BRAVE ENOUGH To Let Go and Be Anyone You Want To Be (after all...you're over 50)
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So, if you could be anything, anyone you wanted to be, who would you be? Gives you a kind of a pause, doesn't it? We've been talking about a sweet life about living that life that absolutely fills you up and overflows your heart inside. To live this kind of life is actually very simple because it's really only comprised of two things. A simple life is about who you are - that's your identity. It's how see yourself. And then another major part of living that simple life, that sweet life, is how you see others, because that has a major bearing on the decisions you make. And life is about decisions. So do you, you see others who are walking their paths beside you as your allies or as your comrades, as your partners, or do you see them as out to get you? These things are big clues about how we see life and how our lives are going to turn out.
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Sadly. So many people never really think about this. They hide from it. It's too frightening for them to actually face the answers to the questions that are difficult to answer such as who am I really? And how do I see others? In the last podcast we talked about how you see yourself, the different sides of you. As you are a heart walking a path. Just You.
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You are born into this world as an individual and you will leave this world as an individual. In between those two points in time, you are making all kinds of decisions about who you are going to be. And you have to ask yourself the question, ultimately, who do I want to be? Who do I want to be in all of these roles, all of these sides that I have in life as a mom, as a woman, as a wife, as a future wife, as a business owner, or a career woman. Who am I in each of these roles?
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Who do I want to be? And I hope you filled in those columns. The second one being - the first one the role - the second one who am I right now? How do I see myself? And the third column being, how do I want to be? Who do I want to be?
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When I was going through my divorce? So between my separation and meeting my most amazing night and shining armor, I did so much work on my identity. I searched and searched for the way to get through that time and come out, ultimately, with a love that I loved as my goal. I came across this picture, this metaphor of being on a bridge. And I happen to love being in the park here in the city where I live. And I took one of those bridges and claimed it as my own.
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Now, the way it worked was - as I walked across the bridge, I was seeing the steps that I needed to take to get to the other side. The outcome. And the exercise was to walk across that bridge, take the steps and, and then stand on the other side and see yourself in the life that you wanted to live. Now, in my case, I was visualizing the love that I wanted and the most amazing thing happened. I would go back there over and over and do this again whenever I felt discouraged, whenever I was feeling as if I was never going to reach that goal, whenever I had setbacks, I went back to that bridge and I walked back over it.
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One day, someone had posted this little tiny red heart. It was a sticky that they had put on the pillar at the end of the bridge and my eyes caught it right away. And it was the most amazing moment because it was like, wow, that's what I want. I want 'heart' in my life. I wanna love from my heart. I want to have my life and love filled to the point where I am living that Sweet Life where I feel as if I'm safe and secure and significant and connected. That's what that heart represented to me.
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Now another thing that was at the end of the bridge I chose was this museum with all of these buildings in them. And they were just on the other side of a fence. And what the building was that I could see from the end of the bridge was a chapel. And I kept that in mind because I wanted to be married again. And I wanted to be married in a love that was incredible. So I would walk over my bridge, imagine the steps, and then I would be there on the other side and I would imagine having the outcome that I was visualizing.
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I want you to imagine a bridge, a beautiful bridge, the best in your imagination that you can come up with. Is it in a park? Is it in a garden? And you're standing there at the beginning of this beautiful bridge. Your bridge, your design. This is about your life. Now I want you to start walking. Imagine walking over that bridge. And you're seeing all the, the beauty around you, maybe hearing the bubbling water in a canal, a stream beneath the bridge feeling a bit of breeze on your face. It's a beautiful walk. And you're walking over that bridge step by step. Each one of those steps is a step forward from today.
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When you walk, when you're standing at the beginning of that bridge, that is today in time, this moment that you and I are talking right now. Now you're going to take a step. Step by step over that bridge. And each step takes you closer to your outcome. Now, when you reach the other side, you have reached your picture of how you want your life to be. Who you want to be in your life. It's your end result. This is you as a woman.
