WITH ANDREA CRISP
“You can’t bring the past with you — are you going to hold on to what has not been serving you or embrace the possibility?”
About This Episode:
Don't let the fear of what could be holding you back from approaching this new year with a brand new perspective. Maybe the thought of showing up and putting yourself out there again makes you cringe. The last thing you want is to face rejection. In this episode we are going to talk about how holding onto the past is keeping you stuck, what it looks like to embrace uncertainty and create space for the possibility of now.
Transcript
Speaker 1 (00:00): The thought of starting new, always brings with it, this fresh anticipation, kind of like this hope that things could be better, but it also makes us feel a little bit uncertain about what's about to happen, the unfamiliar, how things could possibly go wrong. But you know what taking into the future, everything that we've been carrying in the past is not going to serve us any longer. So today we're going to be talking about how to let go of what was so that you can start to embrace the possibility of now
Speaker 2 (00:36): You're listening to the courage, cast a show to equip and empower women to live briefly each week. We'll share coaching conversations and stories of women who are willing to face their fear and pursue their purpose. Here's your host life coach, author, and your secret weapon
Speaker 1 (00:52): Friends! Welcome to the courage cast. My name is Andrea Crisp, and I want to wish you a happy new year. I am so glad that you joined me today, and I hope that you had a really nice holiday season wherever you are in the world, celebrating. And if you had time on your own, I hope that it was just filled with so much rest. If you were with family that you just laughed and enjoyed their company. I know sometimes the holidays can be really stressful for me. It was just a really nice time to decompress, to just take a few moments and pause, not worry about too many things and just enjoy some good food. Just enjoy spending time with my family and really kind of getting myself ready for this new year. I think it's so important for us to take that time, to actually look back at what has been and see what things worked and what didn't and how do I need to move forward in my life.
Speaker 1 (01:56): And for me, that means taking a complete break in everything that I do, and just really getting in a good Headspace. I'm all about body, soul, and spirit. And so this season for me, was really about getting in touch with how I felt in my body and processing any emotions and thoughts that I had so that I can move into the new year, just feeling refreshed and ready to go. And I'm excited about our topic today because I really think that when we are moving forward in our lives, we are taking on something new. Sometimes it can feel so uncertain and that unfamiliarity can feel like, you know, we just don't want to actually go there, but I want to encourage you that as you're moving forward in your life, and as you're taking on 2021, that this is going to be one of the best exercises for you is to really embrace the uncertainty of what could be so that you can actually open yourself up to so many more possibilities.
Speaker 1 (03:00): I want to start by asking you a question today, how are you really feeling about starting in a year? Like really? Like, how are you really, really feeling? I was starting in a year. I mean, we, we had this opportunity last year and look what happened. I mean, 2020, it was a show, but maybe you're a little bit cautiously optimistic thinking, okay. You know what we haven't started yet. So, you know, things could be a go here and you want to believe that anything and everything is possible, but maybe there is still this lingering fear in the back of your mind that what happened last year is actually going to repeat itself. And you're going to carry all the things that you were carrying around lugging around in 2020 into this new year into 2021. And it's at times like these, it's like when we get this, do over to press the restart button, when our core fears just like come up punches in the face, basically because they're front and center reminding us of where we've been, what we've been through, what we're afraid of.
Speaker 1 (04:11): And for as long as I can remember, this is the one thing that I have struggled with the most, which is my own inner critic, the ticker tape, running silently at the bottom of every narrative that I have in my life. It's basically been the bane of my existence. And it seems every new year, I am really hopeful. I am resolute, ready to go. I'm eager to start over again. And last year in January, I found myself in that exact place. Like I was so ready to start over again. I'd had a really tough year before that I had made huge transitions in my life. Some of which I was not really happy about and I needed something to kickstart me into gear. I had moved back with my parents up North. That was a huge, huge blow to my ego. I had been in a relationship, been heartbroken in the midst of it.
