What does it really take to have MENTAL TOUGHNESS!

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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 or share 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! Happy, happy Tuesday.

How are you?

I hope you're doing well, and I'm not sure if you're out there on our Shedding the Bitch Facebook page, but take a look at what I just posted. I decided to just jump on despite the fact that I'm sitting here in a bathrobe, no makeup, basically bed head hair. I've been sick in bed, but since today's program is all about mental toughness, I thought maybe that is what I just needed to demonstrate for you. And therefore, I just took a chance, threw it out there. You can get a good laugh if you care. But that is our conversation for today is mental toughness. So, we are going to talk about just what it takes to really possess it and how it is different than just having confidence or self-assurance. Within yourself, how it is actually an amped-up level of that, a degree of that, and certainly can help you get through just about anything. And if you don't possess it today, you certainly can learn to be able to possess it, you know, going forward, and use it as a very strategic tool in order to not only pursue, not only achieve, but really, really just overcome just about anything and everything. But before we go there, let's see, any rich news? We have some— a lineup of guests coming in, and I'll take accountability for not having those posted just yet, but we will be having some great guests coming on talking about everything from kind of holding your own radio and podcast in order to achieve accelerate your business. We're going to be talking about overcoming not just fears and insecurities, but a major, major life situation or tragedy and how that can really kind of propel you forward as opposed to kind of taking you backwards in life. We have conversations about the whole idea of 3 feet from gold and how to get there. Marketing and PR, finding a job, and what you have to do differently today than you had to do in the past. Because the whole dynamics, especially with social media, with kind of authenticity and transparency, there is a movement, so to speak, when it comes to just how people need to be hiring, and then what you need to do if you're the one seeking a new job or opportunity, what you need to be doing differently than you have had in the past. And it also is affected by diversity and inclusion and a number of other strategic imperatives that the business world is confronting right now, and in a good way, in a positive way. So just stay tuned. I promise, promise, promise you we'll get all the episodes up and loaded. Onto our blogtalkradio.com/sheddingthebitch radio page, and/or you can even go back to our archives on sheddingthebitch.com, our radio page there, and listen even to those that we've had in the past. Let's see, other rich news. You know, it's nice when it's quiet. It's nice when there's not a big either hurrah or a challenge or something going on in the, in the news that is just creating uproar. It is kind of nice that it is nice and mellow and, and calm. And I feel that way right now because I am loaded up with cough medicine, so you will have to excuse me. I am not my normal zippity self. But being that today's conversation is about mental toughness, we are all going to work on it. We are all going to go inwards and really kind of determine what it is that we need to be doing in order to build that resistance, build that level of persistence and stamina. That's a good word for, for today is stamina, in order to leverage it, like I said, toward whatever goal that you have that you're working toward, or whether whatever obstacle might be in your way, even if it's yourself mentally, emotionally, physically. Emotionally. I think I said that already. So that's what we're going to do. We're going to break it down. We're going to kind of walk through some things regarding what mental toughness really is. And we're going to do it in such a way that you can actually, even if it's just while you're listening to the program, you can be making a checklist. And maybe what you do is as we go through this and we talk about these 10 elements, you might say, okay, well, I'm good in that. In that arena, but then all of a sudden we talk about something that you're not necessarily, you know, 100% secure in, and therefore just hang on to that one because that might be the one that you want to start working on. So we'll put it in a form of a checklist. I'm even going to make sure that that's published out onto our shitinthabitch.com blog page so you can go and reference that, even pull it off if you want and create your own checklist that you could be using, not only for today, but as you move forward and you create this shift within yourself to really build up a backbone, really, or a thick skin. Some people might look at mental toughness as having a thick skin. So, as we get into this conversation, a rich question I want you to be thinking about, and for those of you who are listening to the program for the first time, we give a rich question out there to ground you in the discussion that we're going to be having. And so your rich question for today is really, what does mental toughness mean to you? So if you were, and I'll tell you my story in a little bit, but if you were observed as being mentally tough, what would that mean to you? How would you define that for yourself? And on a scale of 1 to 10, now that you have your idea of what mental toughness is, where do you kind of rank yourself? On a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being the weakest in mental toughness or 10 being the strongest in mental toughness, where would you find yourself? Because