Embracing Core Values: A Guide to Boundaries, Self-Care, and Emotional Intelligence for Women Over 40

Susie Ruth, a seasoned life coach and grief specialist, joins us on a transformative journey that redefines goal setting and self-perception. If you've ever found yourself chasing happiness through achievements like weight loss without lasting satisfaction, this episode will shift your focus inward. We delve into the heart of why aligning our ambitions with our core values isn't just good advice—it's essential for true contentment. Susie guides us through this process, particularly addressing the unique challenges faced by busy moms and professional women over 40, empowering them to set realistic and meaningful objectives.

As we navigate the societal pressures that mold us to prioritize everyone else's comfort, Susie Ruth shines a light on the liberating power of setting boundaries. She helps us unearth our buried desires and teaches us the skill of saying no—an act of self-care that preserves our energy and aligns with our personal mission. This episode is a call to action for those who find themselves stretched thin, providing the tools to recalibrate choices and stand firm in the pursuit of a well-balanced life.

We round off our conversation with a deep-dive into emotional control and relationship dynamics. Susie dispels the age-old myth that we can steer the feelings of others, instead directing us to manage our own reactions and establish healthier communication patterns. Whether you're navigating grief, struggling with personal boundaries, or merely seeking to improve your emotional intelligence, Susie's insights offer a roadmap to a more authentic and self-aware existence. Join us for these candid reflections, and carry forward the dialogue on the importance of self-care and personal growth.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:13

So good day everyone. This is Deetre will get fit methods. Our model is less is more to get fit fast. You guys are in for a treat today. We have Susan Ruth. That right, correct, susan? Ruth, you can call me Susie and it's Susie yep, susie Ruth, and she is a life coach and also a.

Speaker 2: 0:32

We call it a so I'm an end-of-life doula or a death doula and I'm a grief specialist.

Speaker 1: 0:38

Yes, so we're gonna basically kind of see what Susan has to to offer when it comes to a lot of different questions that I have. As far as the artist, which is 40 plus, women and their professionals and stuff like busy moms, how to set those boundaries, how to set us up for failure, what you need to do, not to do and not to commit certain things. So so, yeah, welcome Susan. I'm Susie, I appreciate you taking the time out to be on our podcast and I just have a few questions and then you can basically just have at it anywhere you want to answer, just kind of tie it on the other force and make it as as simplistic as possible for those who are listening. So, yeah, welcome.

Speaker 1: 1:25

So the first person I have for you is goal setting. Like you know, as far as goal setting, like it can be kind of daunting for most people. Like you know what to do and how to do it. Where's your advice of getting started on the on the journey of goal setting, and what is the process? Do you think that's best suited for that?

Speaker 2: 1:48

yeah, out there, this is. That's a good question, because I mean, you know, as an end-of-life doler, a death doler, the ultimate goal is having a good life up to the very, very end, right, and if you can plan on having a great life to the very end, where you're on your deathbed looking at your life and not having any regrets, I would say that's the ultimate goal so when you're looking at your goal setting.

Speaker 2: 2:15

I think the most important thing you can do is take a look at that end of life and say what are the things that are the most important to me, what are my top five? What are my top five values? What is going to get me to the end living a really full life and usually people will say something like my family, my health, my health and my mobility, my financial security. Those are generally what people will say would would lead to a really good end of life, and so when you're choosing a goal, setting a goal for yourself, the most important question you can ask is why, why is this a goal? And is it a goal that is based based on my values that I've set for myself for the end of life?

Speaker 1: 3:09

right like.

Speaker 2: 3:10

If your goal is to lose 30 pounds, the question would be why? Why do you want to lose 30 pounds? Because if the if the goal is to lose 30 pounds so I can look good, then is that part of your values looking good, because it's not a very powerful reason to lose 30 pounds right now, if your goal is to lose 30 pounds to be happy, I can tell you that you can be happy without losing 30 pounds.

Speaker 2: 3:41

Right, the the goal is to be happy and the the pounds will come off after that. So the goal is really happiness. The goal isn't to lose the 30 pounds so that you can be happy yes, funny how it's almost similar to money, right, what people say about money.

Speaker 1: 3:59

Like you know, I need the money to be happy, this kind of thing, right totally it's.

Speaker 2: 4:04

It's so true. And so when you get to the really good why of setting a goal, why do you want to lose 30 pounds? And now if you say I want to lose 30 pounds because I want to be healthy and I want to be here for my kids and I want to have my mobility, now those reasons are you're starting to get into a powerful why got it.

