I Stopped Ignoring My Inner Compass I The Difference Between Self-Awareness & Self-Consciousness

I want you to ask yourself, where do I shrink or withhold myself the most? Where are you not being real? And I actually had a conversation with someone this morning, and they were like, oh my gosh, now that my husband's left the house and I've had no one around me, my kids have left school, I'm finding myself. That's what they said to me. And I've had— she goes, I've had one week, one week alone, and I just needed that space to think. I don't know who I am anymore. That was literally this morning. Who are you and who do you want to be? Because it's all in here. Did I ever think I would be doing exercise and going to the gym every day and eating the right stuff and really taking care of what I'm putting into my body and outputting out of my body as well? I'm not an athlete. Well, I am now. Okay, see, I'm not nothing. I was already telling myself, you're not an athlete, you never did sport at school, did lots of dancing and music, you never did sport, you're not an athlete. We box ourselves in. Don't box yourself in. And for you, whose opinion is in the room with you when you make choices? Whose words can you remember? You probably have a name and a face for it. Maybe it's a few people. Don't let them win.

Don't let them win.

And how about this? I've heard this so many times: you're embarrassing our family. Well, because I'm sharing some things on Facebook, not even mentioning stories about you guys, because I'm just being me and they're not used to this me because I've been quiet Vicky for decades. And this has been going on for like 4 years, 5 years now, okay? And it never stops because they're all stuck.

They're still stuck.

What do I fear people would think if I showed my true self?

I don't care anymore. Do you?

I want you to get to that point where you don't care. We have been wired for social survival, acceptance, doing the right thing, not going against the grain. That's what we've been wired towards. But here we're the opposite. We are the ones who are going to change the world. We are the ones changing the world. That's how your self-consciousness came up. You didn't— you weren't born with self-consciousness. It's your experiences through life that have given you that self-consciousness. For you to be a truly self-led leader, you need somatic safety. So you need to be so in tune with yourself, you need to love yourself so much and believe in and have conviction in the thing that you're meant to be doing and how you show up every day so that you can feel safe. The first person you need to prove this to is to you.

It's all to you.

Who cares if other people approve of you?

I don't. So even talking with my gym instructor this morning, talking about people judging us for various things—

cultural choices, you name it. And then the best thing to do is not react. So how are you not going to react the next time someone in your family or someone near you or a friend pulls you aside for an intervention? Oh my God, I've had so many. I am done with interventions. People think that I am off the— off my chops, you know, because I'm crazy. Like I'm actually caring for myself and my family. Because that's— when you have your family, they're the most important thing to you. Not your parents, not your siblings, not your friends, not the external people. You get to choose who then is your chosen family. Hopefully it's us here.

Choose.

Stop outsourcing your safety and asking for permission from others. It is time to build it right inside your body. And it all starts in the mindset. And you've got to love yourself too.

You really do.

That voice that speaks to you every day, you need to shush it like I did. The bad one, the negative one. Because you have standards. You need to stand in your presence and become unshakable, unstoppable, un-everything. You need to recreate like I am. I'm, I'm on my recreation, my full life total recreation. With Andy Elliott, for example, as my mentor. Look, there's a billion recipes to achieving things. There are some people who are grossly unhealthy and have really good businesses, but deep down there's some things missing. So you can have it all. I want to have it all. I want you to have it all. So now I want you to do a little exercise.

So if you close your eyes Place one hand on your heart and one on your belly.

Close your eyes, keep them closed, and let your breath be soft. We need to calm our nervous system, okay? There's so much stress around us. Just gentle breathing, rhythmic breathing, and feel the weight of your body as you stand or sit or lie down, however you are. Feel your breath moving you. And we know box breathing is awesome, so we're going to do some box breathing.

So you're going to be breathing in for 4, holding for 4, and breathing out for 4.

And you can repeat as many times as you like.

So breathing in, 2, 3, 4. Hold for 4. 2, 3, 4.

Breathe out for 4.

1, 2, 3, 4.

Repeating.

Breathing in, 2, 3, 4.

Hold for 4.

2, 3, 4.

Breathing out for 4.

1, 2, 3, 4. Breathing in, 2, 3, 4.

Hold for 1.

2, 3, 4. Breathing out for 2, 3, 4. One more time, breathing in 2, 3, 4. Hold for 4, 2, 3, 4. Breathing out for 4, 2, 3, 4.

Now keep breathing softly, rhythmic, normally, and repeating your mind I'm allowed to take up space. I'm allowed to be here.

I'm safe. I can be me.

And just think, breathing nicely, what am I really protecting, protecting by filtering myself? Because you filter yourself, there's different versions of you.

Have a think.

Then what is it— what's the cost to you by being palatable instead of powerful? And if no one was watching, what would you do differently? Right now? And what truth of yours is ready to be expressed, even if it makes others around you uncomfortable? Keep breathing nicely and keep thinking. Because it's time to stop performing. Life's enough of a circus. Jump out of that circus. Live your truth. Live your story. Be your truth. It's way more important than other people's comfort.