Ep 178 Birthday Reflections & Coaching Concepts

Join me today as I reflect back over the years and share some lessons learned around coaching concepts.  The lessons I’m sharing are around what we discuss here each week – ways to improve your work-life integration so you can excel in your career, without the stress and overwhelm so you can do more of what you want.  Listen today as we have a little fun.

In This Episode:

• Birthday lessons over the years
• Self Awareness
• Naming the podcast 
• Brendon Burchard – It’s Your Time
• Darren Hardy – The Compound Effect
• Perfection vs progress
• Corinne Crabtree – control your time 
• Alanis Morrissette Jagged Little Pill
• Prioritizing self care

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Episode Transcript:

You are listening to the it’s your time podcast and I’m your host certified life coach Michelle Arnold Burke, and today’s episode, I’m discussing birthday reflections and coaching concepts. Welcome to the it’s your time Podcast, the podcast where busy professionals like you get the practical solutions and support you need to gain control of your schedule. So you can strive to be the best in your career, but without the stress and overwhelm. If you’re looking to increase your energy and decrease your stress, you are in the right place. Hello, hello, hello. Welcome back to the podcast friends. If you are new here, welcome. Today is an especially fun day to get started. Because today, it’s my birthday. It’s funny, back in the day, I remember thinking 30 was so old. That really was a tough year for me. And now, many years later 18. In fact, I think 30 is so young, funny how those thoughts can change. Right. So today, I wanted to have a little fun with our discussion. Well, let’s face it every week, I like to have some fun. I mean, what’s the point of doing this if we’re not having fun, right. But today, I wanted to share some lessons that over the years. And don’t worry, don’t leave just yet. I’m not going back the full 48 years. But I did want to reflect on some things that I’ve learned. Or perhaps should I say what I think my most current self believes to be true. And by the way, this might be fun for you to kind of check back on what that was for you last year. And think about how much you have changed. And then also look forward to next year. And think about how you want to be different from that day. And this day, what has changed. And I especially want to chat about things that have to do with what we talk about here, or what I see in my clients in order to be able to improve work life integration, and be able to excel in your career without the stress and overwhelm, so that you really can do more of what you want. And I think the best place to start is around the idea of the name of this podcast. It’s your time. I recently heard Brendon Bouchard talking about this. And I was like, hey, that’s exactly what I was thinking when I named it. It’s your time meaning a couple of things. Actually. It’s your time. Like you control it. I have to tell you, I think knowing this has been a life changer for me for sure. Because for years, and this may be you. I thought work controlled my life. I thought I had no time to do what I wanted. And I thought even if I tried to plan things work always seem to change. And people around me would agree with that story. They totally bought in to how crazy the schedule was, until I started coaching. And it was finally Corinne Crabtree, who is an amazing coach, she pretty much just had no belief in my limited belief. And I finally saw how I control. And actually, it’s not just me, you as well. We all control everything about our time. And knowing that is so much more empowering than thinking that you have no control over your time, and you can’t do anything you want. And that is the beauty of having a coach someone who can, number one, have more belief than you have in yourself and also show you where your blind spots are, like be able to point out what your limiting beliefs are, which ultimately allows you to see it and decide if you want to make changes, which ultimately will change your life. Now. In line with that. It’s your time also means it’s your time to make those changes that you most desire. Listen, there is no better time. Right? And also, you do have the time. You just have to prioritize yourself so often. I hear people telling me, I don’t have time to do that. You do. We all have 24 hours in a day. It’s all made up right time is a mental construct. Think about it. We just jumped the clocks ahead an hour just because of some old farmer’s wives tale I think I’m not even sure You do have the time you have to prioritize yourself, which leads me to the next lesson of prioritizing yourself. It is not selfish to prioritize your self. In fact, it’s what keeps everyone else thriving. Think of the airline role, right? Put your mask on first, there is a reason for that, you know, and it’s the same as life. If you are currently in that place where you feel like you have to give, give, give, and you’re overwhelmed, and stressed, maybe short, perhaps resentful. I want you to know, it does not have to be that way. It gets to be easy. And everything can change. Now, you just have to know what that is. What is it that you