Ask Me Anything with Bernadette Boas (Dec)

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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. Shedding the Bitch, 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. Good day, good day, good day everyone. How are you on this beautiful, beautiful Tuesday? I don't know about you, Deborah and I were just talking before we got onto the show, and I'm still feeling the hangover from Thanksgiving dinner last Thursday. I ate my brains out. I don't know if that's a term, but that's what I'm going to say. Just over, over, overate, and then it's a long story, so I won't get into it, but Landed up taking like 3 cartons, takeout cartons full of leftovers. So I've been eating turkey dinners. I'm done. I was done as of lunch yesterday. So I had been eating turkey dinners for many days and all the desserts. But I hope you had a beautiful celebration, at least for those of you around the world that celebrate Thanksgiving here in the States, but the rest of us, everyone, should now be kicked off into the holiday season. Music is starting to play. I have it on my car, my car radio. I have it on my iPhone. I have it on my television, and I'm just, uh, soaking it up for the next 30-some-odd days, uh, because I absolutely love Christmas music. But when it's done How many of you, you know, can, you know, raise your hand and relate to me? When it's done, it's done. But I do look forward when it kicks in, and I love living in it for that time period. But when it's done, it will be done. So I hope you had a fabulous celebration and you're ready to kind of soak up the next 30, 30-some-odd days all the way into the new year. And we'll have great conversations as we progress into December and into the new year, getting you all psyched up for 2020. But I also want to send out prayers and well wishes to many millions of, of you out there, especially in the States, dealing with the storms, whether that be ice, rain, sleet. And it's been a very disastrous, devastating loss of life type of situation that we've been dealing with for about a week now. But I know also in New Zealand and Australia there's fires, and there's earthquakes over in Asia. And, you know, sadly a day doesn't go by that there isn't something happening. But I just will send out well wishes all the time to everyone, keep you all in my prayers. So please do Just stay safe. Deborah was actually saying that her family due to come in from a couple hours away out in California up north got snowed in with a couple feet of snow, and I mentioned to her, well, that's— it was a better, you know, situation that they got snowed in prior to getting on the road than getting on the road and then getting stuck in it or dealing with it. It's just not a fun situation to be in. Hopefully all of you and your loved ones are safe and sound and, like I said, kicking in the holiday spirit. So let me think. Okay, it's going to be an interesting conversation today. It is our Ask Bernadette episode, and we have some great questions, very suitable and timely, but they've actually stemmed out of our last couple of of episodes, but it's just very relatable to the holiday season. So Ask Bernadette, for those of you who are joining us for the first time, is an opportunity for you to post, email me, you can call me should you care to, and all my information is on sheddingthebitch.com. But I take your questions, stories, and challenges, and I provide you tips, advice, and sometimes tough love. As soon as I get your question. At the same time, I then kind of hold on to them for the month and bring them right here onto our Shedding the Bits program, and we spend an hour discussing a few of those, and you have an opportunity to come online live should you choose to. You don't have to, but should you choose to, and we can dive into your question, story, or challenge even deeper. But at the same time, what we're going to do today too, and I'll explain why in a few minutes, is we're going to blend in some inspiration from Mr. Rogers and Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood. Hopefully, most of you know who Mr. Rogers is. If you don't, you're going to get acquainted with him in the movie that's now out, and I'm sure it's going to be readily available around the world. And I'll explain why this came to me at the very last minute, quite honestly, as I've been sitting here preparing for the program. But, but just let's say it is inspired by Mr. Rogers' kindness. Next week, next week we're going to talk about how to shed the high school drama bitch. Now this came up to me and I decided that it was a question that was going to be part of our Ask Bernadette today, and yet the amount of dialogue that we got into around this subject matter, I thought, well, you know what, this is kind of a much deeper discussion that we can have on a singular episode. So we're going to do that next week. And think about it, the high school drama that you might have gone through, unless like some of us that were talking about it, state that they had an idyllic high school experience, the majority of us did not. And that footprint of high school often carries through the rest of their lives. So it got very heated, it got very sensitive, it got very tearful, and yet at the same time it got very inspiring. So I thought that that would be a great conversation for us to have. Now some of our recent past episodes have included everything from last week's discussion appropriate for going into Thanksgiving around giving thanks and creating riches in your life as a result of being thankful and grateful. We've also had discussions about shedding the intimidation bitch, shedding the mental health stigma bitch. We've talked about, you know, dealing with difficult or tough topics of