Going Beyond Your Limits

Welcome to This Daring Adventure podcast, where we work on bridging the gap between where we are and where we want to be in order to live a bigger and bolder life.

In this podcast, we will provide inspiration, tips, and skills you need to make your life the adventure you want it to be. Here's your host, mindset mentor and life coach Trista Guertin.

Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of This Daring Adventure. Thank you so much for joining me.

This is episode 63 and it's about the capacity to grow. I was thinking about this as a topic because I've been watching a lot of Dr. Benjamin Hardy YouTube videos this past week and he is doing a lot of work and he's written books on this but basically raising the floor as a methodology and it means what we accept, what we do, raising the standard and setting the bar higher so that we set bigger goals, we do more, we accomplish more in a shorter period of time.

And it sounds hustling and stressful, but it's really not. It's an interesting concept. And the idea also includes the. ability to start living as your future self now, when you're setting those bigger goals in a shorter amount of time, it changes your focus. It changes the way you think it changes the way you show up. And in the work that he does with his clients and what he recommends in his books and in his videos is that you are capable of doing so much more than you think you are.

And in fact the most of the premises, 10 X is easier than two X because you are challenging yourself. And completely changing the way you're thinking as compared to just, trying to double something and that can be in terms of an actual goal and it can also be in terms of the actual timeframe.

So say you have a goal for, creating something in 10 years, what he recommends is you reduce that and you do something bigger within a smaller timeframe. Period of time. So say, two years or six months instead, or, he's even talked about two months. So just completely changing and turning upside or turning or putting upside down the whole concept of how we grow how we set goals how we go after what it is we want And it still amazes me that I can find myself at 52 years of age, thinking about this And just enjoying it so much and living into this idea of myself that I didn't know what that was possible and thinking about all the ways I want to create a life for myself that I never believed would be reasonable or feasible or believable.

So I wanted to share this with you a little bit today about, what is your capacity to grow and to get you to think about that. If you're here listening to this podcast, then at some level, you are, you're interested in personal growth and self development.

And This is a journey that we can undertake for the entirety of our lives and our capacity to grow as well as our capacity to change is unlimited and we are born this way and obviously the first step is to change. 20 odd years of our lives are geared and centered around this growth and this change. Everything we do, we're constantly growing, we're constantly changing. And our society is set up that way. We go through school, we go through university or college, we get a job, and we, have gone through that process where we've evolved and changed and grown up in so many ways. But then I think we stall out and there's really not that emphasis. there's really not that impetus to continue.

We get busy and we get comfortable and I think we just forget that this is the reason why we're here. And it's something that I've picked up through my coaching journey is that. We are here to see what we're capable of and to continue growing. This is an innate drive within us. And one of the taglines that I use in my coaching business is if you are feeling like you're meant for more, It's because you are, and I truly believe that we are meant for more. And if you're feeling that, that's, there's a reason for that. It's an intrinsic human desire. It's the way we are created. And it was something that I was experiencing for myself.

I felt like I had spent so many years just lying on the couch, watching TV night after night, and not investing in my growth, not investing in my development, and I was quite content. In a lot of ways, but then my situation changed and I realized that I was no longer content just lying on the couch watching Netflix or whatever it was, I was doing some reading, but there seemed to me that there was so much more out there and indeed there was and that's how I came across coaching. I think the turning point was that I had always thought about running a marathon for several years, but never did it. And to me, the idea of running a marathon seemed really just, you may as well have said you could go to the moon to me. I just didn't believe that it would be physically possible for me. I put it off and put it off and put it off, but it never completely left my mind.

And then when I was 45, I just for fun was fooling around, Googling, marathon training plans and whatnot, and came across a training plan for half marathon and half marathon had never really occurred to me. But it made sense in that, if I thought a full marathon was impossible, it made sense that I could start with a half marathon. And I still was on the fence about that, thinking, gosh, how was I going to run what is it, the 13. 1 miles?

I hadn't run any I don't even run I wasn't even running at that point. And then I kept Googling training plans I just couldn't let it go. And I found a run walk training plan. I didn't know you could walk part of a marathon. Who knew, right? So I thought, oh, I could do that for sure. So I did. And I decided I was going to go to Kuwait to run a half marathon in November, and I trained and it was painful and it was, it really was a turning point for me at that time in my life being, as I said, 45 and, doing something like that, which I didn't think it was possible at that age, that stage of my life here. I was doing something so radically different and radically new for myself that it really was the beginning of everything.

