Ep 13. Lighten Up for The Holidays

I’m Kym Showers, and this is Reinvented After 40, episode number 13, Lighten Up for the Holidays.

Hey, friends. Welcome to Reinvented After 40, a podcast for all you women in the second half of life who are ready to take responsibility for your own well-being and create a life you love living.

I’m your host, Kym Showers, and after spending the first 40 years of my life people-pleasing and following all the rules, I was exhausted and ready for a change. I reinvented myself. I stopped outsourcing my happiness. And I’ve been brave enough to live a different kind of life.

I’ll be here each week to help you do the same thing. It’s gonna be fun. Let’s go.

Hi, guys. Welcome back to the show. You know what? I am super proud of myself. It’s fun getting to the end of the year and feeling really good about all the things, and I do. I reached my business goals, and I reached my personal goals. I’m extra, extra proud of myself today and especially of my business goals. I more than doubled last year’s revenue. I started my podcast. I joined my mastermind. Those were my three goals. I feel more inspired than ever. I feel more confident than ever.

And I feel more in love with my life, more in love with my clients and more in love with this work now more than ever. Three years ago this month exactly I got certified as a life coach through The Life Coach School and officially started my life coaching business. I set a business goal that I would double my revenue each year. That was kind of a big goal. And help lots of women love their life. And I have done both of those things. I set personal health goals and personal relationship goals. And I’ve reached them all.

These past three years have been the most empowered years of my life. I have been transformed by coaching. I have changed the entire way I think about myself, and my life, and my future. I am very skilled at managing my thoughts and very skilled at managing my emotions. And so I can show up every day with no regrets. I trust myself. I trust how I handle things. I am consistent, and steady, and flexible. All of this is from coaching. Nothing outside of me determines how I think, and feel, and act. I know that I am creating all of it.

I don’t blame or shame anyone and I don’t blame or shame myself. I take full responsibility for my entire life experience. I have learned how to have the exact life I want and to be the person in any circumstance that I want to be. It’s all been the result of coaching. Coaching has changed the entire trajectory of my life, not only being a coach but having a coach, having a coach every single week, someone I trust to tell me the truth. Sometimes the truth isn’t easy to hear but it’s the most helpful thing to hear. Someone to help me move forward, someone to keep me thinking bigger.

It’s been so much more than I imagined. I really, really, really want the same experience for you. Coaching will change your life. I would love to be your life coach and help you get more out of your life experience and help you get out of your own way by dropping all of your limiting thoughts about yourself, your limiting thoughts about love, limiting thoughts about money, time, energy. Your brain wants to keep you small, and safe, and comfortable. But you are here on this Earth to do much more than that and I can teach you how.

Come work with me for six months and change your life and your family’s life forever. I have a spot just for you. Make 2022 a year to remember. Surprise yourself and surprise everyone else, it’ll be fun. Go to my website, kymshowerslifecoach.com, sign up for a free coaching session or you can actually jump right in, purchase my six month package and we can get right to work.

By June of 2022 next year you’ll be a different person, telling a different story, showing up to your life in a completely different way and you’ll love every bit of it. You’ll trust yourself, you’ll love yourself and you’ll have so much more fun in your life.

And now onto today’s awesome topic, lighten up for the holidays. Listen, no one loves the holidays more than me. I love them. I’m obsessed with Christmas, but I used to get myself knotted up with anxiety in December wanting everything to be magical, and fun, and perfect. I put a lot of pressure on myself and everyone else. I did my best to control the entire month of December and all the people and all the activities in it. I had ideas about traditions and all the hopes and expectations that accompany those traditions.

I was afraid something would go wrong, or someone wouldn’t show up, or someone would show up and ruin my Christmas. I had a lot of fear. I didn’t have the tools that I have now. I didn’t understand that it was always and only my own thoughts, and beliefs, and expectations that could ruin my Christmas. Nothing outside of me ever has the power to ruin anything. I always thought that something could go wrong. I always thought it was someone else not doing what they were supposed to be doing.

I always thought it was my husband who questioned my spending, or my child who wasn’t behaving, or my friend who didn’t invite me, or a virus, or a mandate, or the weather. But now I know it’s never any of that, it’s always me, and my brain, and what I make everything mean. I am so much different now. I have very little stress about the holidays, or really very little stress about anything. And I can teach you how to do the same.

I have three tools you can use to lighten up your holidays, lighten up your mood, lighten up your perspective and lighten up your relationships, especially the one with yourself. Nothing is as serious as we want to think it is. Nothing is as bad. Nothing is as difficult or heartbreaking, or traumatic. Nothing is as heavy, or dark, or disappointing. Those are all just thoughts, sentences in our mind. We create the drama in each situation. Actually our brain creates the drama in each situation. As long as we are aware of it and accept it, then we can change it.

