You Have the Power - The Road to Truth, Freedom and Real Connection
You Have the Power: The Road to Truth, Freedom and Real Connection is for women who are done asking why emotionally unavailable men keep showing up — and are finally ready to change the way they relate.
This isn’t a podcast about fixing yourself or dissecting your past.
It’s for the woman who has outgrown the old patterns and is tired of repeating the same dynamic with different men. The chemistry is there. The potential is there. And yet… the consistency, depth, and emotional presence never fully arrive.
Hosted by Darla Ridilla, certified somatic, trauma-informed Relationship and Self-Leadership Coach, this podcast is rooted in the Magnetic Connections Pathway — Presence, Agency, and Empowerment — the embodied shift that changes who you attract and what you tolerate.
Here, we name the moments most women minimize: when your jaw tightens because he didn’t follow up after the date and you tell yourself not to make a big deal out of it, when you soften your voice before asking for consistency so you don’t seem “too much,” when you swallow your disappointment and say you’re fine because you don’t want to lose the connection.
That’s not maturity. That’s self-abandonment dressed up as patience.
Emotionally unavailable men aren’t the problem — they’re the feedback. They show up when you’re still over-functioning in connection: waiting longer than you want for a text back, explaining away inconsistency, accepting vague plans, or telling yourself “this is just how dating is now” instead of naming what you actually need.
Each episode names what most women are taught to tolerate — inconsistency, silence, mixed signals — and challenges you to stop managing relationships that require you to disappear, so you can lead from self-trust, clear standards, and agency that doesn’t ask permission.
This isn’t about becoming harder or more guarded.
It’s about becoming unavailable for anything that requires self-betrayal.
Because you’re not asking for too much.
You’ve just been accepting too little.
And that ends here.
You Have the Power - The Road to Truth, Freedom and Real Connection
72: Stop Saying “I’m Fine” - The Lie That’s Destroying Your Relationships
If you’re still saying “I’m fine” when you’re not, this episode is going to hit you in the body.
Not because you don’t know what you feel.
But because silence once kept you safe.
In this episode, Darla Ridilla breaks down the lie high-achieving women have been taught to live by and why it’s quietly eroding their relationships.
You’ll hear the moment that changed everything.
Not a blowup.
Not a dramatic confrontation.
A pause.
A pause where the body knew a line had been crossed.
A pause that created Presence.
A pause that made Expression, the first pillar under Presence in the Magnetic Connections Pathway process, unmistakably clear.
This episode is about:
- Why standards are first felt in the body, not decided in the mind
- How saying “I’m fine” is often conditioning, not maturity
- What real Expression looks like when your body and your words are aligned
- Why delaying alignment doesn’t avoid conflict, it guarantees disconnection
- How self-leadership changes when you stop managing reactions and start honoring yourself
This is not about over-explaining.
It’s not about people-pleasing.
It’s not about exploding after you’ve had enough.
It’s about expressing from truth, early, grounded, and without attachment.
If something in you feels activated while listening, don’t rush past it.
That activation is a signal.
And it’s pointing to what’s ready to change.
If you feel called to explore what this shift could look like in your own life, I invite you to book a Magnetic Connections Call. This is a space to slow down, look honestly at where you are in the Pathway, and discern what aligned next steps could support the woman you’re becoming.
You don’t need to have it all figured out.
You just need to be willing to choose differently.
You’re not here to be chosen.
You’re here to choose.
Expression is the first pillar of Presence.
And when this changes, everything else follows.
Connect with Darla Ridilla:
3 Keys to Magnetizing Emotionally Available Men masterclass: https://www.highvaluewoman.info/masterclass
Book a Magnetic Connections Call: https://www.highvaluewoman.info/call
Website: https://www.highvaluewoman.info
Send me an email: highvaluewoman7@gmail.com
Sign up for mailing list: https://www.highvaluewoman.info/newsletter
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YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@HighValueWoman-m7w
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/darla-ridilla-3179b110/
Darla Ridilla (00:00)
I remember a moment that changed everything. Someone spoke to me in a way that crossed the line. And it wasn't even dramatic or really obvious. But my body reacted instantly. My stomach dropped, my chest tightened, and there was a clear internal stop.
And instead of overwriting it like I'd done a thousand times before, I paused.
That pause, that was presence.
From that pause, I didn't soften. I didn't justify. I didn't manage the reaction. I expressed myself once. Clearly, directly. No over explaining or rehearsed script.
no attachment to whether they liked it.
And something radical happened. afterwards, steady. was no adrenaline, definitely no regret. And I didn't replay that conversation over and over again until 2 AM.
That is how you know that expression is a aligned
Darla Ridilla (01:00)
Welcome to You Have the Power, the Road to Truth, Freedom, and Real Connection. If you've done the work, you've set the boundaries, you've stopped chasing, and emotionally unavailable men still keep showing up. It's because you're standing at the edge of your next evolution.
I'm Darla Ridilla I'm a somatic trauma informed relationship coach for high achieving women who are done shrinking and are ready to rise in their power. And this podcast is for the woman who is no longer asking, why do emotionally unavailable men keep showing up?
She's asking, why does this pattern keep repeating? we walk through the magnetic connections pathway from presence to agency to empowerment.
Each episode brings bold truth, embodied tools and real conversations that help you move out of old stories and into aligned connection. Because you're not here to be chosen, you're here to choose from your power.
your presence, your truth. Let's begin with today's topic.
Darla Ridilla (02:14)
If you're still saying, I'm fine when you're not, you are not being mature. You're being conditioned. And I'm going to say this plainly. Every time you swallow your truth to keep the peace, you teach people exactly how to treat you. That is not kindness. That's self-erasure. reason this matters is because this one habit is
quietly destroying your relationships. And this is happening while you're telling yourself that you're just being understanding.
