When it comes to success, it can be so easy to get caught up in trying to look for validation from the world. However, true success—one that makes you feel fulfilled and happy—is about that inward journey. Rebecca Victor’s guest in this episode is someone who has been walking through that. She sits down with internationally known thought leader, innovative CEO, and mentor coach, Wendy Y. Bailey. Here, WendyY shares with us her inward journey towards finding that gift of transparency that has allowed her to thrive with mental illness, using her platforms to speak about it so that people aren’t afraid or concerned. She dives deep into what she calls her breakthrough strategy, highlighting the power of resilience to who you are and how you show up in your life and business. Moving towards the inward journey has changed not only WendyY’s life but those around her. It’s time you do too. Follow this conversation to learn how to start yours.

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Listen to the podcast here:

Tapping into Your Emerging Genius – Thriving with Mental Illness

I am happy to be here with you and to introduce you to a friend of mine and a colleague, Wendy Y. Bailey. She has been called a force of nature and a trendsetter in the coaching industry because of her fearless approach to innovation. WendyY has been supporting entrepreneurs, coaches, speakers, trainers and consultants for more than eighteen years. She’s a bestselling author, sought-after coach, and sales speaker for her fierce and dynamic dedication to inspiring individuals, groups and organizations to create extraordinary results. She’s affectionately called WendyY by her clients, business associates and colleagues. She is an internationally known thought leader and has made a global impact in coaching as an innovative mentor coach serving across the US and in countries like the United Kingdom and Italy. She has also been honored as the Top Influencer for 2020 by Success Women’s Conference. Without further ado, I’m going to welcome my friend and colleague, Wendy Y. Bailey. How are you?

I’m great, Rebecca. Thank you so much for that wonderful introduction and for having me on your show.

It is a pleasure and a joy. I’m excited to introduce you to everyone and let them have an opportunity to know you in the ways that I have known you and learn from you. Part of the process that we’re talking about is getting an opportunity for people to hear different stories, different ways that people have experienced this inward journey because it’s unique for all of us. When I think about the inward journey, I would like to find out from you a little bit about you, and how turning within for guidance and understanding has helped you.

It’s a great story that I love sharing because I know it helps people when I share it. The big story for me is I’ve been in my business for more than eighteen years. Time is ticking and truly moving. The thing that I know based on where I am today is I’m not where I was many years ago. I’m not the person that I was. I’m not the coach that I was. I’ve just grown a lot. The biggest area of growth for me is transparency. In my twenties, I was diagnosed with major depressive disorder. What most people don’t know is that’s the category that the mental health community gives you.

That’s the diagnosis when they can’t assign your mental illness to substance abuse, trauma or a tragedy. They know in order to treat you, they’ve got to find the right chemical combination. It is a chemical imbalance. When I’m on the right meds and I’m where I need to be, and when the chemicals are playing well with my brain and my body, I can soar. Over the last several years, I’ve been through a lot around my major depressive disorder. I’ve learned to thrive while dealing with that mental illness in a way that I’m able to be transparent about it. Up until 2015, I was not telling people about it. I was ashamed, embarrassed, and afraid.

I remember years ago, I was working on a project with another coach and colleague. We were working so closely together. When I had to miss a meeting and when we met again, I said, “Let me make sure I let you know what’s going on.” I used the word suffer back then. When I told him that I suffered from it, he said, “WendyY, I’m so sorry.” I thought, “What did I tell him? What’s the reason that he reacted that way?” It was beyond compassion. It felt like pity. I went, “Why did he say something like that to me?” It caused me to go back to my closet and not share it with anyone for a couple of more years.

At the end of 2014, I had a full hysterectomy. At the time, I was trying to get that chemical cocktail together with my doctor. We had not found the right combination. For me to be in the space of having that, not being at a place where I was okay, but then to add the hormonal hill that the hysterectomy took me through was problematic for me. I went into a hormonal hell and the depression was even greater. I changed doctors and the new doctor looked at everything that I had ever taken. She said, “Let’s try this old generation medication.” When she did, I started to soar and I have not looked back.

