Stop Letting the wrong voices define you

Have you ever realized you've been living your life according to someone else's opinion of you?

The voice that told you that you were too much. The one that said you weren't enough. The one that made you shrink, second-guess, and play small — for years.

In this episode, Key Glover gets real about the voices that try to write our story for us — the ones from our past, from family, from relationships, and the ones we've internalized so deeply we've started calling them our own thoughts.

We're talking about what it means to be rooted — deeply, unshakeably rooted in who God says you are — so that nothing outside of you has the power to define you anymore.

This episode includes a grounding breathwork practice, the Week 1 affirmation spoken aloud, and talking points anchored in Psalm 1:3.

If you've been carrying a narrative that was never yours to begin with — it's time to put it down.

📓 This week's journal prompts:
· What belief about yourself doesn't actually belong to you?
· Who are you when no one is watching?

🎙️ New episodes every Tuesday. Follow @bigeyedgirlpodcast on Instagram for weekly affirmations and journal prompts.

Transcript

0:00

Hello, beautiful. Take a breath. You're exactly where you need to be. Welcome to the Big Eye Girl Podcast, a space for real conversations, honest reflection, and learning how to see life through a bigger, wider lens. I'm so glad you're here. Whether you press play because you're searching for clarity, growth, or just a moment to breathe and feel seen, you're in the right place. And around here, we talk about things that shape us the challenges, the shifts, the lessons, and the quiet moments in between that often matter the most. This is a space where you don't have to have it all figured out. You just have to be open. So wherever you are right now, driving, walking, or just sitting with your thoughts, settle in. Take what you need from this conversation and allow yourself to see things a little differently today. Let's get into it. Made a choice, said something, wore something, and it was genuinely fully for you. Not for the kids, not for your clients, not to see meet someone's else's expectation, just for you. If you had to think about it for more than two seconds, this episode is for you. You know, I'm integrating something new in into the podcast that I actually do. And that is, I do I offer breath work. And the breath work is for just grounding. So before we get into these conversations, we're gonna be slow and intentional with the grounding breath today. I want you to imagine roots growing down from wherever you're sitting or standing right now, down through the floor into the earth. You are hailed, you are grounded. Take a deep breath in through your nose. Hold it. Breathe it out slow through your mouth. Releasing anything that is not yours to carry today. Let's do that one more time. That felt good. In through the nose. Oh through the mouth. Yes, this. This week's affirmation went a little bit like this. Repeat it after me. Or just let me say it over you. I am rooted in who God says I am. Not in what I've been through, not in what I've lost, not in what anyone else thinks of me. My foundation is unshakable. Say it again if you need, write it down, put it on a mirror. That's my favorite place to put it. Because today we're going to talk about what it actually means to be rooted. See, the scripture reference for this episode is one that I used to always when I well say always, but when I read it, or when I read it and read it, I could imagine me being this tree that's planted. And it says in Psalms 1.3, she is like a tree planted by the streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season, and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever she does prospers. Yeah. See that scripture hit for me. I'm gonna come back to that. Cause we're gonna unfold that a little bit. Just a little bit. And there's seasons in how we found our way back in those seasons. I know, like in past episodes, I've talked about situations or um topics of this matter, and it's like, oh I won't say all why I keep coming back here. However, it this season is specific in um why I'm choosing and allowing the conversations to almost seem repetitive, but in repetition, sometimes in consistency, that is where we can undo things and we can see where things have been done. It was season in my lives where I was saying, I can't say per se that family was constantly uh being the voice drowning out what I believed. It was the voices within that was drowning out what I believed, what God said about me, who I am in God, who I am in Christ. It was the narrative that I was constantly regurgitating over and over and over and over again. That I said, yeah, I can't, how do I