life— death, cancer, or any type of illness, abuse, so forth and so on— and how can you better approach Tough topics and a number of other discussions. And you can find all of our past episodes on sheddingthebitch.com. They're all there as we speak, so you can go to sheddingthebitch.com/shedthebitchradio and find them all there. You can also download them on Apple Podcasts or any streaming service, along with blogtalkradio.com. All right. But today, like I mentioned, is all about your questions, stories, and challenges, and it is a tribute to Mr. Rogers. And so I'll explain briefly why that is. Like I said, I'm feeling the emotional pull of the holiday season, whether that's Santa Claus or whether that's Jesus and God. And I have talked about very openly and candidly on the program in the past holiday seasons that I'm very much a Catholic Christian holiday person. So I believe in Merry Christmas, I believe in displaying, you know, Jesus and stars and anything reflective of my religion and my faith. And yes, I appreciate Santa Claus and snowmen and all that, those kind of things that are fun and joyful this time of year, especially if ones have children, but you won't find a lot of those type of decorations around my house. Mine are pretty much all centered around angelic, faith-based, spiritual type of blessings. No, no foul, you know, toward anyone who loves that side of the holiday season. And so when I was sitting here preparing for the program this morning, I was actually watching the Kelly Clarkson Show. She's actually a famous country singer, and she was doing a tribute to Mr. Rogers. So her entire audience was dressed in sweaters, and she was inserting quotes from Mr. Rogers all throughout the program, and it was all around being obviously a good neighbor, being kind to one another, as Ellen even says. And so she started sprinkling these quotes in that I thought, oh, that's appropriate for Christina's question, and that's appropriate for Alice's question. And so I started all of a sudden, you know, researching myself those inspiring quotes from Mr. Rogers to pepper into our conversation today. And if you're not familiar with Mr. Rogers, you can certainly look it up because like I said, Tom Hanks right now is in a blockbuster movie adaptation of Mr. Rogers' life, and it was, you know, and it continues to be He's been, you know, dead now for quite a while, and the show actually started airing, you know, 50 years ago, but based on various cartoon adaptations and reruns, he lives on, and it's a beautiful thing because we could use a lot more of Mr. Rogers' sprinkle dust, fairy dust nowadays. So you'll hear me reference him throughout the program. But let me kind of highlight for you what we're going to talk about. Here are the questions that I had been given. First, very appropriately, Alice wants to know, how can I do, give, or share not only through the holidays but ongoing? And I don't know about you, but, you know, the more years that pass, I start getting very altruistic, or I hope to, and I want to give back, and I want to start serving others, and I want to stop being so selfish and So all about me and kind of find those things that, you know, get me excited and to give more, share more, serve more. So I love that question. Then I was asked, and this actually came out of Christina's discussion regarding writing her book and from the episode of last week's, and you can go and we'll talk about that in a second, you can go and listen to that program. She wants to know, how do I understand what I have to share from my life that could help others? And then Ruth asked a question I absolutely love and thought it was perfect for our conversation today, and that is, I'm often applauded for having great answers to business problems at work, but then am critiqued that I need to ask more more questions. So which is more— most important, asking questions or having great answers? Love, love, love that question. So we're going to talk about all of that, and like I said, we're going to pepper in some Mr. Rogers. So for instance, Mr. Rogers says there are 3 ways to ultimate success. The first way is to be kind. And you can be kind by giving, sharing, as the first question addresses, and sharing your life, as the second question addresses, and then being one to ask more questions. So he goes on to say, "The second way is to be kind. The third way is to be kind." So today's program is all around kindness and how appropriate as we kick off and get geared up for a beautiful holiday season. So if you want to share and you want to comment or ask your own question, you can certainly do that. We are live at this very moment in time. You can always call 1-818-572-2910 and talk to me directly. You can go on to blogtalkradio.com/sheddingthebitchradio or radio page, scroll down for this episode and you'll see a chat room. And so I'm live on the chat room should you want to go there. But you can also just— especially if you're not listening live and you're downloading it on Apple Podcast or sheddingthebitch.com, you can always email me, Bernadette Boas, at sheddingthebitch.com, Facebook, tweet with me, and I will always be paying attention to get you some tips and advice. And you can tweet and Facebook with us using hashtag #AskMeAnything. We call them Rich Tags. #AskMeAnything. You could say hashtag #AskBernadette, or our normal tag is #ShedTheBitch. And any of those will pop up and make sure it comes directly to me via even Deborah, and we'll get a response back to you. And then we might even have your question highlighted on our next month's first Tuesday of each month, our next Ask Bernadette episode. So we're going to take a quick break, and when we get back, we're going to dive into this first question around how can I do, give, or share not only through the holidays but ongoing. 