what we want to do and what we always try to do here on Shitting the Bitch Radio and all the work that we do with you is to ground you where you are currently and then benchmark where you want to be so you can then kind of aspire and work on and then move closer to that end goal. So, what does mental toughness mean to you? And on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the strongest, where would you rate yourself? And then what you can do as you get this checklist through our discussion is you can then determine where you want to be against those areas that you want to be working on. Alright, so rich tags you can use with us in regards to Facebook and Twitter or anywhere else you want to communicate with us, you can use rich tags #MentalToughness, MentalToughness, or as always #ShedTheBitch. Alright, Deborah is out there and she'll be watching Facebook and Twitter and I'm on the chat room. And if you are on our blogtalkradio.com/SheddingTheBitchRadio page for today's episode, you can scroll down and post a question or a comment or just simply say and say hi. You can also go to our Facebook and Twitter pages anytime, not only live during the 12 to 1 hour, but many of you, most of you, take us with you and download us at a later date, and feel free to always come back to Facebook or Twitter and make a comment or a question or tell your story in regards to the topic of discussion for that particular week, or maybe even if it's a couple weeks later. All right, so when we get back, because I'm going to take some water and kind of open myself up and get ready, mentally tough, for this conversation around your own mental toughness. So we will 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, 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 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 mental toughness today. And I don't know about you, but I really never thought of it in this vein, and yet I like it. I mean, you know how I'm one that's not very fluffy in my words. I've talked about the fact that even learning words like empowerment and transformation and personal growth, those are things that have grown on me just in the last 5 or 6 years, maybe 7 right now, since I kind of left corporate, went out on my own, kind of really went inward to figure out who I am and who I want to be, who I don't want to be. And if you can relate and/or if you are looking for that same type of journey, whether you're 20 or 75, just know that we all kind of are in that process and if we're not wearing it on our sleeve, so to speak, if it's not on the surface of our awareness, that's one thing, you know, to think about or to consider. But at the same time, if we are even in the slightest aware of the fact that we are trying to figure out who we are at this current point in time and where we want to be, then you may may understand kind of where I have been around just all of this personal development, I'll call it, personal growth, transformation, the empowerment. But when it came to mental toughness, I kind of liked it. And how this came about is the fact that someone just recently commented to me at a conference It was after I moderated a panel, and I was moderating a panel on funding in the entertainment industry. And so we were kind of sharing, the panelists and myself were sharing our experiences of what we've been through on our journey to, you know, not only whether it be screenwriters or learning to be a director, learning to be a producer, Add to that being a woman in a very male-dominated industry. Add to that that it's just an industry of rejection, rejection and rejection and more rejection. And this gentleman, I've known him for a while. He's probably been in my network, so to speak, for I would say 4 or 5 years. And so he's seen a lot of my highs and lows when it's come to my own journey which only started from an entertainment perspective, started back in 2012, 2000— well, actually 2014, I guess it's been. And so he kind of commented to me, he says, I, you know, I've seen you over the, you know, years with all the ups and downs that you've been going through, and boy, I wish I possessed the mental toughness that you possess. And I kind of just I just sat there, like, probably just looking at him without responding because I was not sure kind of how that was sitting with me. I certainly did not take it as an offense, but at the same time, I was not really sure what he, what he meant by it. Only because I thought about confidence. I thought about persistence and determination. And I use those words a lot. Here with you. I just, the mental toughness I had not kind of sat with before. And so I was not, you know, I just said, "Thank you so much." And I wish I had asked him right then and there kind of what he meant by that, what his interpretation, what his definition, what his perception is when it comes to that. But what I did do is I came, I got actually in my car, I left the conference, got in my car, and I actually broke down. And I was fighting breaking down in tears with him, so when he was, you know, here he was telling me how mentally tough I was, when actually I was on the brink of breaking down in tears, I got to my car, I was leaving anyway, and I broke down in my car. And the reason why was, as much as I appreciated him making that comment, recognizing that it was a compliment, I wasn't feeling mentally tough at all, even during that whole program. I was there for a full day, I moderated for over an hour, and I wasn't feeling mentally tough then. I had recently been dealing with a, long list of rejections in some of the projects that I'm working on, um, in the entertainment arena. I was confronting and continue to confront a past client who had defrauded me and dealing with that and the highs and lows