battle those? Because I didn't have, and I don't have, and I'm speaking like for right now, y'all. I don't have people around me saying, Yeah, you ain't gonna make it, yeah, you ain't nothing, yeah. You dumb, you know, any of the ignorant things that can negatively affect us and how we move through life. No, I didn't have that, I don't have that now, and I really didn't have that in the past so much. It would be hidden by my own thoughts or thoughts that were contrary to what the word says that I am. I am fearfully and wonderfully made in his image, but then sometimes I compare myself because I would forget. I'll start scrolling through social media and I'll start seeing somebody who make up a little better than mine, or their hair look like this, or they body look like that, or dang, how they had that child they had talking about they didn't have twins, they body way better than mine. I just had one, all the things, so they didn't got married. What's wrong with me? Comparison. I forgot in that moment, scrolling and scrolling and going dumb roll um strolling, that I forgot that I'm fearfully and wonderfully made in his image. You good, sis? You beaming, you you key, you look great. Instead, and when that voice came up, instead of allowing it to fester and take root in my thinking, in my pattern, in what I believe, even if I was to just say when I don't say anything, that's almost saying you agree with it, but in those moments, you have to counter that thought with something. I had to get to a point where as I grew in faith, as I grew in who I am, not just affirmations. See, this podcast is a jambalaya of all the modalities that have anchored me in my faith with God to become in becoming the woman of God that I am. Yes, I love an affirmation, but I also believe that it's power in the word, it's power in the words that we speak, but it's power in God's word. Am I saying that power that affirmations don't have power? It depends on what is being said, but I also know that God obeys his word, not your words, not our words. So I use both of them because the affirmations help me realize that yes, I am beautiful, like I said earlier, I am rooted in who God says I am. Now in what I am, not in what I've been through, but what and not what I've lost, not in what anyone else thinks of me. You see, that's it. I said think my foundation is unshakable because if I'm planted, if I am planted, if I'm like a tree planted by streams of water, I mean I'm planted in the ground, I'm anchored in the ground. Have you ever seen like the roots of a tree, y'all? The roots of a tree. I've seen um images and I've read different articles and things like that, where it says the tree's roots mimic what the tree we see on the outside above ground. That's what is reflected below the ground. That to me is like mind-blowing. So if I'm a tree, if you're a tree planted by the streams of water, that means I'm always supplied what I need. My needs are met. I'm never thirsty. I ain't thirsty for uh someone like my post. I ain't thirsty for attention, I ain't thirsty, I ain't I ain't lacking nothing. I got everything. I'm rooted and I'm grounded, I'm safe and I'm secure. That's how that's how it flows for me. And it may not flow for somebody else like that. It may be like, you know, that ain't the Bible and I don't care. I digress, but it works for me. You, and it may be a lot of y'all who understand that sometimes it ain't what other people do on family saying or relationships, it may be just the thoughts that's in your mind that's having you not believe what is going on. Like I know I'm good, or you're hearing people say, Girl, you're you this, and you give me compliments after compliments, and you got all the accolades, and you're getting all the the cheers and horays, all these things, but for some reason you just can't find the joy to or the joy within you, and you can't celebrate yourself. What you believing about yourself? Are you believing what God said about you? That's the rethinking because right now He said you you like a tree planted about water, like you great. These people looking at you like, whoa, what you doing? But you also got it's also a narrative that's screaming even louder sometimes. And most of the time it is. What they gonna say if I do this? What they gonna say if I wear this, what they gonna say if I wear this red lip? What they gonna say if I got my skin showing? What they gonna say if I I um what what they gonna say? I don't even I can't even think of nothing, y'all like for real. I want to blank a little bit. I ain't gonna lie. You can't we cannot be rooted in people's opinions. Sometimes we be if I have been rooted in people's opinions so much, y'all, sometimes where I wouldn't even move. And I will have to look myself in the mirror and say, Keith, if