175. Tough Love | Keeping Yourself ON The Hook

It's time to be honest. Are you letting yourself off easy or raising the bar? There's who you know you can be and then who you show up as. Here are the 3 things every woman willing to keep herself on the hook must decide. Before we get started, I have something exciting to share with you. For the next few weeks, I'm curating a small group of mindfully living women who are already seeing positive growth in their mindset. They're really starting to show up as who they want to be. And you want to multiply it and apply it to your communication too. It's called the Speak Life Mastermind. And here's what I know. What gets you that first feeling of positivity and growth in your mind will keep it in your mind and keep you at that version of yourself. If this is you, you know that because you've been trying to apply mindset to your communication and continued growth and end up feeling stuck. You need someone inside your real life with a proven framework, strong accountability, and to be surrounded by people that believe in you sometimes more than you believe in yourself, showing you the way forward. Over 6 months, you will work with me personally, plus my framework and each other, to strengthen your mindset, nail communication, and be a woman that feels lighter and brighter with every thought and interaction she's in. Our application process is waiting for you in a simple email to connect@momsset.com with the subject line Mastermind. To get this conversation and your placement started. I'll reach out to you personally to see if this group is what you've been needing. Spots are limited and will go fast. Now let's jump into today's episode about keeping yourself on the hook. We live in a time where it's easy to be let off easy. You can find justification and validation anywhere you go and everywhere you turn. If you want to, you can get it through a grocery store checkout clerk. You can get it through social media. You can call up a friend or a sibling and all of a sudden all of this work in progress you've been making on your mindset and holding yourself to a higher standard and seeing who it is that you want to be. And when you fall short of that, it all just goes out the window. We start being fed excuses and reasons and justification and validation for why it's not happening. And the thing is, you're saying who you want to be, and then there's a convenient exception to this vision. And what I mean by that is— well, actually, listen to this first. This episode may feel challenging to hear, so if you're mentally navigating one too many negative thoughts about yourself and you take inspiration as personal attacks sometimes, Save this episode for another day when your mind is truly under your authority. It's alright to protect your mental headspace. And I already know what's to come in this episode, so before I went any further, I thought that could be a kind thing to share. Now let's really get into this. You can know who you want to be, and if you look outside yourself to confirm your ability to be her, you'll be let off the hook. Let that sink in and let's make this clear. When I work with clients on their identity, we never put an exception clause in the program. And maybe that's what you've been doing for yourself. Maybe you've been having these sneaky exceptions in your vision of who it is that you know you want to be and you're completely capable of being her. Yes, we need more repetition. Yes, we need stronger frameworks. Yes, We need better connection and closeness with people that have done it before us that we can look to. All of that can be true, and you're still capable. And when I say exceptions into this program, into this vision of identity, it's not, I am a servant to his will when his will is exactly what I want, when I want it, and how I want it. That would be exception clauses in my own identity, because my I am statement is I am a servant to his will with a purposeful life of simplicity and connection. So it's not, I am a servant to his will when I'm given what I want with simplicity and connection when everything else settles down and life finally slows down and my husband agrees to cancel some of these commitments on the calendar, be willing to say no to things. No, there's no exception. This is who I am no matter where I go or who I'm with. It's not, I'm an intentional mother if my day starts before my kids at 5 AM and they all sleep past 7 AM. My husband gets up at the same time as me so that I can see that he's working really hard too. No. And it's not, I am a free and joyful woman if my family supports me, my test results show perfect health, and my body is at a desired weight. No, those are your justifications. Those are the ways that you let yourself off the hook from who it is that you want to be. And your life is full of messaging that says you can't catch a break, things are happening to you, and in one way or another, this shouldn't be happening at all in your life. Messaging is quick to pose everything and everyone else as the problem. Rather than challenging and encouraging us to look at ourselves. Who am I choosing to be in it? How about I just go look in a mirror instead of looking all around me, what my kids are doing, what my spouse is doing, what Miss Girlfriend posted, what, what this employee or coworker said, or how my boss phrased that. How about I just consider who I'm choosing to be in it? Because that's the beginning and the end of all things for me is who I'm choosing to be. If it's two children fighting over the last cookie and you can have a crowd ready to tell you, "It's them, not you." You're the one feeling so frustrated about the two kids fighting over cookie and everyone will blame the kids. Everyone will blame the cookie. Some will even blame the cookie company for how many cookies they put in that package. Oh my goodness, there's only 6 cookies in this package