A Sweet Route to Happiness, Hope and Permission w/ Guest, Abby Vega

Hello, hello, and welcome to Shedding the Bitch Radio, where you can discuss, debate, and get advice on how to discover and shed the bitches of fear, insecurity, self-doubt, and negative mindsets so you can realize your dreams and life purpose and create and accelerate the riches you want in life. Join us here live every Tuesday at noon Eastern and dialogue with us at 818-572-2910. You can also chat with us at blogtalkradio.com/sheddingthebitch or share your stories on our website at sheddingthebitch.com. Whatever the bitch is that's holding you back from living your life to the fullest, it's not worth giving up the riches in life that you deserve. So call in now and let Bernadette Boas know what's holding you back. 818-572-2910.

Welcome, welcome, welcome everyone. Yes, this is Shedding the Bitch Radio. I'm so excited that you're with us today. It is going to be a great conversation and just a great hour to spend together in our Shedding the Bench community. Many of you may have gone out into our website and you'll start seeing some changes in the coming weeks and some enhancements, that kind of thing. So I'm getting very excited about how just to open up more and more engagement with you. But in the meantime, before we get there, I hope you are having a beautiful, beautiful day. Evening, morning, wherever you might be around the world. I so appreciate, and so does Deborah, we appreciate that we do have an international listenership and community, which is just fabulous. So thank you very much for making time for us, whether you're listening to us live or you take us with you on the road. And at the same time, I probably I don't mention it as often as I should, but not only can you go and go to blogtalkradio.com and sheddingthebitch.com to pull down our podcast, but you can also go to iTunes. We've been on iTunes, Shedding the Bitch Radio, for a number of years, as long as I've had the show. So also be sure to check us out there as well. It is April, and I'm just absolutely stunned that in just less than a week it's going to be May. And I think I've been expressing with all of you how just a little bit, I don't know, a little anxious about just how fast time goes anymore. And to think that it's already, you know, May and Mother's Day is coming up, it just sometimes just gives me pause because it just feels like I just want to be able to kind of put a rubber band around time and just kind of hold it still for a little bit. So it is May. We're going to gear up for it. We're going to gear up with a lot of conversations regarding mom. So for those of you who are moms, working moms, stay-at-home moms, moms of, you know, kind of all makeup, whether you're a single mom, a coupled mom, Maybe you're even a mom to a pet. Although my sister is now going to kill me because she doesn't like when I say that it's equivalent to having children. But mine is sitting next to me. You all know Charlie. So for Mom's Day, I am typically that week down at the beach with my sisters. And yet, Mom's Day is pretty late this year. I think it's Sunday the 14th. So we actually— gather in Ocean City, New Jersey on Friday. So I'll be broadcasting our Ask Bernadette episode next Tuesday live from Ocean City, New Jersey. How excited are all of you? And I'm going to work to be able to come actually to you live streaming as well, so stay tuned for that. But Ask Bernadette is going to be Tuesday, and be sure you're putting your business questions, your career questions, maybe you have questions in regards to a relationship or a situation in your home or personal life that you just need some help with, put that out on our Shedding the Bits page on Twitter or Facebook. And of course, Deborah's online right now, but she's also out there during the week, and I am as well. So we'll make sure that we get your question addressed quickly. At the same time, we will dig deeper into it right here on our Tuesday episode next week. And you also have an opportunity to call in if you want to and really kind of even give me more detail about what it is that you need some help and support with. So that will be Tuesday of next week, #SheddingTheBitch on Twitter, Facebook, and then of course you can always call in 1-818-572-2910 to talk to me and/or my guests directly. And then our Mother's Day episode is going to be with Irene Hildeberger. Now I came across Irene because I was looking for something that was specific to moms and even more so those of you who are trying to balance, you know, a family, work, and your own personal life. So Irene talks about You finding the me in mommy. So that's very relevant to what it is that we talk about here at Shit in a Bitch. We are all striving to really find our core you, our core me, and that way as you