Speaker 1: 4:25

Yeah, yeah, absolutely yeah, yeah, so, and I even in training. So we, when we do like the first assessment, the main thing we asked. So most people say, like you just said, they'll say you know so, how much, how much is the ideal weight for you? And they'll say you know some random number? My question is well, why, why is that number? Why you need thinking you lose like 30 pounds and the first thing they'll say the last time they associated that with being happy or at their best, when they felt the best was at that weight, which was like 40 some years ago, something like that, right, right. So it's just funny. How that's? That's the question. That's the way they answer that question oh yeah, it's so true.

Speaker 2: 5:06

I think before coaching, before I ever learned about coaching and goal setting and everything like that, I used to think that it was going to be the circumstance that changed how I felt, so like the circumstance of making more money or having a job that I liked, or a different relationship, or a better house or a nicer car. I used to think that if I changed the, the circumstance, that that would change my feelings.

Speaker 2: 5:32

And it's not the circumstance that changes our feelings, it's our thoughts that changes our feelings and so like your thought is, you know, um, like, if you have a thought about your weight like I hate my body, I hate my body, that thought, that thought is never, ever going to suit you for losing weight. That thought creates a feeling of like sometimes I would say overwhelm like why do I even try? You know, it's not worth it. I'm starting. People starve themselves through. Like they push themselves. I want to say like, like a mean boss instead of like a loving boss, right, so they push themselves and push themselves. And I'm going to get up at five o'clock, no matter what, and I'm going to work out an hour, no matter what, and I'm going to do everything my trainer says no matter what. And it's through all of this resistance and it's not sustainable.

Speaker 2: 6:35

And so what happens is people will lose that weight, their goal, but then it just comes right back because they never changed the thought of I hate my body.

Speaker 1: 6:44

And they did everything through resistance.

Speaker 2: 6:46

And so you have to choose a thought that you can believe. You can't just go like I hate my body, oh, I'm going to change that thought to I love my body, and then everything's going to be great. It doesn't work because your brain says but that's bullshit, I don't love my body, I hate my body. But you can go from I hate my body to a thought like I have a body, I have a body. And just that little tiny twist in thinking can make you go. Well, I have a body and it works for me. My body gets me around, my body is keeping me in the game, my body is taking me, I'm able to go to the park because I have a body. And when you change from I hate my body to I have a body, then you can start to say well, I don't really want to put that into my body.

Speaker 1: 7:38

Right Now you have this appreciation for gratitude toward your body, opposed to this kind of forced feeling about where you think you should feel about your body. It's not even true.

Speaker 2: 7:53

And it can go from I have a body to oh, I like my body Right, it's working, it's doing what I'm asking it to do and eventually it doesn't matter what you weigh. You can actually have a thought of I love my body and once you get to that place an authentic I love my body you'll never have to die it again.

Speaker 1: 8:17

True, true, yep, because let me say something you just eat healthy arrow, you'll appreciate it, you'll treat it better, right?

Speaker 2: 8:25

Right and it's easy, and it's easier to say no, and it's like you can. You can be like I'm going to have this chocolate chip cookie today and it doesn't mean that tomorrow I'm going to have another one, because that's what happens right now. Like if I have McDonald's on Tuesday, on Wednesday I wake up, I'm like I'm having McDonald's again. That was good. You know, like you can, you can like you kind of. I think there's a fear of of allowing yourself to have these pleasures in life, afraid that you'll fall back into this trap. But once you get that mindset of I love my body, I don't want to eat like that, then you really don't.

Speaker 2: 9:02

You really actually don't you stop wanting it?

Speaker 1: 9:05

Right, that's awesome, yeah, that's wow. That's a wonderful thought and I hope everybody's listening to that one, because that's a good one as far as, like, how you see or how you feel about your body or appreciate your body. You'll never have to die it again. Yeah, that's for certain.

Speaker 2: 9:21

It's true. You don't have to think like somebody who loves their body. You have to think like a thin person. You have to feel like a thin person. If you want to be thin, you have to concentrate on that feeling rather than the feeling of resistance. And I just got to do this. I got to do this Right. That's not sustainable.

Speaker 1: 9:39

And it calls a different kind of stress on top of that. So anybody knows that we're stressed that like that it's not sustainable. Yeah, so with the women with large responsibilities and they're you know how do you feel about it how would you suggest they set themselves up without over committing to things?