and I wanted each of my kids to have 2, so they need to have 8 cookies in these packages. Are we serious? Yes. Unfortunately, sometimes that's seriously where our mind is going. And that's why I know this episode is so important for us to have, because those are the times that we're letting ourselves off the hook of being who we said it is we want to be, living out our vision for ourselves individually, fiercely and fearlessly. And another example could be if your baby wakes up in the night, throws up in the car seat, or had a blowout in the carrier, you can rest assured there's someone there to excuse your bad mood and woe is me thoughts. It is— there's an overwhelming amount of validation and this excusery happening where you can just be. In a bad mood and treat people poorly and think that you have good enough reason to do so. And the most harmful part in all of it is you're the one betraying who it is that you said you want to be. Everyone else could honestly be just fine. Everyone else can choose to handle what you're doing and your thoughts and your mood with such grace and such elegance because they know who they are and they know who they want to be. And then it would come down to you experiencing the shorthand of it instead of them. And honestly, that's what, that's what I want for all of us, for all of us to feel free and independent to be who we want to be no matter where we go or who we're with. So that way other people really can be in a bad mood and they can have woe is me thoughts and think everything's happening to them. And you have new eyes to view the world with. You have a fresh perspective on things where you're like, I actually really love who I'm being right now. Who I'm being for someone that's in a bad mood, who I'm being for someone that has woe is me thoughts. And we live in a time, and maybe it's always been this way, but this is certainly a time where you are required to hold yourself to high standards and call yourself up. If you want high standards, you and you alone must hold yourself to them. If you want to feel called up to something greater and pursue something bigger than you, you yourself must call yourself up. It is greatly lacking. And again, maybe it's always been this way and maybe I just become more aware of it as I get older. I don't know. What I do know is it comes down to me. So whoever you've decided to be, you need to remove any exception to that vision, any exception to that identity, who you are, period. Other people will give you plenty of excuses and exceptions. And you can find them everywhere. This is why making your mind a steel fortress for good is priceless, because you're the one living in it. Your mind is yours. You're the one experiencing the repercussions of those thoughts, the repercussions of those beliefs, those limitations, those stories you ruminate on. That's you. Other people might notice the bad mood. They might get some of the short end of the stick if you get really reactive or aggressive. Sure, we might be impacted and we might be influenced by that. However, you only have so much say in someone else's life. And there are remarkable stories of people that grew up in very difficult upbringings, very different difficult households, and did something truly exceptional, phenomenal, pursued something bigger than them for the rest of their lives and then go on to have these remarkable lives where they are proving what can be done. And I really believe it's because they made these 3 decisions for themselves that we're going to get to in just a minute. A quick pause here though, and we'll be right back. Earlier in the episode, I mentioned the Speak Life Mastermind, and I want you to know that if you've let yourself off the hook of who you want to be, exactly what we're talking about here, when it's challenging or even risky to be her because you're gonna be around family or maybe your family's never seen this side of you and that all feels intimidating. This group, the Speak Life Mastermind, is for you. I personally coach this 6-month group to think and speak with higher standards they hold themselves to through a proven framework that sets you free from other people and things deciding who you are. So no longer are you going to have other people and things telling you who you are. You can now tell them who you are and hold yourself to those standards of what you think and what you do. This is where you start living by thought and spoken word like a God-fearing woman. So email me connect@momsset.com with your interest in the mastermind and I will personally be in touch soon. So when we come back to this idea of, okay, Tessa, I know who I've told myself I want to be. I've told myself I want to be patient. I told myself I want to be calm. I told myself I want to be active, right? I want to be more attentive. Okay, great. Sometimes with most, with most experiences, when we decide that, our circumstances start to look like a mismatch for that type of identity. So first, let's clear that up. You are given what you need. You are given what you need. You need these circumstances with your kids where they experience conflict with one another in order for you to know that you're a patient mother. You need the circumstances with your kids where they get out of bed several times in order for you to know that you're calm and you're connected and you're attentive and you're engaged. You need the hard circumstances because they are this process of refinement. They help to purify you and to show you, look, you really are her, because clearly, if you can be her here, who else could you possibly be? You just handled that with such patience. Of course you're patient. You just handled that with such clarity. Of course you're clear. You just handled that with such calmness. Of course you're calm. We need our circumstances as opportunities to show up as who we want to be and prove to ourselves to build up this