Episode 4: How to Design Your Next Level Life With Intention and Power

Schedule our conversation here.

Are you asleep at the wheel of your own life?

In this episode, I’m calling you to wake up and make one powerful decision today: that you are the designer and co-creator of your next level. Not someday. Not when things calm down. Right now.

We talk about what it really means to stop living on autopilot, question the systems and beliefs you’ve been handed, and start intentionally creating a life that reflects what you actually love. Because the truth is, you already know what you want. The question is, are you willing to be brave enough to claim it?

In this conversation, you’ll learn how to:

Shift From Living by Default to Living by Design
You’ll wake up to unconscious patterns that keep you stuck and learn how to step into conscious creation of your life.

Get Honest About What You Truly Want
You’ll be invited to answer the most powerful question of all, and start designing from desire instead of logic or limitation.

Take Ownership of Your Life as the Creator
You’ll see how deciding who you are what you are available for puts you back in the driver’s seat of your results.

If you’re a founder, leader, entrepreneur, creative, or a woman who makes a difference and you are ready to break through your upper limits and glass ceilings, I’m personally inviting you to a complimentary Next Level 1:1 conversation with me.

With high-touch support, you’ll get clear on what your next level actually is, identify what’s in the way, and create aligned, powerful next steps tailored specifically to you and your next level of personal and professional success. You’ll leave with clarity, courage, and momentum designed around your vision and your capacity.

Schedule our conversation here.

You are here on purpose.
Your assignment is your next level.
And you have full permission and limitless possibility to create an extraordinary life that makes a difference for yourself, for others and for the world.

Hey gorgeous.

I love you.

I'm so proud of you.

And I believe in your ability to create a next level life you love.

