RealPositiveGirl - Weekly Encouragement & Mental Health

Instead of allowing your past pains & traumas to hold you hostage & get in your way of achieving new goals & having new experiences, decide to let these pains stay in the past & not be the reason you don't move forward in life. Here are 5 tips that will help you do this.

Show Notes:
I wanted to bring this topic up because as we enter a new year, as important as it is to focus on new goals & opportunities we are embarking on, it’s ALSO important to not drag unnecessary baggage & pain from the past into this new year.

Maybe you don’t feel the need to have a fresh start altogether, but at least a clean slate for the moment will make it a whole lot easier to achieve your new goals & not spend too much time on things you cannot change. You cannot change what happened in the past. You can only learn & grow from it, then move on.

When we grasp too tightly to our past pains & tough experiences, these things can hold us captive & it can feel like it’s taking over our whole lives. It’s as if these things that happened however long ago are STILL happening because you are constantly reliving the pain. 

And sometimes we believe that by going over what happened & reliving it, we are somehow fixing what happened or going to find a way out by still continuing to go through it. And I know most often the only way forward is through, but in the case of past trauma and pain, you don’t have to go through it by reliving to move forward. You can deal with it and then be done.

Holding onto your pain makes the journey of moving forward so much heavier & harder. This is why I want to share with you 5 ways to leave your pain in the past, so you can live in the present & look forward to your future. How to leave your pain in the past:

1. Honor & Accept Your Feelings About the Experience 
2. Create Distance - Mentally & Physically 
3. Let Go of Your Need for Apologies & Understanding
4. Make Room for the New
5. Take Responsibility for Your Part

I appreciate every single one of you that listens!
Thank you so much!

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After you create your goals for the year, let me give you 5 tips on how to plan for your best year & accomplish those goals, while also being mentally flexible & open to change.

Show Notes:
I used to believe you had to have everything so ready to go at the top of the year for everything else to work out.  It felt like, if you didn’t know what was supposed to happen every step of the way, you were destined to fail. It’s as if everything was hinging on all these decisions & commitments at the beginning of the year.

When in reality, so many changes & shifts can happen at each stage of whatever you’re working on, that will require you to refocus, replan and shift your perspective in a new direction. 

It’s important for us to recognize that change happens and it’s not something to run from or to fear. And oftentimes, change is an opportunity to shift into a better direction and towards something we didn’t realize would be better and more suited that season of life.

So, when we go into creating goals and intentions at the top of the year, it’s important to acknowledge that the plan we create can and probably will change and we should be flexible and open-minded when that happens.

Not everything is going to fall apart because we have to go in a different direction or realize what we wanted isn’t something we want now. It’s also not something you need to feel guilt or shame over. Mistakes and failures are life’s best learning lessons. We learn just as much, if not more, from the experiences that don’t go as planned as the things that work out.

Today I wanted to talk about how we can set our mindset up for success by creating a plan for the year that allows us to accomplish our goals, while also allowing us to grow & develop into our best selves with less resistance toward the unknown.

Here are 5 tips on How to Plan Your Best Year with Mental Flexibility:

1. Create Monthly Check-Ins
2. Celebrate Every Progression & Milestone 
3. Decide What You Need to Let Go of
4. Don’t Compare This Year to Years Past
5. Push Through the Pain & Don’t Give Up

Thank you so much for listening, downloading & sharing!
Happy New Year to you all!
Check out episode 455 on How to Create Your Best Goals for the Year.

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It's easy to write down a list of things that would be NICE to accomplish and that would impress others. But wouldn't it be BETTER if you created goals you actually accomplished? Here are 5 tips on how to create better goals that are beneficial & easier to accomplish.

Show Notes:
I enjoy goal setting & thinking ahead on how to achieve dreams & ambitions, but a lot of the time I will take on too much and not be as organized as I could about it. I also don’t do the work of considering how I want to feel at the end of the year if I have actually achieved my goals. And often, I wouldn’t even TRULY believe I would achieve my goals, but really hang onto hope & fake belief that it would all just come together. But nothing really comes together if you don’t have a good plan with multiple steps & ways to ramp up the progress & reflect on milestones achieved. If you say you’re going to start a business in the next year, but don’t have the intention & action to create a business plan, research start-up costs & have checkpoints to hit, you’re not gonna start a business. You might actually waste a lot of time and money with nothing to show for it.