that comes with that. Even the, um, even the punch in the gut that you get when someone basically screws you over, uh, you know, if you've ever had someone screw you over, you probably know what I was, what I was feeling, what I continued to feel when I allow it. But I don't often. And yet I, here I found myself in the middle of this crowd talking to this gentleman, having it kind of all pour over me. And then at the same time, I had learned that my little sister had been in the hospital. And so here I was sitting in my car after a successful event and I was breaking down in tears. And I let myself. I just allowed myself to cry pretty much all the way home. And when I got home, I decided to just sit and really ponder what he meant and what his perception of me must have meant when he used those words, mental toughness. And I thought to myself, you know, I bet you there's a lot of women and men out there that also have those times where they just feel like every cell in their body is, is stuck, is sad, is frustrated, is angry, is feeling lost, are scared, are unsure of themselves, they're doubting themselves. And we put on great masks is what I realized. Is we do a really good job at masking all of those bitches, as we call them. Because I must have done a fabulous job in wearing my mask when I have someone, you know, kind of standing in front of me complimenting my resilience, my perseverance, my confidence, my, certainty. He certainly didn't use those words, but in looking at what mental toughness is, I all of a sudden realized that it isn't just confidence or determination, focus, clarity, persistence, passion, as I always kind of considered mental toughness to be. I started looking into, into it and at it, and I thought, oh wow, mental toughness is an amped-up degree of confidence, far more than what I really thought about in the past. And I am not sure if, if you are in the same camp as that, but I do know that, and I did understand at that moment when I am sitting on my couch kind of Googling and searching, but also pondering within, what he may have meant when he made that comment to me, I definitely realized, you know, I don't give credit to those out there, even myself, when it comes to one's tenacity, to one's stamina, to one's perseverance, to one's— and I love this comment that I found. It was from Angela Duckworth of the University of Pennsylvania. She's a psychologist there. And she even kind of puts it in such a way that there was two words that stuck out to me when it came to her explanation of mental toughness. She says, mental strength is that unique combination of passion, tenacity, and stamina that allows or enables you to stick with your goals until they become a reality. Now, that statement as a whole is very powerful, but what I found in that statement are two words that I thought were interesting that made me want to have this conversation today, and that is unique combination. Because here I was thinking it was just that confidence, self-assurance, perseverance, even persistence actually more so than perseverance. You know, I was considering other other qualities. And here I love this unique combination of those things, but then you add to it tenacity and stamina and it kind of just— and resilience actually is also a fabulous word. And it all of a sudden said to me, okay, you know, as weak and vulnerable as I was feeling in my car as I was crying because of all these things going on in my life— can you relate? You know, it doesn't have to be as big as someone in the hospital or as big as someone defrauding you, but even the smallest of things. As much as I was allowing myself to feel all those emotions and dump them and let the tears flow, I also then stuck to this idea of a unique combination of tenacity and resilience and stamina. Because they all talk— everybody talks about the fact that the difference between successful and unsuccessful people is when they fall, is whether or not they get up and keep going. And that, that, that is where that mental toughness differentiates people and is what I realized he was saying to me, how I differentiate myself maybe towards two other people that he experiences. And I thought, you know, there's other people out there not getting the credit for that same thing. And/or they don't understand what that unique combination is, and maybe we can have a conversation about it and we can all kind of decide for ourselves that rating or ranking of where we are on the, on the scale of mental toughness. 'Cause the other thing that this Angela Duckworth had noted is developing, working on your mental strength. And I would say it's a day-in, day-out, and everyday occurrence, something that we all could be working on. Developing mental strength is all about habitually, there's another word, habitually doing the things that no one else is willing to do. And that's the separator, that's the differentiator, that's what, So if he was saying to me that you're willing to do things that other people aren't, then I thought to myself, I need to give myself more credit than that— than I do, rather. I need to give myself more credit than I do, and I need to use that as a springboard to overcome those things that caused me to be crying in my car. And therefore, what I want you to be thinking about is, How can you use those differentiators, that unique combination, that willingness and ability to habitually do things differently than other people are willing to? How can then you leverage that to overcome the smallest or the biggest challenges that you have in your life? And not only challenges, but also if you have a big goal that other people aren't buying in on, or they just don't understand why you're doing it. I had mentioned to you on last week's show or maybe an earlier show how I'm