actually want to change? And who do you need to become? In order to bring about that change? What you need to do is give yourself a little bit of time to really reflect on that question. What do you want in life? So often, you’re busy running, running, running, giving, giving, giving, that you don’t even allow yourself the time to consider that. Give yourself the gift, take a little bit of time and ask yourself, Is this what I want? What is it that I do want? And that alone could be a game changer. Okay, next lesson up, I have to tell you, I’m going back to like the 90s with some connection here that I’m going to make. And I’ll be honest, it was inspired by us last night watching the Alanis Morissette documentary on HBO max which by the way, if you’re interested, totally recommend it. It was so good. I was shall we say obsessed back in the day with Jagged Little Pill and if I’m being honest, some might say obnoxiously obsessed. But hey, that’s a side note of a lesson right? Self awareness. When more of us increase levels of self awareness, holy smokes, the changes that could take place. But back to the music. I loved, ironic, loved, loved, loved it, let’s just say imagine jukebox disco ball bar fun. And oh, what I would tell my 20 Something self about that. But that’s not the song I’m going to be talking about today, I shall spare you that it’s probably better to leave some of those stories back in the 90s. But I do want to touch on two others that she was talking about in the documentary. And the first one up, that I think so many of us can relate to? Is her song Perfect. Just listen to some of the lyrics. Be a good girl, you’ve got to try a little harder. That simply wasn’t good enough to make us proud. How many of you tell yourself things like this still, in the 2020s you are doing enough, you are good enough. And you tell yourself that you’re making yourself proud. There is no such thing as perfection. In fact, what I’ve learned about perfection is that it’s basically a fancy word for procrastination, we think we need to keep trying harder, or wait until we have it all figured out before we actually take on a new adventure before we actually take action towards our next big goal. And then when we’re just waiting, we are actually failing in advance by not doing anything. And we end up feeling stuck or like there’s something more to be had in life, and we just can’t quite figure it out. Progress friend. It’s all about small changes over time. And Darren Hardy talks about this. And the compound effect. You can read his book, or check out YouTube with him or I even have an older podcast where I discussed his book, The compound effect. And I feel like this has been a concept that has helped me so much over the last five years. Just start making small changes. And then you make another small change on top of that. And then you make another small change on top of that and you will see your next year around the sun will be so much different than what you could ever imagine. So drop perfection. And let’s strive for progress and let it be messy. That’s where the magic often is. Okay, next song up, don’t worry, I’m not going to go through the entire album. But I do think another concept to look at comes up in her song hand in my pocket. Well, at least she talked about this in her documentary, that basically, you can hold two things to be true. And so often, I feel like, especially these days, we think things are black and white, right? There’s not much gray, you are either this, or that, you think you have to decide to have this, or that when in fact, you can use the word. And way more often, you can be this and that, you can have this and that. And I’ve been talking a lot about this lately, substituting the word and over, or what more could you bring to your life, if you believed you could, for example, still excel in your career, and have less stress and overwhelm and be able to do more of what you want. And actually, like your job, I think I end up getting most people to coach right around the time when they are at their wit’s end, they just cannot stay on their job anymore. And they want to be able to like it. You just don’t know how. And I can help. Another example of and, or the concept of holding two things to be true at once is that you can hold grief in your life and be grateful for all that you have. Emotions are like waves, they come and go. We get to experience all of it in life. It’s 5050 That is the human experience of it all. I think what’s important to remember at the end of the day, each day, in fact, is the chorus of this song. And what it all comes down to my friends. Yeah, is that everything is just fine, fine, fine. Remind yourself of that. When we know we will be fine. We don’t have to argue with the reality of what is going on. And from there, we can decide what we want to do next in life. That’s where the fun is. Okay, friends, I could talk about so much more but you know, I like to keep it short and respect of your time. And remember, everything will be fine fine, fine. Thank you so much for being here and doing this thing called life with me. I so appreciate you tuning in each week. Okay, that’s what I have for you today. Let’s circle back next week but for now, make it a great day. Take care