Latest / Midlife Rising / 39: The 3 Hidden Patterns Keeping You From a Life That Feels Fulfilling

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39: The 3 Hidden Patterns Keeping You From a Life That Feels Fulfilling · Midlife Rising

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome.
• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: This is the Midlife Rising podcast.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: This episode is part two on what is blocking you from your best life.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: If you are not living a life that lights you up, it's actually costing you your health, physical, emotional, and spiritual.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: It's not the other way around.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: Our current culture is actually training us to believe that if we have our physical health in check and our emotional health and our spiritual, that is what will lead to an extraordinary life, a life that lights us up.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: But it's actually the other way around.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: So this episode is actually what's blocking you from living that aligned life.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: Jen and I have refined our framework and we're going to walk you through it today.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: You're going to be able to identify of four archetypes, which one is you?
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: And within that, what is blocking you specifically from living a life that lights you up?
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: So if you want to find out what's blocking you, then have a listen.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: You're a woman over 40 who spent your life being the one who holds it all together.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: But now your body's changing and your soul is done pretending everything is fine.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Midlife Rising.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: We're your hosts, Sherry and Jen, twin sisters and modern medicine women, here to help you rewire your stress response, balance your hormones, and reclaim your feminine power.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: Every episode is a rebellion against the rules you never agreed to and a return to yourself.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: Join us where midlife isn't a crisis, it's a catalyst.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: I'm pondering this question that we started talking about in our last episode.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: And that is if you don't feel like you're living an extraordinary life, is that okay?
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: Because what we've been talking about would lead us to believe, and the research that we've been doing would lead us to believe that if you are not living your best life, it's not just kind of neutral, that's okay.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's I'm living a mediocre life, I'm sort of happy with it.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: It's actually that your life is draining you.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: You're deteriorating.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: If you're not living a life that lights you up, if you're not living your best life, something feels off or misaligned, or you're wondering, like, is this all there is?
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: Then the answer is no.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: And and it's costing you.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's costing you.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's costing you your physical health, your emotional health, and your spiritual health.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: In some way, shape, or form, that misalignment is affecting all three of those.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, Cher, looking back a couple of years, like I've we've been in this kind of spiritual awakening, personal development world for a long time.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: Like fifth 16, 17 years for me, I started on this path ago.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: And a couple of years ago, I was like, I was in the space where I thought that I was not living my best life again, but I thought it was kind of okay.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: And I thought I was okay because I was on this personal development path and I was awakening.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_00: When in actuality, I was living for my vacations, and my health was deteriorating.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: And the reason I say this, it's so important because I remember coming up to your place for New Year's Eve one year, I think it was 2021.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: And we came up there, had a great time.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I'd actually had a week or over a week off before that.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: I was in the middle of writing up my PhD thesis.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: And we got back, got back home after coming to your place for this beautiful wake, like wintery vacation.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: And the next morning I couldn't get out of bed.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: I had, I had all these symptoms.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: Like I had a UTI that returned for no apparent reason.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, a like my brain was so foggy I couldn't even read a sentence and comprehend it.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_00: I like for because I, this is what we do, we push through.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: I got out of bed and got myself to my desk and stared at the page and couldn't do a thing.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: And eventually I went back to bed, not realizing this was utter and complete burnout, but it was, I only later realized that this was not a health crisis.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: It was, I mean, it was a health crisis, but it was a mental crisis.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: Not a physical one.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: No, it was because I was in so much resistance.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: Like I was what I learned later was that I was imprisoning myself at my desk.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: I was living this life where I was working six days a week, evenings, most weekends.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: I was so burnt out.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: But yet I was forcing myself to sit at my desk and write this thesis, not realizing that I knew actually that had I taken more breaks, I'd be better off.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm telling this story because I think so many women don't realize that they're living in resistance and stress, and that that can cause like living for your vacation, which was what I was doing.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: I like literally my body didn't want to go back to work or to day-to-day life.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: It wouldn't even allow me to.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: All the supplements I was taking, all the, and I'm recapping our last episode here.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: So if you didn't watch or if you didn't listen to the last episode, go back.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: Cause we talked about how, like all the supplements, you can be doing the personal development work, you can be doing the spiritual work, but if you're missing this key piece, all of it's still gonna decline.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: And that was the state that I was in.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I wish I I had just thought of this now, otherwise I would have actually gone to look up the study.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: But there's lots of research out there that shows that people burn out more quickly or they they burn out, period, when they are doing something that isn't aligned.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: When they're doing something that doesn't feel meaningful, that doesn't feel like it it's the job, you know, that pays the bills.