And I know some people don’t believe in new years resolutions or setting goals at the top of the year because of fake statistics that say people give up in the first month or so. And maybe your reasons are different for why you don’t believe in this practice, but either way, I encourage you to consider thinking about goal setting in a different way.

Think about it more in a way to keep yourself accountable to actually starting a goal (especially if you’re one of those people that say you’re gonna do something but never do) and allowing the newness of the year to breathe fresh life & hope into you, while simultaneously allowing the past year to become less of a burden & worry for you.

So, in today’s episode, we are going to talk about how to CREATE our goals and in the next episode will be how to actually work on these goals and better plan your life over the next year. Here are 5 tips on how to create goals & resolutions for New Year’s that are worth creating:

1. Don’t feel forced to start on Day 1.
2. Ask yourself how you want to feel after you accomplish this goal. 
3. Know your reasons for achieving the goal.
4. Come up with your goal, then break it down into the smallest steps possible. 
5. Don’t be afraid to change your mind. 

Thanks so much for listening to this episode! I really appreciate you!

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Instead of getting in a fight or not sharing your opinion at all because of not knowing how to do it respectfully or with confidence, take these 5 tips on how to disagree with others with respect & still owning your opinion & perspective.

Show Notes:
I was sharing with my therapist this week that I am was really proud of myself for being confident in my own perspective & opinion while participating in a group discussion online. I often am the person that will fall to someone else’s opinion because they come across as an authority figure or they say enough things to down play my opinion that I, too, render it useless. But this week I did not! I stood up for my thoughts & opinions in discussion, all while being respectful & open-minded.

And this was a big deal for me! It also lined up with what I was focusing on this week, which was ‘acting as if’ I were confident in most things I do. I struggle with confidence a lot because of my people-pleasing issues, but it’s something I want to work on & become a lot better at. So I set it as my goal to pretend (or as my therapist calls it, “acting as is.”) I was confident & live my life like that. It was a pretty good experiment that yielded positive results, so we are repeating for the next 2 weeks. But the point of this podcast isn’t to recount my entire therapy session, but to share with you what this taught me about disagreeing with others & doing so respectfully.

Whether we are confident or not, it can feel difficult to disagree with someone and do it respectfully because of how their point of view leads us to feel or the way they are coming across or even knowing they are incorrect in what they are saying. Whatever the reason, we can struggle with this, which can lead to bigger blowouts & uncomfortable situations.

But I can tell you from recent experience that being able to express how you think & feel, without it coming across as aggressive or rude (unless the receiver decides to see it that way, nothing we can do about that) is such an amazing feeling. And I think talking about this during this time of year of getting together for the holidays can be really helpful when having discussions or casual chats.

Here are 5 tips of How to Disagree Respectfully With Others:

1. Use ‘I’ statements when you share your opinion.
2. Don’t let your emotions control you. Choose to respond, not react.
3. Don’t put down or make fun of their opinion.
4. Practice active listening skills. Hear them out.
5. Know when to move on from the topic at hand.

Thank you SO MUCH for listening, downloading & sharing this episode and ANY episode of the show. You are GREATLY appreciated!  Thanks!

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Sometimes we think we are doing the work to better our relationships but actually are creating more burdens for us to bear to not get out of having honest conversations with our people. Here are some ways we are & aren't doing the work.

Show Notes:
I started all of the relationships I was in as a people pleaser. This meant that I would always be catering to what their needs were, taking the blame for anything going wrong and never even sharing my needs, but just accepting whatever attitude, abuse or attention I would get. It’s nice to say now that I know this isn’t the way to be in relationships, romantic or not, but it still hurts to think about what how I let myself be taken for granted & not appreciated as much as I should have been. And I’m not saying it was all the fault of the person I was with because it is definitely my fault that I didn’t stand up for myself or attempt to instigate any change. 

