5 Things That will Instantly Make Your Life Easier
LISTEN: APPLE PODCASTS | SPOTIFY | STITCHER
Life is hard, right? It feels like you constantly don’t have enough energy, enough hours in the day, and enough willpower to push through, right? Ugh, it’s not a fun way to live and that’ why I want to share 5 things that I know will help make life instantly easier for you. These five practical things are priceless and will make dramatically POSITIVE effect on your life.
Girl, if you do these 5 things, I can promise you, your life will become so much easier.
Focus on the people who truly matter.
Don’t take everything personally.
Don’t be a “yes woman”.
Let people know what your needs and priorities are.
Do at least ONE thing for yourself every single day
Link mentioned in this episode:
Episode 117: 9 Ways to Reduce Your Stress
Episode 75: 5 Steps to Stop Letting People Stress You Out
If you want more from me, be sure to check out:
Instagram: @embraceyourreal | @movementwithjulie
Website: www.juliealedbetter.com
Free ebook: www.juliealedbetter.com/free-ebook
Amazon storefront: https://www.amazon.com/shop/influencer-6bda1ca8?ref=cm_sw_em_r_inf_pub_influencer-6bda1ca8_dp_DgsIam9salgfi
Transcript:
Hey. Hey, beautiful human. Can I steal 5 minutes of your time? I have something super important to share with you, but I promise I'll be really quick. You're listening to my weekly bonus episode of Embrace Your Role With Me, Julie Ledbetter. I'm about to give you a quick tip for building your confidence, honoring your body, and unconditionally loving your authentic self. Stay tuned.
If you're ready to embrace a real. Let's get it. Let's go. Hey, sister. Are you feeling like life is hard right now? Or maybe you feel like you just don't have enough energy or enough hours in the day or enough willpower to push through. That is no way to live. Truly, that is not what I believe God as intended for us. That's not how we should be showing up or feeling on a regular basis. And so I just want to come alongside of you and share some truth with you. I want to pour in to you. Just think of me and you sitting down at a coffee shop and me giving you some real talk. I'm going to be sharing five practical things that I believe can make a dramatic positive effect in your life starting today.
But before we dove in, I wanted to share this review. It comes from @runfastgoslo. I believe that's what it is. She gave a five star review and said Health, honesty and honoring women. Thank you for sharing your witness of authenticity, specific and constructive health and fitness and overall wellness advice on your own personal journey. I've been listening since episode one, and your voice has always been and encouraging, strikingly honest and honoring message for all women. Well, I love this so much. You guys already know I talk about honoring your body with movement and honoring your body with the things that you say and honoring your body with your nutrition. And so the fact that you wove that into your review, it just truly brings me so much joy. This is ultimately what my hope and prayer for this podcast is, is that I can just spend a few minutes every single week just encouraging you or giving you some practical advice. So thank you so much for your review. If you haven't already read it and read the podcasts, that would bless us so tremendously much. If you just scootch over to Apple Podcasts, tape and embrace your real. And I'd love to know how this podcast is helping you.
Okay, so let's dove into the five practical and priceless things that I believe will help you. Number one, you've got to focus on the things and people who truly matter. You have to ask yourself if you're stretching yourself too thin and you're trying to show up for everything and everyone. Just a friendly reminder. You don't need to be friends with everyone. You don't need to be doing everything. Stop stretching yourself so thin that at the end of the day, you have nothing left for yourself or your family, and so they end up getting the worst of you. I think oftentimes we do this and we don't even realize that we're doing this until it hits the fan. Right. Like you are, you're getting to the end of the day and you're just like, oh, and everybody, the people that you love the most, your husband, your spouse, your kids, the people that you live with are getting the worst of you. Right. It's so important to prioritize only what matters most. Sometimes it can be super helpful to make a list of people and things that you want to plan. And one way that can really help with this is to make a list of people and things that you plan to prioritize in this season of your life. I know that as we are heading into a new season, schedules are changing, things are happening, schedules are different, whether it's with school and the kids or it's at work, whatever it is. Ask yourself, okay, in this season of life, who are the people and what are the things that I'm going to plan to prioritize? I don't want you to stretch yourself too thin and try to make everyone happy and do everything for everyone. You can't do that. It's so important that you know boundaries and you create boundaries. If you haven't read the book boundaries, it is incredible. I highly recommend it. There are so many good takeaways from that book, but it's okay to cancel or it's okay to say no. Don't always think that you have to do everything for everybody.
