Ep 68: The Secret to Getting "Unstuck"

The number one question I get from people is, how do I get unstuck?

In this episode, I'm talking about what I believe to be the way to get unstuck. It all boils down to finding your truest self, loving her and having the courage to show up in the world that way.

When you're being yourself, it makes life so much richer, and much less complicated!

Listen to the episode and let me know what you think!

=== Resources ===

Want to learn more about Adventure to Authenticity, my 4-week program that will help you transform one pattern that is keeping you stuck into an authentic way of being?

Click HERE to set up a call with me to chat!

Transcript

Ep 68: The Secret to Getting Unstuck

[00:00:00] Hello, friends and welcome back to Real, Brave, and Unstoppable. 

[00:00:05] I feel like I always talk about how fast the time goes when I open the show. But seriously, how is it almost November? It's crazy. As I'm sitting here looking out my window, I’m enjoying the view of red and orange and yellow leaves. And, of course, there's a lot of green too because, in Maryland, the leaves don't get that vibrant. 

[00:00:27] Today, It's 78 degrees here. In Maryland, 78 degrees. It's crazy. I'm kind of looking forward to sweater weather at this point though. I’m looking forward to wearing my Uggs. I live in those in the wintertime. They're so comfy. 

[00:00:52] So today I am going to dive into feeling stuck and how we get out of that. 

[00:01:01] It's not as hard as you think. It can feel really hard. But it's not as hard as you think. 

So I have a story to tell you about this to kind of illustrate what I'm going to talk about. When I was growing up, I always felt the need to be someone different to fit in. When I was really little, I was so tall. All the other kids were shorter than me, even the boys until they went through their growth spurts. 

[00:01:26] And I remember wanting to feel smaller. And I don't think it was really from the perspective of being thinner, it was more just being smaller. So, I had this feeling of being too big. Then, as I got older, always wanted to

[00:01:45] do things really well so that I felt accepted or acceptable. The thing is, that by thinking I needed to be different, that I wasn't enough just the way I was, the funny thing is I never really felt like I fit in anywhere. That’s because I was never being myself. I was never really being truly authentic throughout all of that. 

[00:02:10] So I'm going to add to that story. When I first moved to Maryland, it was 2004. So the story probably took place in like, 2005 or 2006. I was deep into my photography business and doing really well with that. I hosted a group of local photographers at my house for the purpose of connecting and forming a local photography community. 

[00:02:37] So, later in the year, I happened to go to a workshop, a photography workshop with a couple of those women in Philadelphia. We all shared a hotel room and we drove together and stuff like that. And it was funny as we were talking when we were there, I found out that when they first met me, 

[00:02:58] they thought I was super intimidating. I just thought, oh my gosh, they thought I was intimidating?! And that felt so weird. But what that was is that I always showed up like I had to have my shit together. Like I couldn't look stupid. I couldn't look like I didn't know something. 

[00:03:15] I had so much armor on that I came off as being intimidating. That was the first time I really got a clue that this isn't how I want to show up. That was, that was like the first time. 

[00:03:32] So when you have that idea of having to show up a certain way in order to be accepted or to fit in or to belong. You start to show up as a different person in different situations, either that, or you just show up with full armor on and you don't really let people in. What happens after doing this over and over and over again? 

[00:03:55] First of all, you kind of forget who you are. And then you actually start to be afraid to be who you really are. Because you're afraid that person's not going to be good enough. And then you get trapped in this bubble. That's called your comfort zone. And that becomes all you know. 

[00:04:13] I can't even tell you how many clients I am working with, or I've worked within the past that say, well, this is all I've ever known, so I don't know how to change it. And that's why - it's basically a habit, you do it over and over and over again. And that person becomes who you are. 

[00:04:27] But it's not truly who you are, it just becomes your pattern, if that makes sense. 

[00:04:32] So the longer and longer you go on. The more afraid you get to get out of your comfort zone. And that is how you get stuck. 

[00:04:42] Makes sense, right? I hear from a lot of women that I talk to, that they feel stuck, they’re not living life to the fullest, they're not where they thought they would be, or they're exhausted from trying to do all the things or, you know, measure up. And then when we dig a little deeper, words like I'm not enough, enter the conversation. Or the pressure to succeed or reach higher and higher goals, 

[00:05:07] to be everything to everyone, take care of everyone, have all their shit together. Those things are, you know, a little deeper. And so today we're going to dive into the idea or the feeling of being stuck. My solution, I really believe,  to get unstuck… the way you do it is to find your truest self, and learn how to love all of that self. 