Speaker 2: 10:00

Another really powerful and good question, especially for everyone on this call. I'm going to imagine most of your listeners are women, Is that right? Yeah, and so you know people who are socialized as women and I know that's a big like term right now that everyone's talking about but being socialized as women, we, through family and society, we have been shaped to understand the room better than we understand ourselves, Right? Or? You know there's three things that we need when we're little, which is, you know, I believe that we need safety, belonging and dignity. So safety meaning, like you know, safety, basically, if we're not safe, then it's life threatening when we're little.

Speaker 2: 10:51

Belonging is also part of safety, right? Belonging in the family you have to belong to the tribe to survive. We can't do it by ourselves when we're little. And then the dignity part is that worth like? You're worth living, You're worth, you know, like the survival of staying alive. So we need those three things. As we're little, that shaping creates, especially for girls, this amazing ability to read the room better than we read our own emotions. There's your safety, right? If everyone is comfortable and everybody's happy, then I'm safe.

Speaker 1: 11:29

I see Then.

Speaker 2: 11:31

I'm going to be part of this family that I you know. And then also we also get praised a lot, right, get praised for being good Look at how good she is, you know and there's your safety, there's your belonging, there's your dignity. And so we kind of are groomed that way to be more aware of what's going on with others than ourselves. And so when we get older and we're looking at like what do I want? I just got off the phone with a client. She's like I don't really know what I want.

Speaker 1: 12:05

It is a big question that most people cannot answer.

Speaker 2: 12:08

I don't know what I want, I don't know how I feel. Right, I you know what?

Speaker 1: 12:13

do you think they come from Like not not knowing?

Speaker 2: 12:17

You know what I mean I think it comes from being able to read what other people's needs are, and being so focused on what how to make sure that everybody else is okay, that we don't are our ability to read what we want and what we need. It never really comes into play in life as we're growing up.

Speaker 1: 12:37

Well, so so we, how you, how you change that?

Speaker 2: 12:40

So coaching, like like I mean, I didn't learn this stuff until I became a coach and we do learn this through through coaching. I think is is a big part of it, like learning these skills. So I think, are we am I still talking?

Speaker 2: 13:04

Oh, yeah, yeah yeah, okay, I think the big question here is one it kind of ties in with your first question, which is goal setting, like one of that, one of the like if I'm coaching someone, I'll take them through a future version of who they want to be. Who is that person that they see? Who is that vision of who they are Like, even through, like a deep meditation and meeting your future self, and what does she look like and how does what does she wear and how, how does she feel? And we take that future person and and ask her what do you need to do to be that person? Who do I need to become to be her?

Speaker 2: 13:51

And right and because we generally have a vision of who we want to be. It's just getting there. We don't know how, but the reality is we do, and we're the only ones that do I could ask. I could ask a million people how did you get, how did you make a million dollars? And they can all tell me a different way, because nobody gets to the same way.

Speaker 2: 14:14

It's the same thing as like asking someone how did you get married? Oh well, we went to this bar and we, we met, and this and that, and I could go to that same bar. It's never going to be the same I might. It's not going to lead me to marriage. It's your own path, and so you're the only one that knows your path. It's a matter of deciding who you want to be and then being that person.

Speaker 1: 14:39

Right, wow, yeah, that is a big question for most people. Like, no, like, who do you want to be? What do you want to be? You know, what do you want is probably the biggest one that I find that most people have a hard time answering.

Speaker 2: 14:56

What do you want?

Speaker 1: 14:58

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 14:59

That's a hard question.

Speaker 1: 15:01

Right, it's a hard question, for sure with a lot of people. So now I come down to this question of, as far as business professionals like yourself and female and all that kind of stuff, what is the, I guess, the boundaries that you need to set to make sure you have enough space for yourself and not over commit to give someone else? How do you do that?

Speaker 2: 15:31

So important. It's so important. I think that the best advice, whether you know, in the short amount of time that I have, is learn how to choose. So right now, most of us will choose our own discomfort over the discomfort of another. We'll choose our own discomfort over making someone else feel uncomfortable with a no, like no, I don't have time for that. Or no, I can't make cookies for the PTA meeting on Tuesday because I don't have time, like most. Most of us that struggle with people pleasing, struggle with choosing our own comfort over Right. So, like I'm going to, I'm going to say no because I'm going to let them deal with the discomfort of a no, rather than me dealing with the discomfort of a yes, if that makes sense. And you just have to get really good at choosing your discomfort, because both of them are going to be uncomfortable, whether you say yes and don't mean it, or whether you say no, right, uncomfortable feelings.

Speaker 1: 16:34

Right and if not both.

