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TWeek 2 - Overcoming Dream Obstacles

Video Transcript - Week 2 - Overcoming Dream ObstaclesTHE DREAM ATELIER

© School of Self-ImageTM 2021PAGE 2 OF 22

T H E D R E A M AT E L I E R

Week 2 - Overcoming Dream Obstacles

Hello, hello, ladies. Welcome to a sunny afternoon. This is the time of the day when the sun just comes pouring into my office. But sunny days are good days, right? How is everyone? So exciting to be together working on our dreams, so fun.

So let’s start with a one word check-in, and let me know how you are feeling in one word. Because this is a workshop. This is very interactive. Determined, dull, decisive, happy, wonderful, pumped, confident, amazing, awesome, focused, strong, tired, grateful, delighted, questioning, beautiful. All of it’s good, right? There’s no bad emotion. There’s just emotions that serve us and emotions that slow us down, that’s all. And we’re going to be talking more about emotions next week. But this week is all about overcoming dream obstacles. So I am going to pull up my presentation. We’re going to do this thing. Here we go. Let me share my screen.

Voila. Week number two, Overcoming Dream Obstacles. “The greater the obstacle, the more glory in overcoming it,” Moliere. Such a good quote. So I want to just do a really quick summary of where we’ve been. So the first thing that you have done in the dream atelier, hopefully by now, is you have decided on your 30 day dream goal. I want you to decide and go all in on your decision. Indecision is one of those traits that keeps us from creating our dreams. We second guess ourselves. We have doubts. We want to change our decisions. And what I’m going to really encourage you to do is to be a woman that you decide and then you go all in on it.

And I just posted on Instagram yesterday that the most important decision that you make is the decision after the decision. Meaning, decide how you’re going to feel about it. Because we all know what it’s like to make a decision, and then we start second guessing ourselves and we start thinking, well, what if that’s the wrong decision? So maybe I should change it. And we never get the momentum going in our lives. I’m all about like, let’s make the decision and then decide we’re going to feel confident, decide we’re going to feel joyful, decide that we’re going to feel determined, whatever the emotion is that you want to feel around the decision that will help you get your energy behind that decision.

Then last week we talked about breaking your goal down. A lot of times we overwhelm ourselves, because we don’t break our goals down to a point where when we sit down to work on it, we know exactly the result that we’re wanting to create. So break it down, put it on your



calendar, the task for your goal, and then show up for your goal. Show up for your calendar. Sounds so easy, but we all know that there are obstacles, and I actually think that’s a beautiful thing, because the obstacles are what will grow you. The obstacles are the very things that we need to experience in order to evolve. And I’ve been saying it all along, but the best part of creating a goal is who you become in the process.

And so obstacles are just a part of the deal. And yet so many of us let the obstacles stop us. As soon as something doesn’t go right, we tell ourselves the story of, well, I guess that just wasn’t meant for me. It’s just too hard. I have fallen off the wagon. You all know who I’m talking to, right? I tell my ladies in Slim, Chic, and Savvy all the time, I’m like, listen, there is no wagon to fall off of. There’s just successes. And then there are failures. You’re either winning or you’re learning, but you don’t fall off of a wagon. So I want you all to begin to embrace obstacles as a beautiful thing, just part of the deal. They do not mean to stop or that something has gone wrong. I want you to imagine that obstacles are gold, because they are showing you exactly who you need to become to reach your goal.

So let’s say for example, one of your obstacles is that you find yourself wanting to eat every evening around eight o’clock, after dinner. Maybe let’s say nine o’clock. The kids are going to bed. You’ve got some time to yourself. You already know that that’s an obstacle. You know that is something that you have dealt with. Well, the beauty of the human brain is that you can plan for that obstacle. You can have a plan in place. You can decide ahead of time how you’re going to deal with it. And the beauty of that obstacle is who you must become. You must become a woman who’s willing to feel the discomfort of breaking an old habit. You must become a woman who is determined to reach her goal, no matter what. That obstacle is there to grow you.

And to me, obstacles are assigned just to keep going and to grow into the woman who is living her dream. So I want to talk about a concept that I discovered years ago in a book called Mindset by Carol Dweck. It’s a fabulous book. And in this book she talks about in her studies of psychology, noticing that there were two types of people that possess two different mindsets. And the people with the growth mindset were the people that were reaching their goals. They were growing, they were learning. The people with the fixed mindset didn’t change that much.

So what is the difference between the two? Well, a growth mindset believes that intelligence and talent are not fixed, but can grow and evolve with hard work and dedication. The fixed mindset, on the other hand, believes that qualities are fixed traits and therefore cannot be changed. People with a growth mindset will view obstacles and setbacks and challenges as a way to grow and become even better. People with a fixed mindset spend more time rating their talent and their intelligence, and as a result, work hard to appear smart and capable.



So here’s some ways that you will know if you have a fixed mindset. You’ll find yourself thinking, I avoid challenges and I give up easily. Feedback is personal. How many of you are so afraid of negative feedback that you don’t even put your work out into the world? And it’s because you make it mean something about you. You don’t separate yourself from your work and just say, oh, it’s about my work. It has nothing to do with my worthiness or my value. But you tend to take it personal. And the problem with that is when you get really positive feedback, it feels really good to your ego. It feels great. But on the flip side, you’re also going to be opening yourself up to negative feedback, which when that happens, it feels terrible if you make it mean something about you personally.

You’ll find yourself thinking things like, I’m either good at it or I’m not. Here’s one of the classics. Why bother? How many of you have found yourself saying, why bother? You’ll be thinking things like, I’m not cut out for this, and people have all the luck. Don’t watch me unless I’m really good at it. So many of you, in order to create your dreams, you’re going to have to get over all of these. I wouldn’t even say so many of you, all of us, we have to get over our fixed mindset in order to create our dream.

So let’s take a look at the growth mindset. Isn’t this little tree in the head so beautiful? With a growth mindset, you’ll find yourself thinking things like, I can learn anything I set my mind to. Challenges are actually fun, because they help me grow. When I’m frustrated, I know that’s when I need to stick with it. I don’t need to give up. I need to work through the frustration and get on the other side of it to prove to myself that frustration does not stop me. I’m willing to sit with a problem until I figure it out. That is the growth in that challenge. I love trying and learning new things. Feedback helps me to become better. Doesn’t that feel better than feedback is personal and it means I’m either less than or better than? No, all feedback just helps me to become better, and sometimes when it comes to feedback, what you’re getting better at is not letting people’s anger and hatred affect you, because not all feedback is constructive.