you don't get yourself together, girl, you is fine, you is beat, you you are this, you are I would say so many affirming things to myself in the mirror, y'all. Yes, my 40-plus-year-old self still does that from time to time. If I need to, I will shake myself together. Girl, you cute, girl. You fine. This is what we got, and we're gonna break it. I what I will what I'm digressing when I started to believe and start to activate what the word says about me versus my narrative of keep constantly repeating what they gonna think if I wear this, or what they gonna wear, or where they going, or what if they think if I do this, or what if what they gonna think if I go here by myself, and what if they gonna think if I I have dinner or I do something by myself? What who cares? Who cares? It's really showing that you care too much about what people think and not enough about what God said. He said you chosen, he said you're a royal priesthood, he said you're a holy nation. He said you're peculiar. I love the way that the old king, the King James, I was gonna say the old King James version, King James version, the peculiar. I just like the word peculiar. The word peculiar does something to me. The misunderstood does something to me, and not being misunderstood to be rebellious, being misunderstood because I'm just misunderstood, but I'm understood by the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords. That is it has taken me so much for me to believe it, even the more to walk in it, to live in it, to breathe in it, to allow that to be the narrative that's going through my psyche. I'm a single mother entrepreneur, and staying rooted daily is not easy. It'd be days where I'll be like, I have failed someday. I had a situation, a um conversation, and it took me down y'all, a down a downward spiral where I felt that I was not able to do anything for my kid. Money couldn't fix it. Me taking him to dinner, me going to get his favorite toy, me spending time with him. I went to church, was literally in church because the the encounter happened before we went to church. And y'all, I was this past Sunday, I was at church and I was not a hundred percent. I was on negative 10. I ain't gonna lie. And I went in hopes like God, you might you you the only one can help me. I can't get myself out of this one, I don't even know what to do. And it was so many negative narratives running through my head, and all I could say is God, you gotta keep me. I couldn't audibly speak, but my energy was so ugly. My energy was like, don't come for me. You couldn't come for to me, come for me negatively. If it wasn't gonna be kindness or smile, a nice greeting, look at me while I'm looking at you. I wasn't being rude to people or anything like that. I had some self-control. I was exercising it. However, common the circumstance, the situation that happened between my son and I, it was a pattern that was revealed to me that I needed God's help in it all. In it all, like I had to surrender it all, and I look good, I smell good, we got a roof over our head, we got a vehicle, I have a career, all the things are checked, but this is something I cannot fix, and it's also something that I participated in that's causing the effect. And when this has come up before, y'all, I have run to my own solutions, so I wouldn't sit in it, I wouldn't sit in the mud. I was telling my mom about it today, and I told her, I said, Ma, I felt like I was walking through quicksand, and she replied, You were because I was, y'all. I was in church and worship was cool out, and I'ma worship like singing, clapping, screaming, hallelujah, praise girl. Okay, I got a couple of those and I sat down. And somebody said, Oh, you let the devil defeat you, and this, this, and that, and you let the devil seal your joy. No, I did not. My emotional, my soul was hurting. My soul was hurting. I was sitting in some pain. I was sitting in some ang, I was sitting, I was sitting in some frustration. And my son, before he had left the house, he could tell my energy had shifted. And he said to me, He was like, Mommy, he said, Mommy, what's wrong? He said, You mad at me? I said, No, I'm not mad at you, I'm disappointed in you. I started to see how my responses to him were not the responses that I would give in the past when things like this had came up. I seen that I couldn't, I wasn't gonna be mean to him because I knew that well I wasn't gonna audibly be mean. Now, energy was like, Yeah, don't mess with me. I ain't gonna lie about that. And even after we left church, he could tell that I still wasn't feeling him. Mama, what's wrong with you again? And I was honest, but in my honesty, I had to let him know like I'm hurting and I need to understand, and I can't understand. And I know you're kidding. You quite don't understand