experience bank and evidence bank in our mind, because our mind takes our experiences to create our predictions. So if you don't have experience being calm, being peaceful, being attentive, being active, and then you go into these circumstances where this would be a great opportunity for you to do so, without the experience to equip you in that moment with some belief in yourself, like, this is it, and the deciding factor of this is who I am regardless of the circumstance, you will revert to old ways. And what's so interesting is your old ways are identity too. I am impatient. I am reactive. I am distracted. I am cold. I am stern. Like all of this negative self-talk that you've had with yourself for decades is part of that identity programming. And you've just built up so much experience and evidence there that it makes sense. Your mind is going to pull on that to make predictions, and that's all that's happening right now. Your mind isn't broken. It's following a program. The improper approach that you're taking is to try and work against that program. You're trying to outsmart it. You're trying to change it. And the very much easier thing to do is to work with it. It's already designed. It's already obviously exceptional. We just got to work with it. And in the Speak Life Mastermind and in anything that I serve you with through resources, through alignment journaling, um, Mommy Mindset, Yes Mom Challenge, the flipbook, all of that is working with the natural processes in our mind because to me that's the most effective way to ensure results. So if you decide, like, here's a really specific example. If you decide, okay, Tessa, I just know that I want to be calm. I want to be calm. And you grew up in a really difficult home and you had this really traumatic childhood. And now you're saying, well, I just really want to be a calm person. And you go and you work on this in your life and you have these opportunities in which you could show up as that calm person. Maybe there was a time where you reverted back to old reactivity, like old identity won, new identity was too weak for a certain moment. And I coach on this very specifically in my masterminds, the gap between old and new identity. We're gonna do a podcast episode on it too, because it's just so good. But if you share that with someone else, like, you know, I just really want to be a calm mom. I really want to be a calm mom. Like, I can see myself being calm mom. And then I just had this experience with my kids where I was totally reactive. And it was like living out the way I was treated as a child. Do you understand that the majority of times you're going to be told, oh, it's your childhood, you were raised in a home where yelling was how you communicate and that's how you're heard, sweetheart. This goal to be calm is just— and to stop yelling is— it's just unimaginable given your past, your circumstances. This is where you're at, you've made so much progress, like, you should be proud of yourself. And then all of a sudden they're trying to get you off the hook. Like, watching you stay on the hook becomes very uncomfortable for them. That's— and that's why, like, who we choose to share these experiences— it's important to share our experiences, absolutely, and have connection and, and help and guidance to these things. However, are you sharing your experiences with people that want you off the hook because it's just uncomfortable for them to see you on the hook? Or are you sharing your experiences with people that are comfortable with seeing you remain accountable and they have the type of experience doing that with themselves? Nobody with little discipline, little self-control, little accountability, little ownership is going to feel comfortable hearing you take accountability and ownership. And to see you stay on the hook when you could be justified and you could be validated and you could be excused from it. None of them are going to feel comfortable watching you on this hook. So they're going to try and convince you to let yourself off. Look at your childhood and you're already doing so much better than your parents. You really need to give yourself more credit. Like, and the reality, it's not about my parents. It's not about my childhood. This is about me and my life today and who I know I can be. And you're done with the excuses. You're done with where you could be validated. You keep your goal of who it is that you want to be. And if your goal that aligns with who you want to be is to stop yelling, to have calm and clear communication, you can do that. You just must keep your mind fixed on the possibility of accomplishing the goal Knowing it takes a steady framework that applies to all circumstances, repetition, and training. You keep your mind focused on, there's a last time for yelling, and that was mine. Kiss it goodbye if you happen to yell. But going to all these shame spirals and attacking yourself is a sure way to make sure you yell again. Letting yourself off the hook when you feel that heavy weight of accountability— sometimes it feels painful. I absolutely get that. That's the kind of weight that keeps your feet on the ground so you can keep walking forward. We need the weight. The pain has purpose. It's teaching us, it's shaping us. It even says in the Bible, no discipline is comfortable and joyful— well, enjoyable while it's happening, but it's so powerful for shaping us. And we later look at it as something that we're extremely grateful for. And Right now, this is a time that you must choose to keep yourself on the hook because other people want you off the hook. There are many people that want you off the hook because it's very uncomfortable for them to see you on the hook. And your frame of mind around all this— there's a last time for yelling, that was mine, kiss it goodbye— about to be unstoppable. Unstoppable. So when you keep yourself on the hook, you win, because it's really