BSB Ep 71
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[00:00:00] Welcome to the Bite-Size Brilliance podcast. I am your host, Dr. April Darley, and I'm going to do a podcast mashup today. So I have recently recorded two different episodes. One I have published, it's episode number 66. The Values Advantage and one I recorded earlier today
I'm gonna give you a little mashup with it and it's all about alignment. What to do when you feel you're out of alignment. So I'm gonna mash those two concepts together for this episode. Values plus alignment equals identity. And when you were thinking about creating something new for yourself, you wanna know these two things, values and alignment, because they will shape the identity and they shape your actions and your plan on how you work toward a goal. Now, why is this important? I have to say the [00:01:00] number one thing I recommend clients do to help with their overall wellbeing and happiness in life is meditation. That's the number one thing I recommend. The number one thing they blow off and don't do for a thousand different reasons.
The number two thing I recommend they do for happiness and wellbeing is to determine your values. That is the number two thing that they blow off, and it's so easy to ignore that. But with my high achieving my corporate clients, they can tell you exactly what the company's mission statement and values are, but they've never slowed down enough to do that for themselves.
And this is a big mistake. We get into this more in episode 66, but if you don't know what you stand for, then you'll fall for anything and it's no wonder you might be feeling lost about who you are and what you're doing if you haven't done that critical step of defining. What you stand for and what's important to you.
So to help [00:02:00] you with that, I created a resource, it's called The Values Advantage. You can pick that up over on my website, aprildarley.com. And that helps get you started with some exercises to guide you through that process of who am I, what's important to me, what am I doing here? And once you know what your values are.
Values help you get to that step two, which is alignment, and it helps you create a life that's true to you, not a life that you think would be good. I'm gonna give you an example that's a really frivolous one. It's do I wear high heels or not to look more professional? So let's break this down in a frivolous way.
Why would I want to wear high heels? Because somewhere I've gotten the idea that women who wear high heels just look more polished. They look more professional. And if I want to be taken seriously as a [00:03:00] professional, then high heels would be part of the package, right? And a lot of women do that. Even though high heels, they hurt.
I mean, they hurt your toes, they hurt in your knees, they hurt your backs. Like any orthopedist can tell you, that's not the smartest choice for you to wear is high heels. So why do people continually do it? Beauty is not one of my top five values, but I do have clients who beauty is in their top five.
Now when something is in your top five values, your top five are the things that you will strive toward, that you prioritize, that you will even chase or sacrifice for. So clients that have beauty in their top five, they're very concerned with fashion. These are the clients that might eat beans and rice for a month to be able to get this piece of fashion.
And some people might call that frivolous or superficial, but it's not for [00:04:00] them if it's in their value system. Those clients that have beauty in their top five, they are right on it with self-care. These are the people that will prioritize self-care, their skincare, their hair care, their fashion routines.
And it's not that they're being superficial or silly. They are living true. They are in alignment with what they have determined is a high priority value for them. But like for myself, beauty's not my top five. Do I care about it? Sure. But I don't care enough about it to chase it, to sacrifice for it, to pursue it no matter what.
Optimism is my number one core value. Knowledge is my number two value. I'm gonna prioritize, Hey, do I feel good about this? And what is this teaching me over? What does this look like? And that's being true to me. So if I were to try to wear [00:05:00] high heels to look more professional, I actually do the opposite.
I end up feeling awkward because it hurts, and when things are hurting, it's a lot harder to be optimistic. By doing something that's not in alignment with me, I actually go against my core value of optimism. This is where we need to bring it back and think about alignment. So there's a couple of ways that we can do this, and that alignment episode is gonna guide you.
I will publish it before this one, I promise, so that you have some reference material for this little mashup. But if you're thinking about alignment, you do wanna go, what is the goal? If the goal were to be look professional, why do I want this goal? And think about all your definition for that. So I get more clients, people take me seriously.
I get heard, I get opportunities. Great. And then it would be, is this a [00:06:00] match for who I am and how I want to live? it's that final question that may trip you up. Is this a match for me? Does it feel good? Is this a match for how I wanna live? I do not wanna live in high heels, lemme tell you that. No.
So, and it reminds me of this quote I heard. I think I heard it for the first time, honestly, on Top Gun Maverick, if you've seen that movie where he is now a very mature, experienced fighter pilot. But he finds himself in the cockpit of the old school F 17, and he goes, it's not the plane that matters, it's the pilot.
A good pilot can fly any plane and that's exactly what you have to remind yourself. It's not the trappings. So for me, who doesn't prioritize beauty, it's not in my top five. Do I like it? Sure. [00:07:00] But am I gonna sacrifice for it, chase it? Prioritize it above all things? No. Alright, so for me, high heels. They're, they're like the plane, right?
It's like I don't need them. The magic is me. I'm the pilot. I could wear combat boots, which I actually prefer and still be professional because I'm the pilot, so it really doesn't matter about the plane as much. Can I give you value? Can I teach you something? Can I make you feel good about what you're doing?
Can I present a new way for you to live your life that's in alignment? Yes. And you know what, my friend, none of that has to do with high heels. That's just the plane and the pilot. So look at your own life and think about what you stress out right now, where you might be having some resistance in your [00:08:00] life, where you may be getting frustrated.
And really take that hard look. What's the values I have? And sometimes we feel this resistance because we're doing what's called a values violation. We are trying to do something that goes against our values system. This is exactly what high heels would be if I wore that. It's violating my value system because it's making me focus on what I don't like instead of being optimistic, which is how I want to really be.
And then are we thinking the way we naturally are isn't good enough? Because that's the trap. If I were to allow myself to believe that only people in high heels are professional looking. And then I don't like high heels. I'm telling the story that I can't be successful and I'm not really professional because I prefer combat boots, lies my friend [00:09:00] trickery and lies.
But this is the stuff you wanna watch out for to really truly be in alignment with your own identity. You do wanna know your values. You do wanna figure out who I am and what do I stand for, so that then you can create a life that is a match for you.
I could wear high heels, sure. But it's not the plane I really wanna park myself in. And this is how. You create true happiness and you create an identity that is really authentic to you, is by understanding your values, understanding where alignment comes from, and how both of those work together to shape your ultimate identity.
And if you right now are trying to change some aspect of your identity, back to basics. Who am I? What do I stand for? And that all begins with values [00:10:00] identification. So please do not skip the step. It is very important. It is a foundational step for every decision you make, and the longer you go without knowing what your values are, the more you run the risk of being out of alignment and creating this imbalance or unhappiness in your life.
And I don't want that for you. It's a real easy fix. It doesn't take a lot of time even, and I've put it together for you in a very quick, easy to consume packet. It's called the Values Advantage. Over on my website, aprildarley.com. If you go to the shop tab, you can pick it up
and it's such a valuable resource for you to get to the heart of who you are, get in alignment with the life you wanna lead, and really feel good about getting yourself there. So until next week, my friends. [00:11:00] Bye bye.