Three tools I want to teach you today are simple. Tool number one, awareness. Tool number two, acceptance. Tool number three, agency. So first awareness, then acceptance, and then agency or choice. Awareness, acceptance, agency. Remember those three things. These are the three tools to lighten up your holidays and lighten up your life for the rest of your life.

So first awareness, when you’re in a circumstance that feels like something has gone wrong, instead of reacting, the first thing you do is slow down and look at the facts. Get some awareness around the situation. This is what’s going on. This is what’s happening. This is what she said. This is what I said. We get honest with ourself and take out the drama and simply name the facts.

For example, your kids call and tell you they’re not able to come to Christmas this year. Your first reaction might be disappointment because you’ve always spent Christmas together. And of course you want to feel disappointed. That’s what we call clean pain. Of course I want to be disappointed. I love being with my kids at Christmas. Then you find your disappointment turns into anger, and blame, and heaviness. This is what we call dirty pain. And I’ll teach you about clean pain and dirty pain in an upcoming episode.

But for now I just want you to be aware of how you are feeling and aware that your thoughts are creating your feelings. Your kids aren’t creating your feelings. Them not coming to Christmas is not creating your feelings, your thoughts are. Awareness is tool number one. These are the facts, this is how I feel about them.

Once we are aware of the facts then we get to acceptance, tool number two. Instead of thinking it shouldn’t have happened we decide that it absolutely should have happened, of course it should have happened. But our brain likes to argue with what is, instead of acceptance of reality, our brain resists reality and that creates a lot of suffering for us. We spin in our mind thoughts like this should be different, this isn’t fair, they should be here, they don’t love us, this is wrong. I had a completely different idea of how this was going to go, and this isn’t it. Christmas is ruined.

These are very common thoughts, and we believe them. It feels like our circumstances cause us so much pain, but they never do. What causes are our pain are our own expectations, and our thoughts about the people and the situation and what they should have done. When we can see that it’s actually us creating our disappointment, or anger, or sadness we can then get some relief. So when we can get ourselves to acceptance instead of resistance we can feel so much better.

I like to think thoughts like nothing has gone wrong, it was always going to be this way. They’re supposed to do whatever they want to for Christmas. It’s not about us at all. It’s about what they want and should be doing. So when you wish life was different, and other people were different, and you were different, you’re rejecting the way your life already is. And I know I’ve already talked to you guys about this but I’m going to tell you about it so many times until we actually get it.

We reject what is and we create a lot of pain for ourselves. We’re unable to get traction to make the change we want to make and to feel better. You get stuck in it. I get stuck in it. And then we end up ruining our own Christmas. But when you accept it and decide to appreciate it, and maybe even love it, and maybe see how it might be better this way, it frees us up to move on. So just say yes, let’s just practice saying yes to all of it, yes to everything, yes to the facts, yes to the circumstances, yes to what is, yes to what everyone wants to say, and feel, and do.

Once you shift into that space of acceptance you are free to choose how you want to respond to it and this is tool number three which is agency, glorious, magical agency. So first awareness, then acceptance, and then agency. We were given agency to make the choices we want to make. Our life experience is in no one’s hands but our own. Our life experience is made up of the choices we make. The way that we respond to life’s circumstances, we never have to react. We can slow it all down and intentionally respond.

We never have to behave like someone else is behaving. No one causes us pain or suffering, people say words, people do things, it’s always neutral. This is so helpful to know. It isn’t our circumstances, it’s our choices. What we think, how we feel and how we act, those choices are creating our life experience and that’s it. It’s not what other people are doing or not doing. So when you are aware of the circumstance and then you accept the circumstance you get to decide how you want to respond to the circumstance. It’s always a choice that you get to make.

It doesn’t matter how anyone else is choosing, you can lighten up your own holiday by making a choice that feels best to you and gets you the results you want. Awareness, acceptance, agency, when you practice these three tools you can have a very light happy Christmas experience. So start practicing and seriously watch what happens. You’ll feel so much better when you own it and take responsibility for it all. You’ll feel so much lighter, you’ll have so much more fun. Sometimes it feels worse before it feels better but keep on intentionally doing the work.

Awareness, acceptance, and agency, you don’t have to blame or shame anyone ever again for the choices they make. They get to make them. They’re not doing anything wrong. When you can get to acceptance it makes everything feel better for you, makes everything feel lighter for you. You can absolutely lighten up because of this practice. Hold all plans, and people, and expectations very loosely, let the days unfold as they may. Celebrate the many wonderous tiny, teeny things all month long.

Create your own magical Christmas experience, no pressure, only awareness, acceptance, and choice, just love and light if you so choose.

So I’m always thinking about you guys and wanting to help you find some relief, and I hope this helped. Have the best week. I love you and I adore you for showing up and listening today and I will see you next time.

Thanks for listening to Reinvented After 40. If you want more information or resources from the podcast, please visit KymShowersLifeCoach.com.