Transcript

0:00

Welcome to her next level with Dana Hunter Fradella. Where founders, leaders, and women who make a difference go to create your next level of personal and professional success. I'm your host, Dana Hunter, Fradella Transformational success coach for exceptional women. And I'm on a mission to remind you of your limitless possibility and to show you how to create your next level so that it feels as good as it looks. Follow the show, my friend. Grab your iced coffee and turn up the volume to create her next level. Let's go. Well, hello, gorgeous. Welcome back to Her Next Level podcast with your favorite host who's obsessed with you, Dana Hunter, this episode. Is gonna require us to be brave. Are you ready to be brave? Okay, let's go. I believe in you. Let's do it. If you've been along for this journey, you know we have already accomplished a lot in a very short time. Welcome to being a woman, and our last episodes I invited you to first and foremost, decide who is going to be your next level podcast partner and. That woman is going to be someone that you, A, ask her to be your partner. B, listen to the episodes together each week. Seek, do what the invitations are in each episode, and D, get together and talk about it and hold each other lovingly accountable so that you aren't left alone in your closet thinking. You have to do everything by yourself, if that's what you're thinking. We can be done with that. And instead you're going to link arms with a woman who is running for her next level or jogging sexually to her next level. And you get to do something really fun and important and meaningful together with someone that you love. I had someone reach out to me this week and say, I love your podcast. I am so up for doing the work and I want to do it together, but I am not sure who I could ask to do the work with. And so. For now, if you want somebody to be your next level partner, I know plenty of incredible women who listen to the podcast where they're doing the work, and they would love to be your one-on-one next level partner, and also I would love to be one of those people as well. I do have a Facebook group and it's called Her Next Level. I'll drop you in it and you can ask for an accountability partner, or I can link you up with someone amazing myself. The point is, is that you need to be linking arms with another woman to do this work. Because we are at the end of the era where we believe that we have to do everything by ourselves or anything by ourselves. I don't know that I'm doing anything by myself these days unless I choose to do that. You feel me on that one. Okay, so you've got your partner or you're going to get your partner. You've asked yourself the question, which we are gonna continue to ask ourselves, what is my next level? And the way to get to what you would like to create there is to ask the question, what would I love? What would I love? So the question is, what is my next level? And underneath that, the answer comes when you ask yourself the question, well, hey sister, what would I love? No, really, if there were no limits, if there were no obstacles, if everything was going for you, what would you love? If you didn't care what other people thought, or everyone was thinking that it was amazing. What. Would you love if you allowed yourself to break out of the how this is gonna happen and the logic and the reason and into this is what I would love to create with my health, with my partners, with my career, with my freedom. What would you love? And sometimes the fastest way in is to ask yourself, well, what in my life do I not love? What in my life is not working? And if you can get clear on what's not working and then ask yourself the hard questions. Well, how long has it not been working? And how much is it costing you? Then you can get excited about and clear on. What could just be the opposite of that is what would you love? So if you're feeling anxious and depressed, for example, what you would love is a day, a life, a body, a mind, a spirit that is filled with ease. That's filled with peace, that's filled with certainty. That's what we would love. And so you might just take a quick look at what in your life do you not love, and then in the area that you've chosen. And I want to invite you, I'm gonna do it again today to choose one area that you would love to create your next level and get really specific. On what you don't love in that area, so that you can can get crystal clear on what you would love. We also, in the last episode, and maybe the one before that went through the four core areas of our life and we ranked ourselves where we are right now. Again, no judgment. There's no Judge Judy up in this podcast, although I would love it if Judge Judy would come on the podcast. We would have a blast. We are approaching this as non-judgmental observers and also as curious scientists, so no black robes here. We want our white coats that probably have some, you know, jello stains and mascara and if you live a life like mine, some other questionable things on them. My point is we are approaching these areas and these ra ra ratings, these numbers with curiosity instead of judgment. Okay, we can be dead with judging ourselves. There's plenty of other people. So the four key areas of life that we're focusing on, creating our next level in, and I'm gonna invite you to choose the one that if you could create your next level, if you could create what you would love, would change everything. Start there. So, health and wellness. Health and wellbeing. That's mind. That's body, that's spirit. The second area is love and relationships. How's your marriage? How's your partnership? Do you want one? How's it going? The third area is career and creative expression. It's your work that you're here to do in the world, whether it's professionally or if you're retired or not working in your creative endeavors, and finally in your level of freedom. That's the fourth area. That's financial freedom. It's time freedom, and it's personal freedom, which means you know exactly who you're in. Our last episode, we talked about what I'm calling the next Level Formula, and in order to get. Clear on what you would love. We wanna get the formula for creating it, right? So most people think if I have the thing right, if I have the opportunity, if I have the money, if I have the connection, then I'll do the thing. If I have the money, then I'll start the business. If I have the connection, then I'll apply for the job. If I have the resources, then I'll finally go for it. And then I'll be the kind of person I've always wanted to be. But that is backwards. Dare I say, is this a Kentucky thing? It's ass backwards. Doesn't even make sense. But it's something that we say, and I love it. That formula is ass backwards. So we're gonna turn ourselves around and put our ass where it's supposed to go, and we're going to lean into the true formula for creating your next level of success, personally, professionally, in whatever area matters to you. That's why we're here. Women, and the first part of that is not have, we're not waiting to have, it's asking ourself the question, who do I need to be? So if my goal is to have a six or seven figure business. I wanna back up and ask myself, who do I need to be to create that level of, of financial success? If you want to have a happy marriage, you wanna back up and ask yourself the question, who do I need to be in order to create a happy marriage? So we start at the beginning, and the beginning is, who are we being? Who are you being? Remember being is your identity. It's the things you're thinking. It's the things you're feeling. And above all it is your energy. Your energy. And the energy doesn't mean like you can go run a marathon. It's literally how is your mood? How is your disposition? How is your personality? Are you lifting the room like light or are you blowing out the candle? I like to say this to my girls. You wanna be the one that lights the candle, not the one that