26 | Fairy Tale or Real Life? Redefining What's Possible

When someone asked me if this whole “life gets to be amazing” thing was just a fairy tale, I had to laugh...because they’re right and they’re wrong. The truth? Life does get to be better, but it’s not about perfection. It’s about the courage to risk, to trust yourself, and to question the conditioning that keeps you stuck. In this raw riff, I pull back the curtain on my mission, why I refuse to stop showing women what’s possible, and the question I want you to ask yourself: Who told you that?

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Transcript

0:00:00 - (Carly): Foreign welcome to Coffee with Carly, your weekly wake up call to a happier, healthier life. I'm your host, Carly Shade, and I'm here to uncover how good life can get. Hello, hello, hello. Welcome back to another episode of Coffee with Carly. So today, today is going to be a bit of a riff, a Carly riff here. And what I want to talk about is a little bit more kind of about my method, but really just help you guys understand really, like my mission and why I do what I do and kind of what I mean. So what sparked this episode is I was talking with a potential client and she's kind of really struggling with a bit of her mental health, but really she's a new mama. She's going through another round of IVF and like, is just like learning hormones for the first time and her cycle and all these things. But really she was talking to me and she's like, I've listened to a lot of your podcast and I love what you have to say, but, you know, sometimes it does feel like these things that we see on social media, things you're saying, this whole, like, life gets to be amazing feels like a fairy tale.

0:01:19 - (Carly): It just feels like, I don't know, is that, like, really possible? That kind of just sounds like a lot of, like, I don't know. So I love this and I want to chat about it because what I do is really, I want to help you realize that life does get to be better, right? That, like, we don't have to settle for these feelings of mediocrity. Right? Whether it's having a crappy period where, like, you're suffering all the time, or a job that sucks the life out of you or a relationship that just feels transactional and performative.

0:01:59 - (Carly): But ultimately, like, my goal is to help you build a life that you're proud of, something that's fulfilling. And that doesn't, though, mean that it's always a fairy tale. And there's two things to this. So one, my life is far from a fairy tale, okay? Like, when I say that life gets to be better and I want to remind you guys of that, it is not without struggles. In fact, that's actually what makes it worthwhile.

0:02:30 - (Carly): Building a life that you're proud of comes from fear, risk, challenges. So what I'm talking about is changing from the inside out. It's from cultivating self trust. It's from, I got this energy. It's a. I don't know how it's going to work out. It's a. This might not actually all work, right? Like I am still on this journey. I've had masterclasses where people don't sign up. I've had giveaways where there's no takers. I've had lots and lots of tears.

0:03:03 - (Carly): I've had lots of these moments of what am I doing? Is this gonna work? I have had so many highs and so many lows, but to me, that's life. That's where I feel most alive when I'm on this roller coaster of the ups and the downs. Because I have worked on my nervous system regulation, my self trust, I have full blown. I got this energy, even though I don't know how it's all gonna work out. That's my definition of a fairy tale. That's my definition of a fulfilling life.

0:03:37 - (Carly): When things get to feel amazing, right? My relationship, I didn't realize it, but I had been pretty insecure in my attachment to him, to my now fiance, you know. You know, we'd been together for eight years and I still had that and I didn't realize it. You know, this reliance on other people, external validations, all of these things. My definition of a filling life is where you realize that everything you want, need, feel, it's all at your fingertips. It all comes from you.

0:04:11 - (Carly): Okay, so point number one is like I don't ever want you to think that this mission, this movement, that I want women to come back to their power and realize that they don't have to stay where they are right now, that life gets to be better. That doesn't mean it's without ups and downs and hard lessons and all of that. But my work is about cultivating enough of that self trust and the I got this energy that those ups and downs and get to become a little more fun and that you just get to understand it's part of the process.

0:04:49 - (Carly): Okay, so that's number one. My life is certainly not without. Everything is perfect all the time. That's not it. But I find the joy in it. I find the lessons, I find the meaning and I control my side of the equation. The next part is it is also kind of my job to show you what's possible. So I am going to share those things of what's possible. When I finally stepped away from a career that drained me, oh man, I have so much more energy to kind of go find this next opportunity.

0:05:18 - (Carly): I'm going to show you what's possible. When we start listening to our bodies, I'm going to show you what's possible. When you take risks, when you choose to be bold when you choose yourself instead of what everybody else has been telling you. The minute you start to choose yourself, there's going to be a lot of people who have opinions because you're starting to change. You're starting to now trigger them. You're starting to show.