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 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, North Georgia Tax Solutions, who offers a broad range of tax services for small to corporate size clients. Go to NGTaxSolutions.com to learn more. And Parker House Virtual Services, who provides virtual assistance and social media support for small to medium size businesses. Email Deborah Parker at deborahparker.va@gmail.com for more information. To become a sponsor or advertiser on our program, email us at media-relations@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. This is our Ask Bernadette, or Ask Me Anything, episode, and we have a number of great questions so appropriate for this time of year, and they are stemming, coming out of— not all of them— previous episodes. And I'm just thrilled when, you know, the listeners all of a sudden kind of dig deeper into what the topic is about and then have their own questions, because that's what this is all about. So we have a number of questions about giving, sharing, questions about understanding what is it within your life that you could be sharing with others, and then a great question about what's more important, having great answers or asking more questions. So our first one, again, is how can I do, give, or share not only through the holidays but ongoing? So Alice wanted to really kind of learn and kind of start tapping into where she might serve, you know, most appropriately. Now, as Mr. Rogers says, all of us at some time or another need help, whether we're giving or receiving help. Each one of us has something valuable valuable to bring to this world. That's one of the things that connects us as neighbors. In our own way, each one of us is a giver and a receiver. So I absolutely love that because Alice's question actually has been something that I've been working on the last few years very intentionally. Now that might sound silly. However, if you spend majority of your life all consumed with yourself, as I did for many, many, many years, Yes, I was loving and giving, and I love sharing and giving presents to my family and my friends, but when it really came to thinking about others who are less fortunate and really giving of myself, I have to say I struggled in that area. And so I've been wanting to make sure over the last, you know, few years that I was very, very much focused. On what I could do all year round, not just at Thanksgiving, not just at Christmas, not just at Valentine's or my own birthday, but more so how could I make it just part of my life and my legacy. So that's what I want to kind of share with you is I was listening to, I think it was CBS This Morning, and Mark Zuckerberg and his wife were on. And forgive me, I'm going blank on her name. I know Chan— I don't believe that's her first name though, I could be wrong. But they were talking about the fact that they had about 4 years ago started a nonprofit which they're giving 99% of their wealth, which is about $40 billion, into this nonprofit because they want to cure all diseases. They want to eradicate all diseases. Anyway, let's go about this a little bit more simple in regards to what each one of us could be doing. But I did leave that discussion saying to myself, okay, Bernadette, you know, as a reminder, you're considering what it is that you want your legacy to be, because that's what they're creating is a legacy. And I would challenge all of you to, you know, first ask yourself, what is it you want to leave this world? What is it that you want to leave your family, your children, but also your community, and the footprint you want to leave on the world? Because it goes far beyond just what you might consider your little circle. So I, you know, I really thought deeply about this question and how it can help you with your own, maybe your own search for the legacy you want to leave when it comes to doing, giving, or sharing. And it's not complicated. You know, of course, we're not going to be leaving 99% of a $40-some-odd billion wealth And it doesn't need to be. It doesn't need to be. And that's what I wanted to make sure that we talked about. Even Deborah and I, Deborah of Parker House Virtual Services, who is manning our radio booth and does our social media, she and I were talking about right before the program that, you know, with all the leftovers, it's stunning how, you know, we really take for granted all the food that we cook up for Thanksgiving, how quickly we eat it.— and then how much we throw away. And I was telling her that in my 20s I just kind of learned that as I was being treated and spoiled as a buyer traveling back and forth to New York, eating wonderful food, more food than I could eat, and I was leaving it on my plate, we got intentional about making sure that we're packing those leftovers up as well as ordering additional entrees and taking them to the homeless over that were hanging out on the Museum of Modern Art in New York. And so, you know, it's kind of how do you make that not just a one-time thing or a one-off thing but more so part of your life. So I would think about your legacy. What is it you want to stand for? Because that will lead to then where do you want to serve. You can also be really just getting simple about— and again, I'm going to, you know, throw in my journaling here. So, if you listen to the program often, you'll hear that I talk a lot about getting it out of your head and putting it on paper. So, as you're processing and thinking through and feeling, I also want you to get, you know, put it down on paper in black and white. So you can see it more clearly, and it then, you know, kind of gels itself into more of a plan and maybe even some actions you can be taking. So think about