Self(ish) Confidence
Your confidence is your superpower… but what if you don’t have any? It can be hard to show up as your authentic self. When we go out, or even scrolling on the couch, it's easy to get trapped in the comparison game, making it even harder to be beautifully you. Self(ish) Confidence is about finding your confidence, shining your light and taking action toward your unconventional life. Every week, we'll chat through barriers that could hold you back. Follow along with me, Jess Clerke, as we learn to find our confidence together and begin to share our magic with the world.
Self(ish) Confidence
Dust off those dreams, sis 💨✨
The holiday season can often feel like a whirlwind of societal expectations and personal overwhelm, but what if there was a way to transform that chaos into clarity and confidence? Join me, Jess, as I share my personal journey of navigating this hectic time of year and how it naturally led to reflecting on and redefining my future goals. This episode invites you to explore the idea of reclaiming your buried dreams and aligning them with your personal vision, even if they seem out of reach. Discover the power of the Self(ish) Sisterhood, a community where women uplift each other in their quests for growth.
Ever wondered if the dreams lingering in the back of your mind still resonate with who you are today? Together, we'll revisit these aspirations, like adjusting a prescription to find clear vision, and discuss how to break them down into manageable steps. By focusing on attainable habits and consistent effort, you can maintain momentum, even during life's busier moments. Prepare to refocus and redefine your dreams, learning how to weave them seamlessly into your current reality, no matter how daunting they may seem.
Join the Self(ish) Sisterhood for only $99 for 3 months.
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Welcome to Selfish Confidence, a place where we can connect and be real about how hard it is to be your damn self. My name is Jess and my goal is to help you build confidence and belief in yourself to live any life path you want, even if it's unconventional. It's time to flip off societal pressures and connect with women who've also felt on the outside by their life choices. We're here to encourage you to grab the mic and speak your truth. I know it can be scary, but we're in this together. Let's get started. Hello, hello and welcome to this week's episode of the Selfish Confidence Podcast. It's Jess here and I have been thinking a lot. I'd love to sit here and be like oh yeah, my brain is pretty much empty as my cats go crazy as I sit down to record this because I think it's dinner time. It's not Murphy, it's not dinner time and I don't normally record with the door open. But we're going to try something new today.
Speaker 1:All about trying new things, but have you ever been in that season where your brain is just on overdrive? We're just like going through all of the scenarios and as we walk into the holidays into, you know, american Thanksgiving for some of you, for, you know, christmas time for all of the things that are right now in our plates, the brain just keeps going, because what used to be a time that we could slow down and we could rest comes with this season of ramp up. It comes with us needing to do more in order to almost earn that time of rest, that time off, and whether that's one day if you get just Christmas day, or maybe you get a week or whatever it is for that time, the season before that seems a little crazy. It seems incredibly busy, and I've just been like sitting and letting my brain go through the waves of this craziness and redefining what this season could look like for us. Craziness and redefining what this season could look like for us. And this is often the season that we sit down and we start to think about next year, we start to think about 2025. And maybe you're like Jess I'm not there yet, I'm not ready for this.
Speaker 1:As you says, you do whatever you need to do right now. If you need to focus on one thing at a time and we're just focusing on getting through this week, then I am sending you all the strength and all the love to get you through this week because it feels like a heavy and exciting and fun season, and maybe that's just me over here, but typically when I feel this way, I know that I'm not alone. There's a lot of us going through things at the same time, and what I wanted to talk to you about today, what's been on my heart this whole week, is, if you're not where you thought you'd be, maybe it's a time to redefine the dream and to refocus and to realign yourself with the vision that you have for your life. I believe you would not be given this vision that you have, this thing that you can see so clearly, or maybe even not clearly a little foggy, but you can see something. You would not be given this vision if it wasn't meant for you, if it wasn't something that was coming for you in the future.
Speaker 1:And I can have some big visions. You know that about me. I can have some big visions to the point where I'm just like that is not possible, that's never going to happen, that's absolutely crazy. No one like me has ever achieved that and that's just. That can't be for me, and we doubt ourselves and we put ourselves down or we keep ourselves safe. One thing that I've been doing a lot of is just keeping myself safe, not taking the action, because if I take the action it means I could fail, and if I could fail I don't want the rest of the world to see that Right.