blows it out. And we are trained in negative thinking. We are trained to see what's wrong. We are trained the wrong way. We're gonna call that Ask backwards too. And we're gonna retrain ourselves to remember who we, and then ask the question in order to create what I would love to create for my next level. And then in the next few episodes, we'll get even more specific on how you can get clear on exactly what you would love to create. Today and last episode, we're focusing on who do we need to be starting from that point? And then be her. If she's creating a raise, if she's creating an opportunity, who is she being? Who are you being? Are you thinking uplifting thoughts? Are you doing the stage generators that we talked about in the last episode? Changing the channel? It's like, whoop, I'm watching the wrong channel. Oh, y'all, I was watching. Heated rivalries. Has anyone else seen this show? Oh my gosh. I'm a changed woman. Changed woman. But I was watching it while I thought my kids were getting, uh, ready for bed. And so I'm watching heated rivalries. I'm getting it in, sneaking it in, and then the 8-year-old runs down the hallway and I said. Change the channel. We're watching kids Netflix. That's what we're watching, and it can happen as fast as that. When I find myself ruminating on negative things or judging myself or judging someone else, I pause. I pick up my remote and I change the channel as fast as we switch from heated rivalries to whatever pony show is on. The second part of the formula for creating your next level is once you've decided who you are being and you be her, then you take the actions and most of society would have a start. Like what actions do you need to take to create the result that's wrong? It's who do you need to be and then take the actions from her energy. From her thinking, from her mood, from her way of being in the world. You take the actions and the actions will always lead you to success when you take them from the energy, from the identity of a woman who is ready to create her next level, and then the last part of that creation formula. We talk all about this in the last episode, so jump back in episode. If you missed it, then you can expect to have what you are creating. So the order is B do have in that order. And if you expect to do it backwards, you will get backwards results. Dare I say, ask backwards. Okay, so now you know the formula. You've asked yourself the question, who do I need to be to create my next level to. You've asked yourself the question, well, when I am doing her, what does she need to do to create the things that I'd like to have in my next level? So the second question is, what do I need to do from the energy of being the kind of woman who is available to create what I would like to have in order to have? So it's B then do, then have, and we also talked last episode about state generators. You are the generator. The leader of your own state. So however you feel you're in leadership there. If you're in a bad mood, you need to do something to change it. You are re responsible for your mood. You are responsible for your energy. You dare I say, are responsible for your thoughts. That's the beautiful part about being human. You've heard of, what is the name of this author? I'm so sorry. Perimenopause is really stealing all of this from me. He wrote the book as a Man Thinketh, and although you know, I'm not really interested in what man thinks the point is is that we are in leadership of our own being, of our own thoughts, of our own feelings, of our own frequency, of our own mood, and we keep looking on the outside to give ourselves permission to feel good on the inside. And today is the last day. You need to do that for the rest of your life. Starting right now. You can put both hands on your heart or even one heart on one hand on your heart, one hand on your butt. On your booty and say, I am the leader of my being. I am the queen of my energy. I am the empress of who I am. And once we take full responsibility for who and how we're being, which is a mix of, remember what I'm thinking, what I'm feeling, my energy, my frequency, my vibration, then I'm ready to take the action and I can expect to create my next level. And we can collapse time. It happens so fast. I coach people every single day and they say, I cannot believe how fast this happened. The podcast was created, the business was built, the promotion, the money, the hotter sex, the feeling more confident, the getting asked to speak somewhere. It happens every single day in my practice. And we start with, who do you need to be if you're trying to create a speaking practice? Or you're trying to create your dream job or you're trying to transform your relationship, or you're trying to remember how incredibly powerful you are so you can get up and go do the things that you have been assigned here, be, do, have, and you can come up with your own specific to you practices for generating state. Did we talk about my Beyonce moments? So I will pause in the middle of whatever I'm doing, especially if I need a mood boost and I'm gonna go down in my kitchen, which has a sign that my sister gave me. Thank you, Allison. It says this kitchen is made for dancing, and then I'll call on my assistant Alexa and she will play Beyonce. Whatever mood I'm feeling, I'll ask her to play Beyonce. Right now we're in, we're back in Renaissance and for, and the duration of the song, I will dance, I'll sing. Sometimes I'll yell, I'll cry and I'll have a Beyonce moment, and then I'll go back to my work or I'll go back to my kids or I'll go back to my husband. And in between me asking Alexa to play the song and me reengaging with wherever I'm going next, everything shifts and it wouldn't have had I been waiting for someone else to make me feel different. Here is a news flash. No one is here to make you feel different except for mailer. Maybe Taylor Swift. She makes everybody feel different, doesn't she? She's amazing. By the way, Taylor Swift is a five one projector. I just looked, looked that up this morning for a client. Who's also a five one projector and projectors. This is a whole human design. You know, I'm obsessed with human design right now, but projectors are designed to. Create big vision and guide the energy for all, for everyone. So very excited to share that. I also, as I'm talking, have completely forgotten where we were going. So next level, Taylor Swift, we'll get back to it. Change the channel. Speaking of Taylor Swift, she could be, you could have a Taylor Swift moment, you could play one of the songs or watch one of her episodes, or close your eyes. And remember that time you were at the ERAS tour and all your dreams are coming. True. Oh, that's just me. Okay. Is it, is it just me? The point I'm making my friend is maybe you wanna go for a walk, maybe you wanna take a yoga class. Maybe you wanna get a pillow and rage into it so intensely that the neighbors might call the police. But you are just moving your emotions because emotions are energy and motion and they can be state generators. I hope you don't hear me say that the goal is to be so happy all the time because it is not. I want us to step into ownership over our feelings and feel them. We are the permission slip for our own feelings, and so if you feel like raging against the machine, you better rage against the machine, my sister, because if you don't, you will suppress that rage and it will become depression and anxiety and diabetes and cancer. You can quote me on that. And so the invitation again isn't for you to be happy and joyful all the time. Like many mouses, it's for you to be authentic and in touch with the things that you need to feel and the emotions that you need to express so that you can raise your frequency and release what needs to be released. So you can be the kind of woman who does the kind of things to create her next level. Do you hear me? Is that coming through? And we change the channel and sometimes in order to change the channel, we