Ep 148: Toni Everard - TTPP Part 2 - What You Need to Stop Carrying to Move Your Business Forward

There are things you've been carrying for so long...

You don't even realise you're carrying them.

The responsibility for other people's emotions.

The pressure to keep everyone happy.

The fear of disappointing people.

The belief that your worth depends on how much you do for everyone else.

And while you think you're building a business...

Those hidden emotional burdens are quietly shaping every decision you make.

But what if the weight you're feeling was never yours to carry?

In Part 2 of the five-part The Turning Point Process™ (TTPP) series, Toni Everard explores the second step of the framework: Release.

Building on last week's episode about validation, Toni explains why awareness isn't enough. Lasting transformation happens when you stop identifying with the emotional responsibilities you took on as a child and finally allow yourself to put them down.

You'll discover why so many entrepreneurs struggle with boundaries, undercharge, avoid difficult conversations, overthink, people-please and burn themselves out—not because they lack strategy, but because they're carrying responsibilities that belong to someone else.

This episode explores:

• why business feels so heavy when you're carrying emotional burdens that aren't yours

• the second step of The Turning Point Process™: Release

• how childhood conditioning creates patterns that continue showing up in business

• why people-pleasing, perfectionism and over-responsibility are learned survival strategies

• the hidden roles entrepreneurs often play—the helper, fixer, peacekeeper, achiever and invisible one

• how these patterns influence pricing, sales, leadership and boundaries

• Toni's powerful Lighthouse vs Lifeboat analogy—and why great leaders guide rather than carry

• how releasing what was never yours creates more freedom, confidence and ease in business

If business has been feeling heavier than it should, this episode will help you understand why.

Because your next level isn't waiting for you to become someone different.

It's waiting for you to stop carrying what was never yours in the first place.

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Links and Resources:

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Transcript

Ep 148 TTPP Part 2: What You Need to Stop Carrying to Move Your Business Forward
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[00:00:00] Welcome back to the Coaching Circle. And, uh, this is part two of the five-part series all about the turning point process. And, uh, I'm sure you know by now if you've been listening that I created a, uh, the turning point process, and, uh, have written a book about it, and that book is available... You can see it in the show no- show notes, and it's in my website.

And there's also going to be a, a training, um, that's gonna be starting in September where I'm teaching people this process because it is so powerful in creating transformation. But what we're gonna be talking about today is step two in that process. So if you didn't listen to part one, that was last week's, uh, episode, so you can go back and, uh, have a listen to that.

That was all about validate. And, you know, this work really comes from, you know, spending 10 years in the coaching and training industry and, and doing some really intense [00:01:00] therapy a- and, uh, you know, conscious, uh, consciousness evolvement, if that's even a term that I've just come up with right then. But how do we continuously e- evolve?

And it's not about becoming someone else, it's becoming more of who we truly are. And, and this is so important in business because in business, business will show you where you need to become more of yourself. Because business is all about how we can create w- what we wanna create in the world, right?

Business provides that vehicle. And so for us to be able to fully be expressed and to fully, uh, be in our power of creating what we wanna create, whether that is, um, around our own time and energy and money, whether it's in the impact that we wanna have, the influence we wanna have, and we choose b- business at that, as that vehicle, then we're required to express more of ourselves and bring more of ourselves [00:02:00] to the surface, to being expressed so that we can create that- And so this is where, you know, I do so much of my work with people in business because a lot of people think they have a strategy problem, and it's never really the strategy.

Strategy, when you're aligned in yourself, you will find the strategies and pick the strategies up and implement them really quickly and easily. Um, but the work is underneath that. What prevents you from doing that? And so, like, invalidation, uh, that was the first step we covered last week, which is so important that we get to validate how we f- feel- felt as a child.

And yes, all of this stuff goes back to when you were a child because that is where you learn about the world and your place in the world and how people respond to you in the world. And, uh, if, uh, there are some needs that weren't met for you in childhood, whether your parents were good, bad, otherwise, everyone's human.

I can [00:03:00] assure you, you didn't have perfect parents who were able to provide every single need that you ever, uh, had. Um, I'm sure they did the best that they could, but it- it's... There will be gaps. If you're struggling to create what you wanna create, there will be gaps in what your parents were-- how they were able to meet your needs.