your legacy, write it down. Think about your passions, your interests, the desires that drive you, that really get you excited, and they could be very simple. So for instance, I'm really excited to be speaking in the next week or so with a woman who reached out to me on LinkedIn, and she works— she's a coach and she uses horses, uh, so she does equine coaching. So she uses horses in her life coaching practice, and she just found that her love of horses and realizing, you know, the healing that those horses did for her— you know, was also very valuable to them what she could be using as a tool in her toolkit to help other people. So, you know, it could be as simple as all of a sudden you love horses, in her case, or you love baking, or you love getting your hands dirty in the garden, and the next thing you know, that could turn into somewhere that you do give or share. In your community and in the world. So make note, literally write down, what are those things that I love doing? I love to draw, I love to write, I love to bake, I love to, you know, garden, I love to build houses or build things, I, you know, I love to put together beautiful packages, whatever the case might be. Consider as a second layer of this, Consider all aspects of your life. So it may not just be your personal hobbies or your personal passions and interests. It could also be professionally. Where do you get excited? I really— as much coaching as I was doing in corporate, I didn't realize I was doing quote-unquote coaching. But then when I left and I kind of missed that mentoring and that coaching, it was natural that that's what I would then do as my profession. And I do a lot of giving coaching, if you want to call it that, complimentary coaching. So consider your personal, consider your business, consider your community interests and passions and desires as well. Many people find their cause and they're calling from tragedy, whether that be illness, whether that be a legal issue, whether that be a hardship of some— of any kind, or, you know, an accident of any kind. And all of a sudden there's something there that then, you know, kind of pushes them or leads them into a place that they can do, give, or share. You also want to consider, do you want to do this locally? Do you want to do it maybe in the state, domestically or internationally? So for example, I kind of get really frustrated, I don't know about you, I get frustrated about, you know, people wanting to cure, you know, take care of hunger around the world, and I'm like, okay, but there's millions of kids right here in the States that are sick. And then I kind of take it even, you know, that much more granular and I say, "God, there's so many kids just in Atlanta," for me personally, in Atlanta. So think about all of those things. Now, so you think about all those things and maybe you're starting to see areas that you could then go do, give, or share. Various ways you could do that. Some people want to do it hands-on. They want to actually go and volunteer somewhere. They want to feed the hungry. During Thanksgiving, I'm sure in, you know, communities around the world, or around the country for Thanksgiving specifically, there's kitchens that are opened up. You know, we do our World Congress Center, they turn into a huge, Thanksgiving dinner for the homeless and for those in need, and people go and, you know, volunteer and give their time. And it's, you know, from groups that are all year round. They're just not doing it for Thanksgiving, they're doing it all year round, but then they do this much bigger thing for Thanksgiving. So think about that. Think about you could be building houses. You could deliver meals to seniors or to the homeless. You can box up packages. So there's hands-on type of doing, giving, and sharing. There's just donations to charities that you could be doing. Um, you know, if you're a dog lover or a pet lover, you could do the ASPCA or whatever's, you know, more local to you. You could give to your church beyond your tithing. There's, you know, groups, missionaries, and, and charities within the your organization, religious or spiritual organization, that could certainly use, you know, whether it's money and/or help. Like I said, feeding children. Now, I would even take it even a lot simpler than that, and this is what also made me kind of get all, you know, kind of childlike when I saw this Kelly Clarkson show earlier with Mr. Rogers. Excuse me. You know, because he just talks about being kind to one another, getting to know your neighbor, talking to the person in the grocery store. You could buy a stranger a cup of coffee. Not all the time, but a lot of the times I drive through McDonald's, I always pay for the people behind me, and I tell the cashier, Don't tell them who, who covered their bill because I'm not looking for the thank you or the accolade. I'm looking more so for the kindness that it makes them feel. You could buy groceries for people. They had a discussion on another show I was watching earlier in the week about— I don't know what star it was, but, you know, she happened to, you know, be out grocery shopping and she just decided that she was going to buy, you know, the groceries for everybody that was behind her in line. A lot of people, you'll hear people unknown and known who will go into the K-Marts and the Walmarts of the world and pay off all the layaways that are out there. So, you know, you can get creative about where you put your time and even your monies. But the key that I told Alice that I really may put people focus on when it comes to them wanting to do, give, or share is you have to be intentional about it. You can't do it out of guilt. You can't do it out of obligation. You can't do it because everybody else is doing it and