Being a people pleaser or just allowing someone to treat you a certain way is not only their fault. You have to take the responsibility of at least trying to get changes to happen. If you don’t, you’re allowing yourself to be a victim. But if you have tried to do something about the way people treat you and nothing changes, that’s a whole different situation.

I’m sure you’re familiar with the idea that relationships take work. You gotta put in the time, energy & willingness to communicate with each other and figure out whatever it is. But I think a lot of people don’t realize that putting in work is different than taking abuse & being pushed around.

When you put in the work in a relationship, you are doing what you believe will help you get on the same page, understand each other better & minimize any fights/disagreements that lead to larger blowouts & hurt feelings. But again, we need to be aware of what doing the work actually looks like & what someone that is more controlling & manipulative would see as YOU doing work but it’s really hurtful, not helpful & abusive.

Today I want to share with you examples of what it looks like to put work into a relationship and what it looks like when you’re just being abused.

Here are 5 examples of what putting work into a relationship is NOT:

1. Trying to change the other person.
2. Walking on eggshells.
3. Tolerating dishonesty.
4. Allowing them to be disrespectful.
5. Having your boundaries crossed regularly.

Here are 5 examples of what putting work into a relationship IS:

1. Working on your triggers.
2. Practicing patience & being kind.
3. Learning to compromise.
4. Communicating your needs.
5. Asking for help.

Thank you so much for listening!! You're amazing!!

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The fear, shame, guilt & worry that can happen when we do something wrong can get in our way of admitting it sooner or finding a way to not take responsibility for it when it's actually best if we just admit it & move forward. 

Show Notes:

Have you ever been in a situation where you did something wrong that would affect others and were afraid to admit it was your fault? I think we have all been in that spot. And it can feel like you’re exposed and vulnerable & might even create some anxiety for you. I personally have felt fear, overwhelm & shame before admitting what I did wrong & apologizing for whatever happened. And a lot of those feelings came from being a people pleaser & not wanting to let anyone down, but also hating the feeling or not doing everything so perfectly or at least good enough to get by.

When something doesn’t go the way we planned, either due to doing something incorrectly or lack of attention to what we are doing, it’s never a situation we celebrate. We often mourne all the times before it that went so well & dread having to tell anyone about what happened. And one of the reasons could be not knowing how other people are going to react to the news. It could also be having to suffer consequences for what happened. And if we don’t know what the consequences are, it could insight even more anxiety & fear. And the more we think about and worry about it, the worse we feel. Even with those feelings, some people STILL won’t tell anyone what happened until the last possible second, which allows those feelings to crowd your mind for much longer than it should. It’s like torturing yourself.

But the best thing we can do is just admit that we did something wrong and move forward. Despite what might happen, even the worst possible outcome, you gotta do it so you can move forward. And so the situation can be resolved, if necessary, from the error that occurred.

I know I say this all the time, but it really applies here: Mistakes & failures are life’s best learning lessons. We don’t need to cower in the face of mistakes & failures & those moments when we do something wrong. We need to take the most we can from those experiences & learn all we can. It will help us do better in the future, to understand what went wrong now & to be prepared for something similar down the line. I know it’s not fun in the moment, but these experiences are necessary to become our best selves. No one gets away with not doing something wrong.

In addition to admitting when you’re wrong & taking that responsibility on, here are a few more things to remember in regard to admitting fault & taking responsibility:

1. Don’t take responsibility for things that aren’t your fault or that you weren’t a part of.
2. Don’t take responsibility for things on someone else’s behalf because you want to protect them or don’t want them to feel bad.
3. Don’t blame other people.
4. Don’t come up with excuses.
5. Don’t falsify what happened.

Thank you so much for listening, downloading & sharing the show! You're awesome!

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We are often giving grace to others & being more open & understanding of what other people go through & struggle with. But we don't do it for ourselves. Here are 5 tips on how to be more self-accepting of who you are right now.

Show Notes:
Isn’t it amazing how easily we will accept other people’s flaws & problems & issues, even without explanation, and we are hyper-critical of ours. We are like, “Absolute not. Do not accept who you are because it’s unacceptable & unreasonable.” We lack the ability to give ourselves grace or any slack, at all, because we have to deal with those things we classify as ‘unreasonable’ on the regular & that can just feel like too much.