Speaker 1:And so we often put that vision and that dream in the back of our head or in the back of our mind, where we're just like put it away, nobody needs to know. Until that one day where maybe you're at a personal development event or you're just hanging out with your friends and they ask you what's been on your mind and you just start crying. You're like, oh right, there's something in there, there is a vision, there's a focus and there's a purpose for my life, and I have been too scared to even look at it. I see you, sis. I wanted to talk to you today about just that vision that you could have put in the back of your head and you never want to think about again, that one that you have really tried to avoid. Why it's there and how you can bring it not to the front of your mind, but just to be aware of it as we walk into the new year and have an opportunity to live a different life, and before I get into the meat and the potatoes of today's podcast, or the tofu and potatoes for my vegans, I wanted to let you know that we're opening the doors open again this month for the Selfish Sisterhood, and there's only a couple more months that you can join before we close the doors for a while. And I say that not as a scare tactic, but because I'm having a baby and I won't be able to manage people coming in and out of the sisterhood for a little bit. So we're going to be closing the doors in January for the last time. So there's only a couple more months that you're able to actually join this community.
Speaker 1:And what I love about this space is the women in there are just next level. They are full of love and they are full of light. And just the other day we had our workshop with Randy, who was talking about the different sex hormones and hormones and health with your hormones and understanding your hormones in general. And having a moment to be able to have these conversations with women who I didn't know that I could have these conversations with a few years ago, is it blew my mind. It blew my mind to have a space where we could talk about things that we weren't taught in school, or talk about things that you know are on our hearts, and the dreams and the visions that we have that we don't always feel safe to talk about with our friends and our family or at Christmas dinner, right, like there's so many things that we don't often get to experience in our everyday lives that we can experience in this space, because it is so welcoming to do so, you could come in and tell us what that vision is that you have on the back of your head, and we'd be so excited for you and help to create a plan with you to build this vision. And so, if that's something that interests you, you're looking for a community of women who stand together and who love each other so deeply and want to be there for each other, to learn, to grow and to express what's on our hearts. This is the space for you.
Speaker 1:The Selfish Sisterhood is for all women. It is not just for entrepreneurs, it's for the people who are looking for their people, and so it's totally virtual, so you can join from anywhere in the world and you can get three months for only $99 Canadian, and that deal is going away at the end of this month. Okay, so you only have a short period of time to be able to jump in, and I'm telling you our calendars for December, january, february and March because I have it all lined up already are fire Like. They are going to be so impactful for you on this journey, on how to start the new year strong and how to step into a season that maybe you didn't know you could step into next year, just because you're in the right community and you're surrounded by the right people and you're applying yourself in that way. So, again, you can join this month, only for three months of the Selfish Sisterhood, for $99 Canadian, and I'll put that information in the show notes for you. But I just want you to know that deal is not coming back. It's the only time you're going to get it and the doors are going to be closing pretty soon for a while. So, if you've been thinking about it, this is the time to jump in that selfish sisterhood.
Speaker 1:And that leads me into what I want to talk to you about today was, if you're not where you thought you'd be, maybe at the end of 2024, or maybe in 2024 in general, I don't think I thought I'd be here either that I would be sitting here recording this podcast for you on a rainy afternoon drinking some juice and just realizing I'm pregnant like super pregnant. And a year ago, although we had opened and started the discussion that this could be our reality next year, I don't think I really thought that I would be here. And planning and building out a life for the future is really difficult when you don't even know what the future could be right, when you can't even envision what that future is. It's hard to see, it's hard to plan for, and one of the things that I've been really focusing on lately is redefining the dream. What is the dream for me?
Speaker 1:And when it comes to a life that maybe you didn't think you would have, or you're not where you thought you'd be, maybe you thought you'd be further along, maybe you thought you would be in a whole different country, maybe you thought you'd still be in that relationship that you were in last year or you'd still have those friendships you had last year, and when you can only see this old vision, this outdated vision, sometimes we need to sit down and redefine what that dream is. We are ever-changing. I've told you this so many times. We are always changing, especially as women, in our menstrual cycles, the moon and all of the things we are always changing. And if you don't take the time to sit down and to get to know yourself and get to know this new version of you that's changing every single day, how are you going to be able to keep up with this vision that you once had? And I am not sitting here to be a dream crusher and to be like you can't have this. You're never going to get what you wanted. No, that's not what I'm saying at all, but I do think as we evolve and as we change, what we want changes and how we want it changes. So, unless you take the time to sit down and to redefine what that is, the dream and that vision is always going to feel a little outdated and almost always going to feel a little out of reach. I found this, too, even with planning Speak Up, right, I had been planning it for so long that the vision almost became outdated once it finally came to fruition.
