Facebook Live Video 4: What Defines you?

Good almost afternoon, Facebook Live. I am switching things up a little bit and decided to do this one on Friday because I'm really excited to share that for the first time in a long time, I'm actually gonna take a weekend off. I'm not doing any open houses this weekend. My daughters are both in a competition called Odyssey of the Mind. And we're going to do that Saturday, and Sunday we're actually going to go out in the boat for the first time in many months. So for that reason, as well as the fact that I'm getting ready to do a couple real estate related video posts, recorded posts for my real estate side, my professional side, I thought I would go ahead and take advantage of today's day and do my Facebook Live. So I've decided— I think this is number 4 And I decided I was going to call this Raw with Renee. We'll see. Today is probably going to be really raw. So I'm going to test the boundaries here of what's safe, what's acceptable, what resonates with others, and we'll see how that goes today. So if my voice wavers a little bit or I look a little nervous, it's probably because I am. I actually talked to someone before doing this one to get a sense of, you know, 'cause a few things that I'll share are gonna be a little vulnerable for me, and I wanted to run them past her so, you know, she knows who she is, and thank you for her guidance and wisdom on this. But my topic today is going to be what defines you. And as I was thinking through, this is one I've been wanting to talk about for a little while. And you know, let me put my disclaimer out there to begin with, and that is I do not have all the answers. My point in doing these Facebook Live posts was not because I somehow think that I might know more than you or others. What I did want these posts to be about is, you know, we're always told that we learn through the mistakes that we make. And for a long time, I, you know, always kept those mistakes to myself, you know, because we don't want to share those. Those aren't the more positive parts of our being, right? But I came to appreciate through my profession and through some of the mentoring that I do voluntarily, as well as my executive coaching when I had my own consulting business, I've come to appreciate that you know, there are those that can learn through your experiences, not just you learning through your own mistakes. And so it was from that vantage point that I decided to do this series of Renee Raw, um, and, and really just kind of share some of my not so attractive, uh, experiences and, and how those have helped shape me. And, and hopefully they'll reach someone out there. I, you know, what I love about doing these— and if you were on when I did my first one, I, I shared how this is actually very out of my element Not that I'm— I'm very comfortable. I've spoken in front of groups of, you know, hundreds and probably at one point close to thousands of people. So it's not my fear of being in front of other people, but it is the fear of doing that and sharing things, like I said, that aren't the most attractive parts of your history, your, you know, your experiences. So again, I just wanted to share that I am not doing these because I feel like I know more than someone else. I'm doing these because I think there's some things I can share. Hi Mark, thanks for coming on. So back to the topic at hand, what I wanted to do today was to talk about what defines you. And when I first started thinking through this, you know, I was kind of thinking of it through a woman's point of view, and I thought, gosh, you know, do us women allow things, circumstances, people to define us? But then I started thinking through examples, and I thought, you know, this isn't about gender because I know many many men that define themselves by their job, by the fact that they're a father, by their roles. And so I think this could be relevant to you regardless of whether you're a man or a woman. I'm obviously going to be sharing it from a women's— a woman's point of view, but I think it's very, very gender-neutral and very, um, hopefully very relevant. So what I wanted to do was, um, to illustrate my point, I will make myself the victim today, if you will, and share what I mean by how we define ourselves. I talked a little bit about, you know, in my intro that I know some people, as an example, that define themselves by their roles. You know, so if I met you right now, I would be Renee the Realtor, and that would mean all different kinds of things to you. It could mean some negative things, it could mean positive things, depending on what your prior experience has been. Dealing with realtors, or perhaps even dealing with me. I could have defined myself as a corporate executive in my prior life. I could have defined myself as a high-income earner in my prior life— not so in real estate, but in my prior life, you know. So I could certainly define myself. I could define myself as a wife, as a mother of 3 daughters. I could define myself as a sister. So, you know, certainly there are people that will grab on to their definition of who they are both internally as well as externally by viewing others as the role they play. There are some times that people will define themselves by the circumstances or the experiences that they've had. And I'm not talking about professional here because I kind of put that in the by the role bucket, um, you know. So I'll introduce you to Renee Hahn through her experiences. And by the way, this is where it gets a little bit, um, we'll just say a little vulnerable. And I've always tried to be a little sensitive to what I share simply because my stories cross over with others, and I always want to be respectful of other people's privacy. So I'm going to probably go out on a little limb here and perhaps upset a family member with some of the sharing, but I think it's, it's relevant. So if you, if you think about defining yourself through your circumstances You know, I could say, well, gosh, I was the girl that grew up not knowing her father, not knowing who he was. I could be the girl that grew up with a stepfather who turned out to be an alcoholic, and then that led to me being the girl that was from the divorced family. And it happens, folks. I came from— I lived, you know, my My mom worked really hard to put us living in good situations despite the fact that we didn't have much money. And I, you know, and I had many, many affluent people that I went to school with. So, you know, I could define myself by the— thank you, Mark, for sharing. I'm so glad to hear that you raised your daughter. And I am, I'll tell you, I am so impressed by so many of the men that step up these days. And whether you're in a divorced situation or you're, you know, still with your spouse playing a much more active role. So thumbs up to you. But again, I