it's the cool thing to do. You can't do it because you want the accolades or you want the thank yous. You can't even do it because you hear people say, you know, serving others serves you, meaning give to others and you'll receive back. You know, some people will view that selfishly, other people will look at it very altruistically, and that's the way you want to be looking at it. But you truly want to pursue your giving, sharing, doing with great intention. So let me give you, for instance, what I mean by that. You know, when you're donating clothes, or you're packaging up the household items, or you're, you know, packaging up those leftovers or those cans of pantry foods that you don't, you know, need any longer, you know, as opposed to just automatically saying, well, I'm going to give it to Goodwill, I'm going to take it to the Mission, really think about, okay, is that really where I want it or will serve best? Because Dress for Success, for instance, you know, for women who are trying to get back into the workplace or for veterans who are trying to, you know, get a job, or the food or household items for those in Habitat might be more applicable than just kind of saying, okay, I'm just going to donate it to the simplest and closest, you know, charity organization that I can get to. Be intentional about the way that you're doing giving or sharing. And then there's other ways, you know, like I mentioned with Mr. Rogers, very simply you can smile, be kind, compliment. Lend a hand, you know, meet a stranger, get involved in things like I mentioned Kelly Clarkson's show. She has a Good Neighbor Challenge. You can hashtag #GoodNeighborChallenge and look on Twitter or her website to kind of understand what that means. And then you can kind of share your experience back with her and her community. Of course, Ellen DeGeneres I mentioned. She just simply says, be kind to one another. And that's probably the nicest and easiest thing to— and easiest way to do, give, or share. Just make it personal and make it intentional, and you'll be on the winning side of that. Okay, we're going to take a break. When I get back, I'm going to address the next two questions altogether about, you know, how can I understand what I have in my life that I can share and help others., and then as well, our last question, which I just lost. Our last question is about great answers or asking more questions. 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 to 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, North Georgia Tax Solutions, who offers a broad range of tax services for small to corporate-sized clients. Go to ngtaxsolutions.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 deborahparker.va@gmail.com for more information. To become a sponsor or advertiser on our program, email us at mediarelations@sheddingthebitch.com. Shedding the 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. Our Ask Bernadette episode today is being inspired by our neighborhood friend Mr. Rogers. So hopefully all of you listening know who Mr. Rogers is. If you don't, just look him up, Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood specifically. You can even, if you want to kind of make it more current versus 1950 or 1965, you can also even look up the movie that just rolled out last week that Tom Hanks is starring in. And I, you know, I'm being told is just a tearjerker and just very inspiring and so appropriate, especially for this time of year, let alone this time in our lives. But according to Mr. Rogers, if you could only sense how important you are to the lives of those you meet, how important you can be to the people you may never even dream of, there is something of yourself yourself that you leave at every meeting with another person. I'll add to that, you don't even have to one-on-one meet them. It could be in the way you just kind of engage out in public, or in my case, when it comes to, you know, being on a radio program or on a stage or in my writing or on a blog. Or, you know, just passing by. Maybe you're sitting on a bus or on, you know, on the L or the train. You know, your presence, you know, is kind of oozing something out to the people around you that can leave an impression, good, bad, or indifferent. But it leads into our second question, which was, how do I understand What I have to share from my life to help others. And this stemmed out of the episode last week about writing a book, writing your story. And we talked about everything from the type of books you could write, determining why you want to write a book, how to keep yourself motivated while writing, determining your writing style. And then we even went into steps about how to go from, you know, pretty much creating the idea to marketing it and publishing it. We really didn't dig deep into how do I go about really kind of identifying something that I could write a book about or write a blog post or share on a podcast or a radio interview or just in a discussion as a meet-and-greet type of situation that could help and inspire other people. Excuse me. So I would first say, as you get into any type of creative process, especially when it's first starting with you and what you stand for, what you believe in, what you are passionate about, what you're inspired by, you have to get out of your own head. Now that seems very contradictory to having to dig deep and discover something about yourself. But I often use that— this tactic with my clients and with my friends because we tend to have a difficult time evaluating ourselves, assessing ourselves, seeing ourselves who we really are unless we're very, you know, self-aware. And of course that's our goal in life, but a lot of us aren't there. So what I like to to do with my clients is to have them get out of their head