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That was the middle of 2015, the end of 2015. I symbolically closed the doors of my business that I had served in for 13.5 years at that point. I opened a whole new brand and started working in that brand. That’s the brand that you see now as Business Beyond Limits. The cool thing about being in this new brand, this new business for me was it gave me an opportunity to be fully transparent, and no longer feel the shame and the embarrassment or hide the fact that I had a mental illness. The reason and how it came about is an interesting story to me. I was listening to a speaker for this women’s speaker’s organization that I was part of. They had promoted her as someone who had this deep, dark secret.

When she disclosed her secret, she’s been able to create a speaking empire as a result. I thought, “Let me check her out. I wonder what her secret is.” The secret was that she had contracted herpes in her twenties and she disclosed it. Once she disclosed it, she became the figurehead for people suffering from herpes or people who had herpes. That elevated her speaking empire in a way that she was in demand. One of the things that I asked the question after I listened to her and thought, “I’m sure that was tough for her. Maybe that was difficult or whatever, but let me ask her this, when did you know it was time to share your story?” Keep in mind that I was at a point where I was thinking something needed to happen. I was starting to believe that maybe it was time for me to share my story to be transparent.

I asked her, when did she know it was time to share her story? What she said to me is something I’ll never forget, “When your desire to heal is greater than your fear, then you’ll share your story. It’s the right time for you.” That hit home for me like you would not believe. I was like, “I’m ready to heal. I don’t want to be afraid anymore. I don’t want to be ashamed or embarrassed. I want people to know that despite mental illness, I’m amazing, professional, and extraordinary in what I do in my business, and who I am as a woman.” It opened the doors for me to so much to release all of that.

For me, the gift of transparency has opened doors. I haven’t become an advocate for all people living with mental illness, but I definitely consider myself as someone who thrives with mental illness. I’ve been able to use some of my platforms to talk about mental illness so that people aren’t afraid or concerned. When people think of mental illness, they always get scared for whatever reason, “That means they’re crazy.” No. Mental illness can show up in a lot of different ways. I had the opportunity to assemble a panel of people who have a mental illness. It will be coming out in 2021 for Mental Health Awareness Month.

There are people on there from my son who has attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder to someone who suffers from bipolar, someone who also deals with depression, but in a different way than I do, and a young man who’s on the autism spectrum. I also talk with another young man who suffers from depression in his own way, and a woman who lost her husband to suicide only to learn that she was suffering from depression as well. It was the close panel in terms of our ability to talk about and disclose what our experiences were. In that regard, I feel like I am an advocate for people with mental illness. The thing that it has done for me more than anything is it has given me a sense of freedom. I feel liberated to do what I do every day at such a high level, and to add such high value to my clients in spite of what many would see as a deficiency. That’s a big one for me. The transparency of my journey has been powerful.

It’s also the idea of seeing a situation, and being able to choose how you want to see your situation. To see the gifts, the blessings, the power that there is in it for what you do and what you bring. That’s what I’m hearing. Is that accurate?

That’s totally accurate. When you have any kind of illness, and I have some others that I’m encountering too, but if you’ve been whole for a long time, when you experience illness, no matter what type of illness you feel like there’s a part of you that is lacking in some way. It doesn’t matter what type of illness it is. You feel like there’s something lacking or something going on that doesn’t make you good enough. What I realized, it seems to be a theme for me throughout my business, was when I’ve had ebbs and flows, the ebbs were about me forgetting who I am, that I’m good enough, and recognizing that I’m amazing and wonderful.

'The only way to get over whatever it is you're dealing with is to go through it.' Click To Tweet

It’s that deficit feeling, and because of the long experience I have with addressing illness in my business, and finding my way back from whatever situations I’ve had. Those were not necessarily disease related or illness related. The ebbs and flows, the downside to things that you forget that you do belong, you are enough and amazing. I call it my breakthrough strategy and it’s what I talk to my clients about too, what I’ve learned is that the power of resilience always adds more value to who you are and how you show up in your life and in your business. When you can fight back, come back, and restore your space and place in the world, then you’re always going to be good enough. You’re always going to be amazing, wonderful, and whole may have a different meaning but you’re still whole.

