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The #1 mindset to help you get unstuck and meet all your goals this year is: I can figure it out. This one thought, as you learn to cultivate it, will help you to move towards your goals and create the both/and life you want. There’s no settling this year working moms, this is the year that you stop over working, you get yourself into a job that you love and you make yourself a priority. In this episode, I’ll be sharing why this “I can figure it out” mindset is important for 2024 and how it will help you get unstuck as well as 5 things to expect when you start cultivating it.
Topics in this episode:
Why working moms are feeling so stuck as they enter 2024.
A mindset that gets you out of “stuckness” and has you moving toward your goals.
Believing the answers are inside of you.
The importance of failing when going after your ambitious life.
Focus on “why” instead of “how”.
Why expecting old patterns to creep back up is important to meeting your goals.
The most important thoughts in your head are the thoughts you think about yourself.
Show Notes & References:
Don’t reinvent the wheel. I can help you get unstuck and into a new job, new working behaviors and new found confidence in 2024 in just 6 months. IClick here to learn more about the process and to book a free call: www.rebeccaolsoncoaching.com
Want ongoing support as a working mom? Sign up for the free 19-day audio series: How to be a present and connected mom. Each day you will receive an email with a downloadable audio of 5 minutes or less that will teach you a tool or strategy for being more present and in the moment. Click here to sign up and receive the first audio: https://www.ambitiousandbalanced.com/be-present-optin
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Transcript
Intro
Welcome to 2024, working moms. Today, I want to set you up for success by offering the number one mindset to help you get unstuck and meet all of your goals this year.
Just one thought, that as you learn to cultivate, it will help you move toward your goals and create the both/and life that you want. There's no settling this year, working moms. This is the year that you stop overworking, that you get yourself into a job that you love and you make yourself a priority.
In this episode, I'll be sharing with you the number one mindset to help you get unstuck. And we'll be sharing five things to expect as you start to cultivate this mindset on a daily basis. You ready? Let's get to it.
Welcome to the Ambitious and Balanced Working Moms podcast, the place for women who want to balance their ambitious career goals with their life as a mom. If you're looking to feel more confident, decisive and productive at both work and home, then this is the place for you. I'm your host, Rebecca Olson. Let's get to it.
Happy new year, working moms! Happy 2024. It is going to be a great year. I have so many fun and helpful things for you percolating for this year. I'm planning on some new workshops, some new trainings, some new programs. Very soon, you're going to hear all about those things and you will also be able to start listening to me, and this podcast, on my new YouTube channel. So stay tuned for that, as well.
I am always thinking about what ambitious working moms need and how I could best support them. I personally connect with hundreds and hundreds of working moms every single year. I speak to even a wider audience as I give workshops and trainings at various companies or just online. This podcast alone is in the top 2% of the world, with listeners in over 48 different countries. I'm very, very proud of this podcast and the wide delivery of its content that is directed at working moms.
And I just want you to know that you are a part of a greater community of women from all over the world that are looking to take back their power and create for themselves an ambitious and balanced life. You're not alone. We are creating a movement together. A movement that says I don't have to choose. I can have the motherhood experience that I desire, be super successful, and have a very fulfilling career. I can have both. We are a both/and community.
And as I've been thinking about how to continue to impact and grow this community of working moms through this podcast, I've been thinking a lot about specifically how I wanted to start this year, and here's what I decided to share. I want you to walk away from today's episode understanding the number one mindset that I think every working mom needs to have this year in order to stop feeling stuck and create for themselves the ambitious and balanced life that you want. The number one mindset. So I'm going to jump into this one mindset and talk all about it. I'm also going to share about why I think this is such an important mindset to have this year and why you should be adopting this above all others. And I'm going to share with you five things to expect as you begin to cultivate this mindset in 2024.
Working moms are tired of feeling stuck.
All right, let's dive in. As last year was coming to a close, I was having conversation after conversation after conversation with working moms who were just fed up. They were tired of feeling stuck, whether that was stuck in their career. Stuck because they're a mom and they don't want to give up more time to their career and sacrifice their time with their family. Stuck in bad habits of overworking and not prioritizing themselves or being over committed or simply just feeling stuck in a lack of identity.
Like they just didn't know who they were anymore and were feeling stuck and needing to figure it out and how to find themselves and find their joy and find their fun in life again. Or for some, they were just feeling stuck in a company that doesn't value working moms. And they're like busting their butts for their companies and sacrificing so much of themselves and their personal life. And they feel stuck because what is required is an entire cultural shift in their company.