As someone who’s very public, I get feedback, not often but sometimes, that’s just coming from a place that I can tell is not meant to help me or to support me. It’s intended to tear me down. And so even that feedback is so good for me, because it’s helping me not to let that affect me and for me to keep on keeping on, no matter what. I am inspired by other people’s success. Growth mindset looks at successful people and they use it as fuel. It’s that mindset of if they can do it, I can do it, too. I want to surround myself with these people. I want to learn from them. Why? Because they inspire me. This isn’t a competition, this is a collaboration. And if somebody else can do something and achieve something, that means I can do it, too.



And then finally, this is my mom. Her favorite two words growing up, when I was growing up, was watch me. My mother loved to challenge herself. She had polio when she was three years old. And instead of using that as an excuse as to why she couldn’t do things, it became her fuel. She wanted to prove to herself that she could. And so she would set out on crazy, have like crazy goals, and we would all be looking at her like, Mom, what are you thinking? How are you going to do this? And she would always look at us and say, “Watch me.” And we would, we would watch her achieve it. And it’s because my mom had a growth mindset. She was willing to try things and fail. She was willing not to be the best at it, and because of that, she became the best at it. She put in her 10,000 hours, and because she was willing to fail, because she was willing to learn, and because she was willing to put it all out there in the public eye so we could watch her, my mom achieved crazy, crazy success in her world. And that is the power of a growth mindset.

So the beauty, as I was saying, with obstacles is that you can actually anticipate them. And when you anticipate your obstacles, you can decide the solutions ahead of time. The ability to anticipate your obstacles keeps you in a creative mode versus when it happens, reacting to it. You’ve already planned for it. You already know your potential obstacles when it comes to reaching your goal. So anticipating your obstacles and planning for them really does make you unstoppable, because you create a plan that keeps your momentum going. And here’s what I’ve discovered. Most of your obstacles are internal.

And here’s some of the common ones that I’ve seen. One of them is fondling useless emotions, such as overwhelm, worry, fear, confusion. How many of you are confused about your goals, and I’m just going to take a look in the chat box, see what is happening. How many of you are confused with your goals? Me, yes, I am every day. And here’s the thing, I want you to understand, and we’re going to talk about this in a future class, but I am confused is a thought that keeps you stuck in confusion. I want to challenge you to never tell yourself you’re confused again when it comes to your dreams and your goals. Now, if we’re talking about the black hole theory, I’m a little confused with that one myself, but I do believe if I wanted to learn about it, I could sit down and figure it out.

But confusion is a choice. And the thing is, as long as you’re engaging in confusion, you get to stay where you are. You get to stay stuck. The moment you decide you’re no longer confused, what’s going to be asked of you is that you make decisions, and for a lot of you, decisions are scary, but I’m going to challenge you being indecisive is even scarier, because indecisiveness is what keeps you stuck. The moment you make a powerful decision, you start moving your life forward. And so when you’re sitting around fondling overwhelm, that’s another one. Overwhelm is not created by anything outside of you. It’s always created by thoughts in your head. Thoughts like, I have too much to do, I’ll never get it done, I have too much on my plate,



I can’t get it all done in a day. These are the thoughts that create overwhelm, and when you’re feeling overwhelmed, you are not as powerful in your actions.

Worry. Worry is one of those things that pretend to be necessary, but it never is. And if you’re someone that tends to worry a lot, I actually did a podcast, I’m trying to remember, I think it’s called the Habit of Worrying, something along those lines, but if you Google French Kiss Life podcasts and worry, you’ll find it. I want you to go and listen to that podcast, because worry is so useless. It doesn’t stop anything from happening, but what it does is it prevents you from being in your full power when it comes to creating your dreams. And fear, I put down here, is useless. Fear is not always useless. If you’re being chased by a bear, which could happen where I live, fear is useful, but I’m talking about the fear of the unknown, and fondling that fear and and scaring yourself with this scary, imaginative story of the future.

If you’re going to tell a story of your future, I want it to be a powerful one. I want it to be one that excites you and it motivates you, not one that scares you into staying in your pajamas all day with the covers over your head. These are useless emotions, and these are obstacles you’re going to have to overcome in order to create your dreams.

We’ve talked about this one a lot, the indecision, changing your mind before trying, or not making any decisions, and then the urge to delay action. How many of you say to yourself things like, I’ll just start tomorrow. I’ll do it later. We keep putting off our dreams and our life until some day, and I want you to make today the day, always. Even if it’s just a small, tiny step in the direction of your dream, do not delay it because that is a habit, a habit of putting off the discomfort of creating your dreams.

Kathy’s like, “Who is it?” Oh, Megan said, “Crap, those are some of my favorite words.” Yeah, our words are powerful and I want you to begin to change your language. Okay. Here’s one of my favorite quotes. It’s actually a passage by Steven Pressfield about embracing and moving through resistance. He says, “Fear is good. Like self doubt, fear is an indicator. Fear tells us what we have to do. Remember our rule of thumb, the more scared we are of a work or calling, the more sure we can be that we have to do it. Resistance is experienced as fear. The degree of fear equates to the strength of resistance. Therefore, the more fear we feel about a specific enterprise, the more certain we can be that that enterprise is important to us and to the growth of our soul. That’s why we feel so much resistance. If it meant nothing to us, there would be no resistance.”

Resistance is a beautiful thing, and it’s not meant to tell you to move in the opposite direction.



It’s actually pointing you exactly to the direction that you need to go. I think it was Joseph Campbell that said, “The cave we fear to enter holds the treasures we seek.” And so instead of moving away from the resistance, I want you to train yourself to move towards it and to feel all of the discomfort, and we’re going to be talking about this next week in creating your emotional fuel, but the worst thing that can ever happen is a feeling. Really think about that. The worst thing that can ever happen is a feeling in your body.