It’s wholeness with a different flavor. Everybody’s whole with a different flavor. How was it that you began to turn inward? Was it a result of the illness that you were working with? What was it that helped you turn inward for guidance?

My inward turn started very early in my coaching business. I’m saying that but I think it was even before then. I was watching something. I was a part of an experience yesterday, and there were 40, 50 people there. One of the people said, “My life changed when I read Psycho-Cybernetics.” I went, “I read that when I was seventeen years old, you read that book?” In terms of turning inward, that was one of the first times that I realized that there was something that I could tap into the inside of me to make a change or to be who I wanted to be in the world. I said early in my coaching business, but everything that I’ve ever done has brought me to a place of understanding the value of turning inward.

When some tragedy or some difficult situation has happened in my life, I’ve been like, “Let me get myself together around it.” I went through Corporate America. I was battered and bruised in Corporate America by a predominantly white male industry that I was in. I’ve had some bumps and bruises. I won’t get into all of the stories, but turning inward is what I’ve known young like in my teen years, that I needed to do, that I had to do if I want it to move through whatever the situation was. Looking back, I know now that I had a low-grade depression even as a teenager.

I wasn’t suicidal, but I was much a loner even though I’m very social. I’ve been much an extrovert all of my life. Turning in by doing something like reading Psycho-Cybernetics was me looking inward and saying, “This book has opened my eyes to what I can do, who I can be, and how I need to respond to things.” I remember in the ’80s, I was in a direct sales organization. I was in the top five in the country. That experience of being in the top five helped me to know that, “There’s something that I can put my hands to and it can spell success for me.” Being able to recognize that I was inside-out living versus outside-in living, it wasn’t the stuff happening to me. It was me being able to choose in a way that lays out a path for me of ease, grace, resourcefulness, resilience, and everything that comes with life. I’ve looked inward for a long time.

It’s been a big part of your life.

The whole idea of transparency happened in the last several years.

 

When you think about your inward journey, what has been the easiest or the most difficult for you around your journey?

I just described the most difficult.

This was working with mental illness or moving through that process, and owning who you are. 

Owning who I am, being part of who I am, disclosing it, sharing it, and knowing that me sharing it can help other people. That’s probably been the hardest part for me. In terms of the easiest part, it’s been being able to recognize at different times in my life and in my business, when I put my hands to something, I can make a change. Many people go through life and they think, “This is what happened to me, that happened to me, and the other thing happened to me.” The reality is it’s not what happens to you. It’s how you respond to things that happen in your life that gives you the power to move through.

I read a quote that said, “The only way to get over whatever it is you’re dealing with is to go through it.” Going through it, you learn the lessons that will continue to give you the gifts that you need to continue going through the next thing, or going through whatever else you’re going to face in your life in business. The opportunities to learn the lessons have been wonderful for me. I feel like I’ve lived and will continue to live a rich life because that’s how I look at it. Everything is a gift, and recognizing the gifts makes such a difference.

That’s a powerful choice to see things as a gift, to see the gifts that they bring, and then what you’re able to do because you see it as a gift. You can stand up and create and be part of a group of people who value one another. As you’re sharing and talking about all the different experiences, you’ve had as a result of mental illness. There’s so much we don’t even know about who we are. There are better words that we can use to identify the uniqueness of each of us.

What you’re looking for is recognizing that there’s not a deficiency because from my perspective, for a long time, I thought that meant I was somehow deficient. I wasn’t whole. The beauty of the lessons that I’ve learned through all of my experiences, not just in the past several years but in my life, is understanding that you either learn and grow, or you to continue to learn. It’s not a failure. You learn or you grow. I was in an argument with my sister. I’m the youngest of four, and I have two sisters and one brother. The sister that’s closest to me in age, we were arguing about something.

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She said, “You’re the same person you were ten years ago.” I just said to her, “No, I’m not. I’m not the same person that I was ten years ago, are you?” She said, “I like to think I am.” I said, “I feel sorry for you because that means you’re not growing.” When you have experiences and you pull from those experiences the lessons along the way, then you are creating the right kind of circumstance and environment for growth. If you continue doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result, that’s the definition of insanity.