do, you are able to kind of find what you really want in life and what you want this life to provide you and those in your world. So Irene's going to talk to us all about that on the Tuesday of Mother's Day week. And so stay tuned for that. We've got great guests lined up for the rest of the month celebrating women, moms, and just overall shedding the bitch or shifting to riches. Excuse the background noise. That might be one of our guests or one of our people logged in. Abby, are you there? All right, someone's having a good time out there. You could always hit the mute button if you'd like to, if you are someone calling in, but, you know, hey, it's— It's radio and this is the way it goes. So we just flow with it, don't we? All right, she might have also had trouble with her connection because I just saw her drop off, so she might be calling back in. All right, so our topic for today, which I absolutely love, and I've known our guest for a number of years, actually probably since around 2009, and she really has kind of a story that many of you are going to be able to relate to, and yet at times even I'm taken aback by just the learnings and the experiences that our guests and people that I speak to all the time, or even my clients that I coach, just kind of what they have— what lessons and what life teachings they've gained out of their ups and downs and their highs and lows. And our guest is no different. So our conversation today is all around a story. A Sweet Route to Happiness. And not only happiness, but also hope and permission, which is a very key word when it comes to our female audience. So she basically sums up the topic of her conversation as her book, Snow Cone Diaries, is the summation of her life as a middle-aged woman who, despite having it all—a great husband of 28 years, two wonderful and beautiful children, a successful career, friends, and a beautiful home, she realized that on the inside she was lost. She was sad, lonely, and even unhappy. Can any of you relate to that? In her memoir, her goals are to inspire, give hope, and finally give permission to anyone, all of you, to go and pursue your dreams, ignite your passions, and follow Your own path to bliss. So the 3 to 5 things that you can be listening for are going to be how do I identify the factors that will make you happy? We all tend to take that for granted. We all kind of walk around with a smile on our face, but if we were to really ask ourselves, are we happy, that question may not be as easy as it sounds. So how do you identify the factors that will make you happy? And then she's going to talk with us about being inspired to acknowledge what's keeping you from taking action on finding that happiness. And then, of course, the permission and empowerment to go for it, overcome your obstacles, and not take no for an answer. Now, as we move to Mother's Day and as we move in, you know, going forward into spring, into summer, It's an opportunity to kind of shed and kind of let go and let the sunshine in, so to speak. So really listening to this conversation, when you probably have many people, maybe even yourself, that people look at and think, wow, she has it all. Look at her. Not only the outward appearance, but also the inward, or look at, you know, her family makeup or the career that she has, just like our guest. And yet none of us know what is going on in the inside. None of us know what's going on in the inside of you either. So this is a great opportunity with this conversation and going forward to really just sit, settle, breathe, and open yourself up to considering what in your life you want to shift or change or give yourself permission to enjoy and to love and to pursue your dreams. So our rich question for today that I want you to sit down and really think about is, on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the happiest, 10 being the happiest, how would you measure your level of happiness? And I really want to implore you to dig deep, be true and honest with yourself. No one else is seeing this little assessment you're doing other than for yourself. And we always talk about self-awareness being key to you being able to grow. All right? So what is that on a scale of 1 to 10? How would you measure your degree of happiness, 10 being the best? Rich tags that you can be tagging us with on your tweets and your Facebook posts are happiness, hashtag happiness, and of course, Shedding the Bitch. So we're going to take a— or shed the bitch, I should say, before Deborah kind of pings me and says, wait, it's hashtag shed the bitch. So on that note, we're going to take a break. We're going to come back and I'm going to introduce you to our amazing guest. We're going to get into this conversation of your sweet route to happiness, hope, and permission. We'll be right back.