And then I was planning to run a full marathon in May of 2020 in Prague. And of course, then COVID hit, the pandemic. And I was about six weeks away from running that marathon. I had trained and trained. I think I had reached at that point, like running 14 miles and had another six weeks to go and was, had my plane ticket, everything booked, like I was going and I was devastated when I had to cancel that or it was canceled. And I haven't done a marathon. I never made it. I did another half marathon. It was like a remote marathon, which means I ran the half marathon by myself on the streets and timed it and then sent it in and got it officiated.

So I've done that and I continue to run a little bit. I haven't gotten to the full marathon and I don't know that I will, but that's not the point. The point is that it was a turning point because I had done something that I had thought was completely impossible and completely ridiculous. And then in 2020, after the marathon was canceled and we were in the middle of the pandemic, I signed up for coach training. And again, that was something that was wild for me. It was a big investment in time and financially. And I didn't, at that point, really know what I would do with it but it was really intriguing to me to learn that, and I was really motivated, I was really interested in it. I thought it would be useful for myself and for my day job, and I thought, it could be a great sort of second career down the road, which I was interested in. Embarking on that journey was quite exciting, that, at that point, I was 48 years old. And then, I started the coach certification program and just loved it. Loved it. It was one of the most exciting, interesting endeavors that I had undertaken. And, I started my business. And that was basically when I was also 48, 49 years of age and, starting a business. I had no idea what I was doing and starting a business at that point. Like it was, it's ridiculous.

When I think back, knowing what I didn't know, it was incredible. And just the transformation that I've experienced since then and the experiences that I've had it's been truly such a rewarding time for me. And I really do feel that I'm just getting started. So all that to say is that I had been experiencing that, that sort of nudge, that urge, that I was meant for more, and I just had no idea what that might be, but in actual fact, running the marathon with something that had been niggling at me for many years and, life coaching with something also that had You know, also had been there for many years.

I remember finding Louise Hay when I was 19 or 20 in Australia, finding her books and her work. And that was really when I started on the self development road. And somebody went in 2003, 2004, making an offhand comment, like you should be a life coach.

We were talking about I don't know what we were talking about, what he wanted to do with his life or whatever, and making that comment, and it always stuck with me, and I don't know why, but there it was and there may be those things in your life where, they keep popping up and maybe you don't pay a lot of attention to them.

But slowing down and having that awareness and starting to take those things seriously, because there's a reason that they keep popping up. And now I spend more time thinking about what it is I want. And it's things like, living in Paris and continuing to travel around the world and doing a TED talk and writing a book. Writing a book is something that I've thought about for years and years. So that's definitely on my list of things to do.

One of the things I always encourage my clients to do, and I encourage you to do, is to make a list of things that you want. And that can be things you want to do, things you want to try, places you want to go, things you want to learn, whatever it is, to really, get still and listen to, what your deepest desires are and start to take them seriously because I promise you, you have them for a reason and you have the capacity to go after them and to get them and to grow and to change and to evolve into that person.

I think if we're not aware of our capacity to grow, and if we're not intentional about growing and about seeing what we're capable of, then it doesn't happen.

You and you just land up living on default day after day, repeating the past, just doing more of the same over and over again. And. It does take effort. It takes time. It takes awareness that you sit down and you listen to that voice and you take it seriously and you put in the effort to continue to grow and to continue to go to the next level. It's something that really gives shape and meaning to our days and our lives. And it is something that creates a sense of purpose.

A lot of people come to coaching because they are looking for their purpose. Learning to continue your growth and to see what you are capable of is a part of your purpose, and it definitely gives you a sense having a purpose and giving yourself an intentional direction and a course for taking yourself to that next level and to growing. And it's changed what I believe is possible for my future. And it's changed me. It's changed me completely.

We have the capacity to grow throughout our lives. And this can mean intellectually, it can be emotionally, it can be spiritually, it can be financially, it can be physically. It applies to all areas of our lives, and you can decide what you want to focus on. I suggest that at different times you focus on different areas, start in one and you will see it will have a domino effect. It will have a knock on effect to the other areas of your life and you want to be focused.

You want to make sure that you're not taking on too much or that you're not losing your ability to concentrate on One particular goal at a time, but, understanding that it is possible to grow and evolve in every area of your life. And the more you do this work, the more you will see the changes. It starts to expand our horizons. It starts to expand what we believe is possible for ourselves. We learn to push past our self-constructed limitations, and we start showing up as our best selves. And we take ourselves to the next level on a regular basis.