If you were taking the lessons and applying them and your responses are different, then all of a sudden, before you know it, you’ve grown by leaps and bounds. That’s how I feel. Even though I’m saying several years ago, I went through a whole rebranding, re-invention, and all of what being transparent about mental illness brought me, I don’t see myself as that same person from several years ago. I’ve grown by leaps and bounds, even in terms of 2020.

Someone asked me a question about how things have changed for me in 2019. It was the experience that I’ve mentioned earlier, “How have you grown or how have you changed in 2019? Is there something that you’d been able to accomplish that you were surprised you were able to accomplish?” The big one for me, and this is another where I turned inward, I came to realize that a mentor of mine says, “Go where you’re celebrated, not tolerated.” Over the past year through a painful experience, I felt rejected and not welcomed into a particular group. I’ll call them a group for the sake of my story. It was painful for me to feel what I considered to be rejection.

It took me several months to come to terms with what that was. What I came to was that it is not my role in life to belong somewhere. I am the one who creates the opportunity for people to belong to and connect with me. That’s a whole different perspective than what I had before. A few years ago, I would have thought something different in the past year. Part of it was COVID, but I was already in process, in the progress of thinking about this. COVID challenged me to be who I am even more. I launched my podcast during COVID, and stepping into what that meant to build it, to invite guests to the platform, and everything.

It helped me to embrace, “I am someone to be celebrated and not tolerated. I get to choose the environments that I want to be in, the groups I want to be a part of, and the people that I want to be around.” It highlighted for me that relationships are everything for me. I always want to be in communication, in compassion, in love, and in giving. I don’t want to be a taker. I don’t think I was any of those before, but that has all gone up for me exponentially. When you realize that you are someone to be celebrated, that you are the source of bringing people together, it changes the whole game for you. That’s what it did for me.

This is so much fun. I’m enjoying your journey and your story. What types of processes did you find yourself using that helped you, if there’s any that you’d like to share on that inward journey?

The big one that I’ll share, coming back from the brink of a major battle with depression, I found myself doing some journaling, writing affirmations a lot, praying, and also setting goals. I also found myself feasting on things that would pour positivity into my spirit, and equipped me to do whatever I was going to do. I didn’t know what I was going to do. I didn’t know what goals I wanted to set, but all of the pouring that I did made the difference. They’re part of what I call my sacred six every morning. I don’t do everything that I described, but I have energy-balancing affirmations that I go through that a friend of mine gave voice to. They’re recorded. I listened to these affirmations. I pray that’s the second of my six. I also revisit my goals for the day. I look at what it is I’m going to accomplish. Whenever I feel the slightest detour from feeling good about where I am or what I’m about to do, I know I’ve got to go back to that space. Affirmations and I’ve got to pour positivity into my spirit. I’ve got to do whatever it takes and that’s the way I look at it. Whatever it takes is what I’ve got to do. Those are some of my tools.

 

When you’re processing something, how do you know if the information you’re working with is of true value for you? We’re always learning new things. You were talking about how you’re open, growing, and learning new things. I don’t know about you, but oftentimes for me, a lot of the learning I’m doing is causing me to step outside the known, into new ideas and concepts. I have a process or I have things that I look at that I can trust that go, “I can trust that this is okay for me.” Is there a process or something you use that helps you go, “This is a good direction for me to take, or this is a viable process for me to learn?”

The big answer for me is I trust my instinct. If I read or watch something and it’s too much for me, then I trust myself to know that if I close the door on whatever it is, if I decide not to look at it after all, I have my reasons intuitively. I can trust that. That’s the very foundational answer to your question. I also think that over time, I’ve come to understand what works for me in my life. I know affirmations work for me like slam dunk all the time. I know slam dunk, prayer works for me. I know how to tap into that.