And when you become really good at feeling your emotions and not procrastinating them away and not eating them away and not overworking them away and doing all of the things that we do to resist our emotional life, that’s when we can move through the resistance. We can do the very things that we’re being called to do.

So, I want to talk about distraction action versus forward action. Distraction action can seem like it’s useful, but it distracts you from your dream. What I have found when it comes to distraction action is that it usually feels very impulsive. So it’s that moment when I sit down to record a podcast and my brain tells me, you should go on Facebook. Does that happen to you guys? Or go check out some recipes on Pinterest, that is a distraction action. And you’ll know a distraction action because it’s comfortable and it’s easy. A lot of you, some of your distraction action is research, right? You’re like, I need to know more things in order to take action.

And what you’re really doing is you’re avoiding the discomfort of putting yourself out there. You’re avoiding the discomfort of making a decision. You’re avoiding the discomfort of possible failure and humiliation. So what you do is you go and research more things. Some of you are using distraction actions such as, well, I need to spend a month figuring out the name of my website. That’s a distraction action. Your energy is so much more important than the name of your website, and you can change the name of your website. I did. My first website was called Just Be Living, and then I went to my name, and then I went to French Kiss Life. So thank God I didn’t...

... And then I went to French Kiss Life, so thank God I didn’t sit around for years trying to figure out a name to a website. I was just like, “I’m going to choose one and I’m going to go,” knowing I can always change it later. So here’s some common distraction actions, watching videos. How many of you are on YouTube pretending to do research when what you really need to be doing is the actual thing to move you forward when it comes to your goal. Here’s another one. Purchasing programs. It’s fun to purchase a program. We get all excited. We’re like, “Yes, this is it. I’m going all in. I’m working on my dream.” But that’s just the first step. The real work is taking what you learn in these programs and applying them to your life. That’s why with me, I love programs. I love learning. I love consuming information but there comes a point where



it’s time to create.

If not, I feel like I’m so stuffed and I’m suffocating underneath all of the information I need to take it, run it through my filter, through my soul and put something out into the world. Reading books can be a distraction action. Eating is definitely a distraction action unless you’re hungry. Doing the laundry. How many of you, this is common for those of us who work at home, we sit down and we’re like, “Okay, it’s on my calendar, I’m going to write a blog post,” and all of a sudden you hear this little voice that you need to go get that laundry done, it’s really important right now. But here’s the thing, when you plan your life like we talked about in week one, you know that you’ve got a plan for your laundry. It’s on Friday at 10:00AM or Saturday, whenever you choose to do it, so you can remind your brain of that and you’re like, “Nope, you’re just trying to distract me from what I’m here to do.”

Scrolling through social media. I love you guys but some of you I’ve been coaching for a while and you’ll say things to me like, “Tonya, I just don’t have enough time,” and I see you all on social media. I’m like, “If you’ve got time to spend as much time as I think you’re spending on social media, you have time to put in on your dreams.” Now, I love social media. Social media is how I’ve probably connected with most of you. It can be so useful when it’s intentional but when you’re using it to distract you from your dream, it is not useful. It is a distraction action. But let’s talk about forward action, the actions that move you forward and closer to your goals. Forward action I find is very focused, full of resistance and is super uncomfortable, right? So think about it. If you can choose between easy and comfortable or resistance and uncomfortable, if you’re not prepared, what are you going to choose?

Facebook every single time or Instagram or the food, right? Whatever is easiest and that’s why you can plan for this. You can plan for those obstacles of resistance ahead of time. Forward action is you showing up for what’s on your calendar. It’s following through on program content. It’s applying what you are learning. So I think honesty is such a beautiful thing. I think we have to be honest with ourselves and I’m really curious to hear from you all with no judgment, right? I’m always a believer that we’re doing the best we can with what we know, so I don’t want you to judge yourself I just want you to be super curious. And what would you say is your predominant action? Is it distraction action or is it forward action? Distraction, 50/50. Distraction, a lot of distraction action and that’s why you’re here. It’s all good, right? You can change that starting right now.

You can begin to recognize it and be like, “Nope, I’m not going on social media until I’ve completed my task,” right? Because here’s the thing. I want us all to be focused on forward action and social media can be forward action. Eating can be forward action because we need



to nourish our bodies. We need to enjoy our food. We need to have a pleasurable relationship with our food, right? And that’s why I’m such a big believer in planning out your life because you will know when you sit down to eat and your brain’s trying to tell you you should be working you can be like, “No, I planned this ahead of time. I planned this yesterday, I planned it at the beginning of the week.” You plan your pleasures, you plan yourself care, you plan your dreams, you plan your work and then all you have to do is show up for your plan and if you’ve planned correctly, you’re going to be moving your life forward.

Okay. Now let’s talk about one of my favorite topics, perfectionism because this is a big obstacle. It’s one that I’ve definitely had to get over myself with and it’s one I still notice wants to creep in. So perfectionism is this need to be or appear perfect, which is impossible and it’s completely boring. Have you ever been around someone who pretends to be perfect? You’re like, “Come on, just be real. Just be human.” But yet we do that to ourselves and why? Because it’s rooted in fear and shame. It’s this idea that we’re somehow flawed, so therefore we must work really hard at overcoming our flaws. It’s also this belief that we’re not enough and we’re afraid that people will find out. Perfectionism and indecision I will say are the two most common traits that steal more dreams than anything. To overcome perfectionism, you must learn to manage your mind and be willing to feel uncomfortable emotions like the fear of rejection, the fear of failure, the fear of humiliation, the fear of judgment.

I love Sarah Blakely, who’s the founder of Spanx. She tells a story about when she was growing up, every night her dad would sit down at the dinner table and he would ask her and her brother, “What did you fail at today?” And I think that’s so brilliant because she talks about how having that discussion every night got her so comfortable with failure, which is why I think she’s probably the CEO of a billion dollar company now, right? Because she was willing to fail in order to succeed. She knew that it wasn’t a bad thing to fail, she had been programmed very early on that failure is something to celebrate because it means you’re trying. It means you’re moving forward, it means that you’re in that growth mindset. The other thing I’ve come to understand is that in order to create your dreams, you must be willing to do a terrible job but committed to getting the job done.