You are listening to Shedding the Bitch Radio with Bernadette Boas. We are inspiring individuals around the globe to discover confront and shed their bitches of fear, insecurity, and negativity so they can create the riches in their career, business, and life they deserve. Be sure to check out Bernadette Boas' book, Shedding the Corporate Bitch: Shifting from Bitch to Rich in Life and Business, available on Amazon and sheddingthebitch.com. We also want to thank our sponsors, TSR Consulting, who offers a broad range of tax services for small to corporate-sized clients. Go to TSRConsulting.com to learn more. And Parker House Virtual Services, who provides virtual assistance and social media support for small to medium-sized businesses. Email Deborah Parker at deborahparker78@gmail.com for more information. To become a sponsor or advertiser on our program, email us at mediarelations@sheddingthebitch.com. Shedding the Bitch Radio airs every Tuesday at noon Eastern time. Be sure to go to blogtalkradio.com/sheddingthebitchradio and follow the program for all of the updates and announcements of our guests and show topics. Now let's return to Bernadette and Shedding the Bitch Radio.

Welcome back everyone. We are going to be talking about Your Route to Happiness. Now our guest, Abby Vega, she first wrote Snow Cones to Diaries, her book, after a 33-year successful and accomplished career in sales, marketing, senior leadership, personal development, management, training, and coaching in large corporations, startups, and her very own entrepreneurial endeavors. Abby is thrilled to start yet another chapter in her life as a writer, a motivational speaker, and business consultant. We all know that experiencing positive emotions on a regular basis is vital to our health and well-being. Because happiness is a personal choice and mindset, this book outlines a step-by-step process to discover the factors that are holding you back from achieving happiness. By figuring out what makes you happy, you can take simple steps daily to turn mundane activities into fun challenges. Abby's true stories of her adventures at home and on the road with her snow cone truck teach us how to turn the unexpected pleasures in life that make us smile every day into tools to help us build happier, more meaningful lives for ourselves. And Others. Welcome to the show, Abby.

Thank you, Bernadette, for having me today. Oh, I am so excited to have you.

I had mentioned early on that we have known each other probably since about 2009, and I'm always— yeah, and I'm always— you're not curious, but I'm always so intrigued by people's evolutions and growth, and yours certainly, you know, through the process of publishing this book has been extremely exciting. So give us give us some background on like kind of where did you come from, where did you grow up, and what— why is Jacksonville, Florida, as opposed to anywhere else in the country, your home?

Sure. You mentioned earlier that you were going to Ocean City, New Jersey. Well, our vacation spot as children was Ocean City, Maryland, so I'm pretty familiar with the area where you grew up. I grew up in Baltimore and was number 3 of 6 children, and I originally came to Jacksonville, Florida when I was working for a division of J&J. I got promoted and moved here, and I got to tell you, upon my first glimpse at Jacksonville, Florida, I wanted to know who did I piss off and why did they send me here? Back in the '80s, it wasn't such a happening place. But now I like to— well, it's my home and has been for the last 20 years. Now I like to think of it as the best-kept secret in Florida.

Nice, very nice. Now you mentioned J&J, that's Johnson Johnson, I'm assuming? Correct. So you, you know, so you come, you know, you come from this big mega corporate background and then you kind of worked your way into the entrepreneurial world and now from an entrepreneur to a consultant and a speaker and now a writer. How did that come about? What made you kind of say to yourself, "I need a change in what it is that I'm doing"?

Sure.

For most women, we're constantly going through change. Our body certainly does. And so our emotions and how we feel about things also change. You know, I first was a newlywed, then I became a mother, and then I became a caretaker for elderly parents.. And each time you take those transitions in life, it forces almost your career to change or your focus or what's most important in your life also changes as well. And so, while I was blessed to spend 30-some years in corporate America in a variety of different jobs and I learned an awful lot. As I began to— probably 50 was the magic number. After turning 50, I started to finally realize that all of those things that I had worked so hard for them, you know, the money, the cars, the house, the, you know, things that people saw were not what was making me happy, that there was still a gap that I wanted to fill. And so the evolution came to owning my own business and then, you know, writing a book, and who knows where I'll go next.

So, okay, so where in the world— it was one thing to question, you know, for me when I was, um, when I read your book, one thing to question the, the title Snow Cone Diaries, although I loved it. But then I kind of dug into it and I'm like, wait a minute, she actually had a snow cone truck.

How did that come about? How's that? It's my Baltimore roots, and on every corner in Baltimore or in Baltimore County, if you drive around in the summertime, there's a little shed or trailer or something where somebody's selling snowballs. And since being a little girl, I always thought that that would be my dream job, you know, simple wear shorts, flip-flops, you know, work in the summertime and just serve shaved ice and make everybody happy. Unfortunately, as a child, I wasn't able to do that, but I never forgot that dream. And so after a couple of major life changes, a dear friend of mine that was the same age as me passed away suddenly from a heart attack, and then the loss of my mother. I decided that if not now, then when do I begin to, you know, change my life and make it what I want it to be?

Right, right. What, you know, it, you know, and I'm gonna, you know, divert a little bit here, but doesn't it suck that you have to have some major pain or loss in your life to then finally say, okay, I want to stop, you know, putting myself through what I'm putting myself through, and I want to pursue what I actually love or have a passion for. I'm sorry, I just had a kind of—

I just— it becomes our excuse to have a nervous breakdown covered by, she's just in deep depression over the loss of— you're fine.

Well, you're right. You're finally giving yourself permission. So what or whom inspired you to write the book? Like, what made you all of a sudden say— well, first off, I want to ask, so you went and had and bought yourself a snow cone truck, and that was kind of a business for you?

