves to allow that sand to get back to the ground.
- 7:35Erin Gray: Like I think that's is what is being asked of us.
- 7:39Erin Gray: And I think so often when we're trying to listen to everyone else and we're trying to do a pod, you know, listen to a podcast, read more books, like going out there and searching and doing all that, we're just continuing to increase the sand in the ocean versus the stillness is actually what creates the sand to settle.
- 7:55Erin Gray: So if you are intentional with travel, you actually can create the space to do this.
- 8:00Erin Gray: I think the second thing that I think travel brings, you know, for me or the experiences is the power of contrast.
- 8:07Erin Gray: You know, when you're in the same environment, and Dr.
- 8:09Erin Gray: Joe Dispenza talks a lot about this of like changing your environment.
- 8:13Erin Gray: But when you're in the same environment every day, when we stop noticing things because of our neural pathways, the way that our brains work is, you know, you know, this is just like the pathway that we go on every single like how often do you take a drive home and you're like, how did I even get there?
- 8:30Erin Gray: Or, you know, you go into your office and you just like already start, or you get up in the morning, you brush your teeth.
- 8:35Erin Gray: Like that's our body taking over because the neural pathway is so strong.
- 8:39Erin Gray: Our brains are so efficient at doing the same thing over and over again and as quickly as possible.
- 8:46Erin Gray: So we get into our routines, we get into our habits, we get into the way things, you know, like the way that we run and we operate things, even stress, right?
- 8:54Erin Gray: Like there are times when I'm in an emotion in an emotional release therapy session, and Stormy will check me and she'll be like, Your body's fine.
- 9:03Erin Gray: And it's like, oh, my brain, that's like that's just a habit that I have that it's used to thinking about money, but my body feels completely calm.
- 9:11Erin Gray: It's like, how often are we, our brains are serving up something because that's what it's used to thinking, you know, that type of stress that it's used to thinking and and feeling our bodies are feeling because we're thinking that way, versus getting into a different environment and allowing the difference and the contrast allow us to, you know, I think it it really forces us to become conscious.
- 9:36Erin Gray: You know, if you think about you have to figure out like how to get from your, you know, a plane to the to the airport to the hotel or to the Airbnb.
- 9:44Erin Gray: You have to like figure out what are the the paths that you're gonna take if you're going to the beach or riding your bike.
- 9:50Erin Gray: Like there's so many different things that we're having to do and be forced to be conscious and to be present.
- 9:55Erin Gray: When I say conscious, what I mean is to be present with ourselves that we don't necessarily, if if we're not intentional about it when we're home, we don't actually have to be.
- 10:05Erin Gray: And I think that this allows us to see ourselves more clearly.
- 10:09Erin Gray: So keep in mind, I'm not saying travel is what does this, right?
- 10:12Erin Gray: Travel is the circumstance.
- 10:13Erin Gray: I'm saying that if we are intentional, if we choose to allow travel to create the space, to see what's already there, then we can have profound insights.
- 10:23Erin Gray: Can we do this at home?
- 10:24Erin Gray: Absolutely we can.
- 10:26Erin Gray: Is it more fun to do this in a beautiful place while you're taking care of your body?
- 10:30Erin Gray: I think so, 100%.
- 10:32Erin Gray: But you obviously have to tap into you.
- 10:34Erin Gray: But like travel is a way for me to explore new places, to meet new people, to get out of my routine, to allow for just space, um, that new perspective.
- 10:46Erin Gray: And what I have found with working with clients is we don't need more strategy, we don't need more information.
- 10:51Erin Gray: What we need is actually perspective.
- 10:53Erin Gray: So the third thing I think that that I have noticed with when I travel is it allows me to access more flow.
- 11:01Erin Gray: And growing up, I did not travel a lot.
- 11:04Erin Gray: So that's probably part of it is I'm very, I should say, not conditioned in traveling because that's not something that we did a lot when I was growing up.
- 11:14Erin Gray: So when I travel, it is all very intuitive because there, I don't hear my mom or my dad's um voice in my head very often because it's not something that we did.
- 11:23Erin Gray: So I'm able to move so intuitively, which I think that is the way we are meant to move.
- 11:29Erin Gray: I don't have all these limiting beliefs and thoughts when it comes to travel that I might have in another area of my life.
- 11:35Erin Gray: So going back to travel doesn't create the flow, right?
- 11:39Erin Gray: We all know people.
- 11:40Erin Gray: My husband used to be one of these people, like travel was very anxiety-ridden for him.
- 11:45Erin Gray: And he has had to retrain his body to feel differently about travel.
- 11:49Erin Gray: So it's not the travel that creates the flow.
- 11:52Erin Gray: I think flow is our natural state.
- 11:54Erin Gray: And I think many of us have simply become disconnected to from it because we are so in the in the weeds of everything that we're doing.
- 12:02Erin Gray: So just think about how highly intuitive we are and how connected we are to our bodies.
- 12:09Erin Gray: And I think that there are still parts of us in our lives where we get reactive.
- 12:13Erin Gray: Like we're human, it's part of it.
- 12:15Erin Gray: And so we may not be hearing ourselves completely or allow the space and the time to do that.
- 12:23Erin Gray: And what I call it is like closing the gap.
- 12:25Erin Gray: So the insight and the wisdom, it's always there within you.
- 12:28Erin Gray: Like I said, you don't need to go travel to do this.
- 12:30Erin Gray: You can do this in your house, you can do this on a walk, you can do this, and and I recommend doing all of those things and also taking yourself out of your environment and go taking some time to travel by yourself.
- 12:41Erin Gray: Highly recommend by yourself.
- 12:43Erin Gray: But this allows this the space to simply allow us to access it.
- 12:48Erin Gray: So although I love beautiful destinations, I don't think that the greatest return is actually the destination.
- 12:54Erin Gray: It's the deepest and the deeper connection that we have to ourselves and to our intuition and to our creativity and our own perspective and our own wisdom.
- 13:03Erin Gray: So, as I mentioned earlier, travel it happens to be one of my favorite ways to create that.
- 13:09Erin Gray: It's certainly not the only way.
- 13:11Erin Gray: So go do this at home, practice this on a walk, or through slower mornings, or having more time by yourself just in your own house, or going out and taking yourself out to lunch, or whatever it might be.
- 13:24Erin Gray: But the invitation isn't always, it's not to travel more, it's to create more spaciousness and to create more room for yourself and to create more opportunities to hear what is already within you.
- 13:37Erin Gray: So I'm gonna leave you with a couple of questions for you to ponder over the next week.
- 13:42Erin Gray: Where in your life have you become too close to something to see it clearly?
- 13:47Erin Gray: What have you normalized that may no longer be serving you?
- 13:51Erin Gray: Another way that I say this is like, what are you tolerating that you no longer want to tolerate?
- 13:56Erin Gray: And where could you create a little more space this week in your schedule with yourself, with your mind and your body and in your business, with your spouse, with your children?
- 14:10Erin Gray: So just listen, take whatever comes in.
- 14:13Erin Gray: I think a lot of times we want to judge it, we want to overanalyze it.
- 14:17Erin Gray: Just whatever you heard when I asked those questions, just go with that.
- 14:22Erin Gray: Thanks for listening for this week.
- 14:23Erin Gray: And if this episode resonated with you, I would love for you to share it with a friend, leave a review, or send me a message and let me know what landed with you.
- 14:32Erin Gray: And if you are looking for someone to be a thinking partner with you, to have deeper support around creating more clarity in your business, your life, more capacity in making decisions from a place of real self trust rather than pressure, I would love to connect.
- 14:49Erin Gray: Okay, I'll see you in the next episode.