You don't avoid expressing the truth because you don't know what you feel. You avoid it because silence once kept you safe. Let that land. And at some point in your life, speaking up, costs you something.
It cost you connection, approval, safety, belonging. So you adapted. You learned how to read the room. You learned how to soften your tone. You learned how to say, I'm fine. While your body was screaming something else. And now, years later, you're accomplished. You're high achieving.
You're very capable, but your relationships feel off and you can't exactly explain why.
So here is what changes everything. Standards are first felt in the body. They are not felt in your head, not in a list, not in a boundary script, in the body. That tightening in your chest when someone crosses a line, that drop in your stomach when something feels wrong,
the heat that rises when you're about to betray yourself. That is your truth. And most women were trained to override it.
This episode lives under the first key of the magnetic connections pathway, which is presence. Presence is not calmness. Presence is not emotional control. Presence is not being agreeable. Presence is your ability to stay with yourself in real time without abandoning what your body is telling you.
And under presence, the first pillar is expression. Not boundaries, not empowerment, not action, expression. Because if you cannot express what is true for you, nothing else in your life will follow your line.
So let's clear something up. Expression is not saying everything you think. It's not dumping emotions. It's not explaining yourself until you're exhausted. Expression is not loud. It's not aggressive. It's not dramatic. Expression is when your body and your words are aligned. That's it.
And most women don't struggle to express. They struggle to trust what wants to be expressed.
There was a version of me who believed she was great at communication. I talked things through. I explained my feelings. I told myself I stayed calm and reasonable, but I wasn't.
And my body was miserable. My chest was tight all the time. My jaw was clenched. And my nervous system never rested. It was always at fight or flight. And I kept telling myself, I'm being strong.
What I was really doing was editing my truth to keep other people comfortable.
That is not expression. That is survival.
is the part that no one tells you. When you don't express early, you don't avoid conflict. You delay it. And delayed truth always comes out sideways as resentment, as withdrawal, as emotional distance, or an explosion that surprises everyone.
You know, like when you yell at the grocery store clerk.
But it's not a surprise to your body. it's been warning you the whole time.
I remember a moment that changed everything. Someone spoke to me in a way that crossed the line. And it wasn't even dramatic or really obvious. But my body reacted instantly. My stomach dropped, my chest tightened, and there was a clear internal stop.
And instead of overwriting it like I'd done a thousand times before, I paused.
From that pause, I didn't soften. I didn't justify. I didn't manage the reaction. I expressed myself once. Clearly, directly. No over explaining or rehearsed script.
no attachment to whether they liked it.
And something radical happened. afterwards, steady. was no adrenaline, definitely no regret. And I didn't replay that conversation over and over again until 2 AM.
That is how you know that expression is a aligned
Darla Ridilla (08:24)
If something in you was activated by this episode, don't rush past it. That activation, it's a signal. It's the part of you that's no longer willing to stay in patterns that require you to override yourself. If you're ready to stop circling that same story and actually shift how you show up in relationships, I am inviting you to book a magnetic connections call with me. This is not a discovery call.
It's a decision point. And together, we'll look at where you are on the magnetic connections pathway. What's asking to change? And what it would look like to move as the woman you're becoming, not the one who's been managing everybody else. You don't need to have it figured out. You just need to be ready to choose differently.
The link is in the show notes. If this feels like the moment you stop managing and start choosing, I'll meet you there.
Darla Ridilla (09:24)
So let me be very clear.
Expression in the form of standards. They are not rules that you announce. They are truth that you live from.
If your body says no your mouth stays silent, your standards disappear.
Expression is how standards become real.
And I'm sure this isn't you, but many women wait until they're furious to speak.
They wait till they're overwhelmed, until their body is screaming. But that's not expression. a system overload.
Because presence, it asks you to speak early.
Earlier, quieter.
from your truth and not from being in a pressure cooker.
So let me say this again, because it matters.
Expression doesn't start in your mouth or your words. It starts in your body. And if you can learn to listen sooner, your entire relationship dynamic changes.
You know, in the past, when I didn't really understand what true expression was, that it wasn't people pleasing, that it wasn't expressing with anger, like a bull in a China shop, that it was expressing my truth from the beginning to avoid that anger.
I attracted a lot of emotionally unavailable men and kept them in my life because I just didn't have the guts to say what I needed to say. now that I live by the magnetic connections pathway in all areas of my life, I say immediately and boldly,
what I need, what my truth is.
I let the chips fall where they may.
because their reaction to my expression is none of my business.
And when I learned self leadership, I learned it was okay to piss people off. I learned that it was more important to honor myself than to make others comfortable.
Because your future self, she doesn't rehearse her truth. She feels it and she trusts it. She expresses it without drama. And because of that, she attracts people who can meet her there. That's magnetic connection. That's aligned relationship. That is self leadership.
And if this episode landed in your body, not a coincidence.
Are you ready to stop performing and start expressing so you can create your magnetic connection? The ones that feel aligned?
If so,
Book your magnetic connections call. The link will be in the show notes. Don't just sit with us. Move with it.
Expression is the first pillar of presence in the magnetic connections pathway.
And if this one changes how you speak, everything else will change. And we are just getting started.
Darla Ridilla (12:51)
Thank you for listening to You Have the Power, the road to truth, freedom, and real connection. If you've done the work, you've grown, you've set boundaries, you've become more aware, but your relationships still don't match the woman you know you are, this isn't a setback.
your relationships from presence, agency, and empowerment. That's where magnetic connection begins. If this episode sparks something in you,
Share it with the woman who's also ready to stop abandoning herself in the name of connection. Subscribe so you don't miss what's next. And if you're ready to live this, not just understand it, let's connect.
You already have the power. Now it's time to use it.