continually asked, "So what are you going to do if this whole screenwriting thing doesn't work?" I'm like, "Well, I'm just going to keep going until it does." And they're like, "But when are you going to decide to give up?" And I'm like, "I'm not going to," because giving up on anything that I feel passionate about would be giving up on myself, right? So that is kind of where I see this whole differentiating conversation taking place is in that gap. In that gap of where even I understood kind of passion and confidence and persistence to be, and yet where mental toughness, and I love that, mental toughness, really resides. So that's what we're going to talk about today. That's where we're going to dive in and dig into what are those traits, qualities, habits— habitually doing the things other people aren't willing to do. What are those things that then you could take on for yourself and have a tool, have a strategy within yourself and within your toolkit that when things are getting tough, when things are getting hard, when things are getting painful, tearful that you can pull out and use, and use for your own, for your own being, for your own doing, for your own achieving. All right, but before we dive into that, and we are going to dive into that, before we do though, I also, apart from your rich question thinking about where you are on the scale of of mental toughness, I then want you to also get in a space of where you have felt rejection or defeat. I don't want you to live in the space or reside in the space. I want you to just think about maybe even the last time or maybe just a big situation, event that happened to you where you were either rejected or defeated. And I don't want you to even move forward to think about, okay, so how did you feel about that, or what were those ugly emotions. What I— I just want you to think about that experience or that situation. It could be, you know, you were going after a promotion or raise and maybe you didn't get it, or maybe you were rejected for, you know, something that you were working on, maybe a loan you were trying to get, or a book you're trying to publish, or You know, maybe just simply that with all the noise in the world, it is just causing you to be very anxious and be very stressed, and maybe even influenced, and you do not like the fact that you are allowing it to influe— you know, allowing external things to influence you. Or maybe it was, as I have dealt with over time, maybe it was just some hate from someone else that you have allowed to kind of, impact you. Again, I don't want you to go to the ugliness, I just want you to kind of live in the situation. Because as you live in that situation and we talk through these 10 points, this 10-checklist, I want you to then use that checklist to say, okay, how will I handle that type of situation differently the next time I'm confronted with it? How can I pull this toolkit out? Whether it's all 10 of these points or maybe it's only 6 of 10, but, you know, there's something in that 6 things I could be doing to be mentally tough that I could apply to that situation should it happen again, so then I have a different outcome. I have a different degree of, remember the difference between, you know, resilient people and non-resilient people is when they come up against something, that they get up and keep moving as opposed to they stay down and let that situation hold them down. Make sense? So, we are going to take a quick break. I am going to grab another little sip of water. And when we come back, we are going to dive into these 10 things you could be doing differently to get that thick skin, to get that resilient, tenacious, stamina that you need in order to overcome just about anything and pursue the goals that you have for yourself. 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, 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 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/sheddingthebitch Shedding the Bitch Radio 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. Mental toughness, what does it mean to you when you think about that? How would you define mental toughness and where on a scale of 1 to 10 would you put yourself today, right now? And that's what I want you to be thinking about as we have this conversation and we dive into what— now when I've taken a look at it, I've kind of said to myself, okay, then what would it mean to not only have confidence and clarity and focus and self-awareness and persistence and certainty, but, you know, then you amp it up with stamina, love that, and tenacity, and perseverance, and resilience. What, you know, what would it mean then at that point when, when you consider what mental toughness is? And if you or I, because I had mentioned, and I even, you know, that lovely Facebook Live little video I put up there right before we went live. What that kind of reveals is we may possess some, few, or all of these things that we're going to talk about, and it's okay. It doesn't matter. What we want to do is we want to leverage whatever we do possess in a way of mental toughness to arm ourselves when it comes to really taking action on our goals and/or dealing with challenges and obstacles, naysayers, or just situations that aren't going our way. And then what we want to do, and the other thing I wanted you to be thinking about is, if there are things that then you kind of say, okay, on this checklist, there's one or two things that I really want to start working on and really want to be focused on and really want to think about and start developing within yourself, because then that's just building that more and more strength and more and more toughness in order to leverage it as that tool when you need it. So let's kind of talk through those things. And again, obviously