And so when that happens as a child, children don't, don't process things by thinking, "Oh, you know, this is an adult that doesn't have capacity or isn't taking responsibility of how they think or, or has their own emotions." The child responds to however it makes them feel and then thinks it's something wrong with them, right?

And takes responsibility. And so, you know, this is the thing, we find that children take responsibility for things that belong to other adults at a very young age. So other adults' emotions, you know, their, uh, their beliefs, their way of doing things, their behavior, and [00:04:00] children will take responsibility for all of that because it's a survival need.

And so that's where we find that there are these unmet needs in childhood that drive people to continuously be outsourcing their power and authority to somebody else, worrying about what somebody else will think or feel or do or, or what they're allowed to have, or the limitations that they put on themselves, all go- goes back to that.

And so we have to be able to validate what that was like for you as a child, um, for you to feel understood. So that's the first step. And then, um, once we can see what that was, and it's validated, and we feel understood in how we felt at, at those times that, you know, that create these patterns that show up in our business, then we can really start thinking about, "Okay, there's something here that I don't need to carry anymore."

And that's really what the second step is about, is about what can we now release? [00:05:00] Because- So often the things that people don't shift, even after years of working with a coach or doing personal development and reading all the books and listening to all the podcasts, the things that they don't shift are the things that they identify with.

So they, the things that happened that they feel like is part of their identity and who they are, and often there's an element of shame, like, "There, there's something wrong with me," right? "And that's why I can't shift it." But once we validate, as I said, and we work out that it wasn't yours to carry to start with, in step two we can start to do the process of releasing, uh, and, and l- putting down whatever it is that we've been carrying And so, you know, people often think that they're carrying stress and overwhelm and anxiety because there's just too much going on in their life.

Uh, but underneath, what's really happening is that they're carrying all the things that they were never designed to [00:06:00] hold. And so the things that, um, people carry and, and have to get awareness of to be able to release are usually responsibilities that belong to somebody else. And so this is really what we have to think about, is that so many of the clients that I work with carry things like the responsibility for somebody else's emotions.

Um, and I don't mean, like, a child's emotions, I mean another adult's emotions, right? There's so many people who are carrying responsibility for other adults' emotions. Um, and what does that look like? Well, they're, they're, like, worried about what they're gonna say in case somebody else gets upset. They're worried about, um, growing too fast or looking like they're too successful or having too much ease in case it makes somebody else feel bad, right?

That's carrying responsibilities for other people's emotions. It's filtering yourself so that you don't have to deal with the, uh, emotional [00:07:00] reactivity of another adult. That is really a heavy burden to carry, and many people are carrying that without even realizing it or without even questioning it, right?

This is, this is so important to understand. Um, you know, so many people carry a responsibility for that everybody's gotta get along and that everybody's else has gotta be happy, or they're carrying responsibilities for their clients' outcomes. This is a big one. You know, so much of, uh, what I help my clients with is their worry about their clients' outcomes.

You know, and I've always gotta say, like, "Do you know for sure that if your client comes and follows every step that you give them and shows up and does everything that they need to do and shares everything with you, uh, and y- they go from here to here doing those steps, do you know that they'll get a result?"

And they're like, "Yes." I'm like, "Exactly." But people carry the [00:08:00] responsibility of their clients not doing those steps and then thinking it's gonna be a them problem. And it, and it really isn't, but this is part of the conditioning that we get into. Um, carrying responsibility for whether people like you or not, right?

I can guarantee you there are loads of people who don't like you, there's loads of people who don't like me, and none of it is any of our business, right? It does not... I'm not in the slightest bit concerned about the people who don't like me because I know I'm a good moral, ethical person and I'm not doing anything that is, is negative to anybody else, right?

It's only other people's perceptions of me based on their own limitations. I don't care about those. They're not going to affect me in the slightest and, but so many people do carry this, "Oh, what if someone doesn't like me?" And not only that, but there's a lot of people that carry the fear that if I upset somebody, they're [00:09:00] gonna tell other people something negative about me.

Uh, and this is the conditioning that happens so much, and it comes from being around adults that don't take responsibility for themselves, and that if you upset them, that they're going to make it, uh, make sure everybody has sided with them, that it's not their problem. It wasn't their fault. It was a u- y- you know, something wrong with you.