not about yelling or not. It's about growing as a person. But when you let yourself off the hook, you lose. You lose because you're reverting back to your old ways. So yelling is not the thing that makes us the person we want to be or not. Winning is not about perfection, it's about perseverance, where yet becomes exciting and still gets overridden. So maybe with the yet, we start to see it as like, it's coming. This is so exciting because it's happening. And I know that sooner yet it will be here. Whereas still, I'm still yelling. We're still in it. This is happening forever, right? The still gets overridden and replaced with the yet. And you win because you become the kind of person that is willing to spend her life working towards a goal until she's become the woman that does it so naturally and so effortlessly that anything else seems misfitting. And then one day it's been so long since you yelled and you'll have forgotten that that was even a goal, let alone a point in becoming the person you are today. That is why we stay on the hook. And I get it. I've been there. I used to share my upbringing with anyone that would listen because I loved hearing the many reasons and excuses uses and justifications to struggle with the things I did in the ways that I was. The anger, the grudge holding, the reactivity, the victimhood. I knew I was there and I wanted out of it. And there was a gap between where I was and where I wanted to be that I just saw it as, okay, if people could just like, you know, they probably see that I'm here too. So if I can just get them to understand why I'm here, then everything will be better. And then all the justifications come flooding in, and the validation, and the letting me off the hook. And those messages, you know, they're, they're to your detriment. I wanted that warm, comforting, you're doing so much better than them, even though I knew I— it— what I was doing was so much less than what I was capable of. And it was so far from this picture I had in my mind of who I could be and what my motherhood could look like and what my marriage could feel like. And the person I was being, who I was as a wife and who I was as a mother and who I was as a woman, was never going to build a marriage like that. She was never going to have a motherhood like that. She wasn't going to have 30-year-old kids coming back home saying, Mom, can you please make us like the family's coming? Can you do? The enchiladas or the biscuits and gravy. Like, hey, can you make that strawberry limeade? That's my favorite when you do that with, you know, a huge family gathered around a backyard pool and hanging out together. And, you know, maybe a family compound, like all of these dreams that I have. What adult child wants to build a home close to his mother that is highly reactive gives them the silent treatment, holds grudges for decades. Like, look, just looking at who I was then, and I had an idea of what I wanted, and it did take looking in the mirror to realize there is no reality that I have that being this person. None. So getting myself to these 3 decisions that we're going— that I'm going to share with you here in the wrapping up of this episode, as big encouragement for you to do so, is what changed my life. Because now I can see I am the mother. I am the mother that would have that. And I am the wife that would have that kind of marriage. And I am the business owner. I am the woman. I am the woman of God that has that. It's so fitting. And here I am years later realizing I, I stopped talking about my childhood. It's pretty rare that I bring it up in reference now. And instead of using it as a story to define and justify who I am, I really just sum it up as priceless. I'm so grateful for what it taught me. I love the people involved, and I, I'd never change. I'd never trade it. I'd live it all again just to get exactly where I am today. And that's it. That's it. And if you listen to previous episodes, I used to bring it up a lot, a lot. So who you become in the process is how you win. The win is not in the perfection of never yelling again. The win is the perseverance. It's who you're becoming, and you become her so seamlessly that naturally she just doesn't do those things that you once used to be fixated on, which is part of the problem, is that you're so fixated on it, so you do more of it. So yeah, the— those messages of validation and justification may feel comforting and even sound true. They're greatly hindering your growth, and it's up to you to know what you're capable of. You're capable of ending yelling, slamming something, and fighting with your words. You're capable of replacing self-criticism and sarcasm and gossip. It's not the mom you want to be if your kids sleep through the night, never get a cold, eat every meal and make— and eat every meal you make and follow your instructions the first time. Sometimes we convince ourselves that's the goal. No, it's not. And those things don't have to happen for you to love who you're choosing to be. You can love who you are when your kids wake up in the middle of the night multiple times. You can love who you are when all 4, 5, 6, 2 children wake up with a cold, coughing, runny noses, sounding congested. Whiny, pink eye, whatever it is, you can love who you are then too. You can love who you are when your kids refuse to eat the food that you put in front of them, and you can love the way that you handle it. You can love the way you repeat yourself, or if you do it all. This is— that's what's in your control. Who you're choosing to be is the goal, and you keep yourself on the hook no matter the circumstances when it comes to who you are. So in any circumstance, any circumstance that you're given, this is who you are in the circumstance and in it, no matter the circumstance. So we have our, we have our 3, um, questions, the 3 things that I want you to decide upon in order for you to keep yourself