you may be sitting with a pen and paper. Most likely not, and that's okay, but as we talk through these, you might say, oh, well, that's, I'm good there in that situation. So kind of put it aside and focus on the ones that you might say, huh, not real sure about that one, not real confident about that one, not real certain about how I reflect that or project that or act on that, so that's where I'm going to focus on. And you're creating a plan. I'm always looking to give you tools and tips and advice that you can start using leveraging to move yourself forward. So think of it that way. And these are things that when I really did sit down and in my basket of tears to kind of understand what, what, what it is and how it differentiates from just being that confident person, these were things that I thought about. And, and I saw how one layer on top of another does create a whole different mojo, a whole different level of energy, a level of confidence. So, I hope you feel the same way. So, first is, and we all know this, it's a matter of putting it into practice, but it's really acknowledging and accepting that there's things in this world you just don't have any control over. And there's things in the world you do. And yet, we tend to, and trust me when I say, you know, being the biggest control freak in the past, having been, I should say, the biggest control freak, thinking that I could actually, you know, move cars on a highway because they weren't moving, you know, as fast as I wanted them to, or, you know, moving the universe so it doesn't have a torrential storm on the night of my book signing. That I just spent a boatload of money, you know, investing in, and here it's the first monsoon Atlanta's ever seen the night of my book signing. So, there's just things in your— in the universe, in your life that you can't control, and there's things that you can. And if you can get yourself to really just consider the things that are in your control and let go and take a deep breath and shake it off, all those things that you can't, I'll tell, I can promise you, you know, you might chuckle and laugh about the fact that you are a control freak and you might have that nervous giggle when someone calls you a control freak or you call yourself a control freak. But take that little nervous self-reflective giggle and really consider what that is doing to you, what that's doing to your, your energy, what that's doing to your peacefulness, what that's doing to your clarity and your ability to really focus on the things that are that matter and that you do have control on, and learn to let those things go. And mental toughness means allowing those things that are out of your control just go by the wayside, and then all you have to focus on— you've now alleviated and rid your spirit and your soul and your mind and your body of all of that weight. Of those things, and now you have a lot of room to focus on what it is that you can control if they are or aren't going your way. All right? So, that would be the first. And then, I talk about this a lot, but I definitely know that this has to do with that amped-up mental toughness. And that is learning how to turn the emotional into the logical. And it's almost like what I did that night sitting in my car in tears. I allowed myself to cry. I allowed myself to feel. I allowed myself to be pulled down, so to speak. And then I shook it off and I said, okay, as I often do, most of the time do, I have to get logical about this. I have to really just kind of dry the tears Sue the pain, although don't do it artificially, and get clear so then you can just look at the situation that you're talking about in a very logical manner. Because that logic builds that resilience, builds that courage, builds that focus, that clarity, that confidence, that energy. Those things that layered on top of one another build this mental toughness that we're talking about. So that's number 2. And I want to add to that, that when it comes to turning emotion into logic, it's really because it's so black and white. We all know that every problem has a solution, and to every solution, you just simply— there's a plan, there's a way to go about solving that problem, and therefore there's this plan. And then with every plan, should you choose to— and of course we all have choice— you take action on it. So all of that is just black and white logic, as opposed to— we often live in our heads and our hearts and our guts, and there's times to use all of those things, and there's times to just purge it out of your head and heart and look at it very simply, very plainly. All right, then the other one is have a clear definition or a plan of what it is that you want and what you don't want in life. This was probably one of the biggest eye-openers for me over the last 8 or 9 years as I've been through my own shedding process, is really understanding, and this goes back to what you can and can't control, is really understanding If I— if and when— when I know what I want and what I don't want, it really makes decision-making simple. It really makes prioritizing simple. It really makes working through a problem simple because it really comes down to that choice I had just mentioned. If it fits within what I want, then great. Then I'll come up with a plan to, or a solution to that. If it's not what I want, that's even simpler. Okay, then I put it aside. Now, people get muddy in the what you don't want, get really muddy. So for instance, entrepreneurs out there, without clarity of what you want and don't want, this is what often happens. You live in the what you don't want. So as an entrepreneur, you sit there and say, okay, I don't want to discount my services. I don't want to give away anything free. I don't want this, this, this, and this. But