Speaker 1 (05:15): And I was really, really just discouraged. I would felt really defeated. I, kind of was like, you know what? I want to make an impact on people, but like, I can't even get my own life together. So the beginning of 2020, I was pretty desperate to have a do over. I was desperate because at any cost I wanted to succeed, I was not willing to have a repeat of the year before. I want to share a little story with you. Back in 2014, I had decided that it was time for me to take things up a notch in my business. So I made a pretty big investment and I thought that it was going to be the thing that helped me to really propel myself into the future. I was convinced of it. And I just knew that this is the thing that I needed.
Speaker 1 (06:10): Well, as it turned out, it actually wasn't, it was not the thing I needed. And all it did was just spin me around and around and around because I was getting all this advice that ran really contrary to everything that I believed, everything that I felt was me. And I'm okay to be pushed outside of the box and I'm okay to even be challenged and to have to change my mindsets. And I would do that all the time. I'm working constantly at trying to grow and try to become more self-aware. But these things were just like, it just wasn't me. It just didn't fit. Right. It wasn't congruent with how I felt like I needed to run my business and how I feel like I needed to be in the world. But it also was one of those times in my life where I just was like, well, I'm going to trust the experts.
Speaker 1 (07:02): They know what they're doing. They're making a lot of money. They must have, you know, something I don't, they must know more than I do. And often the cases people in those industries, they do, they know a lot more, but what ended up happening was for years, I was trying to fit a round peg into a square hole. I was trying to do all of the things that they told me to do. And it was bumping up against obstacle after obstacle, after obstacle, the so frustrated, just constantly feeling like I was not being myself. Like I wasn't showing up as the person who I knew I was, and I just thought, this is the way that it needs to happen. And this is the way I'm going to do it. And I would get frustrated when I wasn't invited to do certain things and I would get really discouraged because I wasn't making the money that I wanted to make.
Speaker 1 (07:58): And I probably wanted to pull the plug every month. Like it was that bad. It was, I can't even believe that I lasted as long as I've lasted because I was just that frustrated all the time. And I would have never really let on to people because that would admit that would be admitting defeat admitting failure in my mind, which was basically the worst thing I could admit. Cause I would be wrong. I would have, you know, not met the standard. And that is my core fear, not being right, not doing the right thing. All I wanted to do was follow the rules and to get it right. And it took those years that hardship to lead me to a place of where I am today. And it took me all of that time because fast forward a bit to, you know, 2020 when I'm ready to make a shift in my life.
Speaker 1 (09:01): And all of a sudden I'm clicking along, I'm grinding it out in, in March of 2020 COVID hits and things just spiraled out of control. And I thought I had a pretty good grasp on things. I thought I was handling it really well. I mean, I had gone through so many things. Like I could totally handle this, but at the end of the day, I was so, so discouraged by the summer that I just honestly felt like, you know what? I can't do this anymore. I just can't do it. I can't try and be the thing that they've told me to be. I can't execute the way they want me to execute. And I'm really, really exhausted. I had a phone call with my friend Sherry. She spoke some pretty tough truth to me that day. And it turned everything around because I started to realize that it was in that moment that my mindset had been so fixed on my fears on things that weren't happening on things that could possibly go wrong, that I was not able to possibly see what could the future could hold.
Speaker 1 (10:18): I could not possibly envision the potential that I had. I was having such a hard time even trying to help myself that I thought there's no way I can even help anybody else. And that's when everything changed for me because I started down a journey to reframe my mindsets. And at first it was a simple app that I downloaded onto my phone and an hour every morning I sat down and I started doing the mindset work. And I drew from all of the things that I had read and known. And I probably got in about 30 days when I started to realize that, you know what I do need help. This is not something that I can do on my own, but it's going to cost me something. And I was really afraid of that because I had paid a lot of money for some bad advice years before that, that had gotten me to this place now.
