Hi guys! Welcome to Episode 443 of the Wildly Successful Lifestyle podcast! How’s it going? Im glad to be here with you. Thank you for listening and subscribing and also giving me a 5 star review if you’re liking the episodes! Have you guys ever noticed all the commentary in your head when you are trying to make a decision? Whether it’s big or small, we often have thoughts about what everyone will think, or how they will respond, or if they will like it or not….My husband says this is very much a feminine trait, which I tend to agree because he does not do this, but I have noticed I do. Not in everything. There are areas that I am not that way like in my design projects, I have a very different style of thought. But there are areas where I have been noticing I do it a lot.
I was shopping for shoes the other day online and as I’m scrolling through the many pictures I heard myself noting “Eric would hate those” or “that’s cute but not very fashionable and I don’t want my clients to think I’m not fashionable.” “Those aren’t sexy at all.”
I realized that I have been looking for the perfect pair of shoes for what seems like forever without finding them and at that moment of noticing my thoughts I realized they don’t exist, because my brain, my thoughts, which is also my ego wants a pair of shoes that my husband will love, my clients will think fashionable, and where other people will find me attractive, but I’m very comfortable in them without looking like I’ve thrown in the towel on sexiness, but also where I’m not trying too hard oh and they have to go with whatever I put on and can’t have a designer logo on it because I’m not trying to be ostentatious, they also can’t have a platform because that stylish blogger I read said she would NEVER buy a platform shoe. Now, You show me that shoe and I’ll buy 10 pairs.
You see I wasn’t just trying to find a shoe that I loved and would be comfortable to me, I’m trying to find a shoe that everyone else will love too. Taking the filter out of my head of what everyone else will think is the most freeing thing I can do here.
It’s the most freeing thing anyone can do. And we don’t just do it with shoes. We do it with every single decision we make big and small. If we could simply take that filter off and look at things through our eyes only, what would we truly want? What would we choose? How would we choose?
As an interior designer I can tell you that the hardest clients I have and I don’t usually have these clients for long, but the hardest ones are the ones that have to get every neighbor, every friend, every human they know on board with the decision they are making on the color cabinet. I have had that happen. I had a client a long time ago we had picked out this wallpaper that lit her up, she loved it so much. I can tell when someone connects with something. So she loves this wallpaper, well, I come back a few days later continuing the project and she tells me she still loves it, but her neighbor said wallpaper was out and has been out for a while. I laughed and I said I didn’t realize your neighbor was moving in and she said she’s not and I said then why are we getting her opinion? Her husband lives there so we care what he thinks but he didn’t have an opinion, so We put that wallpaper up and to this day I saw her recently in a coffee shop. To this day, and it’s been 10 years, she loves it.
She was happy that someone stepped in and let her have something she really liked. You see she had started wavering because she was trying to please everyone. I kid you not we had to filter out about 5 other opinions in order for her to get it. It almost felt like an act of rebellion that she got that wallpaper because she loved it but someone else wanted it to be bluer and someone else said shouldn’t it have a little less pattern and let’s not forget the neighbor who didn’t think she should have it at all. Those are the hardest clients because they often have been looking to other people for so long in order to make a decision, that they no longer trust what they want. Sometimes they won’t even allow an opinion, until they get opinions elsewhere.
Now that’s an extreme case but I’m willing to bet there are decisions you’re trying to make right now that are being heavily influenced by other people. And sometimes the influence by other people is only in your head. You’re creating what other people would think, my husband honestly loves the way I dress. If I ask his opinion he will give it but he also wants me to be me which I love because I want me to be me too. I asked him once to pick an outfit for me because I wanted him to find me sexy and attractive so we were shopping and he brought me an outfit to try on, he thought I looked really beautiful, but I hated it. I didn’t feel like me at all. It was sexy, I love that he sees me that way, but I also know that if I were to try to wear it out in public, it would come off so awkward because it was not something I would ever pick. I want to wear what he likes but not at the expense of me feeling confident and beautiful when I look in the mirror.
Who am I without the eyes of others? That’s the thing that really matters. How do I want to feel? How do I want to look? Not for someone else but for me. What decision would I choose if no one else had a say? What decision would I choose left to only my opinion? How do I filter out what I think in my head vs what is true? How do I filter out what I think in my head vs what is truly right for me?
The biggest thing I can say is you have to get out of your head in order to do that. We have a lot of noise going on in our head at any given time often without knowing it.
We also all have an innate knowing of what’s best for us. A lot of times the noise in our head drowns out our own inner guidance system.
Getting clarity on what it is you want independent of what everyone around you wants can be hard if you’re not used to relying on or even hearing your own inner guidance.
But if you listen, it’s always guiding you. It’s that little feeling of ahhhh this isn’t right or this is right. The more you get used to listening and following your own guidance the more in tune you become to it.
Also the more aware you become of the thoughts that dictate your decisions the more you realize how reliant you may have become on other people’s opinions. Which may explain why life feels so hard, you’re trying to be everything to everyone. When you try to please everyone you end up pleasing no one, including yourself.
So what do YOU want. That’s my challenge for you. Make one decision today that hinges on one opinion, yours. Maybe start with a small one. I want that shoe because I love it. Or it could be a bigger more important decision like I’m moving because that’s what’s right for me. Everything else falls into line as it should when you follow your inner guidance system. There is one person that is responsible for your life and your happiness and that’s you. Don’t sacrifice your opinions for someone else’s. They’re not creating your life, you are. Share this with 3 people who have a beautiful inner guidance system. I love you guys I’ll talk to you in a few days.