It was. I sat down one day and— and I know that you talked about how to kind of rate your happiness. And one day I challenged myself to sit down and write 3 things that made— always made me happy, always made me smile. And the 3 things I came up with were children, ice cream, and bringing joy to others. And immediately I Googled what's the coolest thing in ice cream, because that's my personal favorite dessert no matter where I go. And up pops a picture of this really, really cool truck. And so I started to do some research on, on the truck, and I found out that there was actually a used truck in St. Augustine, just a little south of where I live, and it was for sale. And, um, so I walked in, told my husband I was I was quitting my double six-figure job and I was buying an ice cream truck. And you can only imagine the discussion that ensued after that. And he said, okay honey, if that makes you happy, go ahead and do it. And I did. And it literally changed my life.

Well, I have to, you know, want to make this comment for all the women out there is, does your brother or does your husband have a brother? Yes, he has two. Ah, we're all looking for men that kind of just like, you know, not only support our dreams but kind of hand us the keys and say, yes, go for it. What, you know, what's there to, you know, to be lost? So that's awesome that you had that. Support system behind you too, because that— it had to make the decision-making easier.

It definitely does, because I mean, again, I was giving up a great job and I was also taking a risk. I was taking money out of, you know, our retirement fund on, on a whim. Um, but after being married at that time 20, almost 25 years, He has learned that whenever I make up my mind to do something, it's usually the best thing for me and the outcome is greater results for our family. So he really doesn't question anymore because I've been successful pretty much at anything I've ever set my mind to do. So now he just trusts that, okay, just go with it. If it makes her happy, go with it. Nice.

Nice, nice. Now, do you still have the truck, or did you move on from that? And is that what kind of moved you into writing your book?

Well, lots of interesting things that you can imagine happens when you own a 10,000-pound snow cone truck. One, just learning how to drive and not take people and things out is, is one of them. Two, I got to go to something called, uh, college with a K. So I was actually earning my third degree. I have a bachelor's, a master's, and now I had a degree in cornology or whatever they called it, iceology. Um, and then you, you learn— to me, it was getting back to the roots. Physical— it was physical labor. And it was for me, I wanted to test to see if I had all of the things that I had learned from corporate America, that I could apply it to anything, including something as simple as a snow cone truck, and make it successful. Because if I could do that, then I knew that I could do anything else I decided to do. So I took the— I drove the truck for 11 months., and I took it from zero existing business to $100,000 business book of business in 11 months. And along the way, not— yeah, along the way I met a gentleman who— we were doing a charity event called Snow Cone, uh, and Teddy Bears. Uh, we did— I, I focused a lot on, um, not so much making money with the truck, but making money to give back. I mean, I kept enough to keep the truck going, but for me it was about, for once in my life, giving back for all the blessings that I had been given. And this gentleman stepped on my truck who happened to be at this event and said he wanted to ask me 4 questions. And I don't recall exactly what those 4 questions were, but There was something to do with how did I grow up, how did I get to where I was, have I ever failed at anything, and one other question which I can't remember. And basically he looked me in the eye, a complete stranger, and said, you'd be cheating the world if you did not write these stories and tell people you have qualities of leadership that I have never seen before. And so I'm like, but I don't know how to write a book. And he's like, I'm going to teach you. And so we met a couple times. He said, do this, do this, do this. And he kind of held me accountable. And voilà, there is a book.

Awesome. What a great story. So anyone out there listening, I mean, These things come out of the air in such unexpected places. That is just awesome. That is just awesome. Well, we're going to take a quick break. Go ahead, finish up, please.

No, I was going to say I have one other story to tell you when we come back from the break about someone else who inspired me as well.

So, okay, we will absolutely do that. Well, absolutely. We're going to take a quick break, and when we get back, yes, we're going to hear about who and what has inspired Abby, and then of course what lessons and what teachings and what tips does she have for you when it comes to the sweet route to happiness, hope, and permission. We'll be right back.

You are listening to Shedding the Bitch Radio with Bernadette Boas. We are inspiring individuals around the globe to discover, confront, and shed their bitches of fear, insecurity, and negativity so they can create the riches in their career, business, and life they deserve. Be sure to check out Bernadette Boas' book, Shedding the Corporate Bitch: Shifting from Bitch to Rich in Life and Business, available on Amazon and sheddingthebitch.com. We also want to thank our sponsors, TSR Consulting, who offers a broad range of tax services for small to corporate size clients. Go to TSRConsulting.com consulting.com to learn more. And Parker House Virtual Services, who provides virtual assistance and social media support for small to medium-sized businesses. Email Deborah Parker at deborahparker78@gmail.com for more information. To become a sponsor or advertiser on our program, email us at mediarelations@sheddingthebitch.com. Shedding the Bitch Radio airs every Tuesday at noon Eastern time. Be sure to go to blogtalkradio.com/sheddingthebitchradio and follow the program for all the updates and announcements of our guests and show topics. Now let's return to Bernadette and Shedding the Bitch Radio.