[00:05:33] All of it. Even the things that we've decided are hard to love. That means the things you see as flaws, the things you don't like about yourself, your body, like all of these things, you have learn how to love all of it. 

[00:05:50] When we try to push those things away, it introduces another feeling like stress or worry. So if we try to push away, let's say, for example, we've been told we're “too much”. So we try to tone that down and we try to push it away, but really who we are is just vibrant and excited to share our ideas. And there's nothing wrong with that part of us. It's just that

[00:06:16] somewhere along the line we've been told it's not good enough. Too much isn’t good enough. It's not how you should be. You should be different. 

[00:06:24] And so what I'm saying is, we have to be with all of those things in order to love all of who we are. So can we be with the person who is too much? And accept and love her. Can we do that? 

[00:06:38] Because when we can do that - when we can love all those pieces - we don't have to worry about what other people are thinking, because if we already love that part of us, it's like we've taken back our power with it. And we'll talk about that a little bit more as we go. 

[00:06:54] So first let's talk about how we get to the place of feeling stuck. Where we've really lost our perfect truest self - because we are perfect just how we are. All of us. The biggest reason is fear. That is the root of all of it. Some different fears that people have are the fear of failure or making a mistake, fear of being judged, fear of not being good enough, 

[00:07:24] fear of losing something, the fear of losing our identities, that one's a little tricky. We've built up this identity. And sometimes it's multiple identities because we try to kind of fit in with different people. We have kind of different versions of ourselves, depending on where we're at. 

[00:07:43] So change is sometimes really scary for people, or a lot of times really scary for people because we're letting all of those false identities, or, you know, false selves, we're having to let those go. And they’ve been with us for a long time

[00:07:58] so letting this go is really scary. It's like, well, who am I then? But that's why this is such great work - you find that person again. Fear of uncertainty is huge. We all have that. Nobody likes to not know how things are going to go. And then also fear of not having control. 

[00:08:21] So really being stuck is being stuck in your comfort zone. That's really what happens. And it's the fear of doing something that feels unsafe. So, you stay put. 

[00:08:35] It feels too risky to do something different because it feels unsafe. What if something goes wrong? What if you fail? What if you lose something? What if somebody tells you you're not good enough, what if you don't have control of it, of all of those things, make it feel very unsafe. 

[00:08:51] It's a scary place to be. 

[00:08:54] So getting back to what I think is really the foundation for building a life that is true to you and is fulfilling, full of joy and purpose and passion. What I believe is the foundation for that is to

[00:09:11] find your truest self. And to know your truest self deeply and love all of who you are. That's what I really believe is the foundation for living your best life. 

[00:09:25] So when I work with people on this. And I'm going to tell you about a four-week program I have at the end of this episode. So, you'll have an opportunity to chat with me about it a little more if you would like to. But one of the first things that we do when I work with someone on this is. To look at. 

[00:09:45] Where you're not showing up authentically in your life. What feels misaligned? What feels off? For example, if you're someone who keeps your cards close to your vest, you totally have to armor up and look like you’ve got your shit together… you can’t show any weaknesses or flaws - 

[00:10:07] That's one way of showing up inauthentically. That's not who you really are, I'm willing to bet. 

[00:10:13] Or if you're someone who tries to blend in with the group of people, depending on who you're with. You're kind of changing your personality a little bit from group to group. That is something that I like to call shapeshifting. Some people call it chameleon syndrome 

[00:10:29] but you're changing how you show up depending on who you're with. 

[00:10:35] Or you might show up in your life and always be telling yourself that you're not good enough. Your body is not thin enough or your butt's too big, or you aren't a good enough athlete. You may look at your achievements and always be telling yourself that you haven't achieved enough in your life. 

[00:10:53] Maybe you are hard on yourself about your parenting, or maybe you have stories about how you handle money. 

[00:10:59] Those are all things that are not really your true self.

[00:11:03] Another way that this can show up is by looking at the type of people that you hang around with. Like, are you hanging around with people that you don't really even like because it's like the cool group to be with? That's not authentic or being true to yourself.

[00:11:16] Or the types of things you do in your spare time? Are they things that you really truly love to do, or are they things that get approval or external validation? 

[00:11:28] Or how do you talk to people? Are you showing up authentically there? 

[00:11:35] A great place to start digging into this is looking at limiting beliefs and self-sabotaging patterns. That's a great place to start. Some of those things come up, like, if I don't always put others first, there'll be chaos. I need to keep the peace. I'm the peacekeeper. 

