I'm so grateful to my coach Faith Mariah (Blogging Breakthroughs podcaster) for gifting our community with this phrase.  It's changed my mindset completely.

Anytime I feel I'm in the vibe of confusion, I refer to this phrase "being confused is a choice" which means to me that there is an answer I'm not looking for.  I could know a solution but I'm not pursuing it at the moment.  Or, there is an area of my life where I need to learn more, perhaps develop a skill, or get help from someone who has that skill already.

There are so many options for all of life's confusions.

Maybe I'm not asking the right question or googling enough, but my answer IS SOMEWHERE.  

And this phrase always reminds me of that.

I really appreciate everyone who made my birthday so special yesterday.  For my birthday, I gave the gift of growth to myself.  I did the most uncomfortable thing I've done in a long time.  I have this unspoken goal to do one thing that scares me once a week.  Yesterday may have been the start of that.

Thank you to all my listeners for such a great birthday! I appreciate everyone who wished, liked, commented, or gave to me on my birthday.  My intention for doing what I did and showing y'all how scared I was while doing it was to hopefully inspire or motivate you to do the same.  

Don't be afraid to ASK for assistance, opportunities, etc.

Looking back, I'm wondering if I've gone without in certain areas just because I'm too stubborn to ask.  I'm working on that a lot this year.

WOW, y'all!  I did not expect this to be such an emotional episode for me, but I wanted to give y'all a behind the scenes around how much drama I had around linking my PayPal and Venmo on my social medias today for my birthday.  

This was an extremely uncomfortable thing for me to do.  I almost don't want to do it because it literally makes my skin crawl to think I'm asking for money on my birthday when really I can reframe that thought.

I'm just guiding people to a source where if they wanted to do something special for me and they are thinking, "How can I bless RayLynn on this day?"  "What can I do for my favorite podcaster and friend?"

It's been a hard couple of months for me and while gifts are nice.  I'm in a season of my life where money would go a long way for me since I've been out of work with my foot.  

I appreciate everyone who shows up to listen.  I hope this podcast gave you a little behind the scenes of how tough and how many stories I have associated with asking for help or feeling like I'm asking for ANYTHING.  I'm working on it and I hope showing y'all that process helps someone else.

Venmo: @rayklugh

I care about my listeners a lot.  My intention for every podcast is to give you some truth or information that will enhance and/or bring peace to your life.  Today, I share a little bit of my story about how I used to blame my father for all of my failed relationships and how at some point I realized it was really holding me back from doing the work on my healing.  

Thank you so much for taking some time to listen to my story.  I appreciate you.

The episode may be hard to hear, but I don't think I would be a good podcast host if I didn't share how ineffective blaming is in our every day lives and how our lives can change dramatically when we start doing it.

Tomorrow in part two, I can go into more detail about how my life changed by not blaming because it helped me identify when other people were trying to and succeeding in manipulating me through blaming/pointing the finger at me.

In today's podcast, I talk about the importance of knowing your people.  

You know where you go when you need groceries.  You know you go to a mechanic to fix your car.  You know you go to best friend/co-worker when you want to go on those Happy Hours for lunch.  

In this episode, I get CLEAR about who I am for you.  Which person I am in your life.  

Know your people.

Hey everyone!  So today is a special episode!  It's longer than my typical content because I have another guest on!  

Peygan is a professor at Bayou Jiu jitsu and self-defense. I've been friends with him for over a year now and I've seen him try to do a lot of mindset work in the past year.  And today, I sit down with him in this interview to try to get a feel for what sparked his inspiration to work on his self-talk.  We talk about the challenges that come with being a leader of a gym, especially a leader to young children.  He talks about the mental struggle associated with choosing his passion as a career over taking the college route.  

Lots of good things in the interview.  I appreciate Peygan giving us him time and being so open about his challenges and what he's learned from them.

Today, I talk with y'all while I'm frustrated.  In the midst of starting my day off on the wrong foot and I give myself a pep talk.  The one I would usually give to myself as the day went on but instead I just say it out loud in case you are also going through a rough morning. 

YouTube Recommendation for today: 

6 Mysterious Facts About Your Subconscious Mind

Today, I chat with y'all about how I feel the New Year has doubled the size of my to-do list.  I don't know if I'm the only one... If I'm not, I believe in you.  I believe you can rise to the challenge and I know you need to be kind to yourself.  Whatever resolution or goal you are reaching for this year.