need to have a, a screaming fit, or we need to have a cry on the floor. Or we need to have a jump in the jump in the air party, but ultimately it's our responsibility to lead our thoughts and lead our feelings and lead our frequency. We are in leadership of our own frequency. Ha. Okay, let's move into what we're here to talk about today. I have invited you to choose one area to begin creating your next level. Have you selected your area? You have, okay. No, you haven't. Okay. Do it. The one area that if you, and when you create your next level, it will change everything. Everything in your life. And so you've selected your area, and today I wanna talk about the ways that many of us have been living so that we can start to live differently so that you can do the being. Take the action and create your next level. Most people think that they're living or creating their lives intentionally, but the actual truth is most everybody is asleep at the wheel of their own life, and therefore we're creating by default. Most of us are asleep at the wheel of our own lives. And you know, we're always creating. If you didn't know that, today's the day you get to know it. We are always creating, always. We don't get to turn it off. If you stay in bed all day, you just created a day in bed. You are a powerful co-creator of your own life and your own experience and your own outcomes and your own destiny. And you heard me say co-creator, right? Because we. Are in partnership with the Divine. We are in partnership with the source. We're in partnership with the one who is for us, who is through us, who is in us, who connects us, but most of us are completely asleep. Especially to that, especially to that most of us are creating by default, a lot of us. For women, it's because we inherited, we were imprinted on these beliefs about everything work, what it means to create money, what it means to be a mom, what it means to have ambitions, what it means to be a leader, what even success. Looks like, and we inherited beliefs even about what we're allowed to want. And that's living by default. It's living by those scripts and those programming, that programming that we were just handed as a result of where we grew up, or a kind of family or a society, or our culture, or the school we went to, or the neighborhood. And I was just talking with a client today about the difference between our conscious mind, which is about five or 10% of the way we live. It's the times that we're actually awake and actually in tune with. Smells and the sights and the senses. And then there's the other 90%, which is where we're totally asleep and we're living on autopilot. And it's why I can drive from my house in West Mey to my daughter's school in the French Quarter and not even think about how I got there. I don't need a map. And somehow 24 minutes later I'm there. I don't even think about it. It's because I'm asleep at the wheel of my own life, and I've allowed my subconscious mind to take over. Now in that case, it's good, you know, I don't have to think about the drive. But in other cases, it's not so good. It comes along with scripts and beliefs and ideas and thoughts that are not mine. I just inherited them and now they're a part of my subconscious programming that keeps me away from creating my next level. And that's not why we're here, is it? We are here to question the programming question. The structures question the scripts, and until we do that, we're gonna still be asleep at the wheel and we're gonna create the same life just with different details. It's almost like Groundhog Day. I'll give you an example of this. So when I was younger, chuckling, I'm still very young. When I was younger, I would switch. Things, but they would look strikingly similar. For instance, I had a bunch of different boyfriends, anybody else like to serial date, and I thought if I changed boyfriends, then I would change the way I felt or change my status or change my reputation. But what happened was I would just keep creating the same kind of relationship. With the same kind of problems, just a different face. Am I the only one? Do you know why I was doing that?'cause I was asleep at the wheel. I was not awake to my own programming. I was not awake to my own leadership and who I was being what I was doing because I was creating the same result over. Over and over again. And the work here, my friend, the work of personal transformation, which looks like you creating whatever it is your next level is, is shifting from default to design. So we're gonna wake up at the wheel of our own life and instead of going along day by day, just in default mode, we're gonna switch into design mode. So you are now the designer of your own life. Sexy, right? You can put that on your resume. Life designer and I wanna talk a little bit about some of the invisible stuff that women inherit the programming for us. We as women, are often socialized to create our whole life by default through the expectations that we are passed down to us, whether it's through our family. Our school, our society, the motherfucking patriarchy, and the, this is what it sounds like. You should be likable. You should be more accommodating. You should be responsible. There's a lot of shoulds, right? Don't take up too much space. Don't you? Make those people feel uncomfortable, don't you say that thing. Don't you dare want too much money and you better put everybody first. So I should be likable and I should put everybody else first, and I should keep myself small and don't you dare ask for more. Not more money, not more opportunities, not more promotions. Not more. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Now nobody's gonna. Maybe your mom will do this. I don't know. We got some wild moms out there. It's very unlikely that someone's gonna come up to you and say, Hey, Sarah, hey, Z. Hey Molly. Don't you dare want too much money? Nobody's gonna be in your face like that. They'll definitely look at you side eye and say, are you sure you want the or? This happened to me recently. They won't say, Dana, don't make people uncomfortable. I mean, maybe they will depending on the region, but they might say something like, Dana, you might not wanna talk about the patriarchy as much because it makes you seem like maybe you don't like men. Totally not true. We're gonna be talking about the patriarchy until it is dismantled. Do you hear me? Because she doesn't want me to make other people feel uncomfortable, and maybe she means herself. But that's not, that's my assignment. It's not to keep you comfortable, and that's not your assignment either, to make everybody feel safe and happy and comfortable. Absolutely not. Not even a preschool teacher is designed to do that. Preschool teachers are brave because they're teaching young people bravery and confidence and the power of making mistakes. And yes, sing as loud as you can, and yes, play with all the things. Can we all please be preschool teachers? Shout out to you, Mme. Becker. If you're listening, the scripts and the programming that we inherit shape everything about our lives. They shape the work that we're here to do. They shape the ceilings for finances and promotions and opportunities. They shape the way that we are in our relationships. They shape our willingness to be visible. Do you know how many women need to do a podcast and they, they say to themselves, oh, no. I could never do that. I know I've talked about this other person before, but her example is so striking because it's so common. This woman is designed to be in public service. She probably could be the mayor of New Orleans if she wanted to be, but when I asked her why she hasn't run for public office, she said, oh no, I couldn't take all of the things that they might say about me. I'm like, girl, what? What? You're not gonna run for public office because you're afraid of what they might say. Okay, okay. We gotta shatter that. Well, you've gotta be ready for it, because if we're always worried about what