Read From Fed Up to Fabulous: Real stories to inspire and unite women worldwide Online
Authors: Mickey Roothman,Aen Turner,Kristine Overby,Regan Hillyer,Ruth Coetzee,Shuntella Richardson,Veronica Sosa
Now was the time for me to be who I wanted to be, do the things that I wanted to do and have the things that I wanted to have in my life. I had done the opposite for so long though, it was a challenge to know where and how to start. So, as I set out on my journey to create new things in my life. I invested thousands on attending events, reading books, my first business mentor, a voice coach and speaking and self-development courses. As my purpose in life and message to the world became clear and I started to create a voice and ways to communicate it, my faith in myself and my capacity and capability grew. I created my strategy and action plan for life and started following it.
I learnt about my hidden fears and identifying them. I learnt to be letting go of them and of judging myself, cutting off the environment that feeds my fears. I learnt to be letting go of my ego and its persistent cunning to prove me right, to have me looking good at any cost, even if the result was the last thing I wanted. Getting to recognise all of this and creating strategies to break the cycles and patterns was and is totally priceless.
In my working life, I was the master at setting targets and working backwards from them to reach them. I start by creating my target and the first step from my target knowing that this is the step that I would have had to have taken in order to reach it. Then I would create each step knowing that this is the one I would need to have taken in order to have reached the one before, and so on, until I had created the step that I felt was the very first step that I needed to take, and I would start with that. I started applying this methodology to the things I wanted to reach in my life, creating the target, followed by the strategy and action steps from my target and then taking the action steps.
My intuition and consciousness expanded in ways I used to think impossible. My creativity and resourcefulness had a new purpose and an extraordinary effectiveness. Incredible results and 'coincidences' became a regular occurrence. I was making choices and taking impactful actions to live the life that I truly wanted to live.
My capacity and capability seemed to be tapped into a new and eternal vein of energy and expansion. There were so many things I did well that I had judged myself before as not good at, and I was realising my dreams one by one.
I know we have to have a dream in order for it to have a chance of becoming true, only simply having the dream is not enough for it be our reality. We need to know our why, our real why, past all the fear and logical, egotistical and emotionally charged reasons, and then our how. How to create a congruent strategy and action plan and take actions that are specifically effective for us. How to reveal and breakthrough or manage our hidden fears and self-sabotage habits, especially when we get results that are different from the ones we want.
When I look back at how quickly I realised some of my dreams, it seems miraculous; like meeting Sir Richard Branson and spending five days, on his private island, taking part in one of a handful of leadership gatherings, just four months after I wrote it in my plan and invested in more coaching. The amazing thing is, I had spent a few thousand on coaching before, and it certainly set me on my journey, only now that I was spending tens of thousands, it was taking me to a totally new level. Yes it was scary and occasionally it still is, only I know now that taking small steps towards the edge is not the same as jumping out of the plane.
So what are you holding onto? What small steps are you taking that are having you feeling that you are making progress, that you do not need to jump out of that plane, actually, it is only fooling you into feeling that and sabotaging you having everything you truly want in your life?
We are change junkies and what we need is a transformation. When we look around us, how many happy, abundant and fulfilled people are we seeing?
We have to be at a level of belief in ourselves to truly 'jump out of the plane', otherwise all we do is edge forwards and pull back, or work at looking like we are getting somewhere when we are just going round and round in circles. We all have the logical reasons as to why this is not the time, why there is something else that we have to deal with first. Believe me, these are all excuses for the fears that we are feeling, whether it occurs to us as fear of failure of fear of success, it is fear. Whether we recognise it as fear or not, it is fear, and do you know why I am so sure? Because we are human beings.
By virtue of being human, we feel vulnerable, fallible, mortal and ordinary, or perhaps even less than ordinary. This is the root of all our fears and our ego's vain attempts to outbalance them.
Fear is also the root of all our self-sabotage habits, hidden or otherwise.
This is our sabotage habit of not even starting a project. This leaves millions of us proving that we are not worthy of having any more than we have right now or that we are not capable of it. Every time we get close to starting and not do it, we die a little and lose faith in ourselves. It is like a slow death as we put our lights out one by one.