[00:11:53] Or, my body needs to look a certain way for me to be worthy of love or belonging. Or I need to show up a certain way to be worthy of love and belonging. Or I'm not good enough at X to succeed at Y. Or success doesn't happen to people like me so why should I even try. Or feeling the need to be perfect all the time. Those are all things that are 

[00:12:18] false beliefs that we have that are a really good indicator of where you're not showing up authentically in life. I like to look at those first and really dive into them. And once we can do that, we get so much information about 

[00:12:34] what's misaligned. And then we really look at, how do you think you would like to show up in those situations? What do you think is true for you? And what sometimes really helps with that is looking at what your values are. That's a wonderful exercise by the way. I have a great freebie little workbook. 

[00:12:51] If that interests you, just hit me up on my website or email. And I can send it to you. But your values are such a great thing to know. Knowing your values really helps drive so much of your life and it helps you see where you're showing up inauthentically. 

[00:13:10] Another great thing to look at is listening to your inner critic. Your inner mean, girl, I sometimes call it or your ego is another way to refer to it. But listen to that. Where is your voice saying that you're not enough? Where do you hear that commentary? That you're not enough. That's a good place also to look at where you're showing up misaligned with who you really are. 

[00:13:39] Because you are enough as you are right now. And the voice that says you're not is wrong and is trying to keep you stuck in your comfort zone. 

[00:13:47] And then the other thing that I love to do with people is really simple. Look at what things you love to do

[00:13:54] and that you're doing now. Or are there things that you would love to do that you're not doing now? And then look at the things you're doing right now. How do you feel about those? Do you actually like them? Or not? A couple of examples that pertain to me - for many, many, many years, I did long-distance races, like triathlons, marathons, and half marathons. 

[00:14:21] The marathon and the half-Ironman triathlons were really the most time-intensive training for me. And I did half-Ironman races year after year after year. It was a lot of training. And every time, I would be walking to transition to set up my transition area for my triathlon I would think to myself, I hate this. 

[00:14:47] I hate this. And then when I would get done with the race, I would be like on a high and say the opposite - I love this. I totally want to do it again. As I look back at it, I did enjoy doing those races but I think what I really enjoyed was setting a goal and working towards it and then completing it and feeling good about it. But sometimes I wonder, I think that a lot of the reason that I did those so religiously was that people were so impressed by it, and it made me feel so good. 

[00:15:13] I was in such external validation-seeking mode that it fueled me. And I haven't done one since my ex and I split up - it's been seven years. So, you know, maybe I didn't really love doing them that much after all. I still run and I've done a few half marathons in recent history, but you know, the other thing that comes to mind for me is, for a while, 

[00:15:37] I would spend a lot of my time hanging out with people at a local bar. It was like a beer and wine place and I met some friends there and that's what we would do is go have drinks all the time. Was it fun? Yeah. But it wasn't really an authentic connection I had with the people. It was just a connection I had over beers. 

[00:16:00] And, you know, that’s totally fine. There's nothing wrong with that, but I wasn't out there cultivating real authentic relationships either. So those are some examples. So take a look at that. Where do you feel misaligned where doesn't it feel true to you? 

[00:16:16] I also like to really look at the things they think they don't like about themselves. And part of this work is integrating that, looking at the gifts in those things and integrating them into all of who you are and loving that too. Because you have to love the parts that are hard to love too. 

[00:16:36] You can't just pick and choose. 

There are a lot of different ways to practice this. There are a lot of great books out there, but a lot of it is self-care. A lot of it is journaling. Working on your thoughts. It's really all about shifting your energy pattern, your beliefs about

[00:16:56] yourself and the world. It's really deep work. 

[00:17:00] And like I mentioned, part of that too, is looking at those parts that you don't love so much - the parts that you find are hard to love and then working on integrating those parts and asking yourself what purpose has that piece of you served? 

[00:17:17] And can you just be with that part of you? Who is that? And what would it be like if you didn't have to worry about not being that - if it could just be there and you still love all of it. 

[00:17:29] Because really at the end of the day, 

[00:17:32] We are just beings. We're human beings. And we have all these different parts of us. It's not black and white. You know you might say,

[00:17:44] I don't want to be mean. Well, we all have mean in us. And we all have nice in us, and we might not want to be mean. But that doesn't mean you have to hate the part of you that can be mean. 

[00:17:59] So, what I'm saying is, can you be with all of that? Can you just be with all of that and accept that that is a part of you because we all have varying degrees of all different things in us. If that makes sense. 

[00:18:13] So we're not good or bad. We don't have good qualities and bad qualities. We just have qualities. They're all different.