One of the things, as I mentioned, is that our limitations, our boundaries are self constructed that we have the capacity to grow and to change. And it's unlimited. The only thing that is holding us back is our mind, is our brain. It's what we believe is possible for ourselves. That's what dictates how we show up, what we go after, because if you don't believe that something is possible for yourself, then you're blocking it. As soon as you, you don't believe it, then your brain just stops and you just think that's it.

We need to really push ourselves and tap into that desire for growth and for learning and for change and override the primitive part of our brain, the survival part of our brain that wants to keep us safe that wants to keep us hiding in the cave because it's easier and it's familiar and it's safer. So we really need to understand that our boundaries are created, our limitations are created in our mind and we have to use our mind. To push past them. In order to start your journey, to see what you're capable of and to see what your capacity is, see what's possible for yourself.

It takes intentionality, it takes some self reflection, taking time to explore your values, explore your interests and your strengths.

What brings you joy?

What brings you fulfillment? What has been there niggling at you saying, Oh, you know this, I would love to do this, but it's, no. There are always things in the back of our mind that we pushed aside. What are those things? And then, what are the possibilities for your life that you've never, ever considered? You can also spend some time brainstorming and imagining and getting curious about what might be possible for yourself.

Oftentimes, we are not raised that way. We are not raised to push those boundaries and to go beyond what is right in front of us. And we really need to spend some time reflecting and going outside the box to, to decide what might be possible for ourselves, things that we had never, ever considered before.

You might want to identify your core values.

You can find those, Google a list of values and see which ones speak to you and use those as guiding principles that will define who you are and what you stand for. And that will help to guide you in your decision making, in your actions and your prioritization about what it is, where you want to go, what it is you want to create and how you want to grow and change and create your life intentionally. Setting meaningful goals.

As I mentioned at the beginning, these big meaningful goals are a tool that you can use to grow and to change. In the end, Accomplishing the goal is less important as who you become along the way. And when you set a really big, meaningful goal for yourself, it challenges you. It pushes you to change and to grow in ways that you never would have considered previously. It demands more of you. And therefore you grow more, you change more.

Your possibilities grow and expand, and you are showing up as yourself at a completely different level, and you will need to take action. Intentional action, massive action, and massive action means. It's taking action regularly. It doesn't have to be big action.

Don't confuse big with massive, but the massive action means you keep taking action.

You don't give up no matter what you just keep showing up. You keep taking that action to get you to where you want to go, to create that goal, to change, to go to the next level. Living with purpose, discovering your capacity to grow and to change, taking yourself to the next level is a dynamic process of growth and adaptation. And you really want to embrace opportunities for learning, for self improvement, for personal development, be open to change and willing to pivot as necessary. Listen to that voice, listen to those deep desires, those urges, those niggling little things that keep coming back to you.

Challenge your brain. Challenge your mind.

Challenge the thoughts that come up saying it's too late. It's not possible. You're too old. It's not going to happen challenge those as a human being, you have the ability to change and to grow at any time in your life. At any stage, we have developed socially. And culturally to pause our growth and to significantly reduce the amount of growth and change in our mid twenties, but this doesn't have to be the case later in life, midlife. It takes more work. It takes more effort. It has to be intentional.

You have to be intentional about the process and what you want and where you want to go, but it's completely possible. And it is what will give your life meaning it is what your will give your life purpose. Let's see what is possible for you, what you're capable of, what the next level looks like for you. And I promise that is what will satisfy that meant for more feeling that you have inside of you.

If you're interested, I do offer free coaching sessions. If you want to try coaching for yourself, it's a 45 minute session. The link to my calendar will be in my show notes, come get coached on any issue that you wish. If you want to talk about what you're meant for, if you want to talk about what's possible for your life, this is the perfect opportunity.

I will also tell you about my three month coaching program and the group coaching program that's going to be coming up in May as well. Lots of exciting things going on. I am working on a specific program that will include videos and worksheets for my clients.

So now is the time if you're interested to learn more about that and I will also be offering another free master class coming up in mid April. I will be sending out information about that as soon as I select the date. I've just finished three master classes, which I really enjoyed doing I had great turnouts I really appreciated everybody who came out to support and I hope you found them all useful.

Thanks everybody for tuning in. I will talk to you next week.

Take care. Bye bye.

Thank you for listening to This Daring Adventure podcast with your host Trista Guertin. We hope you enjoyed the tips and conversations on how to get excited about life again.

As always, you can head to tristaguertin.com for additional resources and to book a one on one coaching session. You can also follow Trista on Instagram at tristavguertin.

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Thanks again for tuning in and we'll see you next time.