other people might say, we will never create our next level. We'll never reach our own limitlessness. And that woman needs to be in political leadership. You might need to be in political leadership. You might need to break the upper limit on your own. Willingness to be visible. They're all gonna judge you. Are they gonna judge you? Yes, yes they are. Now what? Can you do it anyway? Or are we hiding in caves afraid of what they're gonna think? Who's they? Your seventh grade mean girl? Who's they? Your aunt who's on the other side of the political fence? Who is they that's causing you to stop your destiny? Stop your dream. We gotta be done with this, and it's not an individual problem. So I don't want you to feel like I'm coming for you, although I am coming for you. It is a systemic social pandemic. It's a plague against women asking us to stay small, because if you don't, then we're gonna, we're gonna, you should be afraid of what they're gonna say. Let them, come on Mel Robbins. Let them say what they're going to say and let you. Create your next level. Most of us are not living lives that we chose for ourselves. We are living lives that we were trained into. I'm gonna say that again. I want you to look at your life, look at your past, and ask yourself, are those the things that lit me up, the things that I said yes to, because I was a hell yes. Were they the things like me, I did because I thought I was supposed to. I thought I was supposed to be in all those clubs that I didn't wanna be in. I thought I was supposed to be president because if you're not president, who are you? I thought I was supposed to go to law school. I thought I was supposed to be a principal. I thought I was supposed to, but the truth is I never checked inside and said is something I would love. Lemme tell you what I loved. I was telling somebody about this today. I was at Vanderbilt trying to take all these pre-law classes, just being like, oh, I cannot even deal with my life right now, wondering why I couldn't get out of bed. I thought it was depression. It was really misalignment. And the first time I accidentally stepped into a woman's studies class, my whole soul sat up and sing the national French Anthem. It's a great song. Look it up. My girls know it'cause they go to French Immersion school. My point is every part of me came alive and I knew that those classes were where I was supposed to be. And lucky for me, they had just created the women's studies major and I said, yes, please. More of that. Yes. And that is how we're supposed to be living. That's how we get to be living instead of being in careers and fields that we're, we think we're supposed to or that we should. I was on another podcast today. The Banish the Lives podcast with Tanya and she's incredible. Please check out her podcast, banish the Lives. But we were talking about all of the lies that we are trained to believe about ourselves as women and what is possible for us. So here's how you know, you're, you're living by defaults. And again, like no personal judgment at all. I'm definitely judging the systemic patriarchy that keeps us in these default modes. Creating my by default might look like you chose work that looked logical and that looked like something you should be doing, like law school when you were really designed to be. A women's empowerment movement leader, so something that you chose based on your logic instead of you feeling totally alive. It could also look like me a few years ago, staying in work that you made a bunch of money and you're good at it, but it drains you because it's not aligned with what you're supposed to be doing. Creating your life by default might look like you not asking for the promotion or the raise. There's a girl that I mentor at an old job of mine. Maybe I've talked about her before, but I love her so much. Erica, if you're listening. Levy so much you're amazing. And we've been messaging and told her to go for the job, and she did. And then she didn't get it. And then they gave it to her. And she's just been on this upward trajectory with me, sticking myself in her ear, being like, ask for it, go for it. Ask for more. Ask for a raise, ask for a promotion. And I was messaging her and she said, oh, next year I might be up for this promotion. And I said, you better. It today. You better ask for it this year because don't let timelines define what you're willing to ask for, because if your work is solid and hers is incredible, the worst thing they could say is not yet. That's what a no is. It's not yet. I'll never hear no and be like, okay, well we're done forever. My ex-boyfriend. You see what I'm saying? It might also look like you just playing small so other people feels okay. Feel okay? Are you okay? Is that okay? Let them feel uncomfortable. I just called out a couple of people this weekend that I love dearly, and the old version of me would've been like, oh, let's just be spiritual and not address it. We'll get over it. It's not that big of a deal. But absolutely not. These people did not honor their commitments to me, and they did not honor my time and they did not honor theirs, and I called them forward. And I said, I was expecting you and I didn't hear from you. Is everything okay? And I've called him forward because if we say we're gonna be somewhere and we say we're gonna do something, we are women of our word. What else are we? If not what we say we're going to be, let's do that. It doesn't have to be perfect. It doesn't have to be a hundred percent, but I'm not willing to make other people feel uncomfortable. And not say the thing like, I'm disappointed that you said you were gonna do be here and you weren't here. That is disappointing to me and owning the way that I feel. The other ways that we might look like we're living by default is these beliefs that we're carrying around about money. My goodness gracious. We need a whole series on limiting beliefs for women about money. So just some of them are, they're not enough. There's not enough and I haven't earned it, and I need to work harder, and I'm not gonna ask for the pro the raise because what if they say no, we're having money is selfish. All that bullshittery. Around money that we are going to clean up, we're gonna clean it up together. It also might look like you suppressing your ambition because you don't wanna outshine your husband or your wife, or you don't wanna look like too much, or you don't wanna be seen as X, Y, Z. I love women's conferences so much because they generally put women up on the stage who are like, I. Go for it. I wanna be, I wanted to be CEO and I went for it. I wanted to make SE seven figures and be a bestselling author, and I went for it. And these are women who are not suppressing their ambition. They are fueling it for themselves and fueling it for each other. And we've talked about in previous episodes, the difference between zone of excellence, which is where I was for the majority of my career. I was in my zone of excellence where I was really good at something and made good money doing it. But never felt fully alive. Now, there were some times throughout my career where I definitely felt fully alive being a classroom teacher, being a principal, moments here and there, where I just felt like I'm on top of the world. Hey, but we don't have to be in moments of that we can be in cadence of that feeling of I'm on top of the world. Anybody have that song on their running list, or is that just me? Yep. Makes the run a lot happier. So we don't wanna be in our zone of excellence. We wanna be in our zone of genius. And that might mean you trying to figure out a way or you creating a way out of your six figure job to create the thing that you know you're here to create, which happens to be my area of ex of expertise. And the thing that I have done that I'm the proudest of shifting out of your zone of excellence so that you can break the upper limit, shatter the glass ceiling in your own life, and create a life filled with your zone of genius. And