Self-acceptance is SO IMPORTANT to our confidence, our belief in being able to do something & how well we take care of ourselves & put ourselves first. It’s way more important than you think it is, which is why I knew I had to talk about it because we are missing out.

We are missing out on the opportunity to treat ourselves with the same love & acceptance we give to other people. And let’s not forget about the forgiveness & ability to not care when a mistake is made or something isn’t achieved as quickly as anticipated. We are truly missing out on this opportunity we afford to others and it needs to stop. We need to treat ourselves the same, if not a little better, than others because we need to be the best we can be to keep helping others & be so forgiving & accepting of others. We will be even better at accepting others if we are more accepting of ourselves.

Here are 5 tips on how to be more self-accepting of yourself & secure in who you are right now:

1. Honor Where You Are Right Now. 
2. No One is the Model of How to Be.
3. Minimize Criticizing. 
4. Have Boundaries With Others that Like to Criticize You. 
5. Spend Time With People that Accept You.

Thank you SO MUCH for listening, downloading & sharing the show! You're amazing!!

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Watch the Video Version of RPG: https://www.youtube.com/@realpositivegirl/podcasts
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We spend so much time asking other people how they are, but how often are we asking OURSELVES how we are doing? Not enough. Here are some tips on how to check in with yourself.

Show Notes:
You know the awkward answer you sometimes give or even receive when you greet someone, there is the question of, “How are you?” and a lot times we respond with something menial like, “I’m good,” “I’m fine,” or whatever else is really subpar. And sometimes we mean those things and other times we don’t. But there is also the awkward response of having a PAUSE before responding with whatever standard answer or actually starting to go into what’s actually going on in your life before catching yourself because it’s not customary to also tell the truth when someone asks that question.

I’ve been told that in other countries when people ask you that, you’re supposed to be truthful with your answer and only Americans lie because we think it would be an inconvenience. I’m not saying EVERYONE feels that way, it’s just a generalization. And after I heard that (still not sure if it’s true or not, it doesn’t matter to me), I decided that if it wasn’t disruptive to an interaction, I would be honest with how I’m feeling. If it was a hard time, I would say it’s a hard day. If it was a boring day, I would admit that. Whatever way my day went, I want to be as honest as possible, but end it with saying that I believe it will get better or will look forward to a new day tomorrow.

But, I want to ask you & I want you to answer honestly (which you can because I won’t actually hear your response), “How are you doing right now?” How are you truly feeling with whatever is happening in your life? Are you struggling with wanting to feel one way but actually are feeling another? Maybe you haven’t taken any time recently to ask yourself this question, so you aren’t exactly sure how you’re feeling. And that’s fair. But if that is the case or any other example I have given or not given, this is the whole reason I wanted to chat about this today.

Let’s chat about some good ways for you to check-in with yourself & know how you’re feeling so you know what needs to change & what you should do next:

1. Determine if you are avoiding or suppressing any emotions. Did anything happen recently that has you all in your feels?
2. Decide if there is anything you need to cut out of your life that is causing issues or just isn’t right for this season.
3. Review how you have been taking care of yourself physically & decide what needs to change there. (sleeping habits, exercise, eating habits, breaks outside)
4. Create a list of things you have felt proud of in the last week. (small things, big things, medium things)
5. Think about what you do to create happiness in your life and determine if you need to be doing more of that or need to make any changes.

Thank you so much for listening, downloading & sharing!!

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It could be fear or our ego & pride or past experiences that prevent us from asking for help, but if we are able to push past those things, we can get the help we want & need and know that we are worthy of asking for it.

Show Notes:
I don’t do this well AT ALL. Growing up, asking for help seemed like something weak to do or when you didn’t know how to do something, which was so embarrassing because you didn’t want to get caught not knowing something. I couldn’t ask for help unless I ABSOLUTELY needed it.

Can you tell how unhealthy my mindset was growing up? But this is really how it was for me and how it probably was for many of you. 

But I’m here to tell you that you don’t have to be afraid to ask for help because it’s one of the BEST things we could do for ourselves.