how to are how to deliver it to me for me to understand. And I need some help here. And I got quiet again. I had to go through these spaces. We got home. I cooked dinner. I had an event to come to, and I and as I'm going through the places and I'm being honest with my emotions with my son, but not being nasty with him as I probably could have been in the past, or you know, just the attitude could have been very heart-wrenching and toxic. I avoided those at all costs by just holding in and kept asking, God, help me, help me, help me. God saved me through this. I don't know what to do. I know that I haven't failed as a mother. I know that I didn't I could not get angry at the people that were involved and why we go, my him and I are going through the situation, going through what we're going through. I could not, I couldn't pick up the phone and dialing in to his dad and be like, yo, or dialing in to my ex and be like, yo, we need we need y'all, and y'all not showing up for him. Because God said, and I looked at the scripture when I was preparing for my podcast. I'm not gonna lie, and I said, God, I need this to be real for me. And y'all, I'm actually this episode is gonna come out late. It's gonna come out late on Tuesday because I'm recording it on Tuesday. That's how transparent I am with y'all right now. Because summer vacation, just summer vacation just started for those who are mommies, parents, y'all understand. But I'm gonna let y'all know I ain't nothing over here perfect. I'm working this thing out in real time with y'all, excuse me. The old folks say something that went down the wrong way. But eventually, as I'm going through that day, Sunday, I kept pressing through and kept going through and I had an event. And as I'm writing, that's when I began to get the revelation that I needed. I got the answer. I wanted the answer came to me. I said, I need some I need a therapist for me and my son. I need a therapist. First, I was like, I gotta need a therapist for my son. For real, for real. Like, I need some help. Because this is emotional healing that needs to happen. This is emotional, and I know it is. Now my son is not bad. He not, he's not like, no, it's not that. This is emotional wounds that he has that I knew that he would have because I'm a part, I'm a reason of why he's he hasn't. I'm part of it. I'm not the whole reason. Y'all, I had to stay rooted in asking God help me. I had to press through some places, have a conversation with a homegirl of mine, then have a conversation with my BFF, my BF, and then I cried eventually, just cried. But as I'm releasing and I'm talking, but I'm being still and not like physically sitting still, not moving, waiting on God. No, I was still. I wasn't trying to put my hand to it because I'm rooted. If I stay rooted in Christ, if I stay rooted in the word, I'm going, my my needs are gonna be supplied because see I'm rooted next to a stream of water. I just gotta wait for what I need fills me, and also pushes the other stuff out the way. Baby and water do so much. Mm-hmm. So today in real time, I'm catching up, catching my mom up on what happened on Sunday. And she said, Yeah, I know something was wrong, which I could tell. She said, But I've learned something about you that when you in the space, you don't just bombard you. She said, You let you kind of process it so you then you will come around today, Monday, yesterday. I reached out to a friend in the family. He's like an uncle to me. Told him I need one of his friends' number. I need the therapist, ASAP. He said, Yep, alright. No, got you, got it. Clock it. If follow through. He called me late last night, you know, not late last night, but last yesterday evening. We talked this morning, and as we're talking, he's listening to me. He said, So what you telling me, both of y'all need therapy. I laughed it off. I said, Yep. See, because I haven't been with a therapist since last year. I was with two different therapists. I was with a group therapist because of my sister's passing, and then I was with just a regular talk therapy. They didn't go well, but you know, but I've been in therapy for in and out my life for I would say over 10 years. Over 10 years. So therapy is real to me. It's a it's a tool that I use. So y'all, this is how I stay rooted. If you didn't hear it, the word believing with the word, say, even with my emotions because as y'all so heard me express I'm good physically, it was my emotional wounds I had to sit in this quicksand, and I felt like I was going deeper and deeper and deeper. I was in quicksand and I couldn't get out, and so I just surrendered. I continued, I just had to surrender. God, I need your help. I just need your help. I need you. I need you to show up as father. You said you were father to the fatherless. My