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: When you're doing that job and you're working extra, like you're working overtime, you're doing all the things, that's gonna burn you out much faster than doing the work you love to do.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I'm a perfect example of this because I spent most of my life in a career that did not light me up and I knew it the entire time, but I didn't know what to do instead.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: And when I started taking these micro steps towards what I really like, what really felt aligned, what lit me up, I can sit at my desk all day long and and not get burnt out.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: Like now when we do coaching sessions on a Sunday, I look forward to it.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: I'm working on a Sunday.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: Otherwise, I wouldn't have wanted to work on a Sunday and be like, no.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I did, but it felt shitty before.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: I felt resentful.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: Resentful.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's a word that we don't realize.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like often we feel bad.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_00: Like we don't frame it up, but we don't actually realize it's resent we're feeling.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's a word that I'm trying to bring to the surface for a lot of women these days.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_00: Cause it's a very destructive.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's it's something we're meant to feel as one of the emotions that we're meant to feel on this earth, but it can also be destructive when you're holding on to it.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, I digress.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: So, Cher, you and I are delving deeper this week into why most midlife women are not living a life that truly lights them up, what that's costing you, and today the critical pieces that are gonna help you fix it.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: Mm-hmm.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: So, Jen, let's start.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm thinking we start with the list describe our framework.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: So we have created this framework from our research with our clients and other research that really puts will help you to figure out where on the spectrum you are in terms of like, so let's say at one end of the spectrum is complete resistance, and the other end of the spectrum is living your best life.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: And when you place yourself on this spectrum, it's not just telling you where you're at, it's going to give you the guidance and the and the roadmap towards living your best life.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: So you aren't living in a life that's draining you anymore.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: And let's take the spectrum idea a little bit further and just describe the two spectrums that become sort of the X and the Y axis in this framework.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: And Cher, before we do that, I just want to say because a lot of people, so what our framework is, is for archetypes for midlife women and where you are living in terms of your best life.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: But I want to say before we start that you're going to want to put yourself in one of these boxes and you will find out what box you fit in.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: And you will also may also see yourself in more than one box.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: And Jen, I'm just going to add to that.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: You may also find yourself judging yourself, criticizing yourself for being in a particular box.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: And that's not what we're trying to do here.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: This is just about identifying where you're at so that you have a place to start to use as your starting point for change.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: Often doing this work, it sort of comes across as us placing blame or telling you that it's your fault, that you're doing this to yourself.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: Shame on you.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_00: And that is not what we're doing here.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: This is, it is not your fault for the way you're living.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: We are the biggest advocates on this podcast for breaking down the patriarchal conditioning that tells us we should be living this way in resistance.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: Go do the job that pays the bills and keep your hobbies on the side.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: And that never helps you to live your best life.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: So all that kind of conditioning and messaging that we get is really, I think, what's at fault here.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: And we talked about all of that on episode number 36 a couple of episodes ago.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: We talked about some of that conditioning that leads us to where we are.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_00: So you've got two episodes that precede this one, really, to go back to 36 and 38.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so let's talk about this framework.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_00: So if you imagine four boxes and they're divided by an x-axis and a y-axis, on the and Jen, keep me honest here.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: On the x-axis, what we're talking about is awareness of your desires, awareness of your dreams.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: We know that many women are serving so many other people and worrying about everyone else so much that they're not even aware of what they really want.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: And go back to last week's episode if you don't know what we mean by that, or you don't know what you want.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: And on and that so that is the low end of the spectrum, is that you're have low awareness of your dreams and desires.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_00: And on the other end of the spectrum is you know exactly what you want.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: And then the y-axis is about action.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_00: So it's the willingness or ability to take action on those desires.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_00: So at the low end of the y-axis is either unwillingness or inability to take action.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: And then at the high end of that axis is like all the courage, all the everything you need to go for it.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_00: Because well, just that we're calling, we're saying it's your ability and your willingness to take action because sometimes if you're afraid to take action or you feel like you just can't, like I couldn't quit my job today, that kind of feeling, then that's that's feels like an inability to take action.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: Because a lot of women will sit, like, might kind of sit here and roll their eyes and go, well, yeah, I I can't.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_00: Like we need financial stability.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: We need, there's so many things that make it feel impossible to chase after your dreams and take action.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: So we empathize and we're gonna help you get through that.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: And we also talked about how it's not about blowing up your life or taking making some major change over overnight.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: And we're gonna talk about that in a bit.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_00: It's micro steps.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: Correct.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: So, Cheryl, let's talk about our first archetype, where we see, I would argue, like most of the women that we see are in one of the first two archetypes.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: So the first one we're calling the settled one.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: What does that mean?