the next thing you know, because of a lack of mental toughness, you all of a sudden realize, okay, you're, you know, you don't have the income coming in, you're not meeting your goals. A potential client comes along and the first thing out of their mouth is, how much does it cost? And you start immediately— can you relate to this? Can you feel this? You start getting desperate. You start panicking. You start feeling, oh my gosh, this could be the only client I'm going to have, and therefore I'm going to make adjustments and discounts. And you just did exactly what you don't want to do. When you are really clear and the mental toughness comes in— and why it layers on one over another of these things is When you go back to that first one, what you can and can't control, you can control saying no, that you're not discounting. You can control the answer. You can control a lot of things. There's nothing about that situation that's out of your control. Then you add on that you want to, you know, ensure that you have a plan, and from that plan, there's a problem to every solution. Well, guess what? Yes, there is. And there is a solution to that situation, that problem. And that is you kind of pitch them. You present to them. You sell them on the fact of the value that they'd be getting, of the impact that they'd be getting, and therefore you don't discount your rates. So that would just be an example of how all of these things layer onto each other, and how you can really build your mental toughness, and how knowing what you want and what you don't want, and even if you put those things on a piece of paper and up on a wall, and everything that you're doing, you look at it and say, okay, does that fit in the category of what I want and don't want? It will provide you an armor of strength and courage to say, in this case, an example, no, and why that is a no, and, you know, and work your way through it. So having an understanding of what you can and can't control, having that plan, and being able to really know what you want and don't want, will really support that strength that you need in order to move forward with that situation, with that event. All right, the other one where I see a lot of people get really caught up is— is being willing, being open, looking for areas where you can fail in, where you can make mistakes. And I definitely see this when it comes to a lot of the clients that I work on, whether it's pride— majority of the time it is— whether it is— well, most of it's going to be pride because then, you know, when it comes to failing, You know, they just, that's the one thing that they are scared because they are not sure if they can overcome the failure. Not that they can't kind of, they don't know that they can make a mistake and making a mistake isn't going to, you know, be life-threatening. But at the same time, they are just not sure that they will overcome it. They are not sure that they will be able to lift themselves up from it. And what I will tell anybody, and I live by this, is you just want to look for those opportunities to fail. Because one, unless you're, you know, a surgeon with a knife in your hand or a cop with a gun in your hand, something that is life-threatening, 99% of us don't have anything that we can't overcome because it's not going to be life-threatening to someone else or even to ourselves. And that might be a drastic overstatement or overuse of an example, but the point being is be open to failing, looking for those places that maybe you don't have a skill or maybe you don't have— you don't feel you have the right to ask or pitch or do whatever. Who cares? Go and do it. And I'm preaching to myself right now as well. Go and do it. Don't worry about whether or not you're successful or not. If you're not successful, if you don't get what it is that you want or it comes up short of where you expected, then look at it as, okay, what can I learn from this? Because once you've failed and you've learned something, you don't do it— 9 out of 10 times you won't do it again. And therefore, that failure just provided a wealth of information to you that you can use the next time. So, you know, for instance, and how all these things layer on top of each other is when I first sent out my script, my first script that I wrote, this was a couple years ago, 2 years ago. And I went to LA with it and kind of exposed myself to a room full of other writers who were far more, I'll say, experienced than I was. Seeing that this was the first script that I have ever written. And I really didn't think about the failure. I never think about the failure. My bitch at times is fear and success, quite honestly. So my one— I have never had a fear of failure because I look for it. I look for those lessons. So I walked in this room and I really didn't even think about that I would so-called fail, and I got ripped apart. Now, of course, they don't do it in a derogatory, demeaning way, but they, you know, they basically ripped my screenplay apart. They ripped the fact that because it's a true story, it's my true story, there's an— there's a part in it about my father dying and my being by his bedside, and I was bawling my eyes the whole time I was reading that section of the script. And I knew that I can't be doing that. I knew that that is not what, you know, a true professional writer would do. You have to separate yourself. But at the same time, that is what happened, right? And I got very ripped apart for it. And my whole script got ripped apart for it not being in the right structure, not being in the right flow, you know, that I would have to just totally rewrite it. And there goes 2 years of my life. I, you know, I just— I sat there and I just took it all in. And I said to myself, you know what, every problem has a