One of the things that I recognize, this is something that others can follow, is when I’m moving to a place where I’m doubting myself, then I know it’s time for me to pour. It’s time for me to go on Audible and read a book that will pour into me. It’s time for me to go to my journal and look back from whence I’ve come. I even go back and listen to my own stuff because it reminds me, “You’ve got some things going on. That’s pretty good.” It pours into me in a different way. Beyond trusting my instinct, it’s knowing what works for me, and making sure that I tap into what works for me. This seems far-fetched but I want to share it. When I was growing up in my early twenties, I used to love watching horror movies.

I used to love watching the cut them up, gruesome kind of movies as well. In my 30s and 40s, that shifted. I can’t tell you when it shifted but now, I’m like, “Nope, I’m not watching that. Nope. I’m not going to read that.” My son, who’s 30 is like, “Mom, why are you not going to watch this? This is not as bad as you think it is.” “Nope. I’m not going to watch it.” My theory at this point is I can’t unsee some of the stuff shown in those spaces. I was watching a movie and even though I knew it was a drama, I didn’t expect something to happen in the movie, and it happened on my screen. I was like, “I can’t unsee that.” The character was literally blown to bits. Hollywood has a way of making stuff far worse than you can even imagine with their special effects and everything. He blew up but he was still screaming because part of him was still alive and I thought, “I can’t unsee that.” You have to safeguard what pours into your spirit. You have to safeguard yourself from stuff.

I remember watching Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds as a kid when it came out. I was mad at him for creating that. I’m like, “I will never see birds the same way.” All of a sudden, this innocent love of birds came like, “When are they going to start attacking me?” I hear what you’re saying around that whole idea of you cannot unsee and you cannot unknow.

You have to safeguard your thoughts, your feelings, and your world from stuff that can impact your ability to go forward and walk through whatever every day. I went to visit one of my best friends a couple of years ago. She lives in Chicago and it was funny for me. This is someone who has traveled the world, all kinds of places, spaces, and experiences on multiple continents and everything. Now she’s afraid to fly. When we started talking, I realized that she watches why planes crash on CNN. I was like, “Do you think that might have something to do with why now you’re afraid to fly? You have never been afraid to fly to go wherever you needed to go. Stop watching that stuff. That’s why you’re afraid now because you see, this is why planes crash? Why would you watch that?”

It’s a thrill that you might be watching, but is that the thrill you want? You’re so right. It’s protecting who we are, ourselves, our minds and our hearts because it’s there. Now you have to figure out how to work through or beyond it. Even if it’s brought up and introduced by someone else, you might respect who they are and care about them, it doesn’t mean it’s necessarily something that is workable for you. That’s what I have found. I have a significantly sized family and everybody’s different. My kids are definitely into the horror flick and I’m just not. I’m like, “No.” I was always one of those that, especially the music, and I’d be lalala-ing it. That’s a powerful suggestion. Be vigilant and respectful to the dreamer, to the visionary that you are. Like your friend, you can be watching how planes crash or you can be checking out how they fly. Most often they fly more often than they crash. That’s a sad thing sometimes too, being very careful around the news.

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During this election cycle, I’ve watched a lot more news than I would normally watch. I’m an empath. What I found is there were times throughout the election that I needed to step away from social media, or I needed to turn the TV to something else. It was almost during that period of time that I wanted to stay informed, but I didn’t want to be overwhelmed by the news. I had to find a balance. I found a balance by the time the election happened in November. I would go through maybe once or twice during the day. I would share a couple of things. I would read a few things. I will read only so much of whatever I was seeing. Maybe I would turn the TV on. Maybe I wouldn’t watch the news.

I got into a pattern of how I could absorb it without it overwhelming me. As soon as the general election in November was over, I was like, “I’m done posting that stuff.” I still post stuff here and there because someone asked me a question about it. Particularly on Facebook, I was posting 15, 16 times a day leading up to the election. Since the election, I might post something related to politics once a day. It’s a different space and I feel good to be free of the election. The other thing that came with that I’ll share was this massive influence that I didn’t expect. There were people who would send me things in my inbox. There were people who would tag me on things because they knew what my position was on certain things. They wanted me to see whatever the post was.