son is fatherless. You said you are close to you, you love the the brokenhearted. I'm brokenhearted, my son and I in this area. Help us. Because, father, if you don't do it, I I've exhausted all what I know to do. I've done it in the past so many times that I can't regurgitate that no more. I don't even want to. Now I'm choosing to sit in it and allow it to resonate. I mean, not even resonate, to allow it to do whatever it's doing for me to believe that greater is he that's in me than he that's in this world. So Psalms one, three means to me that all my needs are always supplied, that I'm planted so deeply into the earth. My roots are so deep that even if a branch does die off, I got so many branches up under there that the water is coming to feed that area in me that was dead, that was rotten, that was untapped. It's just waiting for God is waiting for me to yield it to him. But in every season I yield fruit, you yield fruit when you know that you planted. In the season when it's time to yield that fruit, you know what? When we think about fruit, all fruit right now in this world, a lot of fruit is always accessible to us, right? But fruit has seasons, vegetables have seasons where they're the best. The pineapples, the mangoes, the apples, the oranges. And they'll say you go to certain grocery stores, if you go to Publix, if you hear, you know, you got a Publix or whatever, you go to farmers markets, you go to sprouts, it'll sometimes say in season, letting you know, cherries, my favorite. Tap in, they fresh. So in Psalms 1, 3, yeah, that means something to me. You let me know that in my season, yo, I'm bearing fruit, I'm gonna yield some fruit, and my leaves ain't gonna never wither. And whatever I do, it's gonna prosper. Whatever I put my hand to is gonna prosper. So if the enemy fighting me on producing something, doing something, God said everything I put my hand to is gonna prosper. So I'm let's go. That means I shouldn't have no doubt. That means if doubt, I won't say you should not take that back. That means when doubt does come, because you're gonna have it. That you got something to counter it with. Especially if you're a person, you're an artist, and you do things with your hands, you're a painter, a hairdresser, uh, barber, a nail tech, uh a designer, uh, whatever you create, maybe it's gonna prosper. You align with the will of God for your life. That's what the words say, words say it's gonna prosper, and I believe it. Because whatever I really put my hands to, y'all, it's been blessed. It's just sometimes in the seasons when I'm waiting because it takes a season for things to grow, it takes a season for you get that that bunch of good old collard greens that you placed in that good old fertile ground. Collard greens ain't ready as soon as you put them down in the ground. You don't see no corn stalk as soon as you don't when you put the corn down in the ground. He put the herbs in the soil, the herbs in the slotter on the time, and all the herbs ain't ready as soon as you plant the little seed. Takes time. Psalms 1-3 is showing me that it takes time because as a tree, it takes time for the water to get up those roots to feel to in to quench the thirst. There are three things that keep me rooted, knowing my word when life tries to tell you who you are, you need to do something to get back to. What scriptures or truths do you return to when you feel unsteady? What are the scriptures and the tools you you run to when you feel unsteady? Do like me if you had a dry erase where I'll write these scriptures down. But the season I'm in, is maybe it's enough word for every season, every moment, every circumstance, every thought. Write them down, let them see, let you see them, put sticky notes, mirror. I get a dry erase, an expo marker, and write on my mirror in a minute. Write in your journal, post it in your car, put it on your phone. Another thing I do, protecting my peace. Roots need good soil. So, baby girl, you need good soil. Ask yourself, these are some tools. What are what relationships, habits, or environments have you had to remove from your life to stay grounded? I'm giving y'all these tools to actively get you reflecting and possibly writing it down. You might have to listen to this episode again because baby, this episode is in real time. You understand me? This is raw. June is about being raw for me. I'm letting it all hang out. My uncle told me, he said, My Yeah, you're gonna get to the point with them scripts, you ain't gonna really need them scripts, you're gonna get to talking. This is it. Number three, things to keep me rooted, coming back to myself. How you do that, Key? What does your personal comeback to center practice look like? What do you need to come back to yourself? Some people, it is they like to