solution. I have a plan. I've always had a plan as to how I was going to go about, you know, doing this little adventure of learning screenwriting. I, you know, had— I couldn't control how other people were going to perceive my screenplay. So I either accept what they say or I don't accept it and I continue moving forward. So all these things kind of helped— possessing those, those things have helped me take in their information, walk away, absorb it, not get defensive about it, just absorb it and then make changes and move forward. And that's exactly what I did. That I was not crying because of their feedback. I, you know, I was simply crying because of the story. I just simply said to myself, you know what, that is why I came out here. I came out here to fail. I did not look at it, you know, that way, but I came out here to learn and get lessons, and that is exactly what happened. All right. So we are going to just keep moving here. I want you, and To be mentally tough is just to be steadfast in your beliefs and your goals. Believe that what it is that you want to pursue, just like, you know, here with my screenplay, just like here with the people that are telling me, you know, if this doesn't work for you, what are you going to do next? You have to stay steadfast in what it is that you are doing. Because if you are doing it and you are exhausting yourself doing it, then, then you, you know, you You want to be careful not to let the slightest naysayer or the slightest comment or the slightest delay or detraction or rejection falter or steer you in a different direction than where you were with your goal or with your belief. You don't want to— you don't want to be offended by what other people might not understand or what other people might say or not say. Or how they may support you or not support you. And you also don't want to stoop to their level. If I in that room with all those other writers as they were kind of tearing apart my script, if I had started getting defensive, explaining why I did it the way I did it, or not acknowledging that piece of the script that was very emotional, they weren't asking me to be cold-hearted. They were just, they simply said to me, You have to find a way to separate yourself from the characters of— that they're real characters, that they are your father, that they— it is you, and you have to kind of make them artificial in order for you to kind of separate yourself and not be so emotionally attached. So I had to take all of that in and I had to be steadfast in my belief and in my goal of wanting to tell the story. Yet they pointed out that that's fine, but you have to make these changes. So it's just staying true no matter what other people might say, and just basically like I did, I was like, okay, thank you very much, and I moved on, considered what they said. I made some changes, didn't make all of them. I didn't rip it apart and put it back together again, but at the same time, there were a number of things that, no, I stood true to what it was that I was looking to do there. So stay steadfast in your beliefs and your goals. And then be patient. Be patient that things aren't going to happen, and this goes back to the control. Things aren't going to happen at the pace that you want them to. So you are feeling desperation of closing business in order for you to be able to eat, or you are looking for this script to be finally written in such a way that someone's going to buy it, and it's, you know, because it's been years. Because of the fact that You know, you've been building this business of yours and you're just waiting for that, and you need that, you know, profit. You need to go in the black for the first time, and that will be proof to you that you're doing what it is that you're supposed to be doing. We all understand that we want validation and we want success, but we definitely can't control how the universe is going to show up in order to make that happen for us. But where there is a lot of things that we may be able to control within it— if you have— if you, for instance, are having that business and you haven't turned a profit yet, there are things there that are in your control as to whether or not you, you're going after the right target market, you're, you know, selling the right products and services, you're doing the right thing. After that, you can't control whether or not a client writes the check. Just as I can't control— there's a lot of things I can control around making sure that that script is written in such a way that it's going to sell, but then I can't, like, go into a room and choke the person until they sign a check to buy that script. So we all just have to take a deep breath, and when it comes to pursuing our goals and what we perceive as our passions, build that mental toughness to say, "Okay, even when I have these constant delays, or stalls, or obstacles, or rejections, I'm doing the right things. I'm adjusting where I need to be, and I'm just going to keep going." And yet, I have to be patient that if I'm doing the right things, if you're doing the right things, it's going to happen. It's just a matter of when that happens. And then you definitely, definitely, definitely have to be honest with yourself. Just like that individual challenged me about my script, you know, even though my gut reaction and my immediate response was, no, I'm just going to, you know, continue working it and working it and working it. Will there ever come a time where I have to be honest with myself? I have to be honest with myself every day. You have to be honest with yourself every day as to whether or not what you're working on is realistic, what you're working on is relevant, what you're working on is needed. What you're working on has an audience, has a customer, has an end