Number two, don't take everything so personally. So this is one thing that I really struggle with, honestly, and I think if we're honest with ourselves, a lot of people struggle with this as well. But we need to realize that not everything is about us. I know like that's a really hard truth, this fellow. But sometimes someone says something rude to us because they're stressed out with their life and it really has nothing to do with us. Like they're using us as a punching bag to take their frustrations out on us, but it actually doesn't mean anything to us. And in most cases, you need to realize that it ultimately has nothing to do with you. And you don't need to carry any of that weight. You don't need to let that thing be consuming you right to the point where you're stressed, your anger, you're angry, you're anxious. All of those things you need to learn to have your own feelings to deal with and not let other people's emotions be so heavy on you. I think oftentimes we love to assume right away that it's personal. Like if someone does in Texas back right away, it really has nothing to do with us. It has to do with someone else. They're maybe busy and they may. We saw it and then they realized, Oh, shoot. A few days later, I did not text back. It has nothing to do with you. And I think, man, that is just a life lesson that I've learned. Like the more I take the focus off myself, the happier I am. And the more I maybe ask, like, man, is there any way that I can serve that person? Or How can I pray for that person? Or just don't take everything so personally? And if you if it's really weighing on, you have an open conversation with them. Don't sit there and wallow in silence and misery and thinking like, man, I, X, Y and Z. This person, you know, they hate me. They think all these horrible things. And that's where, man, we can just wallow in self-pity and that doesn't do anything. So if it's really weighing on you and you really think that there might be something that you did, why not just have that open communication with them and ask them directly?
Number three, don't be a yes woman. Stop saying yes to everything and everyone. You don't have time for that. First of all, you don't need to take on all of those responsibilities. You have enough as it is. Again, this kind of goes back to making a list of the things of people and events or or things that you want to be involved in in this season of your life and then creating boundaries about around that. Right. I think sometimes the best things that maybe we're a part of and it's maybe a really good it's a really good cause that you're a part of in your community or it's a really good organization or it's an awesome activity that's serving a lot of people. Those things are all great things, but if they don't have boundaries on them, then you're going to inevitably overstep something and it's not. It's going to become out of balance in your life. And the one thing or the thing that is such a great addition to your life, whether that's you being involved in something in the community or you serving at your kid's school or whatever it is, you fill in the blank. That good thing can easily become something that maybe consumes you to the point where you're not able to show up best for yourself and the relationships that you love. And so you have to learn to say yes to things when they're okay and create boundaries around that. But then you also have to learn when it is okay to say no, say no. And this is one thing that Mom, if you're listening, I love you so much, but man, you said yes to everything growing up and I've had conversations with you about this. She said, you know, she said yes to everything PTO doing this, volunteering here, volunteering for this, volunteering for that. And you get burnt out. You get burnt out. And ultimately that will come out in some way, shape or form, whether it's in your health, whether it's in your relationships, in so many different areas of your life. And so I just want you to know that it's okay to say no, it's okay to say no. And when you do say yes, create boundaries around that.
Number four, let people know what your needs and priorities are. Right. You have people don't know. If you don't tell them, they will never know what your needs or priorities are. They're never going to be able to read your mind, so you need to just be upfront with them. The beautiful thing is that when you tell people to actually care about your needs and priorities, they will respect those needs and priorities. If you tell someone what your needs and priorities are and they don't prioritize it, then you can have that conversation with them. And if they're like, Man, I just can't do that, then ask yourself, Are these people really worth being in your life? It's so important that you are upfront. It's so important that you are just plain honest about where you are in your season of life. Like maybe right now saving money is a priority. And so you going out and spending a bunch of money with your friends, like going shopping, that's just not a priority right now. Be upfront, be honest with them. Or maybe you are needing more help with the kids or you're needing more help in a certain area of life. And you need to let people know what your needs and priorities are. I'm telling you, I don't have kids yet, but Josh and I have been so much better at this. When we get to especially on the weekends, this was like a trigger thing for us was I would go into a Saturday feeling like I had, you know, in my mind I'm going to do X, Y and Z and I want to do this and I want to do that. And Josh would have his own schedule in his mind of like what he wants to do. And we would never communicate that upfront and honest, like, hey, this is what I'm thinking I want to do today. What are you thinking? What are your thoughts? And kind of weaving our schedules together. And therefore, when we didn't do that, we would get in these arguments like, Man, I just feel like I haven't gotten anything done or I haven't done anything today. And in my mind, I'm like, I've done. Everything that I wanted to today, but I realized we were not communicating those things. And so really knowing, like, what your needs and what your priorities are and communicating that to the people that you love and just asking for help. Like if you need help, ask for help and know that it's okay to ask for help and know that that's really, really important. So I encourage you to kind of figure out the areas of your life that are causing you stress and determine what your needs are so that you can help to mitigate the stress in those areas.