Speaker 1 (11:16): And then I was going to go and pay someone else money to help me get out of it. And that seemed like the worst idea ever. But I had to trust my gut instinct and I had done some mindset work at that point. And I started to invest in myself again this time I was more mindful about who I chose as my coach. And I wanted to make sure I was super aligned with where she was going in her business so that I knew that I would be aligned in mind. And maybe you can see yourself in that. Maybe you can see yourself in that same position that I found myself in back in the end of the summer last year, maybe you're like me, you're holding on to things that didn't happen. You're holding onto frustration and loss and grief. And you're finding a really, really hard to let go of the past because you've invested so much into it.
Speaker 1 (12:19): Whether it's time, resources, relationally, maybe you just feel like so discouraged and depleted. And it's hard for you to acknowledge that it's hard for you to say, you know what, that's where I am because people don't see that of me. So why would I want to acknowledge that and say that I need help. I need someone to come alongside me. And the thought of actually putting yourself out there, like showing up, like as you know, someone who is experiencing difficulty, like being authentic about that part of you really scares you because you're still stuck in the need for people to approve of you to say, yeah, you belong here. Yeah. Your message is something we need to hear. Yeah. You should put that out into the world. And you want the nod from someone to validate that what you're doing is good, that it's right, that it's worthy.
Speaker 1 (13:19): And maybe you're sitting on all sorts of dreams. Maybe you're sitting on dreams to launch a business, to launch your platform, to put your gift into the world, whether it's music or art or film anything. And you really know deep, deep, deep down that you want to impact people and you want a bigger stage and bigger platform. And yet you're having a hard time being honest with yourself. And you're having a hard time, not only being honest with yourself, but then how in the world could you ever be vulnerable and authentic on a platform like social media and then even have a bigger platform? Like, do you see what I'm saying here? Like when you cannot be honest with yourself, how can you really truly be honest with the people you want to impact? It just doesn't happen that way. And you're caught between wanting to do all the things to grind it, to hustle, to like do all the things, to make it happen.
Speaker 1 (14:19): And on the other side of that, the flip side is like, you're like, I'm done. I want to quit. It's over. I can't do it anymore. Because when you're in that place, when you're in that spin cycle of trying and trying and trying, the harder that you try, the worst things get. And so that's when the debt mounts that's when you feel like abundance is a foreign concept, you're like, yeah, you know, don't talk to me about abundance because I have no idea what that even looks like. I'm, I'm trying to hard to even pay my bills, you know, get out of debt, do all the things that I needed to do. You feel lost, you feel stuck, you feel isolated and it's time for you to let go of what has been so that you can embrace the possibility of what is now.
Speaker 1 (15:08): And it starts by getting really honest with yourself. That's where I was at. And a really, really honest with myself. And I had to start with letting go of my need to control everything. And that was the biggest thing, because if I was in control, then I didn't need any help. And the truth of the matter was I actually did need help. I needed the support. I needed someone to come alongside me and guide me through the process. So that meant hiring a coach that meant actually allowing her to point out my blind spots. And it meant working on the beliefs that were no longer serving me, things that I had clung to for a really long time, that just didn't matter anymore. Just weren't relevant. You know, didn't need to go forward with me. But some of those things I had, you know, been carrying for so long that I didn't know, I even needed to let them go. And I needed someone to point it out to me and say, Andrea, like you, you don't have to carry that around anymore.
Speaker 1 (16:15): And when you're in the process of really addressing that core fear, when you're in that process, it looks a lot like getting honest, it looks a lot like working through those mindsets, getting the healing that you need so that you can be fully restored, able, ready to move forward, able to be honest, authentic, and put yourself out there into the world to say yes, to things that really truly light you up and then say no to things that are just not serving you anymore, that don't serve your business. That don't serve your vision, that don't serve the impact that you want to make. And it becomes very, very clear what you need to do because you're really in alignment with where you need to go.
Speaker 1 (17:05): It's a rebuilding process. It's like creating this open, expansive space so that the new things can come in, that you can attract those things into your life. And that you are just ready to receive that, which is coming things that are good things that are really going to move you in the direction you want to go. And the best part about it is that when you actually get to that place, when you're actually in that place of transformation, it's like all of a sudden, it doesn't matter what anybody else thinks. These you're happy with who you are. You don't need people to make you feel worthy and valuable because you have that innate value and worthiness inside of you. You know what you have to offer the world.