I say it so many times and I need to find out who is the author of this quote, but there’s a quote that says, “Success is built on a mountain of failures.” And a lot of you, the moment you fail, you give up. But that’s when you need to keep it going and it’s going to require that you get over perfectionism. And here’s the other beautiful thing that I’ve come to understand is that you get to decide what you think about everything, including what you create. Now when I create something, I do have that voice in my head that always tells me it could be better but I also listen to the voice that says it’s good enough. You can improve it later but it’s okay enough to put it out into the world and because of that, many of you have seen me over the years I just crank



out so much content and I just keep putting it out there because I trust that it’s good enough and it’s just going to get better and better.

The other thing I want to encourage you to do is to be a finisher. Finishing things is sexy. How many of you have so many incompletes in your life? You have the project that you started, the book that you started, you started cleaning out your closet and then you got distracted. It’s like squirrel, I’m going to go work on this and because you haven’t trained yourself to be a finisher, you feel like there’s so many incompletes in your life and this is why I love having one goal that you go all in on for 30 days and you finish it. You’ve proved to yourself that you are a finisher because let’s be honest, it’s easy and fun and exciting to start things but it’s extraordinary to finish them because to finish them means that you were a woman that was willing to feel all of the resistance that came up in the middle of the project, in the middle of the goal.

And I want you just to take a moment right now to imagine your life if you finished everything you said you’d do. Just play around with that idea, and I’m doing this for myself. There are many things in my life that I started doing and I didn’t finish and I think about what would my life be now if I would have finished those things. Now I don’t believe in regret, I don’t believe in punishing myself for it but it is a fascinating thought to think about. And then to think about 5 years from now, 10 years from now, starting today, if I become a woman who finishes everything I commit to finishing what my life will be like. Imagine what you would create, what you would accomplish. I love the thought of I am a finisher and that is a thought that you can borrow from me and you can practice it and you can prove it true to yourself.

So we’re going to do a little bit of work now because this is a workshop by the way. And I want you to think about your 30 day dream goal and I want you to anticipate your obstacles. Now we won’t be able to do probably all of it now because I’m only going to do three minutes. I’m going to play a little movie while we do this. But for each obstacle, maybe you just get a few down and I want you to brainstorm how you will deal with it. This is when you get to decide ahead of time when that obstacle comes up you already have a plan in place for how you’re going to deal with it. So let’s take three minutes and write down potential obstacles. Two minutes. One more minute. All right. How was that? Were you all able to see some of your potential obstacles? Tell me all about them. Shifting energy, emotions, the fear of not doing it right. Perfectionism. Yeah, it usually always comes down to our thoughts Francis. Being tired. No weight loss.

Yeah, so when you get on the scale and let’s pretend it’s gone up by five pounds, how are you going to deal with that? Because the old you, the one that’s stuck in the pattern would probably beat herself up and say, why bother? This isn’t working but I want you to think about the version of you that’s lost the weight. How did she deal with that? What did she herself, how



did she shift her energy? How does she get back into the game? So many, job, husband, writer’s block, hating what I write. Christine, welcome to the club. But here’s the thing, because do you know, I’m in the middle of writing my book right now and it’s been really interesting because I know that perfectionistic brain of mine is probably always going to tell me it’s not enough. It could be better. But then I also know that I get to decide what I want to think about it and I’m choosing to think I’m writing a book. I’m choosing to think this is good enough. And the more I write, the better I’m going to get.

I’m willing for people to judge it. I’m willing for people to put one star reviews on Amazon, I’m willing to fill all of it because to me writing the book for me, is so important. My why is so big, I’m willing to feel all of that. And so, I plan for that part of my brain that always tells me that my writing’s terrible. So yeah, thinking my dream should be more important, yeah. So how are you going to deal with that one, Sally? You get to decide that your dream is important for you and every time you hear that little voice pop into your head that says, “It could be more important.” What are you going to tell it? What is the conversation you’re going to have with that part of yourself ? Yeah. So kids wake up two hours ahead of schedule, you know that is a potential obstacle, plan for it so that when it happens you’re not like, “I can’t get any work done. My dreams aren’t going to come true. It’s my kid’s fault,” right?

No, you can plan for that. So how are you going to deal with that when it happens? Have a plan in place. Not being articulate enough. What does that even mean? If I allowed myself I could think that all of the time but I’m always articulate enough. I choose to believe that. Why? Because it doesn’t serve me to think otherwise. If I didn’t think I was articulate enough, I would never show up and do these classes. I would never put myself out there. I would not record a podcast and I have a lot of evidence as to why I’m not articulate. People correct me on my grammar all of the time and I’m like, “Listen up y’all, I grew up in the South. It is a miracle that I can speak proper English to the point that you can understand me,” right? My accent used to be so strong that people could not understand me outside of my little bubble but I just don’t see an upside to it. I choose to believe that I am articulate. Why? Because it does not serve me to think that I’m not.

And I want you to really think about that because if you think I’m not articulate and let’s say you to be a public speaker and you think I’m not articulate, then you’re going to feel probably nervous, you’re going to feel a lot of fear. And then when you’re feeling nervous and fear, you probably don’t articulate well, right? Because you’re so in your head, you’re convinced that you’re not articulate enough. See? I can’t even talk right now. And so, you don’t even put yourself out there because you have so much fear and if you do, then you probably don’t articulate like you want to say, so I just don’t see any upside to that. I lose myself and goals in social situations with food. So hard to not put off my food and weight goals until the next day



but then it happens again the next day. Beautiful Margaret, such a great realization. So you know that as an obstacle for you and you know it’s a pattern, so you need to plan for it.

When you feel that urge to eat in these social situations and you’re not hungry, what is your plan? You need to practice a new way of being in these social situations. Okay, I could go on and on all day with this and we have another coaching call on Thursday, so I’ll be more than happy to coach you all on some of these potential obstacles. So the next thing I want to encourage you all to do is to pay attention to your questions. The quality of your life is determined by the quality of your questions and here’s why. Your brain is designed to answer any question you ask it. You’ll know the quality of your question based on the quality of your answer. Does it offer you new insight? Does it offer you forward momentum? Does it offer you clarity, or does your answer offer you more of the same? Does it keep you stuck and confused and lacking momentum? So when you’re anticipating obstacles, I want you to ask better questions to strategize and overcome them. So let’s say for example ...