Countless conversations I was having at the end of last year and I took on several new clients as the year was coming to a close who were looking to get out of their stuckness. And they hired me as their coach to help them get out of their stuckness and into a life where they feel free and where they feel successful and joy in all areas of life.
I have one client that circumstantially has the perfect life. Beautiful family, great career, supportive husband, makes enough money, everything she wants in life. But she was feeling stuck in this negative “nothing is enough” kind of a mindset and we're going to get her out of that this year.
I have another client that feels like she's underperforming and not meeting her full potential, but she feels stuck in what direction to go and how to maintain her kids being the top priority as she makes changes. So this year, she's going to figure out exactly what she wants to do with her career and learn how to balance that in a manageable way with the family time and the family life that she wants.
And then I have another client who didn't take PTO all last year, and she was just stuck in saying yes to way too many things at work and saying yes to overworking and logging back on and missing meals with her family. No more. This next year is going to be a year about her, where she is saying yes to herself and she's getting out of her cycles of people pleasing and fear of disappointing others.
And I have another client who's ready to move on from her job, but she feels stuck in this thought that she's not qualified for what she wants. So this year, it's going to be a year about increasing her confidence, changing the way she's thinking about herself and the value that she brings her company, so she is able to get into that next job.
A theme is emerging amongst ambitious working moms.
I want to bring all these up because there's this theme that I'm seeing amongst ambitious working moms. Perhaps some of it was Covid, where those that stayed working sort of just hunkered down for stability in the family and people are just having a hard time shaking out of that.
Or perhaps people are feeling stuck because they're comparing themselves to other women, maybe in different jobs or different companies that are living more in alignment with their priorities. They can't seem to figure out how to do that for themselves.
Or perhaps it's just a bad habit. Perhaps you're someone that's stuck in believing that you're not enough and you're believing these “not enough” thoughts and you don't know how to change your mindset.
This is the year we make a change.
Ambitious working moms, no more stuckness. 2024 is a year of you getting unstuck, uprooting your beliefs and habits that are not allowing you to have the life that you want. And so the mindset that I've selected for 2024 is a mindset that's going to allow you to get unstuck and start making progress towards success and balance as a working mom.
You can figure this out.
You ready? Here it is. ‘I can figure it out.” Very simple. It's very declarative. “I can figure it out.”
Now, I want you to notice how this mindset or this thought, it focuses on you and your capability. I can. It's not that “it will get figured out,” or that “somebody else will help me to figure it out.” It's “I”, right?
Where are the answers we are seeking?
“I can” is a statement about you and your ability. It means that the answers are inside of you. They're not found in someone else. They're not found in needing more knowledge or researching more. It's found in you and your ability to tap into that internal wisdom.
This is one of the reasons why coaching is such an effective process and tool. Because as your coach, I don't believe that I have all the answers for how to live your life. I provide you a process and a container and accountability for helping you to figure out for yourself.
I'm not dictating the hours that you should be working or the habits that you want to change or the mindsets that you should be adopting. I'm walking you through the process of declaring and deciding for yourself. That's what makes it so powerful.
I can figure it out.
This problem is solvable.
Another thing that's inherent in this mindset is the belief that it is figureout-able. That it's a problem that can be solved. This mindset does not allow for “I don't know.” I think that's why it's been such a powerful mindset for me in the past, because my brain likes to say “I don't know” a lot.
Particularly when there are multiple solutions, multiple paths, multiple approaches, lots of ways of doing something where there's really no objective way of doing it right. Quote, unquote. Whenever I'm in that type of situation, my brain offers to me, “I don't know”. I don't know how to handle that situation with my kid. I don't know what the best thing is to work on right now. I don't know what my goals are for 2024.
And this thought, this thought that I want you to cultivate this year, I can figure it out. It sort of shuts down the whole “I don't know.” Which is one of the reasons why it has resonated with me so much at various times in my life.
It’s time to declare what you want.
And it feels like the right moment to offer this mindset. 2024 is not going to be a year of “I don't know.” It's going to be a declarative year where you say what you want. Where you declare where you want to take your career, what you want to prioritize, how you want to prioritize yourself. You decide, and then you believe, that you can figure it out.
You can figure it out, but you don’t have to do it alone.
I want to be clear. A little disclaimer here. I'm not saying that you can't accept help in figuring it out. In fact, I very much encourage help. If there is someone that has been where you are and has figured out how to get unstuck. The most logical thing for you to do is to not reinvent the wheel, but tap into their expertise.