that can be at work, it can be in your relationship, it can be in your health. Are you in your zone of genius with. Health. That's an interesting one. Zone of excellence. I have taken a bunch of yoga. I definitely go to the gym a lot, but you know where my zone of genius is. I hope you know this already, but if you don't, it's when I put on my Brooks running shoes. And go for a run. That is my zone of genius. Now, I'm not the fastest runner, nor do I ever care to be, but I want you to know how excited I was. I met this fabulous woman at the Women's Leadership Conference and she told me that the marathon is coming back to New Orleans in November, and I paid attention to the way my body reacted to that, and I basically came out of my grass. I was so excited. What the marathon's coming back to New Orleans, and I'm very excited because A, I'm obsessed with running BI love the time that it takes to create, uh, uh, to create a, the running and a body and a stamina to run the marathon. And C New Orleans is a great place to run a marathon. Do you know why? Guess what we don't have in New Orleans. We don't have any elevation. So it's 26 miles of pure flat run. Perfect. So if you love to run. You wanna be, you wanna run your first marathon or your third or whatever, and you wanna come to New Orleans and run it with me in November. I'm running it. Because I wanna spend as much time in my zone of genius as I can. Do you hear me? Yes. I'm still going to go to the gym'cause I like to have muscles. Yes. I'm still gonna do yoga because it gets me back in my body and it connects me to my spirit. Yes. I'm still gonna go on walks with my husband because we have much better socks when we do that. Did you hear me say that? Yes. But I am excited about spending more time in my zone of genius and I'm excited to help you do the exact same thing in whatever area you are creating your next level in. The thing about creating by design, so we're moving away from being asleep and we're waking up. Moving away from default and moving into creating your next level. By design, it requires a few things. Number one, it requires you to wake up. Wake up. So I normally have my wand. I'm p picking up my wand. I'm waving it at the screen from my audio listeners. Just now I'm waving my wand in your face, and this is a reminder. It's time to wake up and in order to be awake, we've got to be aware. So I want to be aware of how I'm being. I wanna be aware of what I'm thinking. I wanna be aware of what my mood is. I want notice I didn't say judge myself. I said wake up and be aware. Wake up. Do you feel your left big toe? That's awareness. Can you squeeze your right butt cheek? That's awareness. Can you put the tip of your tongue on the top of your mouth and just be with that sensation? That is awareness, and if we can maintain that same level of awareness with what we're thinking and how we're feeling, and who we're being in our energy and frequency, we'll be able to do the second thing, which is to shift our identity. If you're going to create by design your next level, you're going to need to create a next level identity because who you are determines how you think and who you are determines how you feel and who you are determines your energy and your frequency, and it will absolutely determine what you're willing to do. So number one, awake at the wheel for awareness. Number two, you're going to be willing to shift your identity. Who. Are you being, that is your upgraded your next leveled identity. The third thing you're going to need to design your, your next level is courage. And the thing I said about courage and, and my keynote last week is the thing that's required to be courageous is what, what do you have to have in order to also have courage? I'm gonna let you think about it. What do you have to have if you're going to have courage? I hope you didn't say balls.'cause that's an we're a no on that. Have fear. We have to have fear. We've gotta have fear. So if we're awake and we're trying to shift who we are, there probably is gonna be some nervous system dysregulation. You're probably gonna feel a little bit stretchy and a little bit terrified, and a lot a bit afraid, and that is your cue to bring in. Fear's best friend, especially if you're a woman, and that is courage. You're going to need courage to take the action that is aligned with who you are and the next level that you're here to create because you cannot design your next level from the identity that was conditioned to live by default. You can't create your next level from the identity of someone else's programming. So we've gotta ask, who do I want to become? Who do I want to be? What do I actually want? What would I actually love? And what would my life feel like if I were fully and truly? Alive. Can we ask that of ourselves today? And I love talking about feminism. I just realized that I put feminism in the subtitle of this podcast and we really haven't elevated it. Maybe'cause I'm a little bit afraid I'm gonna call myself forward on that. But I love feminism as a lens for car. Conscious creation because feminism isn't political and it's not social. It literally is ex existential and at its core, it's the right for women to design your own life. That is feminism the right for you to design your own life, and that includes your next level. Historically, women have been assigned everything by humans. I'm not talking about the creator's assignment. I'm talking about social constructions of roles. I'm talking about economic dependence on husbands and systems. I'm talking about expectations of being in the home and limitations on leadership and bank accounts and credit. And modern feminism is about reclaiming your choice and you as the author, the designer, and the co-creator of your own experience. Feminism and manifestation are powerful partners. So let's talk about. How we manifest or create by default and how we manifest and create by design, and our hopes and dreams are that we're moving more towards design, which means more awake, more intentional, more on purpose, and less of asleep with the wheel by default. Most of us are manifesting by default through the things that we believe, whether we know that, know them or not. If you don't have enough money in your bank accounts to give and spend and travel and invest, you have. You have beliefs, you have unconscious beliefs about money, and you may not agree with me, but you don't have to. Your results are a reflection of your beliefs. So if you have an incredible marriage, it's. You can have an incredible marriage. If you are successful in your work, it's because you believe that you are worthy of success. On the other hand, if we aren't having success in our four areas, health and wellness, if there's stuff going on in your body, if you're telling me all the things that you have. I'm gonna go off on a tangent. Just come with me for a second. Okay? I need us to stop using the words M and my in front of physical diagnoses. So I don't want you to come up and say, oh, my allergies are so bad. Bitch, those are not your allergies. Did you buy them? You might be experiencing some symptoms of allergies, but you are not your allergies, so you can release the word. My anxiety, my depression, my arthritis. Stop it. Did you buy those? Are you signing up for them? Are you believing that that's who you are? If so, today's the day that you can either stop listening to this podcast or set down that belief it's not yours, and it's possible that your belief is what's causing and creating it. And we're gonna get into how to dispel that. I'm really gonna be manifesting some incredible health and holistic leaders so that we can have conversations around why our beliefs and our feelings are creating the results. And those are great results and not great results. Most of us are manifesting by default through the things that we are believing. We're manifesting by default through the identity that we've either subscribed to or inherited. We are manifesting by default