could be defined by those circumstances, and I actually misspoke because in that category, those are the circumstances that someone else— not even me, I had nothing to do with it. I did not choose for my father to not be in my life. I did not choose for my mother to marry a gentleman who turned out to be an alcoholic. I did not choose to be the daughter of a divorced couple. None of those things were my choices, but you can believe that at points in my life they were absolutely how people viewed me. I could also— now let me turn to a third grouping, which is being defined by my own choices. And again, I already talked about the role part, so it's not about the professional side, but my choices. So my choices were, you know, I in college, my freshman year in college, I, you know, almost flunked out of Michigan State because I went from such a controlled environment to, my gosh, having total freedom, being away from home, and I had fun. You know, that could define me. By the way, I'll talk about this, I did not flunk out of Michigan State. In fact, I ended up going on and getting my master's and finishing with a, you know, very respectable GPA. In fact, my master's was pretty high. But the point is, at different points in my life, my choices could have defined me. Another choice that I made to some regard was who I dated in college. And I ended up in a situation where I became a young single parent, and that wasn't even the worst of it. The father of my child ended up going to jail for stalking me. It was a really disturbing situation, we'll leave it at that, that I chose not to be in the relationship and the other person wouldn't let go and, you know, ultimately went to jail for many years for stalking me. That could have defined me. The fact that I became a single parent could have defined me. But what I want to encourage everybody today is don't let your roles define you. They are certainly a part of who you are when you become a mother or a father or a spouse. Um, you know, those things all cannot help but affect who you are because they bring out pieces of you that may not have otherwise been dominant. Don't let other people's choices define you. You know, there are things that happen to us in our life that we have nothing to do with. They were not by any choice of our own, yet society will place those definitions and those stereotypes on you. Don't allow that. Don't allow your past choices— don't get stuck in some of the choices and the decisions that you made in your past and allow them to define you. What I want to encourage you all to do, and probably what I'm most proud of in my own life, is I could have fallen into any of those buckets and stayed there. You know, there were many, many areas of headwind that were facing me that did not make being successful by my own definition you know, an easy one. But somewhere, and I thank my mother for a good part of it, I had an inner strength that allowed me to make choices as I went through life, to move beyond circumstances and to reach my, my own full potential, which I still work every day to try to do. And so what I am here to encourage you to do is define yourself and hold others accountable for defining you by who you are. Not the role you play, not the circumstances that you have put in by your own or others' choices. You know, so now let me introduce you to Renee, the who I am. I've talked about all the things that I could have allowed to define me, and there are many more, but we'll go easy today. You know, the Renee who I am, I'm creative, I'm stubborn, I'm loving, I'm trusting, I'm strong-willed, I'm competitive in many ways, I can be self-centered at times. There are times when it probably feels like I'm an only child. I'm successful in many measures, you know. So again, I think the longer that we allow, whether you're a man or a woman, others and, and worst of all, ourselves to define ourselves by things that aren't who we are, It allows us to get stuck, and you're always gonna be a day late and a dollar short for what you really could be. The other piece of what I want to encourage you is it's never too late. You know, there are points and times in our life where we get stuck in a situation or a segment of your life or a circumstance, and you know, you might not be able to see your way out of that at the time being, but this kind of relates back to my one last week, which is choose to be positive. Every day I wake up, I choose to look for the bright side. I choose to look for the good news. I choose to try to take actions that make me proud of myself and my family proud of me. And guys, I don't get it right every day. I don't get it right every moment. I don't get it right every situation. But in this case, choose to allow yourself to get in touch with who you really are, who you really could be, and who you want to be. It is never too late to change that. So regardless of where you are in life, and maybe you had, you know, made much better choices earlier in your life than I did based on what I've shared today. Maybe you, you know, were in better circumstances because of those that were chosen to be part of your circle and your family. But I do believe even in the best of situations, we can all do, you know, we all have freedom of choice to do what we think is best, to be who we think is best. And so I'm not talking about, you know, being something you're not, but I am talking about we all have flex space, and it's about utilizing that flex space and getting to your really core being of who you are. So I want to thank you. I'm gonna allow this one to be a brief one today, particularly because this was draining for me to have shared a couple of those things that, you know, aren't the most attractive things about me. Let me read here, Mark, I see your note. Yes, so stay positive. And Mark makes a great point. Tomorrow is not a promise. You know, one of the things I'll share, I don't think I shared this when I was talking about how wonderful my husband is, but you know, one of the things I always call a fire drill, and I see so many people that end up in tragic situations that then use that as an opportunity to take stock in how they would like to do something different, something they wish they had done or said or didn't say, and I always said, you know, I don't want to wait for the tragedy to take stock in how things are going, how I'm behaving, how I'm living my life, how I'm spending my time. So I call that a fire drill. So don't be afraid to pull a fire drill, which causes everything to stop and you to take heed and stock in what it is you're doing, what your choices are, what your motivations are, what your actions are. Because as Mark said very, very insightfully, tomorrow is not a promise. So thank you for joining me today. I hope you have a fabulous weekend, and as always, thanks for stopping by. Cheers!