And that is very, very... Like, that's a huge, heavy burden for a lot of people, 'cause as a child, that feels like, like a threaten, um, you know, it's threatening your survival. If the people that you're connected to are going to, you know, like, uh, tell other people bad things about you or make you out to look like the problem, and then people might disconnect with you or disapprove with you or devalue you, that is a huge, uh, that is a huge burden to carry, and so many adults still [00:10:00] carry that.

And I... And it shows up in business where people feel like, "Oh my God, I don't wanna say anything that's gonna upset anyone because then it might ruin my reputation, then I w- end up not making any money." Right? It's a survival need of that, like, that I've got to try to, um, monitor and, and influence everybody's perception of me so that nobody's upset with me.

Um, and it's just not true, right? It's a responsibility that you just don't have to carry. Um, and you know, a lot of people are carrying responsibilities around how other adults make decisions as well, and this really shows up in sales, by the way. This shows up in sales a lot. People worrying about, oh, if someone says yes, and then, you know, um, the, it, the...

And then, like, they have trouble paying, or it puts them in a financial bind, or it does da-da-da, whatever outcome. You gotta remember that if you're in a sales conversation, you're in a sales conversation with another [00:11:00] adult who has the ability to make decisions for themselves that aren't anything to do with you.

Right? They're, they're making their own decisions. And we... And the way that we get okay with empowering other adults to make decisions that are right for them is when we trust ourselves to make decisions that are right for ourselves as well Um, and so I want to think about what is it that you've been carrying based on something that happened as a child that you took to mean was your responsibility.

Um, and this drives so much of people's behaviors because it will-- it, it shows up as an unmet need. So if you're carrying responsibility for someone else's emotions, then you've got an unmet need of emotional safety for yourself. And so you will consistently have behaviors that take you away from your goal and what it is that you wanna do that are designed to make sure [00:12:00] you never feel like someone gets upset with you Right?

A- and it'll be unconscious, but it'll be part of why you procrastinate, part of why you don't put your offers out, part of why, you know, you don't feel safe having more than a certain amount of clients. All of those things will be tied into it. So we have to be able to release these and to, to, um, stop carrying them.

And this is the thing about hea- being a healthy adult, um, and having healthy boundaries and a healthy sense of relationship with yourself, is that it's much easier to recognize what's your responsibility and what's not, and having clear boundaries in that. And so, you know, this is the thing that often w- when we're children and there's been some kind of significant emotional event and someone's, you know, maybe s- spoken to you in a way or behaved in a way that resulted in you feeling negative emotion, and as a child, it is the adults around you responsibility to help you understand your [00:13:00] emotions and to validate your emotions and help you process your emotions.

Um, but a lot of parenting involves, you know, parents going, "I don't like that behavior. I'm gonna make you feel bad so that you won't do it again." Right? It's not effective, uh, if y- if your only way of parenting is to make someone feel so bad that they're scared to do it again, you're missing the point, right?

There's gotta be guidance, um, and learning in pare- in, in parenting, and this is the thing that was often missing. And so what happens is then, you know, people learn that, oh, if I do this behavior and, and then another adult gets upset or angry or, or has some kind of emotional reaction that causes them to disconnect from me so I don't feel emotionally safe with them, um, I feel like there's a threat to our connection, or there's a threat to, um, my care or, or being loved, then children learn things like, uh, [00:14:00] that that must mean that I'm too much, or I'm not enough, I'm not good enough, or I'm difficult, I'm a burden, right?

These are all the things that children learn from those behaviors, and they identify with it. And so then what happens is if, as a child, you know, you believe from the, the behavior of the adults around you that you are too much or not enough or a burden, then you start becoming, taking on these roles to try to combat that, right?

So you might become the helper. You're always helping people without getting anything really in return. Or you're always trying to fix things because you want things to be fixed and everything to seem okay so that you don't feel like there's gonna be a problem. Um, you might become the peacekeeper where you, you know, you just- Um, abandon your own needs to make sure everybody else's needs are, are sorted, because then it feels like it's gonna be safe for you.

Um, you might become the [00:15:00] achiever, right? The one that has to be always, always making sure that everything's done amazingly and perfectly and the best so that you can, you know, make sure you get, uh, connection or acceptance that way. Some people become the invisible one. "I'm not gonna be seen or heard. I'm not gonna cause any kind of, um, you know, strain or burden to anybody.