Speaker 1:And I am always a person and I don't even know if I'm proud to say this, but I've talked about it before who's always on to the next thing, right. When I am like at something I'm on, you know, next year already, like I am in, you know, baby mode and in retreat mode and in all of the things that are coming up. I often have a hard time being present in the place, but that's because the dream is always growing, it's always being redefined and I need to take the time to sit down and to see it clearly. And although that's been hard for me this year, where I can't clearly see next year, I've really been trying to sit down and refocus on the dream and on the vision that I have as much as I can and focus on what I can focus on, prioritize what I can actually implement and do and make the goals, however I want to make them and almost even realistic for what the season could be. And so those are kind of like the first two steps in this process.
Speaker 1:If you have a vision that's been in the back of your brain and you're like, oh, it's back there and I don't know how I'm ever going to get there, the first thing that we're going to do is redefine that dream, bring that vision back out. Is redefine that dream, bring that vision back out, dust it off a little and look at it. What about? That vision lights you up still. What about that vision is like oh, that's why I wanted this. And sometimes we have to go through those levels of why and peel the onion back to figure out why we want it. And we're not going to do that here today. It's just a matter of, like, pulling the vision forward, seeing it and allowing us some time to redefine it if we need it, to shake it up a little, to see the vision as this current version of ourselves.
Speaker 1:Right, and this could be a dream you've had even since you were a kid. Right, you were five years old and you're like I know I'm going to be a dentist. But now you're 35 years old and you're not a dentist and you're like wait a second, do I want to be a dentist? I'm just picturing the little guy in Rudolph Glenn and I say this all the time. He's like did you want to be a dentist? And he, yeah. So that's just what I'm picturing. I don't know why. That's where I'm going, but that's where we're going today.
Speaker 1:So if this is even a vision you've had for years and years and years, the version of you right now is going to have a different version of that dream too. So take it out, dust it off and look at it. What do you like about this vision? Why do you want it and how can we change it so that it becomes attainable for us right now and I'm not saying tomorrow, I'm not saying we got to run out and do this right now. It's just about bringing it back to the front of our mind and seeing if it's still for us. If it's not, it's not.
Speaker 1:I have visions on my vision board that I have been taking things off as things have been changing this year and life has been changing, and knowing that next year looks different, my vision for my life looks different and so, as things are changing, I'm pulling things off the vision board and throwing them out. And it kind of feels weird, because a prior version of me thought that that was like the best thing, like that was the number one, that was the win. There's no way I could ever not want that. And now, as things are looking different and life's looking different, you know, the vision that I had for all the travel I wanted to do might not be the top priority for 2025. It's not going to be the top priority for 2025, but it's just the vision looks different and it's okay to take some time to redefine that. So that's the first step.
Speaker 1:If you're not where you thought you'd be, pull that vision out and redefine it for the version that you are now. And then the next thing I want you to do is to refocus. I picture this like when you go to the eye doctor and they're trying to find your prescription and they're like what looks better, this one or this one? And you're like they look the same. No, but sometimes they do. One does look better than the other. And you're like okay, but there is that refocus, the moment where it was all blurry and now it can become clear. And that comes after you redefine it. That comes from you seeing if this vision is still for you and if it is, it's time to refocus. What do you need to do in order to make that dream come to life, in order for you to see that vision and take a step in the right direction?
Speaker 1:And if you're like me and you're in a season where maybe that action piece isn't totally realistic, or you can't go as big or as hard as you used to go, or you don't have a lot of time, right, I know we just talked earlier about the holidays and how busy it can be and maybe you just don't have the same amount of time as you do in other parts of the year. Taking that refocus and pinning it down to something really small and attainable that you can focus on right now is the only way that you are going to keep that momentum going. Right now is the only way that you are going to keep that momentum going and I talk about this a lot, especially if you're in the program confidently you making it as small and as attainable as possible is like the best thing you can do. It's like if you want to be the world's best pogo person and you've just been like pogo in all day long and you have been hopping on that pogo and you want to go for like three days, how long do you have to pogo today in order to get there Right? How long do you have to work on some of these habits in order to get you to that vision and get you to that dream? Even if you only have five minutes, can you prioritize the habits that you want in order to make this vision come to life? And this could take a really long time. There's a reason why you're not where you thought you would be okay. It's because this stuff takes work and this stuff takes time and so if we can make it into a way that we can have small momentum every single day, it's really going to help us to refocus and to put that vision at the front.