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the one who believes that this is all there is.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I should be grateful for what I have.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: My life looks good on paper.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: Just pause there, Cher.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_00: Because that is such a big one that we hear so many times.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_00: Like women say to us, I should be grateful.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: I have a I have a good life.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: I should be grateful for what I have.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: And they feel guilty for wanting more.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: And yes, and it's the guilt that partially holds them back.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: So in the back of her mind, and this might not even be conscious, but she's dreaming of something more.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: Something maybe that she's forgotten about, or like just shoved so far on the back burner that she can't even access it.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: It's like a visceral need, a visceral want for something more, and not even necessarily being conscious of it or willing to admit it.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: And quite often, you know, that this is this is the low dream awareness, low awareness of desires, because they're so there's they're there, but they're so deep in the subconscious because they've been covered up and in favor of caring for everybody else's needs and desires.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: So this is quite often the woman who has spent her whole life or her whole adult life caring for kids, making sure the boss is happy, the clients, the dog, the whatever.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so she has put us, she's gotten into the practice of putting aside her own desires for so long that she can't even access them.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_00: So the awareness of what she really wants is hard to tap into.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: And I think many women can really I can relate to this.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: There was, I don't know, there there's been times even recently where I've noticed that I'm by myself and I get to decide what I want to do and I don't even know what I want.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, totally.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: I'm there.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_00: I still go back to that place sometimes.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_00: So we do, you know, we we might move around these boxes too and move on these spectrums.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_00: This is not like stable.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_00: We can move in and out of of phases or boxes.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_00: So the other thing I want to I want to link this to is what you talked about in episode 37, which were the stress responses.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so this one, I could because this is where s where this can get really fascinating.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: But what is blocking the woman who's in this box is a stress response.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's there's a stress response uh associated with each of the boxes.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_00: For this one, it's fawn mode.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the woman who is people pleasing.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: She's so used to caring for others and doing managing other people's emotions, managing their needs, their wants, doing you know, caring thinking about everybody else that she's lost touch with herself.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I want to say if you feel this, I want you to know that the fawn response is a perfectly natural stress response.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: We see it in nature.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: And the easiest way to describe it is when you see a dog that is sort of bowing its head to the alpha dog.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_00: It's fawning.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: So it's it's like it's basically submitting.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: It's submissive.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_00: And it's a stress response.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: When we feel a threat, we do this.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: And in particular, why it applies to people pleasers is because that's what we're doing, is we're actually acting submissive, not necessarily because we think they're better than us, but effectively, subconsciously, that is what it is.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_00: We think somebody else's needs are more important than ours.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: We feel bad for disappointing people and not just guilty.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: Like I felt like a bad person if I upset someone or and there's a slight difference there, but so this stress response is a nervous system response.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: Like I think that's what's so important here, Cher, is that this is not your fault.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: This is a nervous system response that is going to be impossible to overcome with your conscious thoughts.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: And it will stop you from it's going to keep you just feeling like everything's kind of okay because I've made everybody happy around me.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_00: And that calms the nervous system because that's how you've trained it unconsciously through your your life and what is what you've learned, what your nervous system has learned is safe.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_00: So this is you, if you've ever thought, like, I should just be happy.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: I should be grateful.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_00: What you're doing is you're using that because you don't want to admit the truth that you actually want more, because that feels too selfish.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, that's a good point.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: It can feel selfish.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and whenever you hear that word should, there's there's guilt underneath of that, right?
