312: How To Shift Your Identity

We're waiting to be someone else or waiting to feel courageous enough to do that thing that we want to do. Except you don't become courageous until you actually take courageous, messy action and your identity starts to shift. Welcome to the Earn your happy podcast. I'm Lori Harder, founder of The Bliss Project, 3 Time Fitness World champion, fitness expert and cover model, turned self love junkie, lifestyle entrepreneur, entrepreneur and author. Each week I'll bring you a guest or a thought that will help you bust through your fears, connect to your soul and get focused and clear so you can elevate your life, business and relationships. We don't wait until we're ready for someone to tell us we're good enough. We take what we want and we anoint ourselves, get ready to earn, own, and unapologetically rock your happiness every single day. Are you with me? Here we go. Welcome back to the earn your happy podcast. And it's time for another quickie, because there is always time to fit in inspiration. And lately I have been loving getting back to a bit more running than I usually do, which still isn't that much running. And I know so many of you are runners or walkers or however you listen to this podcast, whether it's on the bus, en route to work, or in your car or on walks or whatever it is. I'm so grateful to always be with you guys and to see who's listening to the podcast when you shout it out on Instagram or Facebook or whatever you're doing. And I have been loving listening to podcasts. It's just like giving me so much fuel for just all of these different ideas that are coming to my head for the new year. And always. I really love having new things, thoughts and new perspectives put into my mind. So I am completely a podcast junkie right alongside of all of you guys. And I have lately been listening to a few Tony Robbins podcasts, which I've absolutely loved. And on a recent podcast with him and Russell Brand, if you guys haven't heard it yet, it's a really good podcast. They talk a lot about their identity and how identity shifts through action. And I really want you to think about this. So Tony Robbins said the quote, your identity shifts through your actions. And I was like, of course. Like, we're waiting to be someone else or waiting to feel courageous enough to do that thing that we want to do. Except you don't become courageous until you actually take courageous, messy action and your identity starts to shift. I am not a person who was fit and went to the gym Until I started taking that action. Like, we get to this point where we're like, oh, well, that's not me, or I'm not that person yet, or that's them, or that's how they are, or that must just be in them. There's so little that we're actually born with. So much of it is nurture and our environment. And if you did not get what you needed growing up, and I'm here to, like, give you the world's biggest news flash, majority of us did not get what we needed growing up. And it wasn't because we had bad parents. It was because we truly just either didn't communicate it, didn't know what we needed. Our parents didn't know what to give us because they didn't give it get it either. We didn't understand how to ask for what we needed because we never saw it. So now that we're adults and we're able to really ask for what we need and create what we need and start thinking in a way of what we need and create support systems for what we need, it's really important to take notice of what we need. And a lot of it is nurturing and a lot of it is taking action. A lot of it is self coaching. A lot of it is more self love. A lot of it is more grace in order to take the actions that you need to become the person that you want to become. So I want you to start looking at the identity that you really want, like, who do you want to be? And start looking at what actions that would require of you to start feeling like that person. So for me, my identity used to be so ingrained. If you listen to this podcast, you know, even three years ago when it started, I talk a lot about having anxiety and, you know, even instead of experiencing anxiety. And I was a person who had anxiety and really talking about how in order for me to feel better and become a person who anxiety around. Sorry, anxiety around public speaking, around, you know, being in different social situations, doing things that are scary for me or outside of my comfort zone. And in order for me to create a new identity around what I believed my anxiety was, I would have to start showing up and doing those things that give me anxiety and scare me and approaching them in a different way. Right? Because I've had a podcast in the past. It was, I believe it was called how do you do anxiety? Or how do you do stress? Because when we do something, we're choosing to do it over and over again. Right. I was thinking about it. I was telling people I had it. I was dwelling on it. I was like really, really allowing myself to experience it and freak out and take that on as my identity. So if I want to do a different identity, I have to start acting different and thinking different. And this only comes from choice, right? This is only going to come from your choice to stop the pattern. We're all just a bunch of patterns. If you listen to the Joe Dispenza podcast that was put out last month, I believe if you have not listened to that yet, go and listen now. We are just repetitive patterns of doing something and the becomes our identity. So we're human doings. So what are you doing right now that is creating who you think you are? Because if you think that you are a stress eater, it's only because there's a pattern there that began maybe from something that you saw your mom or your dad or your sister or your brother or somebody do, or maybe because it was something that kept you feeling safe or something that was numbing you out. It's first recognizing what you're doing doing and where your identity is attached, what your identity is attached to, and start saying, what is the identity that I actually desire, Right? And when you notice what you're that you're doing something you don't want to do, please don't beat yourself up, because it's just not working. Like, if you've beat yourself up in the past and you're still not to where you want to be, then it's not working. If you're still not to where you want to go and you keep repeating a pattern of something that you think is going to work, it's not working. So the best part is looking at something and being like, well, that's not working. So I'm gonna try something new. Even if it feels counterintuitive, sometimes the most counterintuitive thing is the thing that's actually gonna start bringing you results because it's different. And we can only get a different result by doing something different for a long enough time, right? So really looking at the identity and write down what identity do you want and what does that person do in stressful situations, right? And start saying, okay, this is what I'm gon to choose to do. And guess what, you're going to fail? Like, you're literally going to fail probably the first or second time that you notice it, or maybe you'll do it the first time, you'll do something different and you'll follow through with that identity and Then you'll fail again and then you'll do it again. And the key is to keep taking notice and to keep trying. Because every single new identity shift that I've created did not happen overnight. And I'll tell you, it didn't happen in a year. It literally took maybe two or three years, sometimes four. You guys, I think it took me 10 years to actually start making working out be something that was just ingrained in me and didn't feel like I was dragging my ass to the gym. Like, I truly remember being like, wtf? Am I going to truly have to work out the rest of my life? Like, I just, for 10 years, I was like, seriously, this is awful now. Now I literally cannot, like, yes, I can wait. I can wait to work out. But I know what's on the other side of working out. I truly am like, look, it's not what I want to do, but I'm so excited that I get to work out because I get to choose to change how I feel right now. So instead of looking at, oh, this is going to suck, I don't want to go and do this, I'm like, oh my God, I get to actually change how I feel right now. I could just choose happiness for the other 23 hours of my day instead of sitting here thinking, this is how it has to be. So I really just look at the future outcome of what I'm doing with everything. Like, I go fast forward into the future of all of my choices. So I take that. I've talked about this before and this is really powerful if you can fast forward into the future for every choice you're about to make. Like, okay, let me really think of how I'm going to feel in two or three days and in two weeks and at the end of this year when I haven't completed this goal or when I still feel like a bag of ass, or when I still don't have the reality whatsoever that I want. Like, I'm able to now fast forward in the future enough to bring some of that pain in if I don't do it. And I'm like, I really don't feel like sitting in this pain and making it way worse.