Speaker 1:This is the time of year that a lot of us say I'll refocus in January, I'll come back then when I have more time. But the truth is we don't have more time in January. We think we do, we think that there's going to be so much time and that's when it's a better time to focus. But the best thing you can do right now is to just find a small way to bring that forward. It is not going to be necessarily a better time in January than it is now. So when you refocus, make it small in the sense where you could do it even in a busy season, so that you have that momentum that when January comes and you are burnt out and exhausted from the holidays, that you still have this momentum to work with, to take it into the next level, to take it to that overdrive, that energize, that thing that you think you're going to have more time, for sure, but you can do it better if you start with small things now. And we've talked about this a lot.
Speaker 1:But I think, when it comes to this vision, I don't know about you, but I put it on the board and sometimes I say, okay, it's there, I manifested it. Right, it's going to happen. But the manifestations also take energy and take work. So just start to move in that direction with your refocus. And then the next thing is to realign Three things here.
Speaker 1:Okay, when you have that vision and you've dusted it off in the back of your head, you're going to redefine it, you're going to refocus and then you're going to realign. Is this still for me? Does this feel authentic? Is this what I want for my life? And if the answer is yes, then get yourself in the position to realign with that vision and bring it to life.
Speaker 1:When that vision has been dusty and in the back of your head for a long time, yeah, sometimes redefining it, reorganizing it with who we are, is really important, but it's also important to realign ourselves with that vision too. And again, you don't have to run out to Christmas dinner and tell your whole family and be like I want this business that I have on my heart, or I want, you know, to become the next Victoria's Secret supermodel. Whatever your vision is, you don't have to share it with the world in order to realign, but what you do have to do is to get your body and your mindset in that right position in order for this to come to life. And I do this through different self-care practices. So even today, when I was just kind of feeling out of focus and I wanted to realign with the vision that I had, I took a bath and I brought my you know Palo Santos to the bath and I brought my crystals to the bath and I just had a moment to meditate with myself alone in the bath. And that's also partly because I have been getting the craziest Charlie horses in my leg. It's a pregnancy symptom I had no idea existed, so I wanted to soak in the bath for a little bit longer.
Speaker 1:But I also thought that this would be a really nice time to realign with myself and my vision. So I brought my cards to the bath, I brought any tools that I wanted, and I'm not saying you have to one take a bath or two, even have different rituals that help you to realign. But what you can do is take that time to be alone with yourself, those nothing pockets, little bit of meditation, that quality time with yourself, whatever self-care is for you, it's going to help you to realign. I know when we take care of ourselves, this is what actually helps us to bring these visions to life. We think that, oh, I don't have time for that. I have to work, work, work, work, work. I have to do all these things. But it's actually in that process of taking care of ourselves that these dreams and these visions become more vivid for us.
Speaker 1:And I noticed this as I have passed the torch to my husband. Actually, he grabbed the torch from my hand and he ran with it because I killed all the plants in our house. I killed them all. Well, I didn't kill them, because they have come back to life, but I just did not prioritize watering them, I did not prioritize taking care of them. I did not prioritize these beautiful plants that I have in my home.
Speaker 1:And Glenn noticed that and when he did, he said you know what? I think I'm going to take them over and honestly, it was kind of hard for me to be like you know what? No, I can do it. I can do it, but they're getting watered like once a month or once every two months and I just can't. I couldn't keep track of the watering. So it's either one of us does it, because if both of us do, they're going to get over watered. It's not going to work, it's just it's going to be a mess.
Speaker 1:So Glenn took them over and I am sitting here looking at this money tree that I got in my office when we first moved into this house to help absorb the sound in this office space, because it was quite noisy. If you remember, a couple years ago when we moved here, it was just like a echoey room, and so I got a few plants that would help that and I let them sadly die, but it is thriving. Since Glenn has taken it over and he's been watering it and he's been giving it the nutrients that it needs every other week and taking care of this plant and a few others that we have in our house. And it was the clear reminder for me today too, of like this plant is doing really well because someone is taking the time to care for it. It's not self-care, because plants need someone to take care of them, but it is that you know the grass is going to grow where you water it. The grass is going to grow where you water it, and that's why it's so important for you to water yourself. Now I'm envisioning you taking a shower, but no, honestly. That's why it's so important that self-care is number one, so that you can realign with these visions and show up for your purpose.