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_00: So you're you're feeling guilty for wanting more, or feeling selfish for wanting more.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_00: That that word should is a guilt trip.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_00: It's always a dead giveaway for something that you're feeling that you shouldn't be feeling, that you don't have to feel.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_00: Let's move to archetype two.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the one that we call the postponer.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the woman who maybe knows that she's not aligned, but she's just needs to write out the next few years.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_00: So this is for you, or this is where you might be sitting if you're saying to yourself, well, I just got to get the kids through university, and then I'll have the financial stability to do what I really want to do.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: Or I just need to write out this job for another couple of years, and then I can retire, slash, find a job that I really want, slash open my own business or whatever.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: Ugh, I have so many friends share in this state.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_00: And like one of them, she said to me four years ago, Jen, just two more years.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's so crazy busy.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: I can't stand it, but I'm just gonna do it for two more years and then I'm gonna do something else.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: And she's still there.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, that was five years ago.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_00: I've had clients say that to me too.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: And and I I probably even said it to myself.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: You know, when you get so far, it it particular it applies to a lot of different things, but it really stands out when you think about your career.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: And it feels way too daunting to start a new job, a new career, like a new job, let alone a new career or a business or or something that really lights you up.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: Especially if you have a lot to lose.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: But it comes up all the time.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_00: And you've built up a lifestyle.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: And so it feels like you'd have to give all of that up.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: Blowing up everything you have in order to get what you want.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: But it it's not just on the career in that area of your life.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: It shows up in other places as well.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: So the postponer, a little bit more about her.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_00: She, okay, so on the axes, this is someone who is on the awareness axis.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_00: She is more aware of what she wants.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_00: But she's low on the willingness or ability to take action.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_00: She feels like she can't.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: She feels like she can't.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_00: Or she feels like if she does, she's got to blow up her her whole life or her whole career and start over.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: But she does have a vision or at least an inkling for what she's meant for or what she wants to do.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: So she has, she has more knowledge or more self-awareness of what she wants.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: But she doesn't know that there's a way to actually live that now.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_00: She, right.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: Anything to add, Jen, before we talk about the stress, um, the stress linkage.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, to start linking it to stress is that this isn't living.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: If you're living this way, it's actually not living, it's surviving.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: You might be very efficient and high functioning.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_00: This is like, this is the high achieving woman.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_00: These are all the directors and well, I mean, not necessarily, but you are high-functioning, high-performing women.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_00: You can do it all.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_00: And that's actually just surviving very efficiently.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_00: You're not doing what lights you up.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_00: And it is draining.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_00: If you talk to most of these women, they know they're not happy.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_00: They know they're feeling exhausted from putting up the front, trying to do all the right things, but not doing what they really want.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_00: You know what, Cher?
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_00: That was me when I was in when I was in my PhD as well.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_00: Like just going back to that story I started with.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: I was, I was actually working at that point, two different jobs, and writing my dissertation.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_00: And you had a two-year-old.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_00: She wasn't even two yet.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, she was two.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that was the year we had COVID too.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I was high functioning.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I kept saying to myself, it's all gonna get better when my PhD is done.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's all gonna get better when my PhD's done.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_00: And then it didn't.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: I finished that and I found ways to make myself just as crazy busy and stressed out.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_00: Nothing went away.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: So let's talk about uh so that's a great segue, actually, to the stress, the the what your nervous system is doing when you're in this box.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_00: And that is fight.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: This is the fight response.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: So we think of the stress response of the fight response as like literally confronting or arguing.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's literally fighting.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: But in this case, what's happening is that you're powering through, you're pushing through.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's a very aggressive kind of energy.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's controlling too.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_00: These are often the women who are swooping in to save the day at work, chronically firefighting, as we put it, in the corporate world.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um over taking too much responsibility for everything, not always delegating at home or at work.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_00: And it ends up in burnout.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_00: Or at least exhaustion.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_00: So that's box number two.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_00: The third one is the awakened one.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_00: Awakening one.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_00: Awakening.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: She might still be yeah, I mean, it is a spectrum, but yes, the one who's awakening.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the one who knows she was meant for more, for something different, but then feels like she can't.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_00: So there's there's still something blocking her, but it's different than the one who knows she's meant for more or meant for something different and is just postponing it.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_00: So this person isn't just postponing it.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_00: She knows.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_00: She's so she's high on the desire access, knows she's aware of what she wants.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: She's aware of her dreams, of her desires.