Speaker 2: 16:37

No, even for you, like okay, like if you ask me hey, can you cook, can you bake cookies for the for Tuesday morning? Right, and I don't have time, and I know in my brain I, I don't have time to do this, but I also can be like, but if I stay up till 11, I can do it Monday night and it'd be fine. You know I can, I can squeeze it in, but you know that this is a hardship and you know it goes against the boundaries that you've already set up for yourself. Like I'm going to be done at five and no matter what, and I'm going to take from Monday nights off, and then somebody asks you to do something and so you're like make these. So saying yes is just is uncomfortable, because you know that you're crossing your own boundary.

Speaker 1: 17:20

Right.

Speaker 2: 17:21

You've set a boundary and now you're you're letting it be trampled by this request, so that's uncomfortable.

Speaker 1: 17:29

Sure, absolutely.

Speaker 2: 17:31

But if you say no, I can't do it. I take Friday, monday nights off. That's my, that's my night to myself. Okay, that's uncomfortable. Yes and the no are uncomfortable. You just have to choose which discomfort you're going to live with. If you want to stop, you know, doing too much for people and spreading yourself too thin, then you have to get comfortable saying no and living with that discomfort. But I'll tell you, when you get used to saying no and living with the discomfort of making other people uncomfortable, you know you're going to be like okay, I'm going to be comfortable saying no. I'm going to be comfortable saying no, okay, because you've already you've set up a boundary and those are the heart. That's the hardest thing in coaching is setting a boundary teaching Right. Really hard, you know, because we're so not comfortable saying no and but yeah, it's you.

Speaker 1: 18:33

Once you get comfortable saying no, you'll be amazed at how much more time you have. Sure Right.

Speaker 2: 18:40

One trick I tell my clients is, when someone asks you to do something, always have the same response Okay. Always say the same thing which is something that comes up for you, which is it's possible? Let me check my calendar, I'm not sure. Let me, let me check my calendar, I'll get back to you. Even if you think it's an absolute yes, even if you know you you're going to say yes to it. Always say let me, let me get back to you and you take a little bit of time to yourself and you ask yourself is this something that is worth my time? Is this something I want to do? Is this something that's valuable to me? And if the answers are no, then you say no. And if the answers are yes, then you call them back and you say I would love to thank you. Okay, but you always take a little bit of time to ask yourself these questions yes, or now you're committing to something right.

Speaker 2: 19:46

Instead of just saying sure, I'll do it, and then looking at your calendar and going, oh my gosh, I can't believe I'm so, I have no time to myself.

Speaker 1: 19:56

Right, yeah, that's a toughie. I see that a lot with some of my clients is that especially those are moms and different business or stuff. So they got all these different kind of activities going on and it's like you know they're saying yes to everything I have to buy for the standard and you know it goes against you know, because I don't want to know, because you know it's going to mess up my nutrition thing, or we're going on and I'm like, well, why do you have to do it? It's my question. Why do you have to do it? You know, but you know they always found a reason to do it. You know, because, again back to, I don't want to say no, I want to say I'm going to say no to them and say no to myself same time. Right, or yes to them and no to myself, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 20:42

Yeah, that's a toughie for most of them, and I don't think it's just female, but I think males too, but I think it's mostly for sure more female.

Speaker 2: 20:53

Yeah, I think. I think men, men, people please, in a different way. Yeah, I think that men do have their own form of people pleasing. For sure I do.

Speaker 1: 21:03

Sure. For sure, yeah, so so soon they have a question. So tell me you know, or the audience, basically I don't know. I found you to one of my clients, so tell me more about you. Know how you got to where you are and why this path for you?

Speaker 2: 21:24

Thank you. So yeah, one of your clients was also my coach and she ended up doing she was a my life coach and she got me started figuring out, because I was about 52 probably I'm 58 now, so when I was 52, I started on this journey of learning how to be a life coach and learning to help people. I've always been a massage therapist, so I've always been in the health field, helping people, but I don't know. I just I went down this path of wanting to help people at their end of life, so I became a death doula and a life coach and then it just kept growing and growing and growing and I don't know. Now I just help people with their final goal is. My goal is to help people with that final end goal, which is having a really good life up to the very end. I can help anybody with that goal. I can help anybody in life.

Speaker 2: 22:24

Life coaching is just basically teaching people things that we didn't learn growing up. It's really just that simple. When we're kids, we think that we have control over people's feelings. We learn that from our parents. Our parents are like oh, you made me so happy, you did such a good job. Or our teacher, you know you guys made me so proud, or we hear you know you made me so mad. You did this thing and you made me really mad. Well, the thing is is we don't really have control over how anybody feels Right. It's their thoughts about what we did that made them feel good.