through fear-based decisions. Decisions made on scarcity beliefs to keep us safe, to keep us small, to keep us responsible, and many of us are manifesting by default through cultural expectations, and that can be from race, from gender, from socioeconomic. People in high socioeconomic groups believe and expect that their kids are going to follow in their footsteps. That's a belief. It's an expectation. It's a cultural programming. It's unconscious beliefs. And that's why the one and 2% are still staying with the one and 2% based on expectations. It's based on what we believe. It's based on the patriarchy. Okay. And so today is the invitation to wake up and stay awake because intentional manifesting, which is manifesting by design, requires us first and foremost to be awake, awake. We should maybe call this podcast awake, but it means you're going to have to consciously create, or recreate, or reconstruct your own beliefs. It means you might have to dismantle some things that you used to believe that are not true. Living by design. Manifesting by design means you get to choose who you're being. You choose your identity. You're not waiting for someone else to tell you who you are, you decide you embody. It also requires you to have an aligned vision, which means once you have decided who you are, you need to create a series of actions and strategies to create a result that lines up with that. It's why I closed down girls who recover, because talking about recovery all day long is not aligned with what my dreams are. I appreciate the thought leadership. I appreciate the ways that I'm able to serve others in that way, but that's my zone of excellence. It's not my zone of genius. And so remember, alignment just means all four tires are moving in the same direction and your wheel isn't turning a hard li hard left on the interstate like mine was. It means that who you are and what you say and what you do, and what you think are all lined up with what you wanna agree with your next level. It's all a through line, and it also requires you to be courageous in your action. Living by design means you are going to have to be courageous because fear is gonna try and stop you because she just wants you to feel safe. So by living through design in a design-based way of creating, we are awake to the things we're believing. We are deciding who we are. We are lining up our being with our action and our results, and we're being courageous with the actions that we're taking. Your life's already being created. Always, always, always, always, always, always. And the question we wanna answer today is, am I creating it by default or am I creating it by design? Am I awake at the wheel of my own life? So here are some questions to wake us up when you look at the whole of your life. Maybe just look at the last 24 hours to keep it simple. Which parts of your last 24 hours did you consciously choose? Did you choose? So I woke up this morning at five. I went to the gym because I go to the gym on Mondays. I'm in the middle of a 24 hour fast because I 24 hour fast on Mondays. Thank you, Dr. Mindy Powell's fasting has changed my life. I chose that. There are parts of my life that are not consciously chosen. We've got some financial stuff that we're clearing up. We've got some health stuff that we're clearing up. We've got some harmony in our family that we're clearing up those parts because they're not part of what we would love. We're subconsciously chosen. Or chosen by someone else. The other questions you can ask about your 24 hours or the totality of your life is, what did I inherit? What did I inherit? Now I'm gonna give you a silly example, but do you know that we have, let me count them. We have seven pets. We used to have eight, but. RIP. Elmo Elmo died. Our white rabbit we're so sad about it. Okay? But we have seven pets. We live in the suburbs and we have seven pets. We have four bunnies, Remy, precious, cocoa, and steely. Dan, we, Santa just brought us two kittens. So we have Lena Skittles, and then we have Louis Ketos, and then we have our dog, who has recently been deemed by the parish as a dangerous nuisance, and her name is Honey, appropriately named. That's a different podcast. I inherited this love of animals. I also inherited a love for chaos because if you have seven animals and three kids, there's probably gonna be chaos. I inherited that, but you hear me not judging it, right? Because I chose to have those animals. I choose the chaos. I welcome it. But there's some parts of my life that I inherited that I don't want, and it might sound like, oh gosh, I have to work. I have to work 12 hours today to get it all done. Oh, I have to follow up with every single person. Oh, did I say the right things on my, on that podcast interview? Can I get it all done? That part I inherited.'cause I was raised with a bunch of lists that in order to sleep well at night, you had to get all your lists done. And I was raised with this messaging that in order to be successful, you have to be the person who works the hardest and that is a lie. That's a lie, and I'm awake at the wheel of my own life. I also am very grateful to human design because projectors are not even designed to work that much. Praise be. And so I'm awake and I'm realizing that I inherited those things. Now I get to decide. Do I wanna keep lugging'em along? Or do I wanna change my own game? Some other questions we can ask is, am I living in someone else's expectations? I don't know if he listens to the podcast, but my husband has really high expectations about cleanliness. He got those expectations from, well, he got came by. Honestly, I'll just leave it there. That's his story. I did not come by those same expectations. I went to visit, uh, my mom stayed at my mom's house last week, and my mom and I are so alike. We love all the things, and so our space isn't the cleanest. Now. I went on a minimalism kick when my second daughter was born, so I'm recovering from that. And I really am embracing minimalism, but my husband's expectations are very different than mine. And so we're just gonna let him have them, and I'm gonna do my best. But what I'm not gonna do is have one more argument about me being a slob, because I'm not a slob, I'm just not at your expectation. And I'm gonna let myself have my own expectation, and I'm gonna let you have yours. And I'm not gonna change for you, and I'm not gonna stress for you. I'm gonna be clear on what's important to me, and I'm going to be aligned with that. Do you hear what I'm saying? Is it coming through? Okay, good. And then I wanna ask us also, what would life look like if I first of all took leadership from my own identity and frequency, and two, if I designed it intentionally? One of my very first teachers, Mary Morrisey, I'm obsessed with her. I love her so much. She asked this, she said she made this point that blew me out of my seat. She said, most of us spend more time planning a vacation than we do. Planning our life. No, I'm not much of a planner, I'm gonna be honest with you, but I do plan a little bit for our trips and vacations and you know, you have kids, you gotta plan stuff, but I had never thought about the intentionality that if I just use that same focus time and energy on planning my next year or planning my next level, or planning my life as I did, planning the grocery list. Anybody else, how differently it would look. And since I learned that I've done what I'm going to teach you to do in the next several episodes, which is to be as intentional about that part of my life, designing it with the same level of tenacity that I approach the week schedule with creating my next level. Anybody else have like a color coded by kids schedule? I don't have that currently, but I definitely made one. And then my recovering type, a part of me was like, Hey sissy, you don't need that. Let it go. So anyway, we're all growing progress, not perfection. What happens if we. Don't create by design. What happens if we just keep living asleep