That could be a close friend or a colleague or a family member, or you could be looking at hiring someone. Someone like myself, a coach, a therapist. You going to someone else that is an expert or has been through what you've been through is you figuring it out.
Your new motto…
This is the motto of the year. It's your mindset. It's your perspective. It's your thought. Whatever you want to call it, because that's all saying the same thing. The mindset that will unlock success for you and get you out of your stuckness this year is “I can figure it out.”
What should you expect as you cultivate this new mindset?
Now, I want to share with you five things that you can expect as you cultivate this mindset this year that's going to really help you be successful at it. I want to sort of, gear you up, if you will, or suit you up for this year, because the process of figuring out how to get unstuck and meet your goals, that's a journey. And I want you to know what to expect. So we're going to go over five things you can expect as you cultivate this mindset.
#1: Expect failure.
And the first one, this is going to be really hard for some of you to hear, right? So prepare yourself. But it's 100% inevitable that this is going to happen. You ready? Failure. Yes. You need to expect failure.
Let me give you an example here. I had a client that was really struggling with her sleep. She found herself dead exhausted after she put her kids to sleep. But then she would wake up at like one or two in the morning and just couldn't get herself back to sleep. Her brain would be racing with all of the things that she didn't do yesterday, all of the things that were coming up, all the ways she was failing people and disappointing people.
And I help a lot of my clients learn how to get better sleep and learn how to shut down their brain and address all of their not enough thoughts that contribute to them kind of lying awake at night. It's a process.
And in one of our coaching sessions, we came up with a plan for how she was going to address this, her sleep issues. We focused on her bedtime routine, and we looked at what she was going to do in the middle of the night when she woke up. But here's what I told her. I said, “It's probably not going to work right away.”
But in the process of things not working, she was going to learn some of the parts of the plan that worked for her and some that didn't, so that we can actually tweak them. And what I said is, I expected her to fail. And why do I expect that? Because you're forming new habits.
New habits take time and they take trial and error. What works for one of my clients is not necessarily going to work for the next one. We have to sort things out for you and that requires a little failure, so that we can learn and tweak the process.
I had another client that was interviewing for a new job, and she was kind of going for the job above her job. So she was going for a promotion within different companies and she was extremely anxious and nervous, which was one of the reasons why she had hired me.
Her brain was constantly telling her that she was not qualified enough and that she would never get this kind of a job, which was holding her back from even applying to begin with when we started together. But over the course of our time, we spoke a lot about her qualifications, why she was ready for this position, what made her really good at it.
She started to learn how to redirect her not enough thoughts so that she could put herself out there and interview in jobs. And I remember telling her that I never expected her to get the first job that she applied for and was interviewing for. Even if she was the perfect fit, she was going to have to learn how to present herself at the next level in the interview process. She was going to have to learn how to exude confidence in a way that she never had before. And so I expected some trial and error.
Turns out she ended up interviewing at maybe a half a dozen places and moving on to second interviews at several of them. And eventually she was offered exactly the job that she wanted at a company that could not wait to bring her on.
I promise you, you will figure it out, whatever it is that you are stuck in, but you're going to fail along the way. You're not going to get to your desired results right out of the gate. We just need to expect that.
#2: Expect your brain to focus on the “how.”
Now, the second thing I want to offer to you to expect, as you cultivate this I can figure it out mindset, is that your brain is going to focus a lot on the “how.” It's going to want to know exactly how you're going to get unstuck, how you're going to find that new job, how you're going to change your overworking habits, how you're going to get better sleep, how you're going to make time to work out, how you're going to stop working after the kids go to sleep so you have a little time for yourself and your partner.
Feels like a logical question, right? Your brain wants a map. I'm here at my house. I'm stuck in these bad behaviors. I'm stuck in my job. I'm stuck in feeling lost or not knowing who I am. And I want to drive to Oklahoma City. That's going to take me a while. But when I get there, I'm going to feel freedom and abundance. I'll have that new job. I'll feel valued. There'll be time for myself and my calendar. It'll be great.
So what's the first thing you're going to do in order to drive from your house to Oklahoma City, where you want to be? What are you going to do? You're going to pull out your phone, right? Your GPS. And you're going to plug in Oklahoma City and you're going to get “Starting route to Oklahoma City.” That little voice that comes on. That's going to bring up a map in a series of directions that if you follow them exactly, you're going to arrive in Oklahoma City or wherever you are.