That was a surprise for me. I did not expect people to say, “WendyY was posting this or look at what WendyY has done.” I also did something that I never do. I went live to talk about politics. That was odd for me. There were a lot of things that happened, but I feel like I was still in control of it. I was still able to manage it in a way that didn’t overwhelm me. I unfriended a lot of people. I blocked some people. It felt good to do that because it’s part of safeguarding. I didn’t want to get into arguments with people. I wasn’t trying to open myself up for debate. I wanted to share information and share my outrage about certain things happening in the world. Even then, I had to safeguard myself.

Even then, the internal awareness of what was and what was not appropriate for you. As you were speaking, there was something that was within you. That’s what you were saying, “It’s important for me to say something here. It’s important for me to speak. It’s important to me to honor that.” Also, at the same time, “It is okay for me to set the qualifiers around what this is.” I feel you. 

These last few months, I never posted anything, especially incendiary. I didn’t have a position that I would share publicly about anything. I had been burnt out on social media. Part of me breaking through that situation I described where I was rejected was feeling a level of burnout on social media. I had stopped posting. I was still reading stuff here and there, but I wasn’t active on social media, and then George Floyd was murdered. I was hiding and I knew I could no longer hide what I believed and what I thought. I felt like if I did, I was complicit in the wrongs of that scenario and other injustices.

That’s when I started very clearly posting what I believed about certain things. It brought out some people that were connected to me. As I said, I’ve unfriended, I blocked, and I moved through it. When I made the decision to become what I consider to be a Facebook activist, I knew that there were things that will come along with it. In knowing those things that will come along with it, I knew that I had the ability to do something about that. It’s intuition, being intuitive, and being mindful about how I show up in the world.

I told you that the influence was a real surprise to me. The thing that I was clear on was I was like a pebble in the water. I was creating ripples, and those ripples were touching other pebbles, other stones, other things that were in the water. To take it out of the metaphor, in my posting and sharing my perspective about things, I was connecting with other people. They were seeing me say what they thought and felt. People commented on all of that stuff. I loved that it inspire some other people to post, comment, and step up more because I heard that as well.

 

Whenever I go inside or within, to use your words, and I come out of it more powerful, more resilient, more resourceful, and rejuvenated, I find that attraction happens for me. It’s something people love. They’re drawn to it and they want to learn more about me and who I am. They don’t do it for that purpose. It’s great that I’m able to touch people in that way. I don’t always think that I had that ability. It’s a reminder of who I am and who I can be.

There is a genuine and authentic power or presence when we start to own that which matters to us, and we speak in alignment with that. There’s a real presence and power that’s like a light in sharing and speaking to that, which is calling from within to be presented, to be shared in the best way that we know how at that moment to do so. When things like that happen and you are feeling called to speak, to claim what is important for you to claim, do you find that it affects how you speak? What I mean by that, oftentimes when we have ideas and thoughts, especially around 2020 for many people and myself included, there’s been a lot of emotion. Sometimes that emotion is blaming. I think blame comes from disempowerment, but when you were honoring your internal guidance and there was this call to speak, was there a call in the speak to chastise another person? Was there a call to speak about what was important to you or lay what you saw out on the table? 

For me, that wasn’t the call. The call was to share what I saw as injustice, to share what I’ve experienced, to share what I see in a way to be the voice of people who might not readily share it. That’s why people reached out to me the way they did. They knew they couldn’t share whatever it was, they sent it to me so I would. I gave voice to the people who would typically be afraid to share, to express their commitment to something one way or the other. I even shared it with my mom. I was talking to her not long afterwards. I was like, “I think I’m a Facebook activist.”

She got this funny look on her face and then she said, “I don’t want anyone showing up to the house and it causing any problems.” I was like, “I don’t think it’s going to be that.” It is about people wanting things to be said. They’re seeing things, they’re wanting things to be said. Now, they feel empowered to say them. They feel empowered to like it or to say, “Amen. Yes, I thought the same thing.” I’ve noticed some people go a little bit beyond what I would say or do. That’s their opinion. If it gets to be much, what I’ve also done is I will delete their comment or I will hide their comment. If they want to take someone to test on my timeline, what I’ve been able to do is shut it down pretty quickly. The thing for me in sharing it and giving voice to the people who would not normally be able to say anything has been also about recognizing that I have the power to address whatever else comes up as a result. I don’t have to take whatever that response is if it’s not okay for me. I don’t have to accept a fight brewing on my timeline. It’s recognizing that I have authority.