So let’s say for example, we’ll go back to the weight. You get on the scale and you’ve gained five pounds. And your 30 day goal is to lose five pounds. So you’re looking down at this number and what we often do is we go to terrible questions like, why can’t I figure this out? Why am I always struggling with this? Why is this so hard? And your brain is going to be like, well, let me tell you why it’s so hard. Let me tell you why you struggle. Let me tell you why you can’t lose the weight. A better question in that moment would be, what do I want to make this mean?

How am I going to lose the weight? How do I want to feel about this? What do I want to make this number mean? All of a sudden your brain is like, whoa, I have to think a little harder for these questions cause I’m not used to asking these kinds of questions. So sometimes when you start asking yourself better questions, you’ll find that you have to think harder, but it’s only because you haven’t practiced them. You’ve practiced the terrible questions like, why does this never work out for me? Why can’t I get any clients? Why can’t I make money? Why do I procrastinate?

Why am I so lazy? Why does this never work out? Right? Those are terrible questions. I want you to be asking yourself empowering questions. I just made a decision a couple of weeks ago that super uncomfortable, super, super uncomfortable, but I know it’s the right decision. And I could have gone to the scary what if ’s. Like what if this doesn’t work out? What if this is a terrible decision? But those answers don’t serve me and they certainly don’t excite me. And so I started to ask questions like, what if this is the best thing ever?



How will I guarantee that this works? What’s the good in this? What do I love about this decision? So I’m getting better answers. A lot of you are asking terrible, what if questions of the future. What if I fail? What if I lose all my money? What if I get sick? And all of those things could happen. But the question is, how does it serve you to think about that in this moment? Does it excite you? Does it motivate you? Does it get you into action? No. It keeps you scared and stuck. Ask better questions of your future. What if it just keeps getting better and better?

What if my best days are ahead of me? What if this is better than I could have ever dreamt of ? All of a sudden you’re coming up with better answers and the future is unknown for all of us. And as I’ve been saying, if you’re going to tell a story about your future, make sure it’s a story that you want to live out. So I want you to brainstorm 10 quality questions that you can ask of yourself when it comes to your goals and potential obstacles. And we’ll just take a minute because I want to see a couple that you come up with, but brainstorm 10 quality questions and just come up with a couple and then you can do the rest after the workshop. One minute.

Okay. What’d you come up with? What if people love my website? That is awesome. What would be the best possible version of me have done instead? Oh, I love that. What if I did great? What if I’m not too old? I would change that one a little bit, Sherry, because it still has that premise of what if I’m not too old, like that fear of not too old? What if we changed that too? What if I’m the perfect age for this? Right? Can you see the difference. One’s like still focusing on I’m too old. What if I’m at the perfect age to do this? What if my best days are still ahead of me?

So good. Look at all these questions. How am I amazing? Tell me, Liz. I love that question. What if I loved my body instead of hated it? Yes. What will my life be when this weight comes off ? What if my body is really good enough as it is? Now, here’s the thing. If you’ve been thinking your body’s not good enough, your brain will be like, what? But I love that question because you’re going to force your brain to consider what if my body has always been good enough, but it was my believing that it wasn’t that actually drove me to overeat or to not take care of it.

I love that question. What can I control? Beautiful. What will I feel like when I succeed? How can I find ways to enjoy my writing journey? Well, dropping the perfectionism is step number one. Let it be good enough. These are so good. What if I can do it all? Yes, I love it. What if I enjoy this ride? I love questions like how can I make this more fun? How can I make this easier? Because we can complicate a lot of things. I know in my brain, like when I have a project, I will always go to the most complicated version of it and then I have to back out of that.



I’m like, how can I make this so much easier? So fun. These are so great, you all. Good job. Good, good job. I love it. How can I celebrate without food? Yes. What if I have a happier inspired life? What if I get multiple offers and have to choose from among them all? Yes. So fun. See, it feels so much better to ask yourself better questions because your brain will come up with better answers. All right, let’s see what’s next. So strategize your solution. So I want you all to know that every obstacle has a solution.

Every obstacle has a solution and you can focus on the problem or you can focus on the possibility. Because I feel like every problem within it has possibility, but if you’re complaining about the obstacle and you’re arguing with the obstacle and you’re fighting with it, you can’t pivot to see what’s amazing about it, what the possibility is, what the potential solutions are. And this comes from a fixed mindset. When you’re in that fixed mindset, you can’t see the bigger picture. You can’t see what could come from it. And that’s why being curious and just being open that every single challenge also comes with a solution.

And this is where I think it’s so important for you to have a bring it attitude. I’ve been talking about this with my clients in the slim, chic and savvy society. And we talked about last month about one of the thoughts that I love that’s actually gotten me through this pandemic, it’s gotten me through my daughter’s sickness, it’s gotten me through so many challenges is I love the thought of bring it, I was made for this. Bring it, I was made for this. So when I have a big challenge come up, what we often want to do is we want to resist it, we want it to go away and we ended up fighting with our lives versus being open to it.

And for me, the moment I’m like, bring it, I was made for this, I tap into this deep knowing that no matter what happens, I’m going to be okay. And that’s where my confidence comes from and that’s where my certainty comes from. My certainty doesn’t come from outside of me. It comes from within of knowing that no matter what comes my way, no matter how sad I am, no matter how much grief I may experience, no matter how much fear is involved that I was made for it. And how do I know that? Because it would not be have been given to me if I were not able to handle it.

It’s our fighting with what it is that causes us so much suffering. It’s our avoiding of the suffering that causes more suffering. Part of life is the hard. Part of life is the contrast. But if we didn’t have this, we wouldn’t be able to appreciate that. And so for me it’s going to come at me anyway. You think about it, whatever’s going to happen is going to happen and it never serves me to fight it. And so for me, I love the thought of bring it, I was made for this. Knowing that a solution based life is a forward focused life. And for me, whenever you stop fighting with life,



you start moving forward and you are able to access the solutions.