I'm not gonna have any needs. I'm just gonna be this kind of invisible one that everyone can, um, not have to do anything for, and also not have to feel blamed that, that they're not doing anything for." Right? Like, these is the kinds of roles and identities that we came in, and, uh, like developed in those situations.

And so, you know, if you took on this role of keeping everyone happy and never disappointing anyone, uh, or not asking for help or, you know, being over- overly responsible for other people, um, you know, making life easier for everybody else except for you, [00:16:00] then that's gonna show up in your business in a way that is going to lead to burnout, exhaustion, feeling like everything's too hard, where you're not gonna be paying yourself, right?

Um, so, you know, if you're taking on the helper role, then you probably won't be charging properly, right? Because if you learned that your value was in helping people just to stay connected, then it will feel like it's weird to charge people because your reward is being connected to them, not being, you know, valued for what it is that you have cr- you know, the value that you have, um, given them Or if you're the fixer, you know, you might always feel responsible for every one of your clients' results.

Like, regardless if they're doing the work or not, you'll be there trying to fix it and, and, you know, make sure that you're taking responsibility for the things that they should be doing. [00:17:00] Um, or if you're the achiever, you might never be able to recognize your success. Like, nothing even ever feels like it's enough, that you always gotta...

You know, you might achieve one thing, and then you're just quickly moving on to the next, like, always looking for that, how can I prove that I'm good enough? Um, or, you know, if you're the peacekeeper, you might really avoid difficult s- conversations. Um, av- you might avoid picking up the phone. You might avoid, like, if your client has got some kind of, you know, question or something that they're challenged by, you might be dreading speaking to them in case, you know, they're upset with you.

Um, you might be avoiding sales conversations because you think, you know, asking for money is gonna create conflict. Um, so, you know, these are the things that happen in business. You might... If you're the responsible one, you might never be able to switch off. You might never give yourself a break and just be busy, busy, busy all the time, um, and [00:18:00] just carrying everything all the time and never getting really good structure in your business, right?

That's, that happens a lot. For people that feel like they're not allowed to rest, or they've never done enough, or their value is in constantly doing and supporting people, they generally get, have bad structure set up in their business, and they try to hold everything in their head. Um, and they don't even want structure 'cause they want to be able to control everything and, like, you know, deliver whatever they think is gonna be the right thing at that time, rather than standing strong and, "No, this is what I offer, and this is how I do it."

Um, and so this is why, you know, I go so deep with people in business, and looking at all of these things, and unders- and I understand these patterns 'cause I've had these patterns myself. Um, I've had to work through so much of this stuff for myself, and I see what's, what it's like on the other side. And when you've worked through patterns yourself, it's so easy to recognize them in other people.

[00:19:00] Um, and so this is where, you know, so much of the work is ha- uh, you know, happens with my clients and why people say when they listen to the podcast, "Oh, I felt like you were talking directly to me." I'm like, "Yeah, 'cause I know your patterns. I see these patterns." I was even at a networking event, um, during the week- And I said to someone what I did, and he said, "Oh, are you gonna read, are you gonna read my mind?"

Uh, and I said, "Only if you pay me." Because literally people do feel like I'm reading their minds, but it's just because I understand patterns at such a deep level. You show me what's going in, in, uh, in, going on in your business, and I'll be able to ask you the questions to see what the structure is underneath it, and how to resolve it.

And, uh, and you know, I know, like, for me, definitely one of the things that I used to carry was this responsibility for other grown adults. Like, I was so conditioned in looking after, and especially the men in my family, like making sure [00:20:00] that they were okay and, you know, like just helping them out and sorting them out.

And I was, like, the youngest. I was the youngest and the female, and I took on the role to support the men in my family. Like, that's how badly I was conditioned into this. And so, you know, that's why I talk about the good girl conditioning, right? Like, I was so conditioned that, um, I would be the good girl.

I would be there helping make sure everyone's needs were met, make sure everybody was okay, make sure I didn't have any real needs that anyone had to feel bad about not fulfilling for me. You know, all of those kinds of things. Like, I was that emotional support for everybody. Um, and I realized that it didn't serve anybody.