That’s very empowering. That sense of self-empowerment by listening to that internal guidance. It’s about honoring that and not necessarily about manipulating. It’s not about manipulating anything outside as much as owning, honoring, and speaking from that sense of self what’s being called. There is a call to the awareness of what’s happening there, but there’s an internal call to it versus an outward in. 

You’re right on the money because I knew that I could no longer not say anything. The call or the tug for me was, “Are you going to sit back and watch this and not have a response to it somehow? Are you going to do something about it? Are you going to say something about it?” When I came back to social media at the time that I did, I knew that it wasn’t enough for me to post some whimsical quote or some funny, silly thing anymore. It wasn’t enough. I had to contribute to the conversation. That was how I knew I needed to contribute. I didn’t know that it would turn into what it turned into, but I’m grateful for the lesson that it taught me about being part of the conversation.

It’s how to have a conversation coming from our own awareness, understanding, and that internal call. What would you like to share with those who might just be beginning this journey of turning inward? Either they’re going from or realizing their focus on the external has been intense. They’ve gotten this or they’ve gathered this, and they’ve manipulated their outside conditions enough, but there’s still something missing and they’re new to it. What might be something you’d like to share with those who are new to this type of journey?

Recognize that you have authority over what happens or doesn't happen, what comes in and what goes out of your life in your world. Click To Tweet

The first thing that came up for me was to be brave. You don’t have to be afraid of what’s happening in the journey when you are brave and you embrace it. What you’ll discover is what it is supposed to mean for you and to you. The other thing that I thought of is to be patient and kind with yourself. Recognize that you have the ability to choose, and you’ll choose what works best for you, whatever it is. The last thing is that to recognize that you have authority over what happens or doesn’t happen, what comes in, what goes out of your life in your world.

Recognizing the authority you have, which means you get to choose. You get to decide. You get to think, “I think this works for me. I don’t think this works for me.” You’re the authority. One of the things that I’ve learned particularly in the past year is to trust myself. It’s funny because I always thought I did. In a lot of ways, I did but it’s been a different level, a different caliber of trust that I have for myself now. What I’m saying in that last one is you don’t have to ask a ton of people what they think about it and get the yes-man person saying to you, “That’s a good thing.” You can decide with all of the information you have what works for you. You get to decide that. You get to choose. You have the authority to do that and be brave about what that looks like.

I’m not saying don’t talk to anybody or don’t ask people. What I’m saying is remember that you have the power to decide. You can get input from people that you trust. I have a small council that I look to and I don’t look beyond that. I don’t have to ask 12,000 people. It’s usually less than three people that I touched base with about something. In the past year, what I’ve learned is there are some choices that I can make before I even talked to the council. I have the authority. I’m smart and wise. I can process the information in a way that works for me. I don’t have to do that. If it’s something that I am struggling with, maybe I need to touch base with the council. If not, I have the authority. I can do things, make an executive decision, and do something. Those are the three things that come to mind for me.

I appreciate that. It has been such a joy and pleasure to be with you. I’m grateful that you’d spend time to share your journey and ideas with people who are on their own. It’s has been fun, WendyY.

Thank you, Rebecca. I’ve enjoyed it as well. As you know from our experiences together, all you’ve got to do is ask that question and I’m off and running.

What a delight WendyY is. If you want to know more about her, you can check her out at her website, BusinessBeyondLimits.com. There will be more information down below as well that you can reach out if you’d like to learn more about WendyY, and see what might be there for you. I have myself learned a great deal from her. I’m grateful for all that I’ve worked with and continue to work with. Until it is that we meet again, I sent all of you the greatest respect and affection for a life well-lived. Here’s to your life, have fun making it a good one.

 

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