And when you plan for your obstacles and you have solutions in place, you’re less reactive and you’re more creative and you start to feel like instead of life happening to you, you begin to happen to your life. So we did this in the last action time, but I want just to ask you now, like what solutions do you have for your potential obstacles? So just pick one of your obstacles, just one, and tell me what your solution is, how you’re going to plan for it. I usually tell myself, girl, you’ve got this, time to show. Yeah. Procrastination, a 15 minute timer. Love it.

Advertising the heck out of book drives, multiple alarms, stick to my calendar. When I feel fear, I will list a past victories that I’ve had. Love it. Remember Parkinson’s law? Yes. So it’s really interesting. Speaking of Parkinson’s law. So my 30 day dream goal is to clean up some clutter in my clothes situation and my bathroom. And so I had given myself two hours on Saturday, I think, yeah, two hours to do some cleaning. And I wanted to declutter and I had the exact area that I was going to do and I decided I was going to give myself a challenge and I shrunk it from two hours to one hour and I got it done.

And what was really interesting about that is that it gave me less time to be dramatic. It gave me less time to be confused. I just had to decide. I would literally pick up an item and say, nope, I had so much I just let go because I didn’t have time to think about it. I didn’t have time to overthink and over analyze. So I was able to shrink what I thought was going to take me two hours into one hour, which was super fun. We’re capable of so much more than we realize and we’re capable of doing it in less time than we often give ourselves.

And I’m not saying you need to do that, but it would be fun for you to play around with that. Let’s say you’ve given yourself two hours to write a chapter of a book. What if you gave yourself an hour? You would have to get over the perfectionistic brain. You just have to write. You just have to get it all out. That way, you can go back and make it better. But I love Parkinson’s law when we use it for us because it says things will shrink or expand to the time given. So we can give ourselves a whole week or we can give ourselves an hour. Your choice.

Okay. Now I want to talk about exceptions, exceptions versus excuses. When it comes to your calendar, when it comes to your commitments, what I want to say is that exceptions should be very rare. A lot of you are often making exceptions and it’s become your norm. The I’ll do it tomorrow. It can wait, like you just keep putting it off. Exceptions are very intentional and they’re well thought out and they’re deliberate when they’re done well. Excuses are common. They’re very reactive, and their aim is to help you avoid resistance, the very thing that you need



to feel in order to reach your dream.

So you get to decide ahead of time what your exceptions will be and they should be very few. So for me, I will say my exceptions are if I get a better opportunity, something like Oprah calls me and is like, hey, do you want to come on the show? And I had something planned on that day, I would make an exception and I would like my reason for it. It would not be an exception to avoid doing the task at hand. It would be an exception to move my life forward. So that is an exception that I make. I also will make an exception for dire life circumstances.

So for example, my dad actually during the last Dream Atelier. I got a call that he had coded, they had put him on helicopter and sent him to a bigger facility where he lives and that was an exception. Now interestingly enough, I still taught the Dream Atelier. I did it. I flew to be by his side and I would still show up for what was on my calendar. I did have to change some things around. I had to let some things go because in that moment I had to pare it down to what is most essential right now. And showing up for my students was essential and being with my dad was essential and I had to let go of a lot of other things, but that is an exception.

I tell Sarah, my daughter’s here, she’s 22, and she wants to spend time with me and I love it and I plan that time with her, but I don’t allow the distraction when I have things on my calendar. She knows when I finish up work, that’s our time, all the quality time in the world. And in the mornings we have coffee together outside. And so a lot of you are letting yourself be distracted because you’re afraid of saying no, and it’s also a way to avoid discomfort. So you should have very few exceptions when it comes to your dreams and you should like your reason for your exceptions.

So I’m curious what exceptions you came up with. Yes, if Oprah calls. But some people wouldn’t. It wouldn’t be that important. But if she called me, I think I’d pick up the call and I would make an exception. Family emergency. Yeah. The University of Chicago asked me to be a special speaker. Love it. My girls. Yeah. I would be specific like with my girls. Like what would the exception be? Like if my daughter called me up and she’s like, mom, I need you immediately and she was having an emergency, I’m like, I would let everything go.

But there are times when she calls me up and she just wants to chit chat, which I love. But if I have something on my calendar, I’m like, listen, I love you. I will call you back. Because a lot of time we sacrifice our entire lives for our children and we put our own desires and dreams on the back burner. And honestly, I just want to be an example to my daughter. I want to show my daughter what is possible and sometimes that means saying no to her and being very



intentional so that when I’m with her, I’m truly with her. I am 100% present.

Tonya coming to upstate New York and having a get together. Okay. We would make an exception for that for sure. So fun. Endometriosis flare and family emergency. Yeah. So life happens. Right? And I’m not saying you should be like so all in on your goal, you’re like, I’m not going to the emergency room even though I’m in pain. Like no, you need to already have in your mind like if I’m super sick, I’m going to extend myself grace and I’m going to rearrange and I’ll get back on track. But right now this is what’s happening and this is my exception and you need to feel good about it.

Don’t make an exception and then beat yourself up. That defeats the point. I want you to make your exception and feel good about it so that when it arises, you already know, you’ve already planned for it. Awesome. Love it, love it. Can you all see how powerful this is to like pre decide, know what your exceptions are, know what your obstacles are to plan for them? You really do become unstoppable. The other one I want to talk about is your plan B. Your plan B is your plan for what you’ll do if you don’t honor your plan, which sometimes happens.

And here’s the thing, you all are learning this for the first time, or some of you have done this before. But for those of you that are learning this for the first time, there are going to be moments where you don’t honor your calendar, and that’s okay. Now, what you make that mean is either going to keep you stuck or it’s going to move you forward. You can tell yourself, I’m learning something new. Let me be curious as to why I didn’t show up for what was on my calendar. Let me understand my thinking. And you can extend yourself grace, and you can also be full of grit that you’re going to show up and you’re going to practice again.

And you’re going to keep practicing until it becomes your norm. But your plan B is that plan that should rarely-

But your plan B is that plan that should rarely be used and it should not be your norm and it should have a consequence because the brain is wired to pursue pleasure and to avoid pain. So if you make your plan B painful, you’ll work hard to avoid it. Having a plan B in place guarantees that you’ll keep moving forward even if it’s bumpy.