Welcome back everyone. Have you been thinking about and considering, and maybe you even made notes on a scale of 1 to 10, where do you rate yourself, 10 being the happiest? Where do you rate your happiness in your life? Because it's a critical piece of information to really understand as our guest Abby Vega, who's an author, motivational speaker, business consultant, she's showing us and expressing just how in the simplest of places we can recognize what really makes us happy and what we might just be comfortable in doing, and at what point do you decide that that comfort is no longer comfortable and you want to pursue that happiness. So Abby, as we were going to break, you were going to be sharing a story about another individual or situation that inspired you. I'd love to know.

Sure. Actually, there's two, and I'll try to keep them real brief. You might all be familiar with the famous business book writer John Gordon. He happens to live in my neighborhood. He wrote The Energy Bus and The Shark and the Goldfish and a bunch of other books. But he lives in my neighborhood and I attended his book launch way back in the day when he first wrote Shark and the Goldfish. And this was before I owned the snow cone truck, before I ever imagined myself writing a book. I walked up to him and I said, "You know, I can do what you do." And he looked at me like, "Who the heck are you and where did you come from?" And I said, "And I can do it better because I can write it from a female perspective. You only share the male perspective and one day you and I are going to write a book together." And so for 5 years, we, we walked around on the beach and he'd be like, how's that book coming? How's that book coming? Um, and I sent you a copy of the book ahead of time. Guess who got the first copy when it was ready, uh, or the manuscript? And I asked him to write a foreword for me on the book, and he's like, wow, you actually did it. And his wife is actually one of my biggest fans. But the biggest inspiration was Christopher, and if you read the book, Bernadette, you know who I mean. It was one of the very first events I did with the snow cone truck. A woman from New Jersey coincidentally called me and said, please don't say no. Everybody else has told me no, and I just know you're going to say yes. I'm like, what am I saying yes to? And it's when I, when I, when I said yes, I realized that I was completely letting go of all common sense, of all the things that I knew better. And I was just letting my heart guide what I was wanting to do. And her request was to drive to a drug rehab facility in Homerville, Georgia, which is about 130 miles from where I live. I wasn't licensed in Florida. Alone, Georgia. It wasn't my territory, and I didn't know what I was going to be dealing with when I got there. But I packed my 15-year-old son and myself on the truck, and we went and we did a 21st birthday for this young man and all of the other people who were at this rehab facility. And I got to tell you, to see 50 grown men come out, start crying be so touched by a simple act of kindness that she thinks that I went and, and helped him. That moment changed my life for forever. He helped me more that day than I could ever have helped him. Wow. Because I was letting go. I let go and I trusted. And the rest has— is history, what's happened since then. By the way, he successfully completed rehab, halfway house, and now works 60 hours a week and has a girlfriend. I changed his life, he changed mine.

Woo! That is awesome! If we weren't on the radio, I'd say, okay, let's take a minute to just sit and reflect on that. But that is awesome, and I hope everybody, you know, kind of understood that and appreciate it. But there was one key thing that I took from that, and even the way you just explained it too, and that I think will benefit everyone listening to this, is to let go and trust. And it's actually, you know, it's trusting yourself that everything is going to be okay. Let go and trust. Absolutely beautiful, and I want everyone— I want to make sure that you know this— I want everybody to check out her book. Get her book. Buy her book. But, and you can, you can get, you can go to Amazon, it's there, but you know what, there's some challenges for authors sometimes on Amazon, so please go to Abby-Vega.com and pick up her book there. Plus, you'll be able to get it autographed. So there's a kind of a bonus for you going to Abby-Vega.com. I also, since we're there, I want to give you her other handle so you can be following her. And I love when my guests make it really easy for you. So Facebook, Twitter, basically I found her if I just— Abby Vega Author, you can find her on Facebook. On Twitter it's @vegabi1313. Still, I went into Abby Vega and I was able to see kind of where her Twitter handle resided. She is on Instagram, Vega Abby, and that's V-E-G-A-A-B-B-I, Abby short for Abby. And then LinkedIn, obviously, Abby Vega Author. She does have a blog every Friday, so if you were to go to abby-vega.com, you can also check out her blog. Also, I'm also aware that she's always rolling out new programs and new ways for you to partner with her, let her inspire you. So just continue to come back and forth to AbbyVega.com, and not only for the book, but also for, you know, just everything about her, and plus her, you know, soon to be coming new programs around coaching and consulting and supporting you. She's also a motivational speaker., and of course an author. So you'll want to kind of LinkedIn with her, tweet with her, and Facebook with her. All right. Oh, that just kind of made me so excited. That story was so powerful. So from there, kind of when you say, "So now the world's just opened up for me as a result of that experience." First off, give everyone an idea. How long ago was that situation with Christopher?