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_00: And she's low on the so she's low on the willingness or um, on the willingness to take action box as well.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the person who she she might even have a vision.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: She knows what she wants to do.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_00: She wants more impact.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: She wants more meaning, and just doesn't know how to do it.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the the the when you were taught.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_00: So this was me for most of my adult life, actually.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_00: Let's come back.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_00: You you were telling me about somebody recently, but let me so for me, I spent my 20s and 30s knowing that I wasn't in a career that was really lighting me up.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so I kept looking for something else, but I couldn't quite find it.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't know how to find it.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_00: So this could be someone who's actually who doesn't know her desires.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_00: She just knows she's meant for more.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_00: And I also thought that once I had kids, that because I watched many women in the in the corporate world sort of take a take a step back from their career when they had kids.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: And so I thought, well, their career must not be as important.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_00: When they have kids, they have this other purpose.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_00: So I sort of thought, well, maybe I'll just, I know that I'm meant for more, but maybe that's the more.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_00: And then when I got to that stage of my life where I realized I wasn't gonna have kids, then I had to really face reality and say, okay, I know this is, I know I'm meant for something different.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_00: And I can't continue to live this way because it is burning me out.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: I don't love, like I, this is not letting me up.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_00: It's draining me.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_00: This is the corporate woman who just wants to, like I one of our clients, she said to me, I just want to go open up a yoga studio.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, Why don't you?
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_00: And there was too much fear.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_00: And that would be obviously a big, huge jump.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_00: Like she had a mortgage to pay, all the things.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then another one, she just wants to be a chef.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_00: She's like, I just want to cook, but she doesn't know what that could look like.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_00: And she doesn't also feel like she could leave her job.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_00: So so we started to talk about well, how can you start taking steps toward that?
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_00: And how can you make that, what you love to do, a part of your daily life?
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: Because what so if if this is you, what's often blocking you is the fear, like a fear of loss of either relationships or like financial security, even your identity.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: Like when I was in corporate, I was like I was professional.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_00: Like I had an identity wrapped around that.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_00: I was professional, I was put together.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_00: I had I had a way that I dressed.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_00: You have a title.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_00: I had a title and you have a lifestyle.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, definitely.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: I had to give, I gave that up.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm trying to rebuild that back.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_00: But um, yeah, so there's a lot of a lot of fear in this one.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_00: You know what you want, but you're unable to take action because of the underlying fears.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_00: So the the nervous system response that's going on here, when you start to think about, I want to cook, all I want to do is cook.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_00: But then your nervous system response that kicks in here is flight, that fear.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_00: It may be freeze too.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yes, that's true.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_00: Freeze or flight.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_00: You're either avoiding it or you're actually stuck in overthinking, like, how am I gonna do it?
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_00: What am I gonna do?
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_00: And you end up overanalyzing your situation that you end up doing nothing.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_00: This is the person who might be stuck overthinking, or she might be running away from what she does know what's aligned.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: So if you feel like you're kind of like circling something, but you can't just zero in and do it.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's such a good way of putting it.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_00: This is you.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_00: Now, moving on to the last one.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_00: This is the one that we call the aligned woman.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_00: So before we talk about this one, this is the this is the one who is high on the awareness of her desires and her dreams, and also high on the action.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: So she's either already living this way, she's aligned, or she's moving in that direction.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: I think we also want to mention here, too, that this is not a perfect woman with a perfect life.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_00: So I feel like I'm on the way to this box.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like I I really love my life for the most part.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_00: There's, but there are definitely days when I do things that I look back and think, that didn't feel aligned.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_00: That didn't light me up.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_00: Why did I say yes to that?
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_00: Or why did I do that?
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's not, I'm not perfect.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, there's also things, you know, yeah, I'm living my best.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_00: I I feel like I'm living my best life.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I know it still can still get better.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_00: And yet bad stuff still happens.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like we had water in the basement the other day.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_00: Then you take a step back.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_00: We had we had water in the basement the other day.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_00: Did would did that have anything to do with alignment?
