The 3 P's of Living With No Regrets

Today is a hit splits episode for Author audience.

Welcome to the Author audience show, the podcast that helps you reach more people with your message. Create a book, connect with your audience, change lives. Here's your host, Shelly Hitz.

Today I'm going to talk about the three Ps of living a life of no regrets. This came as a result of an unexpected tragedy that happened in my family this last week. My cousin's husband, 43 years old, suddenly died last week. Mike Schroyer. It really rocked me. I think it was Thursday that we found out that he passed away. And I immediately started sobbing because it was so un unexpected. But it got me thinking about this topic of living with no regrets. Because my cousin's husband Mike, lived with no regrets. He lived a life that was well lived. He lived a life to the fullest. And I want to ask you today, is that something that you want? Do you want to live a life with no regrets? If something unexpectedly happened to you today, we would you be able to say, today I lived with no regrets. I want to be that person as well. I want to live that kind of life. I don't want to live a life where I always think, well, what if I would have done that? Or what if I wouldn't have let fear stop me? Or what if I would have taken that risk? My cousin Amy and Mike, they took a risk. Mike was a pastor Andy Stanley's church. Some of you may know Andy Stanley in Atlanta, Georgia. He was a children's pastor there. He resigned his job to follow their dream of starting their ministry for families. It's called Create. He left that regular paycheck to follow his dreams. I did that a little over four years ago. I left my job as a physical therapist to follow my dreams. And I want you. It doesn't have to be dramatic, but I want you to live a life of no regrets. I want you to reach your goals. I want you to be able to cross that finish line, whatever it is in your life that you want to do. I recorded a video yesterday just to honor my cousin Mike. And if you're interested in watching that, you can just go to shellyhits.com mike. It'll redirect you to my personal Facebook page. I'm not saying you do that without certain steps. And so that's what I'm going to talk about today. I'm going to be diving in to these three ways, these three Ps of living a life with no regrets. First P in living with no regrets is patience. What do they Say, don't pray for patience, because guess what, you'll probably have something come into your life where you'll have to be patient. But when I was planning to resign my job as a physical therapist, I didn't just resign that day. I had to have patience. I had to look ahead and see when did it make the most sense to realistically take that leap. And we still took a pretty big leap. But what we wanted to make sure is that we were out of debt first. We wanted to pay off our debt, pay off our consumer debt first, so we didn't have all of those bills hanging over our head when I resigned my job. And so sometimes living a life of no regrets will take patience. You may have to wait while you work through the steps, but I'm going to tell you today, it is worth it. It is worth it to take that time and to, you know, I talked about it in my scope the other day. Little, consistent, small consistent actions over time are what tends to give the biggest results in our lives. We want this big, big result. We want it right now. We're a microwave society. We love getting those instant results. And so.

I want you to think about this. It's a small, consistent actions over time that will give you results. It's not always just that big thing like quitting my job. We had to take those small, consistent actions over time to pay off our debt. The years leading up to that, it wasn't just an instant thing. And so the first P to living a life of no regrets is patience, realizing that some of your biggest goals, your biggest dreams, the biggest things that God will do in your life are going to happen over time. And it's going to take small, consistent efforts day in and day out, whether it's paying off a debt, whether it's writing a book. You can write a book by writing 15 minutes a day. That's all. You don't have to think of it as such a big thing. You can do it in those small chunks of time. So my husband and I, when we were getting out of debt so that I could quit my job, so that I could work for myself, have that freedom, do what I'm doing today. It took planning. And to be very, very honest, I had spending issue. And so at that time, one of the things we had to do in that process of planning, I actually froze my credit cards in the freezer so I couldn't get access to them to buy anything else on the credit cards. Oh my. You know, I mean, you, sometimes you have to do drastic things to get what you want to get to achieve your goals. But the planning stage can also be like my husband, we, we talked about it. We decided to use the Dave Ramsey debt snowball method. Have you guys heard of that? Basically, you pay off your smallest bill, your smallest credit card, and then you roll that into the next biggest. So what you were paying on the smaller one. Once it's paid off, you roll that minimum payment into the next one. And then once you pay this one, you roll it into the next one. And so basically it just, it's a snowball effect. Well, that's what we did. That was the plan that we did to pay off our debt. Now, when you're writing a book, you also need a plan. I recommend that you write in this order that you create your outline. The more fleshed out your outline can be, the easier the writing will be for you. To do the outline, then to do the preliminary research, then once you have the outline, once you have the research, then sit down and write and then finally do the ending. If you haven't yet, I encourage you to sign up for my free writing challenge@writingweek.com w e-e k and it's a free seven day challenge to help you get started in that writing process. So the first P was patience. The second P is planning, and the third P is perseverance.

Anytime you're wanting to do something significant and live a life with no regrets, there will be obstacles. Can I get an amen? There will be obstacles to those dreams. There will be obstacles to achieving your goals. And yet when you have perseverance, it basically is having that attitude of never giving up. It is true. I tell this on my webinar. Three Book Writing Formulas Every nonfiction author needs to know. If you haven't joined me on that webinar, I'm going to hosted again in a few weeks. You can find out@shellyhits.com livewebinar but at the end of the webinar, I share the story of my journey to finishing the Pikes Peak ascent. It's a half marathon at the top of Pikes Peak, which is over 14,000ft, which you only have a very small percent of your oxygen at the top of Pikes Peak. It's a hard race. I'm not an elite athlete like my husband and so it was very difficult for me and I faced many obstacles. One of the obstacles I faced while I was training for that race is that I had a miscarriage. I am 40 years old. @ that time I thought it might be my last chance to have a child. We haven't been able to have children and I was devastated. I was grieving and it was really hard for me. I thought about giving up on training for this race, but instead I decided to keep going. Actually, running became therapeutic for me in 2014, and it was a form of therapy. Have you guys ever found that to be true with exercise? It can be a form of therapy and help you with stress and to cope. I ended up finishing that race and I ended up finishing it in even faster time than my biggest goal. So I want you to think today. Are you living a life of no regrets? Is there something that's just gnawing at you right now as I talk about living without regrets? Is there something that you know deep down inside that you were created to do that you're not doing?

What is that today? You want to tweet me or you can also DM me on Twitter. I've opened it up for anyone to DM me there. But what is it that you know you're to do but you're just not doing it? Where is it that you might be stuck? I encourage you to apply the three P's in that area. Patience, planning, and perseverance. Last year, I created a video, a training video on how to plan with sticky notes. It's a fun way to plan. And it's the end of the year, it's, you're starting to think about the next year goals, planning, all of that. And so I'd like to offer this as a free gift for you for spending some time with me today. And I think any of you would get value from this video of just maybe a different way of thinking, of planning. And you can get that video@shellyhitz.com planningvideo living a life of no regrets. I encourage you to live a life that you know if you left this earth today, that you have accomplished all that God has called you to do, has gifted you to do. And the three Ps of living a life with no regrets. Number one is patience. It's the small, consistent actions over time that give you the biggest results, that will yield the biggest goals, that will give you the things that you are most proud of and that will help you achieve the results you want. Many times we want it today, but I encourage you to have that patience. Number two is planning. And I encourage you to check out my planning video@shellyhits.com planningvideo and then the third is perseverance. Like Winston Churchill said, never, never, never give.

Up. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Author Audience Show. Connect with us online@authoraudience.com where you'll find all the resources mentioned in today's episode. While you're there, grab Shelley's free video training on how to write and publish your book using her Six Step Ascent method. Join us again next week to learn how to reach your audience with your message.