Uh, I purchased, um, purchased the truck probably about 5 years ago. I kept it for a year, sold it, and it took me 3 years to write the book because I struggled with how much of my personal self I wanted to reveal to the world because I was afraid that others would think that this woman has truly lost her mind. And yet I have found that the reason why the book has been so successful is it is because it is so raw and open and honest, right? And that's what connects readers to you. So from that, I mean, John Gordon and I have speak regularly now. And I have been on all the local TV and radio channels here in Jacksonville. I'm looking to kind of broaden, broaden what I do. Sure. And absolutely, I find that I meet people that I would never have met before since just leaving myself open to it. And one such individual is Dr. Chuck Coker, and he has spent 32 years studying happiness, but happiness on a different thing. And someone invited me to a breakfast at 7:30 in the morning, which I don't do 7:30 anymore so good. I went to this breakfast and I'm like, who is this dude? And he's a PhD, teaches at Oxford in England, is who this dude is. And we swapped books. And his is the science behind happiness, and mine is the real-life story of happiness. And we've been introduced together, and so he and I are going to be partnering and sharing the stories of using my true life story to back up the science of what he's discovered about happiness.

Absolutely, that will be awesome. And again, everyone, if you're listening to Abby, and you can hear kind of the excitement and the passion and the happiness in her voice, consider your scale on that 1 to 10. And it's okay, and I'm sure Abby you would agree, it's okay if it's down at a 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Because acknowledging it means that you have so much opportunity for growth and expansion. Letting go, and trusting. Would you agree, Abbey?

Totally. I mean, you might even be in the negatives. There were points where I was in the negative. And so, you don't get to a 10 overnight, but, you know, one of the things I talk about is just making one change every single day. And I shared a story about how many lunches lunches I packed for my 2 children over, you know, a 20-year period of time. And so, you know, it becomes kind of boring and mundane to pack lunches for your kids even though you love them, until I started switching up the bag that I put the lunch in and embarrassing my son in high school on a daily basis and drawing attention to him and then hearing his response every day when he came home. So that took mundane to happy for me. And you know what, even though the first day wasn't so good for him, every day after that he's like, "It's just how my mom shows that she loves me." So he got it. Right. Right. Right.

And you know, it makes him stand out and be different and not be so mundane himself, let alone the task of making lunch. That's awesome. So you suggest to people, to change up one thing every day that can, you know, kind of take it from mundane to exciting or happy or fun.

One small baby step every day will get you to the point where you're ready to make that leap. Cool.

All right, so you talk about, too, that there's ways to identify the factors that make a person happy. So how would one go about that?

You know, I think the best way to do is give yourself 10 seconds just to sit down and write off the top of your head, write the 3 things that make you happy. Eliminate family because that should be a given, although in my case sometimes not my immediate family, but the rest of my family doesn't make me so happy. But just real quick. And then another way to figure it out is, where do you— where does your mind wander when you're sitting at that mundane job or in that mundane marriage or whatever it is that's making you unhappy? Where does your mind wander? Chances are that's where you're going to find your happiness.

Really? Because sometimes mine wanders to all the stress and crap that's going on around me. Yeah, I get what you're saying.

Which is telling you, Bernadette, that there are probably some changes you need to make too.

Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. I'm not— I am not ashamed or embarrassed or too prideful to admit that. All right, so we're going to do one thing differently every day. We're going to sit down and consider when we start drifting off, where is it taking us? What other factors kind of give us an indication if we're happy or not?

Just making that list. If I could, if I had enough money and nobody would laugh at me and I really didn't care what anybody thought, What would I really, really love to do or be? Just take all the filters off, because that's the problem. We have so many filters that we have to process all this information through. Take the filters off. That's cool.