And the number five do at least one thing for yourself every single day. All right. I'm going to dump a bunch of clichés on you right now, but you truly cannot pour from an empty cup. You cannot show up as your best self if you are not showing up for yourself on a daily basis. There is so much truth in this, like for your physical activity, for your personal growth, for your sanity. You have to learn to put yourself first in certain areas of your life, like do at least one thing every single day for yourself. So maybe that's dedicating 20 minutes in the morning for reading your Bible and praying. Maybe that's taking a solo walk with your phone on airplane mode. Maybe that's knocking out that 45 minute workout and asking your husband to watch the kids or whatever it is. Maybe it's drinking your coffee in the morning, in silence, whatever it is. I want you to do it, and I want you to do it unapologetically and know that when you are able to fill your cup, you are able to pour that cup out on other people and it will be the best of you. They're not getting the worst of you. They're getting the best of you because you are prioritizing things in your life so that you can at least do one thing for yourself every single day so that you, when you lay your head on that pillow at night, you not only feel satisfied because you allowed yourself to do the thing that you wanted to do, but you were also able to show up as the best version of yourself because you did that.
All right, there you have it. Those are the five things that I hope will make your life easier. I hope that this was just some real talk that maybe you needed maybe one or maybe all five of these things spoke to you. I would love to know, but I want to recap them. Number one, focus on the things and people who truly matter.
Number two, don't take everything so personally. Number three, don't be a yes woman. Learn to say no. But if you say yes, at least learn to create those boundaries. Number four, let people know what your needs and priorities are. And number five, do at least one thing for yourself every single day. If you love this episode, I know you will also love Episode 117 nine Ways to Reduce Your Stress and also Episode 75 five Steps to Stop Letting People Stress You Out. I will link both of those in the show notes below. But Sister, I would love to know which one of these really spoke to you or I would love to know maybe an aha moment that you had in this podcast. So be sure to screenshot this and post it up on your Instagram story or whatever social media platform. I'm basically on all of them and I would just love to know, so be sure to tag me. Either I embrace you real account or Julie account or Julie celebrity account. All of those accounts. I'll see it. But I love, love, love connecting with you guys and I love seeing kind of your aha moments and just seeing what you're getting from the podcast. Also, if you have a girlfriend or a friend or someone in your life that you feel like would really benefit from this specific episode, I just ask that you share it out with them. You can copy the link and send it to them in a text message. You can also again screenshot this posted up on your story and you can tag some of your friends to listen to it.
And now on Instagram, everybody has the link option, so you can just copy the link from the podcast app and you were able to directly link it in your Instagram story as well. That is all that I have for today's episode. Thank you so much for tuning in. I love you so, so much and I will talk to you. All right, sister, that's all I got for you today. But I have two things that I need you to do. First thing, if you are not already following me on the gram, be sure to do so, @juliealedbetter. Yes. It's with an a in the middle for that daily pose about real talk, healthy tips and tricks and honest accountability to keep your mind and heart in check. The second thing be sure to subscribe to Apple Podcasts to never miss an episode. Thank you so much for joining me and means the absolute world and I'm going to leave you with one last thought. The most beautiful women that I have met in my life are the ones who are completely confident and secure in being authentically themselves. Remember, that beauty goes so much deeper than the surface. So go out there and embrace the real because you're worth it.