on the hook. Who do I want to be? Number one. Not what circumstances do I need to be her? I need my kids to listen the first time. I need them to sleep through the night. I need my husband to put in just as much effort as me. Ah, that just feels exhausting to say, honestly. So if you want to be a woman willing to keep herself on the hook, you must decide who you want to be. You got to know who you're willing to stay on the hook for. If you knew staying on the hook, even when it feels painful, even when it feels hard, even when I could be let off for some justification or reason, it's worth it to stay on the hook because of who I become in the process. What it makes of my character to stay on the hook is why I do it. Not just Who do I want to be? Because she can be in any circumstance you're given. So the question is not, what circumstances do I need to be her? No, it's just, who do I want to be? Because you can be her in any circumstance you're given. This is who you are in any circumstance you're in. So question number 1 that you must decide on is who you want to be, not who your husband wants you to be. Not who your kids want you to be, not who your parents want you to be, or your girlfriends, or your boss, or your customers. Who do I want to be? Decide that. Second question: What is the standard I hold myself to that would be unacceptable for me to break, even if it could be justified to break it? These are the repetitions of what you do in any circumstance you are in. So there's who you are, and any circumstance that you're in. And then there's what you do in any circumstance that you're in. That standard, the non-negotiable that you hold for yourself, could sound like calm and clear communication, persistent adherence to routine. This is what I do. I persistently adhere to routines even when I feel tired and we have had a long day and the kids have— did skip their naps or do have colds or My husband was called into work. Persistent adherence to routine. And this, that, these questions are unique to you. So what is the standard I hold myself to that would be unacceptable for me to break is up to you. You've got to decide it though. You've got to know what it, what is it that's so worth staying on the hook for? And what is my hook that I keep, that I stay on for? The last question for you to decide on is What is the foundational belief I have in myself that gets the first say when I feel challenged to be who I want to be? Again, validation and justification is flooding women. You get to decide the messaging you subscribe to. So this foundational belief that you have in yourself that gets the first say when you feel challenged to be who you want to be could sound like, there's a last time for everything that was mine. Or for me personally, the foundational belief that I, that I bring to myself, it gets the first say, is I prove what can be done. So even if it feels extremely difficult, excruciatingly painful to be the woman that I want to be, it feels terrifying sometimes, it feels so vulnerable, it feels like Are we sure this is her right now? Like, are we sure that this, this is the high road to take? Because it really feels like a doormat. There's totally times that that happens, that it really seems like this is the time that I give them a piece of my mind and I just let them know that this is unacceptable and they're wrong and blah blah blah. And all of that, all those ideas are just so far out of alignment with who I want to be. And I told you The way I answer these questions is, number one, who do I want to be? A servant to his will with a purposeful life of simplicity and connection. That's who I want to be, no matter the circumstance, no matter who I'm around, no matter what's going on. The standard I hold myself to: calm and clear communication. It is unacceptable for me to break that standard, and if I do, I keep myself on the hook because it's important for me to know that I still believe in my ability to do that. That's why I'm staying on this hook, because I know I can do it. And I'm going to learn something from this because it does take repetition and it does take training and it does take framework. And so I'm implementing, implementing, implementing, learning, digesting, implementing. And the way I'd answer that third question of that foundational belief I have in myself, like it's the first say when I feel challenged to be who I want to be, is I prove it can be done. So I will do what's right even when it's hard. Maybe that's your new foundational belief, or maybe that's the standard that you hold yourself to of what you do. I do what is right even when it's hard. Deciding on these 3 things is going to be such a game changer for you because it's going to open up the opportunity for you to remain as who you want to be no matter the circumstance, who you're with and what they're doing and what went on and if, if you got paid or not, or if the kids woke up, um, after 7 or goodness, before 5. I've got experience with both, so I get it. And through all of these diverse circumstances that we experience, what you're doing is just building up the evidence in your mind that even here, even now, even with them, I can be exactly who I want to be. And then you become unstoppable. I hope this episode served you greatly. It would mean so much to me if you left a review of the show and made sure that you followed along so that you get updated on the episodes to come, as I absolutely love serving you guys. And it means so much to me that you're part of this work and this mission, and you believe in mothers' abilities to be who they want to be no matter where they go or who they're with. And we absolutely can be the ones thinking and speaking positively in the home. Through any circumstance. And to me, I think we're meant to do it. So I want more of that for us. Please leave a review, like the show, follow along, and I will see you guys real soon.