exercise, they may like to sew, they may like to draw, they may like to cook, or it may be exercising, you may practice yoga, stretching, Pilates, any of those things. For me, it is breath work, yoga, and meditation. And personally, I am a um I'm a certified yoga therapist. I mean, yeah, but the practice of facilitating classes I haven't done in outside of beauty school, I haven't done for the collective in a year, and I feel I was telling my mom today, because y'all getting real-time stuff. I said, Ma, redid my resume, and I'm about to go ahead and just go ahead and start applying to these yoga studios because I really know what I'm doing. But y'all just like, y'all, I'm talking to y'all about it. The thoughts of doubt. I was a little bit bad. I was battling with the with the chick. I was battling with doubt. I was like, yo, can't do that. Blah blah blah blah blah. You ain't practice, you ain't been consistent in y'all practice, da da da. Then I had to remember, like, chick, yoga is not about the asanas. Oh different gosh conversation for another day. But guess what I did, y'all? I redid that resume and that cover letter, and I'll apply to some spaces. And I'm about to get it popping. So, yeah, in a minute, y'all gonna have to pull up. Yup. I told you I got things, I got things coming down the pipe. I'm not playing with it. God didn't have me doing tapping into these modalities just for my benefit. I have a gift of healing on my life that I did not ask for, it was given to me, and I'm gonna continue to use it for the glory of God because it's it's needed out here, and um, yeah, so that is um me coming back to myself because it helps me. That's not just helping me whenever guy is in something, y'all. That's reciprocal. I believe that it's a reciprocity here. I'm not always giving to people who can give back to me. I'm gonna give them to people who really can't do nothing. But them showing up and their sincere cry or their sincere smile or their their hug or them saying thank you for seeing me fills a cup that baby. Not saying I ain't gonna make my money, I'm gonna make my money, honey. But those sincere expressions, they come, they hit differently. As y'all already know, y'all got the journal prompts for Monday, and I'm changing how I'm doing as y'all already know, how the episodes are flowing. I'm wanting to, I'm integrating more, I'm integrating the things that I offer on social media that is on a podcast as well. I don't, I want you to have the affirmations on the podcast because I give affirmations on my social media platform. I give journal promptings on my social media platform. I make real posts and then I also give you the audio version of myself. And soon it comes, drop it in July, you have a video version. So this week the journal promptings were two questions. Let it sit with you for the rest of the week. You can answer them to yourself, you can write them down, whatever you feel led to do. First question is what is one belief about yourself that you've been carrying that doesn't actually belong to you. And the next is and who are you when no one else is watching? Yo, this one used to get me, y'all. Oh my god. Because hypocrisy is a team in the community, and I've been in some communities, maybe like this, oh, we don't do that. That's what the Christians do. I'm looking like, yo, I didn't see you at home, bro. Oh, we don't do that. That's what we like, yeah. But it made me that question makes me look at myself because I don't want to come off as a hypocrite. And if I ever did, I always would say, forgive me. I'm sorry I messed that one up. I did this, I did that. So write these out and be honest with yourself. Remember, my beloved, you are rooted, you are held, and the fruit is coming. I love you, I see you. I'll meet you back here next Tuesday. I'm key and it continue to keep those wide eyes awakened. Peace. Before you go, I just want to say thank you for being here and choosing to spend this time with me. It really means more than you know. If this episode spoke to you in any way, the best way you can support the Big Eye Girl Podcast is by simply following the show right here where you are listening. That way you never miss a conversation. Because new episodes drop every week. And if something you heard today made you think of another woman in your life, a friend, a sister, a coworker, share this episode with her. You truly never know how a conversation can shift someone's perspective or give them exactly what they needed to hear at that right time. This space is about growth, honesty, and seeing life through a bigger, wider lens. And it only grows stronger when we bring other women into it. So follow, share, and keep the conversation going beyond this episode. Until next time, stay open, stay hopeful, and keep living wide eye.