Speaker 1 (18:00): It's a friend. Maybe that is where you find yourself right now at the beginning of 2021. Maybe you can totally see yourself in everything that I've said in, in the story that I've shared. I talked about the transformation that I went through. So it was a period of time where not only did I hire a coach, but then I hired another coach. And I hired a therapist because I realized that I was just kind of coming undone. And there were so many things that felt unsettled in my life. And I really did the work like beyond getting coached. I did the work on my own. I was doing the mindset work, the transformation process, and I was digging deep, deep, deep so that I could reframe those negative mindsets, those things that I was fearful of, the things that I had been holding onto for a really long time, because it is possible for you to step into alignment, to step into your full purpose and potential.
Speaker 1 (19:12): And if you have the support that you need to make those changes, you are going to feel aligned. You are going to be able to know that someone is there to help you to find those blind spots, to indicate to you when things need to stay or to go, to help you to sort through all of that stuff. And you will no longer be facing all of this uncertainty feeling like the unknown is so scary because you will have a handle on all of it and say, you know what? It doesn't matter if things are uncertain, it doesn't matter. Things are unknown because I am embracing the possibility of what is to come because I'm not holding onto what was, you can start to define what success looks like to you now, moving forward, it doesn't have to be what it was before. It can be on your own terms and you will find your true value and worth in what you're doing in who you are and how you are being in the world.
Speaker 1 (20:16): And not only will you find it, but you'll speak it, you'll share it. You'll impact people. You'll be able to courageously stand up and share where you've been. This is my transformation, and this is what's happened in my life. And this is what can happen in yours too. And let me tell you a friend, working from a place like that, being able to help people at that level is going to be what makes you stand out from everyone else. So it's time to let go of the past. It is time for you to grieve what was acknowledge, who you are today. Even if that person is so imperfect and not who you thought you were going to be. That's okay. Got to let it go. You got to forgive yourself for where you've been. You got to forgive others for maybe wounding you along the way, embrace the uncertainty and the unknown that's coming.
Speaker 1 (21:21): It's okay. Uncertainty is not a bad thing. It just needs to be embraced. And then open up, create that space for expectancy and hope. It'll bring in fresh ideas, collaborations, and so many, many beautiful things into your life. So I want to leave you with this one thing with this one question, because you cannot bring the past with you. So are you going to hold on to what has not been serving you or are you going to embrace the possibility of what is to come friend? I'd love to continue this conversation with you, and if you're ready to truly step into alignment, to transform who you are so that you can impact people on a greater level, in a place of vulnerability and authenticity. I want to encourage you to reach out and set up a 30 minute call with me. Let's work some things out and see how you can get moving in the direction that you want to go.
Speaker 1 (22:37): Don't delay. Don't wait. It's time for you to actually get the support that you need so that you can see the blind spots that maybe you've been missing along the way. Just go to my website, Andrew, crisp.ca Ford slash schedule. Well, I'm so glad that you are hanging out with me today. It was so good to start the new year off with you. And, we've got some great episodes coming up next week. We're going to be talking about how to overcome those core fears and how they may be limiting you as you're moving towards putting yourself out there in the world. Whether that's through speaking, through coaching, through performance and whatever area that you are actually using your gifts. Sometimes those limitations can really hold us back. If we haven't already connected, make sure that you follow me on Instagram at Andrea crisp coach or at, at the dot courage cast. And of course I'm on Facebook as well. So I'd love to have a conversation with you there and connect with you and I'm excited next week. So make sure you tune in until next time. Remember you have everything you need to live bravely.
Speaker 2 (23:53): If you like this episode of the courage guests, we'd love to hear from you, leave us a rating and review, and while you're there hit subscribe. So you never miss an episode, original music and production by Stephen Crilly.
Listen Here:
Your mindset is your greatest asset! But it is also what may be holding you back from taking that next step in your life. Are you ready to reframe your mindset so that you can step more confidently into your purpose?