Speaker 2: 23:04

Like they had thought that I was a good girl and so that made them happy. It wasn't anything to do with what I did. It had everything to do with how they thought about what I did. Right, when we get married and we think that we have control over our husband by, like, making him happy if we do the dishes or making him happy if we clean house, it has nothing to do with what we do. It has everything to do with his thoughts about it.

Speaker 1: 23:28

His thoughts about it or her thoughts about it. Right, for sure, yeah.

Speaker 2: 23:32

Yeah. So once you get it into your head that you can't control their feelings, well, they can't control yours either.

Speaker 1: 23:40

Right. Well, I would say perception is reality. You know so. You're wherever you perceive that to be true to you. That's what your reality is going to be, right.

Speaker 2: 23:50

Like he doesn't take the garbage out, and what your thought is is that he doesn't care about me. Right, he's lazy, you know, he. You can have all these thoughts that create all of this negative energy for you, like, oh my gosh, I'm so mad because he doesn't care. Oh, my favorite is they're always late, right.

Speaker 1: 24:11

Oh, that's a good one.

Speaker 2: 24:12

That's a good one to coach on. Like they think that a partner that's always late has the problem Right. They think it's their problem and that they need to fix it. They need to change because they're always late. Well, guess what? It's you that needs that. The fix the mental thought about them, Because what we do is we think he's always late, he disrespects my time.

Speaker 2: 24:38

If he, you know, he's disrespecting my time, my time. He thinks his time is more important than my time. He thinks we make up this huge story about their partner always being late and that story is. It could be true, but it probably isn't. It's probably that he's really bad at keeping time. It's probably that he's really distracted. It's probably that he, you know, I don't know, I don't know why he's always late, but the story that we tell ourselves is what creates the anger.

Speaker 1: 25:10

Yeah, yeah, so true. And so what we do?

Speaker 2: 25:12

is the boundary is hey, listen, it's really important for me to go to the party and be on time. I like to be on time, so I'll meet you there.

Speaker 1: 25:22

Right right.

Speaker 2: 25:23

It's as simple as that. I hate being late. I hate going through security at the airport. I'm going to take a cab, I'll see you and I'll see you at the gate.

Speaker 2: 25:32

Right, I don't want to deal with the stress of being so rushed. I love you, I'm going to go. You take your time and I'll tell you. If the person that's always late is willing for you to take a cab to the airport, great, and but most of the time they'll be like no, no, no, I'll get ready, I'll be on time. Right, I'll be on time. I'll be on time, I'll be on time. Yeah, I see how important it is for you and you're going to leave without me.

Speaker 2: 25:58

So I'm going to just be on time, because I see, right, yeah, absolutely you can. You can just take control over the situation, and so that's how boundaries work. It's just, it's not about. It's not about like a boundary isn't I want, I need you to do this thing. It's about here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to do this, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this If you, if you Pull a gun, I'll call the police. Right, I'm going to do the boundary Right, pull your gun, but I'm going to call the police If you, if you hit me, I'll leave. Right, that's it. This is what I'm going to do. I'm not telling you you can't hit me, but I'm telling you what I'm going to do if you do Right. My website is Susie Ruth S U.

Speaker 1: 26:46

S I E R U T.

Speaker 2: 26:47

H Dot com. Yeah, it looks like I'm just a grief coach because I do specialize in grief, but you can just put your name on the list and um, and set up an appointment with me and I'm happy to talk to you about anything.

Speaker 1: 26:59

Oh, great, yeah, and this just been fantastic. Uh, yeah, I mean a lot, a lot of a lot, of Jen being dropped there as far as, like the you know, not over committing and perception and reality kind of thing. So, um, I'm hoping, um, I'm hoping that we can continue this conversation for another time too and go to other things that later too. You know this whole thing about focus, and you know, uh, focus on your value of yourself, you know, and keep yourself. You know, more time for you, less time for showing us is okay, right, saying no, uh, when you say no, when you need to say no, opposed to when you think you have to say no right or yes to anything. So, yeah, this is this has been great, thank you. Thank you for your time. I appreciate it.

Speaker 2: 27:44

That's my pleasure. Thank you so much. I hope to see you again.

Speaker 1: 27:47

Awesome. All right, this is Deetre Horsey with uh get fit methods. Uh, again, you can find us on Instagram and Facebook and uh YouTube. So, susie, ruth, I appreciate you. Talk to you soon.

Speaker 2: 28:02

Thank you, bye-bye.

Speaker 1: 28:03

Okay, bye-bye.