goal or an achievement that is realistic and capable of being achieved, let alone pursued. At the same time of being honest with yourself, don't let others sway what that answer may be for yourself. If you find yourself that you have assessed the relevance, the reality, and you still have to put aside any external noise that may still have you questioning whether or not you're moving in the right direction and on the right path. But telling yourself lies, if you're continually hearing, and this happens a lot with business owners, and entrepreneurs, you're continually hearing no or continually hearing comments about what's not working or what's not appropriate or not good for what it is someone else is looking for or what it is that you're working on, then you have to hear that and you have to consider that and maybe even adjust and shift and transform as a result of it. Because telling yourself lies isn't, isn't helping you or anybody else either. But once you have grounded yourself in the truth and grounded yourself in your own honesty, then just stick with it and, and, and pursue that and not be swayed by it. And of course, many of you probably feel that a degree of mental toughness is knowing that there are times where there's going to be little to no support around you. And God, you know, I would want to bless you that that doesn't happen. But I have mentioned to you in the past that I found myself with a large circle of friends one day and a, you know, an empty couch with just me and my dog the next day for a good 9 to 12 months, simply because they didn't get it. They didn't understand. They didn't— whether or not they believed, you know, wasn't— important, but, and therefore they all kind of strayed away. And I lost that support system, so to speak. So, so there is going to be times where you are going to go alone. And, and you just have to. That mental toughness is all about you being okay with that. And finding different sources of support. Finding different people. Finding different groups. Finding different, entities for that support and being okay with, with your mental toughness to keep moving forward. And then of course we always talk about pushing through your fears and making it hard to, making it hard to give up simply because there's something that you've never done before. Remember going back to the definition that Angela had provided. It's being willing to do things that other people aren't willing to do. And in order to do that, you have to overcome whatever fears you might be dealing with. Those doubts, those negativities, whatever it is. And those other things before that helps you to push through those fears because recognizing what you can control and not control, having a plan, You know, being open to failing, being steadfast in your beliefs and your goals. Having all those things ticked off your checklist pretty much builds that armor of mental toughness that you need in order to get through what it is that you might be fearing. All right. And then, of course, you know, as Nike says, just do it and don't give up. Just know that giving up on whatever it is that you want, you believe, you aspire, you are passionate about— giving up on that for family, for friends, for things that you can't control, for the boss, for whomever else other than yourself— is giving up on you. Is giving up on you. You know, other people are pursuing their own goals, their dreams. Not concerned about you. Not concerned about whether or not you support them, you believe in them, you know, you are there for them. Certainly don't allow external— external factors derail you and take you off course and take you off track. Stay true to what it is that you already determined that you have a plan for and that you are a you aspire toward and that you are willing to do and not do. And believe in all of that, like I said, layered on top of each other, and that will give you the mental toughness, the mental strength to not give up on yourself. So I'll leave you with this as it comes to this topic. And as you consider, of all those things, where do you, you know, where you stand now. What was that rating you gave yourself of 1 to 10 of how mentally tough you were? Quite honestly, I would have, you know, put my scale on probably a 6 or a 7 when it came to mental toughness. When I really started looking at all these other things that then amped up the confidence, and the focus, and the clarity, and the persistence that I kind of always ground myself in, I really actually picked myself a couple of, of, you know, scales higher because I do tend to do these other things that I really just never considered. I kind of took them for granted, which is in some cases a good thing, right? But I'll leave you with this, and it was in the same article with Angela's note, which basically says a reporter once asked Muhammad Ali how many sit-ups does he do every day. And his response was, I don't count my sit-ups. I only start counting when it starts hurting because when I feel pain, that's when it really matters. So, basically, the bottom line there is feel the pain. Be looking for that pain. It is almost like be looking for those failures. Be looking for those mistakes. And be okay that you are feeling that pain. And that is when it really matters. That is when that, this mental toughness is going to be pulled out of that toolkit. And you're going to leverage it in order to move forward and to really achieve what it is that you want. All right, so I want to thank you all for joining. Stay tuned for our next episode next Tuesday at noon Eastern time for Shedding the Bitch Radio. And mentally tough, go after the world with mental toughness and mental strength, and I'll talk to you then. Bye everyone.

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