Well, so when you say filter— so when you say part—

say that again. I said be honest with yourself. I mean, you can say on a scale of 1 to 10, I'm, I'm 5. That's a good safe zone. But really, I mean, are you a 5? I mean, do you jump out of bed every day, say, woo, let's go? Or you're like, okay, here we go, I just got to get through this day until another day in the future. Um, you know, make today the day. Yep. We learned that together. Okay. Make today the day. Right, exactly.

Well, and those filters, I want to go back to those filters that you mentioned, and you know, you had mentioned think about what would you do if you knew you could, you know, no one was going to laugh at you if you had all the money in the world. Some additional filters would be, because that gets people stuck, wouldn't you agree, would be things like What would you do if you knew you couldn't fail? What would you do if you knew you could only be successful at it? Are those additional filters you would kind of have them look at as far as what's preventing them from going after it today?

Absolutely. One of the things that are in the book, I did that kind of scales of whatever. For every reason I could think of to buy the truck, I could think of 2 reasons why I shouldn't buy the truck. And at the end of the day, I still decided that the way the thought of it made me feel was worth the risk. And where I live in, in Ponte Vedra, believe me, my neighbors saw me driving up in a 10,000-pound truck, and I'm pretty sure they thought I lost my mind. But I will say, those very same women have now come to many of my book signings. And I thought that they were laughing at me, and what they tell me now is, "We are A, so stinking proud of you, and B, you are living the life we only think about, and you're not afraid of anything, and I'm so envious." that you have the courage to live your dream. So, right, I guess the filth— the biggest filter is what people are going to think about you. Because you know what, they're having that very same pain too. They're just not necessarily willing to expose it. And you got to expose it in order to do something about it.

Uh, I just can't— I can't even express how, how truthful that statement is. I mean, and hopefully everyone, you really, really took it in. You know, what someone else thinks about you should be of no concern. And it's so hard to really kind of embrace that. I will say that I completely embrace that. I really, you know, kind of have an attitude that I'm going to do what's going to make me happy and I could care less what anybody else thinks about it. And so, oh, I just love that, Abby. That is awesome. And would you say that it's these things that you're talking about are what inspire people to kind of say, okay, I want to acknowledge what's keeping me from taking action? Are there other things that they should be kind of paying attention or be willing to acknowledge? Or what would you say?

Well, I think the first step is just a basic acknowledgement of yes or no, am I happy? Then rating it on a scale. And then what's keeping me? Is it what people think? Is it what I think? Is it that I'll fail or not? You know, I'm lucky enough to know that, that I have a track record of success. So I know that if I make up my mind, I won't fail. So For those of you who don't maybe have that track record, start building that track record of success. But I think the most important thing, at least for me, to keep going— I mean, because I'm going to branch out into a whole bunch of things I've never done before myself, even now— the thing is the letters. And the comments that I get back from the people who read my story will, will bring you to your knees and make you cry because they're like, oh my God, I thought I was the only one that felt like this. And that's what inspires me to keep pushing the boundary of what I'm capable of. Yeah. So it helps you find out you're not alone. Yep. Yeah.

And I would say if there's one thing to inspire people to acknowledge what's keeping them from taking action is, you know, it may be— and I don't know if it's just people don't want to finally say, I know other people, you know, have dealt with this and have overcome it, and that they're using that as a kind of an excuse not to. But we all— there is someone out there that's been through anything and everything that we can come up with and that we might deal with. And we need to know that we are not alone. You need to know you are not alone. And, you know, find that source or find that individual or group of individuals or community of individuals and kind of learn from them if you have to. Alright, when we get back, I really need to hear from Abby her whole take on permission and what she learned about the whole permission aspect and how that has turned into empowerment for her and therefore it can for you. So we will be right back with Abby Vega.

You are listening to Shedding the Bitch Radio with Bernadette Boas. We are in Inspiring individuals around the globe to discover, confront, and shed their bitches of fear, insecurity, and negativity so they can create the riches in their career, business, and life they deserve. Be sure to check out Bernadette's book, Shedding the Corporate Bitch: Shifting from Bitch to Rich in Life and Business, available on Amazon and sheddingthebitch.com. We also want to thank our sponsors, TSR Consulting,, who offers a broad range of tax services for small to corporate-sized clients. Go to TSRConsulting.com to learn more. And Parker House Virtual Services, who provides virtual assistance and social media support for small to medium-sized businesses. Email Deborah Parker at deborahparker78@gmail.com for more information. To become a sponsor or advertiser on our program, email us at mediarelations@sheddingthebitch.com. Shedding the Bitch Radio airs every Tuesday at noon Eastern time. Be sure to go to blogtalkradio.com/sheddingthebitchradio and follow the program for all of the updates and announcements of our guests and show topics. Now let's return to Bernadette and Shedding the Bitch Radio.