and think about what other people would say about them. So if you're looking to really identify something that you could teach, inspire, coach, advise someone else on, or, you know, or write about, think about what other people have said to you about you throughout your lifetime, personally, professionally, in the community, whatnot, in relationships. So someone might say that, you know, you're a great cook, or that you're great at fixing things or solving problems. Maybe you're a great advisor or mentor to somebody. Maybe you're a great, you know, entertainer in some fashion. Maybe people tell you on a regular basis how funny you are. Maybe you're a show-off, and that term to some might be a negative, but yet that really just defines that you love to entertain or love to be out in front of people. So turn that, what you might perceive as a negative, around, and it's a strength or a talent or an expertise or a skill that you have of yourself. Maybe you're a singer, great writer, heck, you might even be a great typist. Even on computers and on texting. Maybe you know phones inside and out or know computers inside and out or know how to build a car inside and out. Think about anything that someone might have said about you and make note of it. Because if you're good at something, most likely there's an audience that would also appreciate having that type of knowledge, that type of skill or expertise. So first, get out of your head and think about what other people say about you, and then consider what you say about yourself. Now, this goes two ways, and if you want to just very quickly get done with what you're going to say negative about yourself— well, yes, they're saying I'm a great writer, but I'm really not a great writer, or that I'm a great cook, but I really don't think I'm a great cook— then forget about that and don't consider your own assessment of yourself. But if there are things that you know, I was often told even before I started a radio program, but so predominantly in my corporate career, that I am a great person who asks questions. I'm a great interviewer. And this is going to be very appropriate for our last question. And it actually kind of lends itself beautifully into not only my coaching and my mentoring, but also in my radio show when I do have guests. And I do often have guests, even though this year it was very focused on you and I. So think about all those things, and then look at that list and consider of those things what gets you really excited about. Forget about whether you're questioning, can I teach somebody this? Or can I package something up that someone's going to learn from or be inspired by? Forget about how you're going to use it. But think about what gets you excited about any of those topics that you might have created and come up with. So I'll give you another for instance that I just thought about. The other day, a group of us— I play pickleball, as many of you know.. And a few of us who were going to be competing played with this one, practiced with this one young woman. She's in her mid-30s, I would say, and she has the most elegant stroke. She has the most elegant way of hitting and handling the paddle. So a few of us said, hey, why don't we ask Rose if she would coach us? So I asked, I approached her and asked her at the end of the session. She's like, "Well, I don't coach. I'm not a, you know, I'm not a teacher. I don't know if I could teach you what I'm doing." I'm like, you know, "Yes, you could, and, you know, I think you'll be surprised. Can we talk to you about it?" So don't get in your head about whether you can or can't. Just think about what are those things that get you excited. And as you're doing that, Be honest about the degree of your passion and your interest for it because it's a lot of work once you decide that you are going to, you know, either write, teach, train, speak, you know, interview, whatever the case might be, and to— in order to share your knowledge and your expertise. So you really want to ensure not only, you know, do you consider you're good at something, but also how passionate and interested are you in that subject matter, because it's a lot of hard work. You know, I just don't get on here, although it might appear sometimes I do, I don't just get on here and start talking. You know, there's planning, there's preparation, you know, there's work that to be done. You know, I need Deborah to do some things for me, so it's not just as simple as it might first come off. Yes, YouTube and the YouTube stars make it appear easy, it's not that easy, trust me. Even just investigating equipment and tools and applications and, you know, just materials that you need, doing the research, writing a script, any of those things, it's not as simple as many people will make it out to be. So be sure you're really thinking about if you're passionate or interested. I'll give you another example. My mentoree, one of them, he, about 6 months ago, I meet with him about once every 2 weeks and we talk about his goals and his plans. And he had put that he wanted to blog about a certain type of software. You might be familiar with it, Salesforce.com. And he knows that a lot of people are wanting to learn that software. That tool right now, that piece of software right now because it's embedded in major companies around the world and it's a very powerful sales tool. Anyway, so he decided he wanted to start blogging about it. So he puts it on his list of goals. So week after week or whenever we're meeting, we talk about it and he yet has started to start his blog. So then I asked, "Why?" And at first it's kind of artificial. Oh, I just don't have the time. Oh, I have so many other things I need to do. And then weeks go by and I continue to ask him. And it kind of turned