[00:18:21] When you can love all of it, you don't have to worry about anything outside of you because you're just dealing with what's going on inside of you. 

[00:18:31] You can build the confidence that you have everything you need inside of you. There isn't anything outside that you really need to have a joyful life, a purpose-filled life. You can stop focusing on what your life looks like on the outside, and you can shift to what it feels like. And does it feel right to me? That's your compass. 

[00:18:52] You will be empowered. You're in control of how you view your life. You're in control of how you respond to things. 

[00:19:01] You're always in control of that anyway, but you'll feel it. When you're loving all of it, all of yourself, you will be in better tune with your intuition. Your intuition guides you. It's a little bit like your values guiding you. When you get quiet, when you love all of yourself,

[00:19:23] it's so much easier to tap into that intuition. It's so much easier to trust it and hear it. 

[00:19:30] There are no longer any judges when you love all of who you are. Because you're the only one you have to be enough for. That's the most beautiful part is that when you get that, you're the only one you have to be enough for. It's so freeing. You don't need to measure up or set higher and higher goals. 

[00:19:53] You do what feels true for you always. 

[00:19:56] It's like, you find your inner compass when you can love all of you. That's like your inner compass and it helps you just find your way. Because you can always go back to that. Who am I? 

[00:20:09] And when you love that you trust it. You can listen to that. You can feel your way through life. What is aligned for me? What feels good? 

[00:20:18] And all of this enables you to believe in yourself and in your dreams and this is where you get unstuck. When you believe, you trust yourself, you have faith in others. You believe it's in your power to create happiness, joy, passion, freedom. You're not embarrassed by your dreams. Some people get embarrassed when they are asked what their dreams are - they don't want to say too big of a dream because that might seem arrogant or, too much. We forget how to dream as we get older. We limit ourselves.

[00:20:48] And when you go through all of this, find your true self and love that person. You're not going to be embarrassed by your dreams. You know, they're not too big or too small. There's just going to be your dreams and they're authentic for you. So that's all that matters. 

[00:21:05] And truly you become unstoppable. Where anything is possible for you because you love all of who you are. And you believe in that person and in her dreams. So beautiful. Right? It's so beautiful. 

[00:21:19] I'm going to tell you real quickly about this four-week program that I'm offering for a limited time. 

[00:21:24] It's called Adventure to Authentic. In this program, the intention is that you're going to go from feeling stuck and exhausted from the pressure of feeling like you need to measure up or have it all together. From going through the motions and feeling like you're not living your best life, to discovering what matters the most to you,

[00:21:45] having self-confidence and belief in yourself - and in your dreams -and making happiness, freedom, purpose, and passion, a natural way of your life. It is just who you are. 

So the way it works, it's four weeks. 

Week one, we have a kickoff session where we do a deep dive into your authentic self and your values. 

[00:22:06] And then we have in weeks two and three, 45-minute coaching sessions, where we expand on that and really integrate whatever shifts you have so you can practice it and have accountability. Making it part of your life. Because sometimes that's the hardest part. 

And then week four is a celebration and wrap-up session where we also set intentions for you to move forward into your life with this new shift in how you show up. I have a limited number of these sessions available, and this is actually such a great time to get started with the holidays around the corner. 

[00:22:46] Having a coach during this time is going to help you learn what is important to you, which is so important this time of the year. It's going to help you learn to put yourself first. So your cup is always full.  We don't do that enough. We put everyone else first and then we end up exhausted and we don't have enough to give the other people in our lives. 

[00:23:06] It's going to help you manage your time in a way that's authentic to you. And it's also going to help you show up for yourself. And lots more. Huge benefits! 

So, what I want to do is chat with you about it. The call alone is going to give you so much insight. You're not going to want to miss that. We'll chat about the program, see if it's a good fit for you,

[00:23:31] and even if it's not, you're going to get so much value out of that one call and it's totally free. So go to kortneyrivard.com/lets-talk and you can sign up for a time. If you don't see a time that works for you, just contact me through my website, kortneyrivard.com/contact. 

Those are linked up in the show notes as well. 

[00:23:56] So, get in touch with me and we can talk about how you can be on your way to living a happier life. 

[00:24:06] I hope you guys have enjoyed this episode. It's something I'm really passionate about because I know that once you can really embrace who you are - and it is a journey to loving all of that person, it really is - but it's a beautiful journey and you'll find that the more that you really get to know who you are and

[00:24:26] like, and eventually love that person, your life just gets so much better and better all the time. So let's talk, get in touch with me and I'll see you again next week.