at the wheel of our own life? Well, you probably already know. It leads to burnout. It leads to resentment that you're just keeping inside. That's why you feel like a volcano sometimes. Default living by default is the reason why we have what are called midlife crises, which my friend at midlife butterflies calls them midlife breakthroughs, and I love that. It leads to us not fulfilling our assignment or potential. It leads to us not living in our zone of genius. And the, the thing about living by default is it's a tragedy. And the tragedy isn't a failure. The tragedy is women living entire lives that they never consciously chose. That's the tragedy. And we're gonna be done with that. That's the whole reason why this podcast exists. So Za, let's get to it. What designing your life looks like a next week's episode and subsequent episode, we're gonna get really into the wildflowers on this, so we're gonna get specific about. What it looks like to blueprint and to design your life. But today, some examples might look like you being brave enough to pull your car over, crack open your notebook and write down the answer to the question, what would I love? Because I know you're listening and maybe you haven't done it and you're missing the point. What would I love? What would I love? And it might be being brave and audacious and say like, I love. To make$500,000 this year, I'd love to live in a body that loves me back. I love to have a thriving marriage and a hot sex and deep connection and adventure and partnership. I'd love to feel like my work was on purpose in making a difference. I'd love to have so much money that I can give generously and invest in the causes I care about and make a true difference with my dollars, not have to worry about money ever again. I love to be the boss of my own calendar. And I love to know exactly who and whose I am no matter where I go. Living your life by design might look like you leaving that job that does not fit you. It might look like you being brave at asking for more money. It might look like you negotiating. It might look like you building and scaling your business. It might look like you being the brave one in the room to say no, it's not okay to tell a hundreds of women leaders that we're gonna have an hour and a half long conversation on peptides because the message when we do that is all y'all need to lo lose weight. And this conference is about leadership. It's not about body image. You get to be the brave one. That could be a part of what designing your life to be audacious and courageous. And a difference maker, or it could be just you telling somebody that you hurt, they hurt your feelings. It's definitely gonna look like you'd redefining what success looks like. It might look like redefining what you wanna be as a parent. It might look like you creating work that feels like you're fully alive. I'm not sure, I'm not in your shoes, but I know that living your life by design looks like you creating your next level that you're in love with. Think Meg Ryan. Where she's at the cafe with, oh my gosh, perimenopause. You've taken his name, but you know which one I'm talking about. They're at the cafe and she has her little drink, and then she says she freaks out because it's so good, and everybody in the cafe says, oh, what she's having. That is what it looks like to live your life by design, and that is what we're here for, and that is what you're worthy of, and that is what your destiny is. If you're willing to answer the question, what would I love? If you're willing to get curious and aware of the ways that you are living in your own programming. With beliefs that don't belong to you, that might be suffocating you, and it might look like you deciding that today is the day that you are going to start living by design. That means you get to design what you're thinking and what you're feeling and how you're being. You get to decide, design and decide for the actions that are aligned with that identity. And it also means you deciding that you are available for the results of your next level, this or something. Even better still. I also wanna remind you that you are a spiritual being, having a human experience. And so when we talk about co-creating, we're talking about you being a wave in the ocean. You are the ocean. We're talking about you being a ray in the sun. You are the sun. We're talking about you being a piece of the master, a masterpiece. We're talking about you being some. Of the one someone. You are a spiritual being, having a human experience, and part of this is gonna require you to tap into your spirit and your source and become the light that you were created to be so that you can do the thing that you've been assigned to do so that you can make a difference for women and girls in this world.'cause what else is there? Today's episode has been all about you. Deciding that you're awake at the wheel of your own life. You interrupting this living by default and you deciding that you are the designer, the co-creator of your own life, that you get to decide who you're going to be and what you're going to do so that you can have the next level in the ways in your life that will make the biggest difference. For you and the people that you are sent here to serve. And girl, it is so big, your assignment, I'm so grateful for you and if you have felt called forward by this work, there's a calling on your heart. It looks like your next level, but you are not sure how to co-create it yourself. And you want support and mentorship and someone to run with you and believe in you. In the show notes, there is an invitation. To a complimentary conversation with me. And if you and I sit down for 90 minutes and we get crystal clear on what is happening right now in your life and what your next level looks like, you will become unstoppable. You will remember who you are. You will remember what is possible for you, and it would be my pleasure and my gift to spend that time investing in and pouring into your dreams so that you can create the next level that you have been sent here to create. To make a bigger difference in this world for you and for the women and girls who will lead and follow after you. I love you so much. I'm so proud of you. This has been a super fun episode. Thank you for your time, for your love, for your energy. And before we go, I want you to know I love you. I believe in you. I'm so grateful for you, and I am right here with you as you create your next level of success. That feels as good as it looks. See you on the next episode. Whoa. Did you just feel what I felt? There's a whole lot of that and so much more to help you create your next level of personal and professional success on upcoming episodes of Her Next Level podcast, now ranked in the top 5% of podcasts globally. If you're a leader, a founder, an entrepreneur, or a woman who makes a difference in the world, and you're ready to break through your glass ceilings and upper limits. Let's make it happen together. In the show notes, you'll find a link to book a free one-on-one conversation with me. We'll get clear on what next level success looks like. We'll create powerfully aligned goals and a plan just for you. We'll talk about the things holding you back, and you will walk away with a roadmap for how to create your next level of personal and professional success because hear it from me, my friend. You deserve next level success and freedom, and the full identity of a woman who knows what she's capable of and exactly who she is. And I wanna help you get there. So book your free call in the notes. If you love this episode, follow the podcast. Give us five stars, write a lovely review. Share it with your best friend, share it with your neighbor, share it with your mom. Share it with the extraordinary women in your life, and in case you haven't heard today, I love you. I'm so proud of you, and I believe in your ability to create an extraordinary life you love starting right now. I'll see you in the next episode.