I picked Oklahoma City because it's in the middle of the country. It is logical and certainly more comfortable to know exactly how you're going to get unstuck and how you're going to make all your 2024 goals happen this year. The problem is we're human beings and we don't get to foresee the future. I don't know exactly how you are going to get unstuck and reach all your goals this year.
Based on the hundreds of working moms that I have personally coached and the thousands that I have taught over the years, I have a pretty good idea of the process. But you're still a unique individual with your unique set of thoughts and your unique circumstances that all need to be accounted for.
I don't know how much trial and error there's going to be. I don't know how many times you're going to be rejected. I don't know how hard it's going to feel and the emotional hurdles that are going to come up for you. You never know how you're going to get unstuck and how you're going to reach your goals until you do it. And then, at that point, then you get to reflect and you get to look back at your journey and say, “This is exactly the steps I took, in this order. This was the path.”
So here's what I want to offer to you. Your brain is going to want to know how, and it will be your job to redirect it to “why.” Why do you want to be an ambitious and balanced working mom? Why do you want to get unstuck and learn how to prioritize your family over work? Why do you want to get out of your not enough thinking? Why do you want a different job?
Your “why” creates natural motivation towards your goals. It creates positive energy, an ability to problem solve, to solve with creativity, curiosity. One of the things I like to tell my clients is that when the “why” feels more motivating to them than the discomfort of going after whatever it is they want, that's when they'll do it. So your job is to focus on the “why,” not the “how.”
#3: Expect your brain to focus on what you don’t know.
The third thing I want you to expect when you cultivate this mindset, “I can figure it out,” is that your brain is going to want to focus on everything you don't know.
It will focus on how you don't know exactly how you're going to get unstuck and meet your goals this year. It will focus on how you don't have enough time and you don't know how you're going to make time. It will focus on wondering if you should hire someone or bring someone on and how you're going to afford all that. It will want to know if there's going to be any repercussions in your job or with your boss, if you make changes.
Your brain is going to want to focus on all the things that it doesn't know, all the things that it fears. Your job is to redirect your mind to the things that you do know. Focus on what you know has worked for you in the past. Focus on what you know has worked for others. Focus on what you know about yourself. Regardless of if you fail at this, focus on what you know about why this is important.
Focusing on what you know centers yourself. It brings your brain back to reality and grounds itself in truth. Your brain is going to want to focus on all of the unknowns and you need to redirect it back to what you know.
#4: Expect your brain to focus on circumstances.
The fourth thing that I want you to expect, as you're cultivating this mindset of “I can figure it out,” is your brain is going to want to focus on fixing all of the circumstances that are causing you to feel stuck, rather than focus on believing in yourself and your ability to move yourself forward to reach your goals.
I like to tell my clients that the most important thoughts in their mind are the thoughts that they have about themselves. You need to be intentionally directing your thoughts to things like, “I am worthy. I am valuable. I'm good at what I do. I'm an amazing mom. I have everything I need. I'm totally equipped. I am liked. I'm an asset to my team and my company.”
These are the types of thoughts that cultivate confidence, that get your brain thinking about your worthiness and how deserving you are of your goals. And worthiness is something that comes up a lot for women on their breakthrough calls with me.
In order to make a big financial investment of time and money in coaching, you have to believe that you're worthy of it. Just like you would spend every penny in your savings account to help your kids get the support that they need to have the life that you want them to have. You are deserving of every penny as well. You are worthy of every financial investment, every time commitment. You are worthy of other people having to sacrifice their time, energy, or even money for you.
Your brain is going to want to pull you down. It's going to want to focus on all of your not-enoughness, all of your failures. It's going to want to make you even more stuck and find even more evidence for how you are stuck. Your job is to redirect your thoughts back. Why you are deserving, why you are enough, always.
Thoughts that you have about yourself hitting your goals are the most important thoughts that you could ever have. I had a client that was really struggling with thinking, “I'm not good enough.” “I'm not doing enough.” And was in a perpetual cycle in her head where she was worried about how everybody thought of her and every little thing around the house that wasn't getting done became a sign of how she just wasn't good enough as a mom or a wife.
And so I gave her this very simple exercise of writing down the words “I am enough” and then coming up with a reason why she believed that today. And she was to do that every single day. And so several weeks went by and she mentioned to me how impactful that exercise had become for her and how she actually noticed when she wasn't doing the exercise, like if she skipped a day or something like that, and how that affected her. She said the exercise of just focusing her mind, even just once a day, on her enoughness, how that grounded her and it actually allowed her brain to come back to it from time to time throughout the day.