0:05:40 - (Carly): And hey, I don't have to stay here, but maybe that person isn't ready for it. So there's two sides of the equation. My job is to also go remind you that there's more. So I am going to show you the ups and the highs and all of the amazing things that come from the other side of fear and risk and scaredness. That is my job, to show you what's possible. But I also just want to further define, remember to remind you guys that this amazing life, when you feel most alive, is when we have the ups, the downs, the highs, the lows and challenges.

0:06:21 - (Carly): Okay? And some people are also going to say, well, there's toxic positivity. You know, I choose to see the positive in things and it's not toxic positivity. It's choosing to focus on my side of the equation. I get to control my reactions, I get to control my thoughts, I get to control my feelings. Right. There's a war on happy people. My mentor told me that, and I couldn't agree more. And so this mindset that, you know, you can't just go live a fairy tale life is actually part of the conditioning that keeps us stuck.

0:06:56 - (Carly): But just like any fairy tale, any good story, there's risks, there's stakes, there's highs or lows. You don't actually know if it's going to work out. And it always does work out, but maybe not even in the way that you thought. Right? It's the rom com syndrome. It works out. It always works out, but not in the way that you always thought. So that's what I mean about this fairy tale life. A life that you're proud of, where your body supports you, your relationships fuel you, and your work inspires you.

0:07:26 - (Carly): A life that's worth living, has ups and downs, but we get to control how we respond. We don't let it keep us stuck. And that fairy tale life, it is possible, but it's a story. And like every good story, you have your risks, you have your stakes. You have the parts where you just really don't know it's going to work out. But it always works out maybe just not the way that you thought. So that's my little riff.

0:08:00 - (Carly): And I felt that that was important because you know, I'm starting to do more and more one to one sessions, starting to show up a little bit more on social media. And yeah, I don't want you guys to get confused with when I say I'm here to help you live a radical life, that just means choosing yourself, supporting your energy, supporting your hormones and doing the things that scares you. That to me is a life that you're proud of.

0:08:30 - (Carly): The health, the relationships, living up to your full potential. And there are a lot of positive things that come from choosing that. And I'm going to continue to remind you that's my job. I'm not here to always tell you what you want. Okay. I'm here to remind you, trigger you a little bit, push you into expansion. So I'm not going to stop showing you what's possible. But I hope that this episode gave you a little bit more peel back the curtains of what my mission is really about.

0:09:01 - (Carly): It's just helping women step back into themselves, into their bodies, into their power. And a lot of the women I work with are the ones who are the adventurers, but have been stuck in their heads, been stuck in the masculine and they've burned out. And so that's why I use science. That's what worked for me. It gave me the permission that I couldn't give myself. The nervous system regulation helped me cultivate the safety that I needed to then go after what I wanted.

0:09:30 - (Carly): The cycle syncing, learning about women's hormone health gave me the permission to slow down when my energy wasn't there, to stop trying to produce 247 like a robot. Okay? So that's what I do. We blend in science, but we mix it with the soul. And I help women go after what they want, choose themselves. And it's a radical move to rest, to be bold, to, you know, go to a business conference where we wear funny outfits and dance around like that's what I mean about a life you're proud of. There are no rules.

0:10:10 - (Carly): And the conditioning has told us that to be successful we have to be serious all the time. And to that and then the idea that like having this fairy tale life is unheard of, like that is something that I also want to remind you of, is that like who told you that life doesn't get to be amazing? Who told you that we can't wear funny little outfits and go dance around Mexico in a business conference with wildly successful women?

0:10:38 - (Carly): Who told you that you have to just wear a business suit and this and this and be super professional and constantly try to push and push and push. Like, who told you any of those things? So that's just what I want you guys to walk away with. Sorry, we. We had a second wave of the riff. Here is question some of those things. If you're sitting there saying, life doesn't get to be better, life isn't a fairy tale, who benefits from that, really?

0:11:05 - (Carly): Because it's not you who benefits from that. So that's my question to you. The next time you kind of catch yourself having this thought, something that maybe comes up a lot in a relationship, in your health, in your life, something that is maybe keeping you stuck, what we might say is a limiting belief, ask yourself that question, who told you that? And do I think it's true? And let me know what you find out.

0:11:38 - (Carly): And that's all I got for you guys today. So here was my riff number two. A little bit more about my mission and my purpose. And what fuels me is this. And that's why I work with women. That's why we use cycle syncing. We use our bodies to then go after what we want. So thank you again for joining me on today's episode of Coffee with Carly. This was just a true rant, so I hope you found some gold in here, and if you did, let me know what landed. As always.

0:12:09 - (Carly): And like a good cup of coffee, my friends, stay bold, stay balanced, and I will see you next week.