Right?

I want to do this thing right now so that I can get long term gratification, happiness, joy, and really start shifting my identity into the person that I want to be. And you guys were always writing who we want to be. Like, we're writing this story for the rest of our lives so you don't just do something and like, oh yeah, that's great. Now I'm this person. You will forever keep creating that identity. And even when I said like my identity now is to go and work out every day, don't get me wrong, there have definitely been times like when I've traveled for two or three months in a row when I come back and I'm like, I don't know, maybe my identity is just that I'm a walker. And then I'm like, okay, come on, get back to the gym. Like lift some weights. Because it always feels good when you lift weights. Like, get back into a routine. You can do it. Not that walking is bad because I freaking love walking. I could walk the rest of my life. But I do really also enjoy strength training and how important it is for your muscles, especially as we age and just staying strong. So anyway, random.

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Okay guys, so I really hope that you start to notice that who you are right now is just a set of choices. It is not wired in who you are, good or bad. So if you're this amazing person who's like doing everything that want to do and shows up incredible in every area and all of, all of those aspects, that's also something that if you are this person, you're well aware that if you don't continue to take the actions to be that person, you won't continue to be that person. So when you look at someone who looks like they have it all together, it's because they've set up an environment and they've set up their patterns in their actions so that they stay that person. So if you're not yet that person, that's okay. Nobody who is there was born there. Like they had to slowly become this person. So one thing at a time, one identity shift at a time and you will get there. In fact, all it takes is some doing something different today to start becoming that person and attaching your identity to something different. So I'm sending you Guys, so much love. I'm so grateful for you. I'm just super thrilled about this year because I my plan is to just really focus on the podcast and possibly bringing some lives podcasting events either to a city near you or just to LA lives. Just really doing some really cool stuff with the podcast to reach out into the community because I am obsessed with meeting all of you and being in rooms with you. So I'm going to start exploring what that is going to look like because my main focus this year is the podcast because it is one of my favorite things to do. I just love having these conversations with all of you, seeing all of you and having conversations with people and sharing them with you. Because these are the types of things that have really impacted and shifted my life the most, is hearing how it really is. So if you ever want to hear a topic, if you ever want a certain guest on, always shoot me a message because you are the people that I am talking to. So until next time, earn your happy. Bye everyone. Thank you guys so much for spending this time with me on the Earn your happy Birthday podcast. I am so glad that you stopped by. If you could take one second to share this episode with someone you think would love it, that would be absolutely amazing and we would be forever grateful. Also, please leave us a review if you feel so moved by going to itunes and leaving us an honest thought, an honest comment, tell us what you think, tell us what you want to hear more of. It would really help us out on our journey to helping thousands and thousands of people. Until then, don't forget to earn your happy. Thanks again guys. Bye Bye.