Hi guys! Welcome to Episode 481 of the wildly successful lifestyle podcast! Thanks for listening and sharing and giving me a 5 star rating if you’re loving the episodes. It makes a difference in the podcast world and it means a lot. Ok
I heard someone say one of the keys to discipline is the ability to say no and that doesn’t just include telling others no, it includes telling yourself no. I thought about that and I thought about how often I tell myself no and are there areas where I could do better. As I thought about it, I realized I do have the ability to tell myself no but sometimes I get lazy with it. For instance, I am in a constant battle with my phone which really means a constant battle with social media, so just distracting myself from doing things I’ve told myself I’m gonna do. So I thought hmmmm. I’ll try telling myself no and see how that works. I I’ve been practicing it this past weekend, so literally saying it to myself when I have the thought to grab for my phone, telling myself “no”. And you know what? It actually works. It has kept me from grabbing my phone 5 or 6 times already. Im telling you guys that because it’s something that you might want to try too. You never know unless you try it….
Ok, So often I get episode ideas from a book ive read or a video Ive seen and this week is no differen. There’s a video that’s been around a while I’ve seen it a few times and I watch it on repeat whenever it pops up. There’s a reporter asking a little boy a question he’s probably 4 maybe 5 and he tells her he learned something he wanted to share and it’s that you can’t control the wind but you can adjust your sails. The reporter says oh I love that, so when life changes, you change with it. And to that the little boy says well that’s not exactly what that means, but I know what it means the reporter laughs and says my bad. Do tell. …to which he said what it really means is that it’s not about what happens to you it’s about how you react to what happens to you.
It took me a minute to gather the idea of adjusting your sails because I thought well aren’t you still changing then if you adjust your sails? But I realized when you adjust your sails it’s because you are heading in a certain direction and if the wind changes, you don’t just say oh ok I guess we’re going in that direction now, NO you adjust your sails so that you stay the course. Now it makes sense. We adapt of course but we don’t allow life’s ups and downs to derail us, we decide our course and we adjust our sails accordingly so that we stay on course. So it’s not always going to look the way we want it to, it may not be a straight line, we might have to take a few zig zags here and there and it isn’t going to look the same for everyone. We will all have challenges and the way we meet them will be up to us, and how we meet them will decide our life’s course.
I wish I had that wisdom at 5! It took me decades to learn that and the difference it has made in my life is exponential.
I’ve heard and often thought and most likely have even said that life is a roller coaster but what I’ve since learned is that yes life is a roller coaster but I have some control of that roller coaster. In other words I don’t control the wind, but I can adjust my sails. So, I love adventure but not unnecessary risk. I love excitement but not unhealthy drama. I love my friends and family but not at the expense of my own peace. I know that anything someone else says or does has everything to do with them and nothing to do with me. That’s a hard one but when you live your life that way you don’t take anything personally. But this would be a good time to refer back to the I love my friends and family but not at the expense of my own peace.
In my opinion the most powerful people I meet are the ones that know who they are without needing anyone else to confirm or deny. They handle things that come up on their own end not needing others to conform or be a certain way in order for them to be happy.
I used to think that other people were the reason I was mad or sad or felt worthy or unworthy. My sail was set to whatever wind was blowing at the time. We all learn at our own pace and there’s nothing wrong with that. Every once in a while I notice I will have thoughts that someone else has hurt my feelings but then I say wait a minute. What they did or what they said was about them and what they had going on, I just happened to be in the line of fire.
Growing up my family would go hiking at Fall Creek Falls every year and as we got older we’ve started doing that again. Eric and I are usually the ones that get it together. This recent trip my brother couldn’t go because he was too busy. I noticed I got my feelings hurt by that. I was making it mean we weren’t a priority. Well, when you make it mean that of course you get your feelings hurt. Reality is he wasn’t coming. How I reacted to that was how my day was gonna go. So I just told him we would miss him. And we did, of course but you know what? My husband, Eric and I had an amazing time with my baby sister Molly and her husband and my older sister and our parents. We couldn’t change that my brother didn’t come but none of us let it change us and how much fun we had. And look the human thing is to be having thoughts over the weekend that oh we’re missing our brother or he doesn’t care about us that’s what the human brain wants to do but the most powerful thing you can do for yourself is catch those thoughts and tell yourself NO I’m not going to allow that thought to be there and I’m certainly not going to say it out loud. We can use that word No in so many ways to make ourselves feel better, it doesn’t just apply to social media..we can tell ourselves no whenever we feel we need to.
There are gonna be many ebbs and flows in our lives. And there are going to people that come and go. Sometimes that means family may come and go too. On your end or on their end. They may be going through a season of life that is really tough or busy and you may not see them for a while. That doesn’t mean they don’t love you, it just means they have things going on that you don’t understand. My dad said over this past weekend that sometimes people do things you don’t like or understand and maybe you don’t even agree with but you just have to accept that it is what it is. And I thought you know that’s a powerful thing to be able to grasp. When someone is able to accept what is without fighting it or chasing it or making it mean something bad about them…that person becomes unusually powerful. Because they can no longer be jerked around by the winds of the moment. They know their worth and it doesn’t change because the wind changes.
So two really empowering things you can do for yourself this week is know when to tell yourself no and know when to adjust your sails.
My challenge to you this week is to get good at telling yourself NO and when you need to stay the course, make sure when the winds of life change directions and they will, you get really good at adjusting your sail.