This is our sabotage habit of starting a project and looking like we are doing all the right things, only we leave out one or two ingredients that we hope are not essential or skimp o
n
something important. We are always busy, always working hard and either we only just get our heads above water or we never quite get there. It keeps us hooked because we keep feeling that we are getting close. That is the scary thing, we are putting so much time in and life never gets easy enough to truly enjoy.
This is our sabotage habit of managing to find a way through some, or maybe many of our fears, we make lots of money and yet the feeling of satisfaction is either temporary or never there. We know we have achieved way above the average, we look successful on the outside and yet the feeling of wholeness, completeness or fulfilment seems illusive. We tell ourselves that we probably need to get to the next level, and the next level, and the next level, in order to feel it and then we die never feeling the complete satisfaction of self-fulfilment.
All of these self-sabotage habits apply to us whether we are working for ourselves or others.
Finally, there is our sabotage habit of telling ourselves we can do it without anyone's help. We all like to feel independently capable and we all like to discover things for ourselves, and there is definitely a feeling of satisfaction when that happens. So, we struggle and search for a way through, we are determined to find it on our own to feel capable and counteract our fear of being incapable. It is a huge trap, because that fear will always be present and all we need to do is accept it and get ourselves the right coach, or several coaches that have achieved things that we want to achieve. I did that and this is why I am realising my dreams and writing this chapter.
I am travelling around the world speaking on major platforms, learning new languages, meeting amazing people, creating and building deep friendships and relationships with so many people and so many happy clients. I am getting invitations to stay at my clients' houses when I travel. I am getting wonderful emails of heart-warming stories of the difference that my first book, my material, my programs, my workshops and my one-to-one consultations have and are making in their lives.
I am getting to earn my living, fulfilling my purpose and helping others to find and fulfil theirs. I am getting requests to write a chapter in a book to share my life story and my message to this world and I am happy that I chose this one, because every single story and every single woman in this book is extraordinary and my coach and mentor that pushed, pulled, cajoled, scared and keeps moving me to my next level, JT Foxx, is writing the foreword. Thank you JT, thank you Mickey, thank you Ruth, thank you Kristine, thank you Regan, thank you Shuntella and thank you Veronica.
Finally, thank you for investing in this book, in yourself and for reading this far. I am feeling blessed and honoured that you chose to, and my wish is that it will inspire you into taking new action and having new results.
My final message to you is totally commit to yourself every day, every moment, no matter how many times you have to do it and do not try - because you are either doing it or you are not. As soon as you use the word try you are looking for a get-out clause.
You are born different because you are meant to make a unique difference in this world, be it and live it.
Always be putting skin in the game.
Always be going way out of your comfort zone.
Always be getting to know and letting go of your fears and hidden self-sabotage habits.
Always be acknowledging your humanity, your fears and your ego, they will only be getting in your way when you are fighting them.
Always be taking impactful action now and getting yourself a coach that has you feeling and living the excitement and the discomfort of uncovering your real why, then aligning your effective how, to finally being and living the real you and having everything you truly want in your life.
She chose to give up her corporate life in 2013 and use her strategic planning and execution expertise to plan and effectively realise her own dreams. Since then, she has lived in Italy, written and published her first novel, Wadi by Aen Hussein, spent 5-days on Necker Island with Sir Richard Branson on a Leadership Gathering and spoken on stages around the world.
Aen's focus is on inspiring and enabling others to realise their dreams, no matter their circumstances, and create their true legacy.
Her clients love her naturally instinctive and spiritual heart-centred approach, with a logical and strategic mind-centred one. This is reflected in all her material, programmes, workshops and consulting style. It effectively enables them to uncover and break through their hidden fears and self-sabotage habits that block them from starting, breaking through to their next level, or realising their ultimate dreams and creating their true legacy.
Her material includes:
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Breaking through hidden barriers to a successful life
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Creating my strategy and plan for life
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Launching my legacy
For more information about Aen visit:
aenturner.com
, and follow her on Facebook and Twitter:
https://www.facebook.com/aenturnerpublicfigure/
,
twitter.com/aenturner
KRISTINE OVERBY
is a Life Strategist & Speaker at Kristine International, Chairman for Aurskog Chamber of Commerce and Director of the International Concept "You Got Promoted"