For me, my plan B is usually, with the exception of this 30-day goal, because a lot of times my 30 day goals are often business-focused. I love using Parkinson’s law to get a lot done in less amount of time, because I love my free time. I love my weekends. I love my time with friends.



I love days where I do nothing but think and just be with myself. And so, for me, oftentimes, my plan B is that I will have to do the work on the weekend and I don’t want to do that. That is painful for me, because on the weekend I want to be with Sarah. I want to be with Glen. I want to be on the boat, I want to be with the dogs. I want to be hiking, I’m going to be having brunch with friends, so I will work so hard to stick to my calendar because I don’t want to do my plan B.

Now, for this particular 30-day goal, because I’m planning it on the weekends, my plan B is that I am not allowed to buy anything. No more skincare, no more clothes, nothing, until it’s all gone. All the clutter. Here’s the thing, right now I have my eyes on a pair of shoes that I really want. So if I am going to get those shoes, it means I have to show up for my plan. And if I don’t show up for my plan, I don’t get the shoes. It’s that simple. And because these shoes are on sale, I really want these shoes. So I’m going to work really hard to stick to my plan because my plan B is painful.

So I want you to think about, what is your plan B? If you don’t show up for your calendar, what’s your backup plan? How are you going to deal with that? And you need to make the consequence painful, because that’s going to inspire you to show up for plan A. Let me hear in the comments, what is your plan B?

Weekend work. Yes, we don’t want to do that. We want our weekends. Here’s the thing, you all, I am all about leisurely hustling. For any of you that have been following me for a while, you know that I coined the phrase leisurely hustle. I love focused work and getting it done, and then I love my leisure time. And I’m very protective of my leisure time, so often time my plan B is I lose out on my leisure time, which I don’t like.

Yeah. Wake up at 5:00. That’ll help me get it done. If I know I have to wake up at 5:00, I’m going to get it done because I am not a morning person. C-level work. I love it. Wait to eat. Weekend work. Loose pool time. We don’t want that, Vicky, so let’s get it done. Okay. So you all just answered this, what is your plan B? And stick to it. You’ve got to plan A and then you’ve got to plan B. If you do not complete plan A, which is showing up for your calendar and doing what you say you’re going to do, do your plan B. There’s no plan C, that is not an option. You’ve got plan A and you’ve got plan B. And plan B is not going to be fun, so get plan A done.

Okay, closing comments. Dream making requires the three G’s; grace, and that is the forgiveness, the compassion, the self approval, the allowing, the ease, the faith. And I’m realizing, okay, you all want to talk about imperfection, this ... Let me just give you a quick



backstory. The class I’m doing right now on the obstacles used to be at the very end, on week four. And women were saying, “I really wish you would do that on week two, because it’s so useful.” Because during the month the obstacles are coming up and so I moved it to week two, and this is actually the side that was with week four, but I’m just going to go with it because it’s still applicable, because grace is needed when you don’t show up for your plan. Grace is needed when things don’t work out. Grace is needed when you have to resort to plan B or you have to make an exception.

You never ever win by beating yourself up. Grace is the secret to your dreams. Because you have your own back, you’re kind to yourself and it just so happens that that kind of woman, she keeps moving forward. Grit is the perseverance, the stamina, the massive action, the resilience, the never-give-up attitude. The gumption is the boldness, it’s you saying, “Here’s what I want. Here’s what I’m going for. I’m all in.” It’s being decisive. It’s the courage. It’s having guts. You have a blank slate, my friends. You can do a lot in a week. I want you to remember this. I say this often, but you get really good at what you practice the most. So continue to practice showing up for yourself because, remember, the best part of creating your dream is who you must become in the process.

And you may see the slide again, and I may preach even deeper on these issues, but that is how we overcome dream obstacles. With that said, I’m going to take some questions. We’ve got, what time is it? I’m going to take a couple of questions and then I’m taking my doggies down to the lake. They’re coming up to say hi. Hi babies. Hi. You want to come say hi?

Jennifer says, “How and where do you hold your to-do list before they get transferred to your calendar?” I don’t have to-do lists. I mean, I write everything down. I brain-dump what needs to be done, then it goes directly on my calendar. It’s that simple. I feel so much resistance this time. I don’t even know why, because it’s just what Steven Pressfield said, [inaudible 01:06:49]. It’s like the resistance is the sign that it’s for you. It’s not a sign to give up. It’s a sign to figure out what you’re resisting and doing the work of overcoming that resistance, feeling the discomfort, showing up no matter what. Living your life based on your desire, not your mood.

Do you know how many days I don’t feel like doing anything? I just want to hang out with my dogs, but I imagine if I did that day after day after day, how disappointed I’d be at myself. That inspires me to show up because my why is so big, which we’re going to talk about in a future class. But my why is so big that it’s just not an option. I think about my future self. I think about how proud I’ll be in the next show up even on the days when I don’t want to.



“What about completely unforeseen obstacles? Something that can [inaudible 01:07:45] you?” Can you give me an example? I mean, there are so many things. Like a loved one becomes sick. That’s why for me, that goes into my exceptions. Someone I love becomes sick or I get in a wreck. God forbid, could happen. We don’t know. Those are things we can’t foresee, but it’s all a possibility. I don’t spend a lot of my time thinking about those things. I just trust that if something like that comes up, then I’ll deal with it. But we know our common obstacles, and as I was saying, most of them are internal. It’s the perfectionism, it’s the negative self-talk, it’s the procrastination. Those are the obstacles that are familiar to us and that we can plan for.

“Can you choose to become a growth mindset?” Absolutely. Absolutely. You’re going to have to monitor your current fixed mindset and you’re going to have to practice shifting it. So every time, for example, you find yourself saying, “Why bother,” you’re going to have to remind yourself why you are bothering. Why is worth it. Over time, it’ll become more normal to have a growth mindset versus a fixed one.

“My favorite hobby is needle point. How do I know when it’s a distraction or if I can just enjoy it and not feel guilty? Do I need to schedule my hobby time?” I would. For sure, I would schedule it. That way, you’ll be able to just be present with it. For me, there are days where I don’t have anything scheduled. It’s just my day off. I can do whatever I want. That would be the day that I would do my needle point, but you’ll know it’s a distraction action if you’re using it to avoid what’s on your calendar. If you’re using it to avoid your goals.