It didn't serve me, and it certainly didn't serve my business, but it didn't serve the people I was doing it for either, because they could not grow if they weren't getting a true reflection from me of themselves Okay? I [00:21:00] was forever buffering the actual reflection that they needed of themselves to realize where they needed to grow within themselves.

But once I did, yeah, things changed really quickly. Things changed really quickly for them, and things changed really quickly for me. And so we have to realize that, you know, you can have compassion for people without carrying them, right? You do not have to carry other people's responsibility. You can have compassion for them and what they're going through.

You can support them as they're dealing with their own responsibilities. But you, you don't wanna carry things for other people because, you know, this is again where I talk about being the lighthouse instead of the lifeboat. 'Cause if you're the lifeboat, you're gonna be in the storm with them, trying to pull them in while they're falling out and, like, just forever.

It's a never-ending job. And so, you know, we wanna be the lighthouse where we're on high ground that we've got ourselves to by taking responsibility for our own stuff, [00:22:00] and we're shining the light. We're shining the pathway for people who want to, to step up. So we're leading rather than being there helping.

And, uh, and so, you know, that's why it's so important to be able to understand the deep structure of this work and to recognize what it is that you can stop carrying. Um, and you know, and knowing that when you stop carrying these things, and we'll talk about this more in the next episode as well, it doesn't mean that you're forgetting that, you know, whatever happened or pretending it didn't happen or, or, you know, imagining that someone else's behavior was okay.

'Cause, you know, the important thing is that often people carry, keep carrying these things because that it feels like it protects them from happening again. But what we have to realize is that you don't need to carry these things in order to be safe because it was never yours to carry to start with, right?

That's really important. So [00:23:00] if we think about your nervous system has been carrying a really heavy backpack for years, the validation step allows you to see what's actually inside the backpack, what you've actually been carrying, and, and recognizing that it's not actually yours to carry. And then step two, release, is, like, you actually being able to decide, "Oh, actually I don't have to carry this anymore.

It's not mine to carry. I can put this down." And so we have to be able to do that before we can move forward in what it is that we want to create more of for ourselves. So, so I really want you to think about this for you and your business, and no doubt if you can see it in your business, it'll cross over to your family as well 'cause this is where these things start.

Um, but whose emotions have you been managing? You know, whose expectations have you been carrying? Whose disappointment have you been trying to prevent? Um, you know, what are the [00:24:00] responsibilities that you've hol- been holding for other adults that just aren't yours? Right? What is that role that you've outgrown?

Because you're gonna need to, like, l- put those things down to step up into your next e- ful- fuller expression of who you are. That's gonna be required for the goals that you want to achieve. So, so, you know, think about this, and this is why I'm so passionate about business, and I want you to be too, uh, too as well, is that business isn't just about, you know, running a business.

It is a big part of how you grow into the person that gets to be in your power and authority over your own life, in what you get to create. It gets you to be more fully expressed in yourself, m- more in charge of what it is that how you experience life, the impact that you have, the legacy that you leave.

Um, [00:25:00] and, you know, to do that, you gotta let some of other people's stuff go. Well, you gotta let everybody else's stuff go, to be honest, and just let other people take responsibility for themselves, and know that you're gonna be safe in the process, that it's okay. You're still gonna be loved. You're still gonna be connected.

You're still gonna be supported. You're still gonna belong. All of those things that we'll talk a lot more about in the next episode. Uh, so remember the book launch, The Turning Point book, you can order your copy. The, um, link's in the show notes for that. You can find it on my website. But do keep the 12th of August, uh, save the date for the 12th of August, 'cause I'm gonna be doing the official book launch on the 12th of August at a venue to be confirmed, um, very soon.

I've got my amazing event planner on that right now. But as soon as those details are confirmed, it'll be out. And, uh, I'm about to head off to Vietnam. So I'm gonna be in [00:26:00] Vietnam for the next couple of weeks. But, um, of course, you can still reach out through my emails, and, uh, I will respond to you when I'm back.

Um, and you'll still be hearing episodes of the podcast, of course, over the couple of weeks, because by the magic of systems and structure, the episodes will still be going while I'm on leave. So I'm excited for that. And, uh, yeah, see you, I'll speak to you again very soon