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_00: No, it just it just happened.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I had to look at that as, okay, this is really, really shitty in the moment because I've got all this stuff to clean up and I don't know who to call and I'm, you know, I'm doing all trying to figure out the whole situation.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_00: And once I get through it, then I can sit down and go, okay, what can I learn from that?
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_00: How is that moving me in maybe a direction that I hadn't considered?
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_00: What can I do differently as a result of this?
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_00: So bad things happen, and maybe sometimes it's just it just happens.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: But we can always look at those as how might this be a sign that is leading me in a different direction or that is leading me to a e an even more aligned life.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_00: It could be a detour in a different direction.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you meet like you and I, about a year ago, we missed our flight.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I've never missed a flight before in my entire life.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_00: And you and I were running to the JFK airport.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I remember that.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_00: My goodness, running through JFK.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_00: The security line was two hours long.
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_00: We're running through the airport.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_00: We miss our the like the gate closed five minutes before.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know what we missed it by.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_00: But what that it actually gave us a gift.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_00: Like in the moment, we thought, oh my gosh, this is a this is bad.
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_00: Now we're gonna waste a whole, we got to wait for the next flight, which is the end of the day, spend whatever it was, however many hours sitting in the airport.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_00: And in hindsight, that actually gave us a gift because we were able to sit down and really have the the breathing space to absorb the three-day conference we had just been at and do some strategy work and talk about all the things that we envisioned.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_00: And and so we wouldn't have had that had you, we each, you know, gotten to the, you know, landed in Toronto, you go off to your life, I go off to mine, and you forget every thing you learned at the conference.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's not that her nervous system isn't activated ever, because of course it is, but she's acting, she's learned to calm the nervous system in ways that allow her to do what feels aligned.
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_00: What feels intuitive.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_00: Let's let's define aligned too.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_00: So what feels intuitively right, the gut feel, the the nudge that you keep like that's in the back of your mind.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: Sure, it's actually following that.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_00: Because so many women say to me they don't have they're not very intuitive.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_00: And actually everyone is intuitive.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_00: We're born that way, we evolved that way.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_00: What most of us don't do is follow it.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_00: Right, because we've learned not to trust it.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we've learned to only trust logic and decisions and what we should be doing.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_00: All the shoulds again.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're an aligned woman, you are following that, and you're able to follow, listen to your intuition and follow it.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_00: And I want to talk about what that feels like because that is the question that everybody asks me.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_00: They're like, what does that even look like?
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_00: What does that feel like?
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_00: And it feels like waking up in the morning and not dreading your day is like the starting point.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_00: Like real, like feeling motivated and excited for your day.
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_00: It feels like coming home from vacation and like not wishing your vacation were longer.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_00: I just went on a vacation a few weeks ago.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_00: And at the end of it, I was like, cool, I'm excited to go home.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um it feels, it feels exciting and it feels alive, which are which are abstract.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_00: I know those are abstract and hard to kind of put your finger on, but but I guess so.
• 36:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, the the really the biggest way that I can describe it is feeling excited for the day and feeling fulfilled, like doing something.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like when we get off a coaching call and I go, oh, that was great.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_00: Like I just feel like my cup is full.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_00: I feel inspired.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_00: When I'm that's something that really that's what I associate with feeling lit up is feeling inspired, or it's well, and I think we have other episodes on this, but it's when I it's I can ask myself when something, when an opportunity or something comes up that I could do, it's does this light me up?
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_00: Is this a hell yes?
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_00: Does it feel good in my body when I think about doing this?
• 37:46
  SPEAKER_00: Or does it feel like fear and resistance?
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_00: Does it feel like dead?
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_00: Does it feel slaughten?
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_00: Anxious.
• 37:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_00: So this is about choosing your life and choosing what you want to do every day.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_00: And yes, we have to do things that we have to do, of course.
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_00: But it's feeling intentional about your days.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_00: Like it feels like you're choosing your life and the little things that happen every day.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_00: Or at least the things that happen to you it's like the universe has got your back.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna just quickly recap these.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_00: So we talked about the settled one.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_00: So this is our framework.