out to be just something he— like, yes, he loves to and he thinks it could be valuable to someone. It's just not a priority in his world right now. So guess what? That's okay. That's okay. Because I told him, I said, you know, you want to be consistent. You want to do it well. So it's okay if you're just not ready to do it or it's not something that will hold your interest for any given amount of time. Just be honest about it, all right? And that's going to be the key when it comes to— when it comes to really trying to narrow down what you could write, speak, blog, podcast about, all right? Now, again, if you want to listen to the whole episode around how to go about writing your story, then go to last week's episode that we had on sheddingthebitch.com, or you can download it on Apple Podcasts or any one of those other streaming services. All right, we're going to take a break. I'm going to get a little thing of water. When we get back, we're going to get into the question about which is better or more important, being able to ask more questions or have great answers. 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's book 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, North Georgia Tax Solutions, who offers a broad range of tax services for small to corporate size clients. Go to ngtaxsolutions.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 deborahparker.va@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 www.facebook.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 being inspired today by Mr. Rogers as I answer your questions that are very appropriate, by the way. To this time of year, but as I answer your questions that are really centered around you doing, giving, sharing, learning, and even wanting to grow, and appropriately so for our next question around asking more questions as opposed to just having great answers. So according to Mr. Rogers, the best thing we could do for each other is to listen with our ears and our hearts and to be assured that our questions are just as important as our answers. So think about that. So Ruth had asked, she says, I'm often applauded for having great answers to business problems at work. But then I'm critiqued that I need to ask more questions. So which is more— do you feel is more important, having great answers or asking more questions? Now I'm going to send you back to your childhood. I love this question because I was certainly one who wanted to throw my hand up as quickly as possible while I was a kid in school. And, you know, because I knew the, you know, I knew the answer and I knew it was going to be a great answer and the teacher was going to, you know, love and applaud me and accolades and wonders and all that kind of good stuff. So if you could just kind of get in your head around, you know, when you were a kid. Unfortunately, we were always measured on having an answer. And even, you know, we were even rewarded for having that right answer. You know, you were reprimanded if you didn't. You know, remember when you were in school and the teacher would call on you because you would never necessarily volunteer an answer? You didn't want to raise your hand even if you had the answer. You didn't want to raise your hand. And when you did raise your hand and you didn't have the the answer that the teacher wanted or that was the correct answer, you always remember the reprimand. You didn't necessarily, you know, recall the reward that you would get other than, you know, other people saying that you're smart or a great question or whatever the case might be. We were often shot down if we had the wrong answer. We were shot down even more so if we were always asking the question as opposed to having the answer. So can you remember that when you're in school or when you're at home and you're asking all these questions and the teacher's like, Bernadette, be quiet. Bernadette, be quiet. That's not what we're talking about. That's not an important question. You know, let other people talk. See, I'm reacting and reliving my childhood drama. So my belief, and this has only come as I've aged and the years have passed. My belief is that it's more important, it's more life-transforming, and it's definitely a great and critical talent to have if you focus on asking questions. So let me explain why I believe that is. Because it really forces you to have to to listen, to engage, to give of yourself and your time and your attention to someone else other than yourself. And it sounds easy. If anyone just says, you know, just listen to other people, it sounds like it's really easy to listen. But try it sometime. Try it sometime. It's hard. It is hard. It is hard to stay, you know, alert and attentive and present and engaged without drifting off and thinking about, you know, that laundry list that you have of to-dos or that, you know, pile of work that is piling up on your desk or the kids that have to be picked up at school. It is really hard to listen and it is much easier for us to raise our hand and want to spew and want to talk. You know, and that's coming from me. So, you know, if you're questioning it or doubting it, just focus on it the next time that you're in a discussion with someone and you've, you know, and you've asked a question. And are you really listening to someone's response? When you say, say to someone, how you doing today? Are you really paying attention and waiting and listening for their answer, or are you just wanting to, you know, kind of say something to say something? So the first step is to learn to listen, you know, in order to really appreciate why asking questions is so important, life-transforming, and a great, great skill to have. Because asking questions means you're very interested in learning. You're very interested in