84. Step into your Power and Purpose

“Self-care is how you take your power back.” -Layla Delia 

This episode is all about power, purpose, and how basic self care is necessary for a purposeful life. Art, meditation, being in nature, prayer, dance, and the ways that you feel in contact with yourself and your source can help your purpose so much. In fact, I think it's essential. 
 

Transcript

“Self-care is how you take your power back.” This quote from Layla Delia starts us off today, and we are talking all about self-care and the process of using your values to prioritize and really get creative in your life. 

Welcome to the Modern Creative Woman podcast, and this is for women like you who want to elevate their creativity and start applying creative thinking in their everyday life. I'm your hostess and creativity expert, Dr. Amy, Backos. Through our conversations and creative insights, I'll provide simple, science backed tricks and proven creative practices that will help take the mystery out of the creative process so that you can start each day feeling empowered, creative, and ready to take on Whatever comes your way. Let's get started. 

I hope you're having an incredible week, and that the holidays are going slow enough for you to enjoy them. Today we are talking about how the process, the way we live our life, the process we choose really has this incredible influence on and influence from our personal values. Now, inside the modern creative woman, we talk all the time about our purpose. It's one of the pillars inside the community that all the women there get to focus on in their own unique, purposeful way. Let me give you a little clarity on what I mean by purpose. It is two components your values and your committed action. Your values are those guiding principles, those qualities that are unique to you and they're chosen by you. They are how you want to live your life, and they may or may not line up with what society thinks or wants you to be, or what your family wants you to be. But these are freely chosen. And sometimes we're living according to our values. Sometimes we're not. Now, the second part of our purpose is our committed actions. These are the exciting, interesting, often nerve wracking, and a little bit scary steps that we take to stay in alignment with our values. They are concrete steps. They are behaviors. And remember that Gandhi says happiness is when our thoughts, our words, and our actions are in alignment with thoughts. Our words and our actions are in alignment. And that is what a committed action is. You think something is important, you take action on it and you use your words, your language, your communication with others to be very clear about what's important to you. So many of us struggle to understand what's important, or we struggle to understand how we can take action on what feels most important to us. I'll give you some examples. The value of health is my most important value. I believe everything rests on that. It is something that's been important to me my whole life. My parents were always very encouraging of sport being active, and it's something I carried into my adult life that has ebbed and flowed. After I had my son, it was really hard to exercise, to get out alone and lift weights and go to the gym, so I did other things that were appropriate. At that time. I really focused on what I was eating, going for walks, and what I had thought was the only way to take care of my health, really expand it. I had a much more broad way of understanding what was important to my health. And certainly if you've had a child, you know rest is the most important thing in that point of time. Now, today, I have a lot more free time, and prioritizing my health requires a lot of boundaries. It means saying no to events that would interfere with my health values. It means that when I travel, I am certain to be found running around where I am going to the gym. If I'm staying at a hotel, and I even have a little equipment that allows me to stretch when I'm traveling, I make it a priority. I also say no to things that don't align with my health value. I quit drinking about five years ago. All the research said there's nothing good about it for us. And it was just part of a 21 day health fitness thing that I was doing. And then I did it another 21 days and suddenly five years later, like, oh, this is an incredibly powerful way for me to put my health at the top of the list. I think one of the more important lessons that I've learned about health and other values is that I should never overscheduled myself. I can't double book myself. I can't schedule myself for the entire day. I have to schedule breaks to go for a walk to rest. 

So overbooking myself means that I have eliminated other things and there's no room for for life to happen. So I no longer overbook myself. I create space, I schedule things for my help, what I eat, making sure I get out for walks every day and I leave time for life to happen. There's a, um, thing that pops up in my business that needs my immediate attention. It's not a crisis because I have time. I've made time. I've scheduled time. That's really, really important when you're thinking about how to take action on your values. So remember, values are not goals. They're not a thing. You check. I'm done. Health is something I'll never like achieve. Check. Now I'm healthy. I'm done. That's not how it works. What's really, really important is that I take action towards my health every day. I'm consistent and reliable on that point. Committed action also requires very conscious choice. It's a choice. If I leave room for taking care of my help, it's a choice. If I leave room for, um, being responsible to myself and what I eat, that I journal, that I meditate, that I take good care of the instrument of my work as well. Remember, alignment is key. We have to get in alignment with what we believe is important, what we think is important with the actions that demonstrate it. So there's no problem. There's nothing wrong with not prioritizing some aspect of your life reading, making art, seeing friends, exercising, eating healthy. There's nothing wrong with not prioritizing those. But we really suffer so much when we say this thing is important, but we don't take action on it. And the fastest way to feel better about yourself is to be very honest with what's important, and make your behaviors consistent with that belief. I have a few examples around our values and committed actions. You might have a value of kindness in friendship, and that's pretty easy to do. You like spending time with your friend. You enjoy them, but then you have some kind of disagreement and it gets harder, perhaps to stay kind. Perhaps you want to say something negative or speak your mind, even if you know it's going to hurt their feelings and you think you need to say something. But kindness in friendship, if that's really a value, we learn from those moments where we don't want to be kind, where we feel frustrated, and if we are taking action that's in alignment with that value. It means that we stay kind even when it it feels really uncomfortable or difficult. Another example is honesty in the love relationship. I think most people want to have honesty in their relationships. And honesty also can be very uncomfortable. 