The thoughts about yourself are everything. They are what make you feel good, confident, sufficient, successful, powerful. Your job is to constantly be redirecting your thoughts, particularly the thoughts about you, into positive.
#5: Expect old habits to die hard.
Now, the last thing I want you to expect as you cultivate this mindset, “I can figure it out.” And notice a little side note here. Notice how I have used the word cultivate this entire episode. And I use that word very, very intentionally. Mindsets, thoughts, perspectives. These are cultivated by repeating and redirecting over and over and over and over again.
In coaching, I provide you so many tools on how to cultivate this mindset and how to get your brain into the right space. It takes repetition to create a habit of a mindset, right? You literally are cultivating. You're intentionally focusing.
The last thing I want you to expect. This sort of goes along with failure, but it's a little bit different. I'll explain that in a moment. I want you to expect your old habits to creep back up. I want you to expect that you will work later than you want or that you will log back on even though you didn't want to or didn't plan to. Or that you will be distracted with your phone when you're trying to be present with your kids. Or you will say yes to too many things at work out of fear of disappointing someone. Or you will not advocate for yourself in the way that you want to with your boss.
I expect your old habits, old behaviors, and old ways of thinking to show up. It's totally normal. This is really, really important, because a lot of people give up at the first sign of failure. I missed my workout this morning. I guess I'll just skip the rest of them this week. It's okay. Or I didn't leave work at the time I wanted to. I guess I'll just try to get a lot more done and be better next week.
This sort of all or nothing mentality when it comes to goal setting and moving ourself forward, it's not useful to any of us. When you're breaking old habits and going after something new and ambitious in your life that you've never done before, I would expect your old patterns to come back.
Sometimes you'll be very conscious of it, and sometimes you won't. It's okay. It's totally normal. Right now, this moment, is always the time to recommit back into your goals. I wouldn't even wait for tomorrow. Right now.
In coaching, we spend a lot of time normalizing failure, normalizing old habits of thoughts and behavior. Because beating yourself up and judging yourself for old ways is useless. It only makes you feel bad. And so instead, we just expect old ways to creep up. And I promise, the more and more and more you redirect your old thoughts and old ways and old behaviors, the less they will show up.
I had a client that just finished up her six months of coaching with me. And she was commenting about how the old version of her, the version of her that was in constant people pleasing mode and was working crazy hours and was worried about what other people were thinking and kind of sacrificing herself and her family, she still shows up.
But through coaching, she's learned to give her space, kind of like a container of space, to normalize her presence and to not worry about all of her anxious thoughts and, ultimately, how to let her go. And this was such a celebratory moment on this call as we were talking about it, because the old version of her just all of a sudden wasn't a big deal anymore.
She was interacting with her old self and her old patterns with so much love and so much care that they just were not such a big problem. And they weren't showing up as often anymore. And she felt empowered by that.
You can figure it out. Don’t settle.
Working moms, you can figure it out. You can figure out how to have the both/and life that you want. Don't settle for working 60 hours a week if you don't want to, or even 45 hours a week, if you don't want to. Don't settle for a job that you hate going to every day. Don't settle for being underpaid or undervalued at work. Don't settle for sacrificing personal time or time just for yourself and your family. Don't settle for all your not enough thoughts, crazy thoughts in your heads.
2024 is a year that you will figure it out. If you want help or a guide through this process, I would love to connect with you. You can learn more about who I coach, how I coach, the process, a bit more about me by going to my website, www.rebeccaolsoncoaching.com.
All right, working moms, this is your year. Let's get to it.
FREE RESOURCE: How To Be A Present And Connected Mom
Hey working moms, if you want more practical tools to live a successful working mom life, I want you to go ahead and sign up for my 19 day audio series called “How To Be A Present And Connected Mom.”
This was previously a client-only series that I just recently opened up for you. During this free audio series, you will learn 19 tools and strategies to quickly get out of your head, so you can engage in everyday moments with your kiddos. You'll learn how to calm your mind and stop constantly thinking about your to-do’s, so that you can have a life outside of work.
Here's how it works: When you sign up, you will immediately get an email with the first download, and every day after that for 19 days, you will receive a downloadable audio of 5 minutes or less that will teach you a practical strategy to be present and in the moment.
And not only that, you'll also receive the number one tool I use with my clients to help you rewire your brain into the positive, so you end all of the constant “not good enough” chatter. To sign up and receive the first “How To Be A Present And Connected Mom” audio, you can go to https://www.ambitiousandbalanced.com/be-present-optin . I'll also have a link in the show notes.
All right, working moms, let's get to it.