Welcome back everyone. We are talking with Abby Vega, author, motivational speaker, business consultant, and we're talking about her sweet route to happiness, hope, and permission. But she's taken that route and she's turned it into tips and advice and inspiration in her book Snow Cone Diaries. It's the summation of a woman who Despite what everyone thinks, or even she knows, she has it all, she needed to find her happiness. So Snow Cone Diaries, you can check out at Abby-Vega.com, and it's full of just different stories we can all relate to and be inspired by, but also learn from. So the one thing, Abby, from your story and from the stories you share, is this thread of the idea of permission, whether that's giving yourself permission or whatever the case might be. What is your take on permission and how to turn that into empowerment?

Sure. As I mentioned, I was raised in a family of 6, good Catholic, you know, full of guilt. You know, I was full— be everything to everyone. You know, you, you are meant for a life of sacrifice and serving others. And I believe to an extent that that is still true. My purpose is to serve others. But after I lost a friend at 51 years of age, I decided that it was time to give myself permission to serve others, but serve them in a way that brought joy. I mean, I had accomplished, you know, taking care of my family and putting money in the bank and all of those other things. And so I finally gave myself permission to experience joy. I gave it to everybody else, I provided it for everybody else, but I denied it for myself. And so permission You know, grant yourself permission to, to seek what it is that brings you joy, because when you're joyful, the joy you give to others is tenfold. Christopher gave me my joy. He gave me my permission because I saw what a difference it made for him. And from that point on, I mean, whenever I speak, whenever I do a book signing, everybody that buys a book, I'm like, okay, this gives you permission now. To have a happy life, to pursue whatever you want to do. And it just seems to make all the difference. Women deny themselves permission to, to have joy. They, they, they believe they are meant to serve others.

Do you think that women even think about giving themselves— the concept of giving themselves permission? Do you think that kind of is even in the mind of, you know, not the average woman out there, but just the woman out there kind of just living life, or I should say existing in life as opposed to living it. Do you, you know, what do you find that it takes to kind of all of a sudden wake up and say, wait, I, you know, I need something, I need something to change or to shift or be different here? And I need, you know, and I give myself permission to do that. Does that make sense?

Yeah, and I described that best in the chapter in the book called Breaking Point, and it just refers to literally if I did not change my— the way I would— I mean, I wasn't sleeping, I was gaining weight, I was unhappy, you know, friends were dying, my mom was dying. It was just like I felt like I was dying, even though I was breathing and functioning and working and traveling and doing all those things. And so, you know, it was almost getting to the breaking point before I finally gave myself permission to take a break, look, think about things, and then Being very blessed to have a husband who said, okay, it sounds crazy, but go ahead. Yeah.

You know, and what if you didn't? And what if you didn't? So one last kind of minute of conversation. What if you don't have that support system that you have? What would you tell or suggest to someone who still knows or is seeking that permission to themselves? To just go out and live life?

I would say you only have one life to live. You have no idea how long that is. Could be today, tomorrow, or 15 years from now. And so if not now, then when? And if not you, then, then who? You know, someone else will go and do it. So stop depriving yourself because even that person who might be withholding that permission from you, they're doing it for selfish reasons because it brings them joy to have you serve them. So there has to be at least a small percentage of you as a woman that you save for yourself because you can only give so long before you break, and you can give so much more when you're happier and, and, and you have found that thing that brings you joy. I mean, my whole family's life has changed since, since I took this leap of faith, and I'm so much more fun and cool to be with, and they just love hearing what story I tell next.

That's awesome. All right, everyone, I want to thank Abby for joining us today and talking to us about her amazing story that you can pick up at AbbyVega.com called Snow Cone Diaries, full of stories, inspiration, and things that you can consider for your own life. Abby, thank you so much for joining us. Your story is just awe-inspiring.

Thank you for having me, Bernadette. I really enjoyed it. And I hope it makes a difference, at least for one person today. Then I've done my job.

Well, I'm still here.

Yeah, it definitely— yeah, here we go. Thank you for listening to Shedding the Bitch Radio with Bernadette Boas. Join Bernadette every Tuesday at noon Eastern as she helps you shift your bitches to riches. And the dialogue is always going on at sheddingthebitch.com. See you next week.

Well, thank you everybody. Abby, thank you so much.