“What I know now is that when we derive our worth from the relationships in our lives — the intimate ones, the social circles we belong to, the companies we work for — we give away our power and become dependent upon external validation. When that is taken away, our sense of value, and identity, goes with it.”

This reaffirms a theme we explore from a variety of angles throughout this podcast. The idea that you are good enough for who you are, regardless of the relationships outside yourself, is important. It’s all the more impactful when it comes from someone who is achieving great success within those relationships and as an African American woman. It’s a message for everyone.

This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. If you have been a part of the growing community from around the globe (30 countries by last count) that are following these daily meditations and ideas, we love your presence and are so glad you are listening. I hope that the process is making a difference in your life. If you would be so kind as to help our online visibility by giving us a review on Apple iTunes we would be deeply grateful. We’re starting this podcast from scratch and are bringing content and value to our listeners every single day without exception. Your support in even this one small way would make a big difference. Thank you!

“Being human is not hard because you’re doing it wrong, it’s hard because you’re doing it right. You will never change the fact that being human is hard, so you must change your idea that it was ever supposed to be easy.”

The mindset that life is supposed to be easy gets a lot of us in trouble. We want to avoid pain and struggle and as a result (perhaps ironically), we suffer. It may not be easy to embrace the struggle of being true to yourself, but in the end you will live a more fulfilled, joyful life. 

Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test. Thanks for tuning in today.

“I cannot make you understand. I cannot make anyone understand what is happening inside me. I cannot even explain it to myself.”

Sometimes our struggles transcend words, or our ability to articulate what is going on inside ourselves, whether or not we’re having a good day.

Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test. Thanks for tuning in today.

“The technocratic illusion is that poverty results from a shortage of expertise, whereas poverty is really about a shortage of rights. The emphasis on the problem of expertise makes the problem of rights worse. The technical problems of the poor (and the absence of technical solutions for those problems) are a symptom of poverty, not a cause of poverty.

In some ways it states the obvious, but it is an argument you rarely hear in today’s discourse on systemic racism, whether or not it exists, and why various impoverished communities remain with so few resources, opportunities, or people who rise from such conditions.

Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test. Thanks for tuning in today.

“You can’t know where you’re going until you know where you are.”

Pretend this book is a map, and you are looking at the point that says: You are here. That’s where you’re starting really all the time, from where you are. It doesn’t matter where you come from, where you think you are going, what job or career you have had or think you should have. You are not too late, and you’re not too early. But where are you? Strategic thinking can help you build your way forward from wherever you are, regardless of the life problem you are facing. But before you can figure out which direction to head in, you need to know where you are and what problems you are trying to solve.

Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test. Thanks for tuning in today.

“We are triggered not by their behavior, but by our own unresolved emotional issues.”

“Do you see me?” This is the big question your child is asking every day. “Can you recognize me for who I am, different from your dreams and expectations for me, separate from your agenda for me?”

Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test. Thanks for tuning in today.

“If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.”

This book teaches the powerful and resonating lesson that our perceptions create our reality. There are external events outside of our control that happen all the time. We can do nothing about that part of life, but the part we have complete control over is how we respond to circumstances. It is a mindset approach to all of life, and can lead us to how we respond to and handle failure, amongst other things. 

Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test. Thanks for tuning in today.

“Totally without hope one cannot live. To live without hope is to cease to live. Hell is hopelessness. It is no accident that above the entrance to Dante’s hell is the inscription: ’Leave behind all hope, you who enter here’.”

There is a lot of darkness in our current historical moment, but there remains tremendous goodness. We live with the hope of a more just and equitable culture. Hope brings us to life. There are scientifically-based studies that investigate the concept of hope in people’s lives. It is also helpful to know theologians have done their own systematic research into the concept of hope. To hope is to want a better outcome. It makes the present situation more bearable, and motivates us to create the conditions for a better future. 

Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test. Thanks for tuning in today.

“It is by tracing things to their origin, that we learn to understand them; and it is by keeping that line and that origin always in view, that we never forget them.”

Paine had a provocative and idealistic sense of what we often should see as “self-evident” truths. It seems he was already tracing things to their origins, such as the basic rights of a peasant child compared with one of royal pedigree. If only these ideals had become reality through the Founders in the first place. For our purposes, too, we should think about how this quote applies to the self. Keep sourcing yourself for the core questions and you will get somewhere.

Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test. Thanks for tuning in today.

“Grief is the conflicting feelings caused by the end of or change in a familiar pattern of behavior.”

The emphasis is on feelings. Grief involves emotions, however intense the grief may be.

Six common responses to loss that completely ignore emotional needs: (1) Don’t feel bad; (2) Replace the loss; (3) Grieve alone; (4) Just give it time; (5) Be strong for others; (6) Keep busy. Each of the misconceptions is examined in the book where this quote comes from and revealed for the damage it does.

Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test.