We say we want honesty, but we have to be willing to be vulnerable, to share our feelings, to perhaps have our feelings hurt in important conversations. Honesty as a value doesn't always feel good. It doesn't always, um, come off the way we mean it to. It can be hurtful to another person. And so we want to figure out how to use our values of love and intimacy so that we can be honest in a way that allows our feelings to be expressed and in a way that they will hear us. So honesty, even when it's uncomfortable. That's committed action. And another example, so many of you are artists and our therapists and really creative people and creativity in our work is so important. It's interesting. It keeps things engaging. We like to be creative in our work process, and we can find it easy when things are going well or when ideas are flowing, or when we're having fun. But what about when we're stuck? We can think of any ideas, or we've got a good enough idea that'll solve the problem enough. But it's not very creative. It's not very interesting. Do we go with it or do we stick with the problem a little bit longer so that we can be confident that we've given creativity a shot in the project? So sticking with a creative task, even when it feels frustrating, that means I finish my knitting projects. Even if I have to rip out a sleeve over and over and over again. And if you're a knitter or a crochet, you know what I'm talking about. So you knit. So shall you rip. Well, how do we fuel our purpose? I want to speak to this for just a moment, because it really matters that you have examples of ways you can fuel yourself so that you are able to live your purpose. Self connection is essential. It's something we really highlight inside the membership. And the women there are knowing themselves in these really profound ways. This self-awareness and personal insights about themselves, their behaviors and what's important to them. Of course, you got to have insight from art and writing. Creativity is essential. It's in our biology. What are we doing if we're not using our creativity? Support from others can also fuel our purpose. It might be education. It might be reading a book connecting with women who support you and want to mentor you. I have some incredible mentors and champions that have allowed me to get to where I am today, and these are women that are just so special to me, but I had to be open to it. They could have wanted to help me, but maybe I wasn't open to it. It wouldn't have worked out at all. So I have to be willing to receive support. This is essential. 

Another way that we can live our purpose is taking accountability, and I call it uncommon accountability. It's not very often that people are fully engaged and accountable for their actions, their words, their choices, and accountable for what they desire, what they dream about. Owning that it's your choice and you're committed. That's part of your purpose. Another necessary step is boundaries, inner boundaries and outer boundaries. If this is an area that feels confusing to you, I encourage you to do some reading on it. I am planning to have a month long boundary class coming up in 2025. It's setting limits parameters for yourself and what behavior you're willing to engage in, and it's also setting boundaries around what behavior you will accept from others without some kind of consequence. Removing yourself or or changing somehow. Prioritizing. Do you know what's important? What's your number one value? Number one. What is it? I already told you mine. It's. How can only have one. One priority. It's not a plural word. One priority. Leaving space for life to happen. I mentioned that already that we have to have room in our schedules if we over schedule ourselves. That's a choice that we're making. And there are consequences down the road when life happens. Another thing that we can do is say what we mean. You've probably heard this phrase before. Say what you mean and mean what you say it means. Quit being vague in our language. As women, we tend to say, I don't know. I'm not sure if this is right. Does that make any sense? Are you sure that I shouldn't do this? We really take this step back from our knowledge and owning our confidence. Um. When I was young, I learned about ending sentences with a lilt where so many times women will say their name. Hi, my name is Amy, but an up lilt makes it a question. Hi, my name is Amy. You hear the difference saying what you mean with a period at the end, not a question mark is a really important skill to have. If you make a little recording of yourself and see if you do this, you can start to change it. Saying what you mean includes setting a limit, saying, no, that's not okay with me. I don't want to do that. I don't have time to make cookies for your party. It is saying what's real and true, not doing what someone asks you to just because you think you have to say yes. And the last one is, is really, I think, foundational connecting in some way with your source. And it could be meditation, being in nature, prayer, dance, art, the way that you feel in contact with yourself and your source can help your purpose so much. In fact, I think it's essential. 

Have a wonderful rest of your week. 

Now that you know about how to use your creativity, what will you create? Want more? Subscribe to the Modern Creative Woman digital magazine. It's absolutely free and it comes out once a month. And I know you can get a lot out of the podcast and the digital magazine. Yet when you're ready to take it to the next level, I want you to know you have options inside the membership. And if you're interested in a private consultation, please feel free to book a call with me, even if you just have some questions, go ahead and book a call. My contact is in the show notes and you can always message me on Instagram. Do come find me in the Modern Creative Woman on Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest at Doctor Amy. Because if you like what you're hearing on the Modern Creative Woman podcast. I want to give you the scoop on how you can support the podcast. You can be an ambassador and share the podcast link with three of your friends. You can be a community supporter by leaving a five star review. If you think it's worth the five stars, and you can become a Gold Star supporter for as little as $3 a month. All those links are in the show notes. Remember to grab your free copy of the 21 Day Gratitude Challenge. The link is in the show notes and you can find it at Modern Creative women.com. Have a wonderful week and I cannot wait to talk with you in the next episode.