• 38:41
  SPEAKER_00: There are four archetypes.
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_00: The first one is the settled one, where you are feeling like you just want to stay stable and you're just gonna keep helping everybody else.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_00: You I should be grateful for this life.
• 38:55
  SPEAKER_00: I have a pretty good life.
• 38:57
  SPEAKER_00: Number two is the postponer.
• 38:59
  SPEAKER_00: And this is if if this is you, you are just holding everything together, high functioning, but you're really just surviving.
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_00: And you're saying, I'll just give it two more years, and then I'm gonna do what I really want.
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_00: That's the key on that one.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_00: The third is the awakening one.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the woman who knows you know what you want, you're feeling a pull towards it.
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_00: So you're awakened to it, but you're too fearful to take action.
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_00: Or maybe you're overthinking it.
• 39:35
  SPEAKER_00: And then the last one is the aligned woman, which is the one we've just been talking about, which is what we are all working towards.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_00: I think deep down, Jen, don't we all want that?
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_00: Like someone said to me, a friend said to me, I don't need meaning in my life.
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_00: I just want to live a good life.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_00: But they're one and the same.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_00: Feeling like you're living a good life is meaningful for you.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_00: And like we said in the last episode, uh an extraordinary life, your best life is your definition.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_00: It it's according to your definition.
• 40:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's not a flashy life necessarily unless that's what you want.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_00: It's not the, you know, it's it's not the luxury vacations and the celebrity fame, although that might be for some people.
• 40:38
  SPEAKER_00: It might look very ordinary from the outside, but if it lights you up, that's the important part.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_00: That's what that's how you know you're aligned.
• 40:47
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the work that has inspired us to help more women get to their aligned life, their alive life, to feeling like they're experiencing life.
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_00: And if you go back to last week's episode, because so many modalities and areas, the health industry are missing this, and it's costing us so much.
• 41:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's costing so many midlife women their health, their mindset, their emotional well-being, and their happiness and joy.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's costing so much, we have created a nine-day journey.
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's a retreat, it's an in-person international retreat that will walk you through the steps so that you come home from this retreat knowing that you're going to live your aligned life, having clarity on what that life is or what it starts to look like, what you really want, and having the confidence to actually go after it.
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_00: And Jen, I would add that going on the retreat itself might be an aligned action.
• 42:03
  SPEAKER_00: So ask yourself this is the like me going a little meta.
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_00: Now that you know we have this retreat going on, you're feeling the nudge.
• 42:12
  SPEAKER_00: If you were that person, are you then putting yourself in one of these boxes?
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_00: So, no, I'll do a retreat like that once the kids are finished university and everybody's out of the house.
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_00: Are you saying, uh, no, I should be, I should be grateful for what I have.
• 42:29
  SPEAKER_00: I couldn't take all that time for me or all those funds from our family to do that for me.
• 42:36
  SPEAKER_00: That would be selfish.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_00: Or are you the one who is like, oh, that is for me.
• 42:44
  SPEAKER_00: But what if what if I don't get along with all the women there?
• 42:49
  SPEAKER_00: What if this, what if that?
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_00: And all the fears start coming up.
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_00: What we want you to do is tap into what is the nudge saying?
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_00: What is your gut saying?
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_00: If you felt the nudge, if you feel like, and you know, check in with your body.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_00: You know if this feels aligned.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_00: And if it does, check out the link, book a call with me, Sherry, and we'll chat about it.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_00: We'd love to have you with us.
• 43:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:15
  SPEAKER_00: So we didn't even say, Cher, where this is.
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to Peru.
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_00: It's in November.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_00: And what better place to awaken to your soul's inspired desires than in the Sacred Valley, which includes a trip to Machu Picchu at a beautiful retreat center.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_00: It is just, it's the content that we are curating for you for 10 women.
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_00: So there's a limited number of spots.
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's just going to be so wonderful.
• 43:48
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not just an escape that you're going to dread going home from, although you might, because it's going to be so amazing.
• 43:59
  SPEAKER_00: But You'll be inspired to go home and start.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_00: Get started on this new inspired aligned life.
• 44:07
  SPEAKER_00: So click the link on the show notes.
• 44:09
  SPEAKER_00: We can't wait to see you and come back next week for another episode.