Speaker 1:That plant was not living its purpose when I was the one watering it, because it was here to absorb the sound. It was here to help with the echo-ness of this room and it could not do that because somebody wasn't taking care of it. That someone was me. And now that it's been watered and loved and cared for, it's doing so well and it's helping with the absorption of sound in this room. It's honestly just helping with the overall mood of this room, because who doesn't love plants? Right? It's just such a beautiful thing to have in this space. And it could not do its job because it was not getting watered. And that was my bad. Okay, that was my bad, and maybe you can look at your self-care routine right now and you're thinking you know what that's my bad.
Speaker 1:I haven't been taking care of myself. I've been letting the holiday season, you know, overwhelm me. I've been letting work take over things. I've been letting the kids take over things. And don't get me wrong, I know that we're in a season that might be difficult to make time for yourself. But just like that goal of refocusing and allowing there to be something really small it's the same thing with realigning you can allow it to be really small. Your self-care doesn't need to be an hour at the spa every week, right? It can just be five minutes of reading in your book before you go to bed at night, or going to bed a little bit earlier. Or maybe it's making a nutritious meal and prioritizing your health, right? Self-care looks different and it can be really small. You're going to make a meal anyway. So instead of it being a frozen pizza, let's try to make something different.
Speaker 1:Okay, do what you need in this season in order to water yourself and in order to realign and to help you grow, like this plant is thriving because somebody is taking care of it, and that is the same thing for your vision and for the dream that you have for your life. If you water it and you water yourself, it is going to grow. It's going to grow and if you're like me, that can be really scary for you because you don't 100% feel like the person who deserves that dream, who can achieve that dream or who can step into the power that it takes in order to make that come to life. But you have it on your heart for a reason. The vision is there, dusty in the back of your head. For a reason Because it's yours and because you can do it.
Speaker 1:Are you going to mess up along the way? Yeah, a few times. We're going to make some mistakes, and that's okay. But if we can keep redefining, refococusing and realigning for this vision, we can really step into this new version of ourselves that brings this vision to life. And again, it's probably going to change along the way. Three months from now, we're going to need to do this again. We're going to need to redefine, we're going to need to realign, we're going to need to refocus and bring this to life. Okay, it's going to be ever-changing, but if you continue to water yourself and you continue to show up for yourself, it is going to change your whole world. Essentially, a year of me watering myself, of me putting in that effort, putting in that energy and that was the most life-changing year I've ever had, like the biggest year of my life going from crying on the kitchen floor to speaking on stages in a year. And that can happen as long as you start to water yourself and take care of yourself and to you know, realign with the vision that you have and I know it's scary and overwhelming and you can be like easy for you to say, jess, I'm telling you, rightusing on what's important and realigning to the vision, the new vision that we have.
Speaker 1:Jess of one year ago didn't know she was going to have to put in this work. She didn't know that everything was going to change. She had an idea, she thought it might happen, but back then that was just the vision. Right Now it's actually here. It the things. It's not going anywhere. Is it going to look different? It might, yeah, but I know that this is such a key part of the vision that I have for my life that I wouldn't give it up.
Speaker 1:It's not going anywhere, but we are going to have to redefine, refocus and realign right now, in this season, to figure out what's best for me, to figure out what's best for our family, and to know that I need to water myself and to water this community, because that's what it takes. So if you have a vision in the back of your mind that's been a little dusty and you're like I don't know if I want to, if I can just take some time to redefine, take some time to sit with it and see what comes up, because I think it can be really magical what can happen when you allow yourself the space and the time to dream. So I love you so much, I hope you're having a wonderful week and I hope to see you in the Selfish Sisterhood. Last call for the best deal of the year and a perfect time because we are getting ready to talk about mental health around the holidays and then in January, our vision boards for the new year and really stepping into self-care and all of the things that we might need.
Speaker 1:And this is the perfect time to spend some time with yourself and to spend some time with amazing women. So I will put all the information in the show notes for you, but remember your vision matters. You are worthy and you can freaking do this. What's up, sis? I am so glad we could hang out today. If you love this episode, send it to a friend or share it on your social media and tag me so I can personally thank you for helping me sprinkle some confidence in the world. And don't forget you are magic. Let's show the world your shine.