The caveat is that there WILL be people that still behave the way we are used to people behaving when we ask for help, but the majority of people want to be helpful. Allowing other people to help you gives the helper an opportunity to use their gifts & talents in what they are skilled in. It’s almost a gift to the helper to have them help you, especially in a task they are really suited for based on skills alone.

So today I want to share with you some tips on the best way to get out of our own fixed mindsets & ask people for help when we need it or just want it. But before we get into that, it is important to accept that there will be times when we will experience rejection. Not everyone likes to help (and it doesn’t matter the reasons) or feels like they can’t help (this is more because of their own mindset & imposter syndrome issues), so they will say no. If, on top of the ‘no,’ they give you grief about asking for help, make sure to shut them down for projecting their insecurities onto you when they really need to focus on themselves.

Rejection is a fact of life. It’s going to happen. We can’t hide from it forever. You can try & get really comfortable in your comfort zone, but it isn’t going to keep you safe forever. There will come a time you have to step a toe out of there & you will experience it’s wrath. But it’s something that makes us stronger (I know that was cheesy, but we all know it’s absolutely true) & helps us realize that rejection doesn’t mean we failed or it’s the end of the road. It just means we either need to find someone else to ask or reframe what we are looking to get out of this request.

So let’s go over the 7 tips I have for you on How to Ask for Help from Others:

1. Start with this Affirmation: “I am worthy of asking & receiving help from others. This doesn’t have any reflection on who I am or what I am capable of doing.”
2. Don’t Get in Your Own Way. 
3. You Have to Actually Ask for Help. 
4. Find Someone You Trust to Ask First. 
5. Have a General Idea of What You Need Help With. 
6. Embrace the Discomfort for Gained Strength. 
7. Don’t Deny Someone When They Offer to Help & You Know It Will be Helpful. 

Thank you SO MUCH for listening, downloading & sharing the show.
You're INCREDIBLE!!

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It's easy to get caught up in false beliefs if it's the way we grew up or were told was true, either innocently or not. But it's important to expose these & find the ones that actually help us grow & become our best selves.

Show Notes:
Have you ever believed something SO DEEPLY to only find out that it wasn’t actually true? The pain & betrayal of discovering something you knew for so long isn’t actually correct can feel heartbreaking. And annoying. Let’s be honest, it can really suck. But even after all that, we can transition back and forth between understanding & denial because whatever the belief was that we had, it was so deeply ingrained in us that turning our backs on it now seems crazy or unreal.

But sometimes you gotta do it. You gotta take a step away and widen your perspective to see that it no longer works for you or was founded in manipulation & gaslighting or you just discover it isn’t true. But despite learning all this, it can STILL be incredibly tough to let go of something we know isn’t right, but was something that comforted us or something we used to define who we are & what we are all about.

Letting go of a belief can be really tough, but it’s really strong & brave. It’s also a sign of mental & emotional growth. You are realizing that what you believed before is something to move on from & there is something better.

I’m not gonna get into the idea of moving on from beliefs that actually are good & true for us, but we end up losing faith & true belief in those things. That will happen. And we will make our way back to those things. And that’s it. It’s a personal journey with lots of different experiences & reasons & sometimes excuses. And it also has nothing to do with what I’m going to share with you today.

Today, we are going to chat about false beliefs we have in regard to emotional growth. Meaning, the things we believe are true about our emotional health but actually aren’t. I am going to give you a list of false beliefs we have about our emotions & then help you understand why that is false. And you may disagree with me on some of these. Good. It means you are critically thinking about what is true for you & your life. I encourage you to do your own research & figure out what’s best for you. But this is the knowledge I have found to be true.

Here are 7 false beliefs we have about our emotions:

1. I need external validation to know I am doing my best. 
2. Boundaries are selfish. 
3. If I’m not positive all the time I won’t have a good life. 
4. How people behave toward me is how they feel about me. 
5. I don’t need to deal with people that think & believe differently than me. 
6. Being alone is a bad thing. 
7. It’s okay to treat others the way they treat me first. 

Thanks so much for listening, sharing the show with others & downloading. You're the absolute bestest!

Support the show

Watch the Video Version of RPG: https://www.youtube.com/@realpositivegirl/podcasts
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