Let’s see. “Willing to do a terrible job, but committing to getting it done. As a physician, I can’t reconcile this thought. Any suggestions? I feel like my job demands doing a good job.” Yeah, and here’s the thing. You get to decide if you’re doing a good job or not. There are physicians out there, believe it or not, that are not doing a good job by many standards, but they believe they are. You get to decide what you think about what you do. I’m just really curious how this relates to your dream goal, because a lot of times ... Okay, here’s a great example. I was a critical care nurse for 15 years and I had to be willing to do a terrible job to become a nurse. I remember something as simple as checking someone’s blood glucose. I was shaking.

I was like, “Oh my God, I don’t know if I can do this.” It’s a little prick. But I was so nervous and I had to be willing to do a terrible job to eventually get to the point where I could run codes and start IVs, like it was no big deal, but I had to be willing to do a terrible job in the beginning to get good at it. Does that make sense?

I think a lot of these I’ve answered throughout the call. Just trying to see if there are any other



ones. Margaret says, “Will you be re-posting this tonight? I need to see this again as soon as possible.” We will have it up in the morning. Margaret’s like, “I need this on repeat.” “I’m learning that there are many more tasks that I did not realize that I had to do with my dream. This takes me on a detour to do the task and then I get back on track. Is this normal?” Yeah. I feel like when you’re first learning this, honestly, you’re practicing the skill of knowing what needs to go into your dream. When I first did this process, I had like five things written down and then I was like, “Oh, there’s a lot more to this.”

I was in it when I discovered that and then I just had to course correct and break it down and put those in my calendar and reassess. But I want you all to allow yourself to be a student and to be in that growth mindset and to know that you’re learning a new skill and you’re going to get better and better at it. It might be more time consuming now, but in the end you’re going to save yourself so much time and you’re going to get quicker and faster at it. Trust me on this, but you have to practice it.

“I fell behind last week. Can I still succeed?” You tell me. This is a great question. You get to decide. First of all, know I-fell-behind is a thought. What’s the facts of the situation? The facts may be, I didn’t fill out the calendar. I didn’t decide on my 30-day dream goal. Those are the facts. Maybe. For you. Now, what you make that mean will either drive you forward or it’s going to hold you back. If you start telling yourself the story of, “I’m behind, I can’t succeed,” then that’s going to be the story that you live out. I would encourage you to tell the story of, “I’m right on time, I’m going to pick up where I am and I will succeed. I’m deciding that I’m going to succeed.” Can you see the difference? Totally different stories. Same facts, two different stories that’s going to create two very different results.

“What if scheduling everything in a calendar makes your stomach twisty?” Laurie, I would ask why. Why does that make your stomach twisty? What’s the story in your mind? Because for me, I can relate to this because I used to think, “Oh, it’s taking all of my freedom away. What if I don’t show up for it?” That’s why I’m so deliberate about what goes on my calendar. I don’t just haphazardly schedule, which is what a lot of people do. They put things on their calendar knowing as soon as they put them down, they’re not going to show up for it. I don’t do that. My calendar has given me so much freedom, so much freedom. I get twisty thinking that I don’t have a calendar. You have to understand too, I have weeks where I don’t plan anything like when I’m on vacation. I have days I don’t plan anything. I have so much more freedom and I feel so much more in control of myself. And so, I’m just really curious for you why it’s causing this twisty feeling.

Yeah, and in terms of the details of the calendars, like Jennifer was saying, all the colors may



... it was too loud, you can do the calendar however you want. It doesn’t matter. You don’t have to color code. You can use paper and pencil, but it’s about you being intentional with your life. It’s about you deciding how you’re going to spend your time. It’s about you being committed to your goals.

“It feels like my job instead of a fun thing.” My dream is my job. Think of it that way. For me, it’s fun to show up for my dream. It’s fun to become the woman who shows up for her calendar and therefore is showing up for her dreams. So just look at ... I’d love to coach you around this, so maybe if you can come on Thursday to the coaching call, Laurie. But I really want you to ask yourself, why are you looking at your dream as a job that’s not fun? If that’s the case for you, then we need to go back and revisit your dream. Although we’re not changing it. I want you to stick to your 30-day dream goal just to prove to yourself that you can. But our dreams, even though they terrify us and they scare us and they’re uncomfortable, when you imagine yourself having achieved it, it should be fun. It should be something that you’re proud of just to think about.

Okay. “How do you get over feeling bad about not completing the task on your calendar on that day?” Again, it’s just what I was saying earlier. I want you to ask yourself, “Is there any upside to feeling bad?” Feeling bad keeps us in the cycle, so we tell ourselves a story like, “I never followed through.” You feel bad and then how do you act when you’re feeling bad? You don’t follow through. You just keep perpetuating the cycle. And so, for me, I’m always just super curious about myself and I know there’s no upside to feeling bad about it. So for me, I just go to like, “What happened?” Why didn’t you show up? It’s just like with a child that you love and they do something and they’re feeling bad about it. You don’t want to go and beat the child up. You want to be curious. You’d be like, “What happened? Why are you feeling bad? Why didn’t you do that thing you said you wanted to do? Let’s figure it out.” You can’t figure it out if you’re beating yourself up. And so, just no upside to it at all. Ever.

Okay. You all are amazing. I want you to be proud of yourself. This is some hard work. It’s hard changing our habits. It’s hard showing up for ourselves because we’ve been practicing showing up for everybody else except ourselves. Maybe we’ve had years of proving to ourselves that we don’t follow through. And so, changing that narrative and changing the habits is so uncomfortable. But I want to challenge you, it’s so worth it. It is so worth it. So remember, grace, grit and gumption. Those are the three ingredients to making your dreams come true. I want you to be practicing them every single day. And as I was just saying, if you’re not showing up for your calendar, I just want you to be super curious with yourself as to why. What are the thoughts in your head? Because we’re going to be talking about thoughts and emotions over the next two weeks. With that said, I’m going to go take my boys down to the lake. Have a beautiful day, everybody. I will see you on Thursday for our coaching call. Cheers.

the dream atelier

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