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I want you to imagine you as all you want to be. Every side of you is aligned. You are so full of love and courage and proud of who you have become. You feel so much peace inside - safe, strong. You respect yourself. And you have this sense of being a Warrior who has walked through the battle and done her best. Maybe she hasn't done it all perfectly, but she has learned from everything she has been through. She is you at your most confident, being totally who she is, being grateful and amazed at who she has become.
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Now for a moment, you just turn on, you look back and you see the steps over the bridge. You see where you have come from. The decisions that you've made when the bombs went off in your life and absolutely devastated you. Or when the boulders fell on you and left you flat and heavy for a time. You see the decisions that you made to move yourself forward after that. You see the rocks that others may have thrown at you to knock you off your bridge or to pull you off your bridge or to try to bring you off your bridge onto theirs, to walk with them on their bridge which was not your bridge at all. You see the decisions that you made to stay true to your own path over that bridge.
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You see that you have left a legacy. What is that legacy? What is it about? How you have lived in ways that tell your kids or your friends or your family or your coworkers coming behind you how to stay true to who they are, who they're meant to be? What is the legacy that you have left?
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Now I want you to look at the woman who stands so proudly, so confidently, so serenely at the other side of her bridge. Imagine her. Sense, her. Feel her. I'm going to ask you three questions about her. The first one: How does she hold herself? Is her head high? Is she tall and straight? Or is she hunched over? Are her eyes down or are they up looking directly at you?
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Does she give off this sense of strength or does she live in fear? Do you get a sense of fear coming from her? Does she look old and defeated or does she emanate youth, a glow from being in her Sweet Life? The 2nd question: What kind of words does she use? How does she talk to herself? Does she use words of love and permission to make mistakes? Or does she beat herself up all the time?
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How does she speak to others? Does she talk to them as if she actually sees their hearts - that they are a growing person who are also trying to find their way in life? Or does she talk to them as if they can't do anything right? What kind of language does she use?
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The third thing is w:hat does this woman believe? Is she so grateful for how every situation in her life that was difficult has made her better, has grown her or does she believe that life has been cruel to her? Does she stand on high values and high standards or does she kind of sink into this bitter picture that says life wasn't meant to turn out like this? It has given me a raw deal. What does she believe? What does she stand on?
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You know what I want you to do? I want you to think through these three things. How does this woman look? What sense does she give off just by her presence? Secondly, what words does she use? How does she talk to herself and to others? And third, what does she believe? What does she live by? What does she focus on? I want you to write those things down. Just briefly. Just make a little list of who this woman is.
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She's the woman at the end of your bridge, the outcome, the person that you want to be. Write down her qualities. Write down how she feels to be there at the outcome, to have arrived at that Sweet Life where she can bring herself back there anytime she wants to, nomatter what's going on around her. She makes the decisions. She holds the key for her own heart.
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She's beautiful from the inside out. She's strong from the inside out. Open to life, fearlessly, loving, true to herself. She has mastered the S.O.F.T. & Strong and every morning for this next while I want you - in fact, it would be amazing to make this - build this in as a new ritual for yourself every morning - read through that list until it's absolutely in your memory.
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I want you to visit her. I want you to imagine walking over that bridge and reaching that outcome to meet that woman that you want to be when you have gotten over that bridge.
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Now, what we're going to talk about in the next podcast is how you can go from today, at the beginning of this bridge, and begin to take steps toward decisions that you make, attitudes that you refine, how you face the hard stuff in life in order to become and end up as that woman. And she's gonna show up earlier than you can imagined. So don't think that it's a long journey. It's really not. The bridge is not a long bridge.
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Okay. Enough for today. Join me to start talking about the steps in the next podcast. And I am so delighted to be here with you. I will talk to you next time.
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I'm Bernice McDonald and I'm a Mindset Coach. I help women beyond 50 who are seeing their dreams disappearing off into the distance as they age and feeling the fear of inevitably becoming invisible.
Together we identify their vision, break through the wall of fear and past stories to develop a plan that shifts their eyes to a much more exciting focus other than "getting old". It's exciting to see them step into their purpose, find the courage to make those bold decisions and, best of all, begin to fully love this next phase, embracing the rest of life instead of missing out. Meet with me to set up your Personal Aging Beautifully Plan (free with no obligation)