expanding your mind and even the world around you. You're interested in what it is that the other person has to say, and therefore, not only are you interested, but you could— you're appreciating them, you're having compassion for them, you're having a number of emotions and feelings for the other person while you're asking questions, because it's telling them that you're interested in who they are and what they're experiencing, good, bad, or indifferent. Asking questions, if Ruth is being critiqued at work around needing to ask more questions, not just answering them, it could also be telling her that she really needs to want to learn, that she wants coaching, that she is coachable, that she is mentorable, that she's curious about, you know, improving herself and being better. And like I said, opening and expanding her mind to other things other than what's going on in her little, you know, world. And it's fun. It's fun to ask a lot of questions and to learn about other people and other things and other worlds. And other people's interests, and even to hear other people's differing viewpoints. You know, it creates, you know, conversation. It creates debate. It creates dialogue. It creates conversation. Now, again, it's easier said than done because the key about asking questions— and I was experiencing this myself even when I started my radio show many years ago— is I needed to be, you know, I need to be and you need to be authentic about it and engaged and really interested in wanting to learn. It's one thing to ask questions because you're being told that you need to ask more questions or because you're a radio host and you need to ask questions of the guests that you have. There's a great difference and a huge gap between that and wanting to. So need and want. Because need just means you're asking the questions and whatever is coming out is just being artificially heard and used for whatever purpose it is that you have. Whereas being intentional and being engaged and being authentic and being honest and being present in a discussion of any kind because you're asking questions that you want to learn from. That is far more, more difficult to do. Even think about it when you're— next time you're with your good friend or your spouse or partner or with your children who you supposedly love and adore, you know, are you truly really present and listening with them and actively engaged with them? So you need to work on being present. You need to forget your own agenda. And objective. You need to forget about the fact that you're looking and patiently waiting for your time to be able to jump in and say something, as opposed to when you ask a question, you're supposed to almost, you need to sit on your hands, shut up, and listen. It's a huge, huge skill to have if you're a salesperson. And I've struggled with this a good part of my life as a, in sales or pre-sales.— and that is, you know, asking the questions and then shutting up and listening. Asking for the deal, asking for the money, and then shutting up and just listening for— because what they're about to tell you, good, bad, or indifferent, is going to feed so much information to you that will help you with the next set of questions that you need to ask in order to get the result that you want. So, keep that in mind. You know, and you have to get creative about the questions that you're asking, whether it's in a professional environment or a personal environment. Maybe it's a first date, maybe it's a job interview, maybe it's a discussion about a, you know, a business proposal. Get creative in the questions that you ask. Don't just want to ask them, you know, people will send me, if I have a guest, they'll send me their laundry list of questions. That they want me to ask them. That's fine. I always appreciate it. I actually ask for it. But what I'm interested in is the questions that are not being asked, that are not being proposed. I'm looking for, you know, asking them the question they want me to, hearing a response, and picking out what then I can ask that they're not expecting. I was talking to Gian, one of my mentorees. He's going on a job interview with Amazon, and I'm like, What could you be asking them that will make you stand out from other people around you? Maybe you ask a question about how you can, you know, use your desire to, you know, be active on social media or blogging or writing or speaking. Maybe that could be something that you work on with them. So get creative and drill into the information that you're receiving, as I mentioned. You know, ask the question, get some information, and find that question that might take you off in a different direction. And as I said, you have to actively listen. You can't just— and that could be what Ruth's people at work, I'm not sure who it was, that was critiquing her on asking questions. Maybe they're telling her, you know, stop just wanting to talk and actually ask questions so people feel that you're interested. And you're engaged and you're curious about learning something new and different. All right? Talking's easy. Listening is very hard. So, that is our Ask Bernadette episode for this week. I so appreciate you listening, and please feel free to share your questions, stories, or challenges on Facebook or Twitter, our Shitting the Bitch pages. And I will be happy to get some advice, tips, and maybe some tough love out to you to help you create the riches in life that you deserve. Next week we're talking about shedding the high school drama bitch, so tune in next week at noon Eastern time. Have a rich, prosperous week, everybody. Thanks for joining us.

Thank you for listening to Shedding the Bitch Radio with Bernadette Boas. Join Bernadette every Tuesday 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.