“Every single day you are making teeny tiny little changes either towards where you’re wanting to go or keeping you stuck or going backwards.”

In this first episode of 2020, I’m sharing with you 3 simple daily practices you can do so that you can start the year strong and create a life that feels fulfilling and is massively productive.

THIS EPISODE IS FOR YOU IF YOU WANT TO LEARN:

• The thing you might be missing out on when you are counting your wins
• What the difference is between internal and external wins with examples of how to find and count each of them in your day to day life
• How to train your brain to feel and be successful
• The research-backed physical and mental benefits of counting your gratitude
• A simple practice to feel value in yourself and take your confidence to a whole other level
• The things that holds the highest emotional frequency in our bodies

And so much more.

You got this! Listen via the link at the top of this page.

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

→ Apply to coach with me

→ Continue the conversation in my free online community

→ Get The 4-Day Accomplish Your Dreams Free Training 

→ RECAP REWARDS episode

→ CUT THE CRAP episode

→ Pussy by Regena Thomashauer

Full transcript:

Episode 24: START STRONG

This is the Become an Unstoppable Woman podcast with Lindsay Preston Episode 24, Start Strong.

[music]

Welcome to the Become an Unstoppable Woman podcast, the show for goal-getting, fear-facing women for kicking ass by creating change. I’m your host, Lindsay Preston. I’m a wife, mom of two, and a multi-certified life coach to women all over the world. I’ve lived through enough in life to know that easier doesn’t always equate to better. We can’t fear the fire, we must learn to become it. On this show, I’ll teach you how to do just that. Join me as I challenge you to become even more of the strong, resilient, and powerful woman you were meant to be. Let’s do this.

[music]

Hi, there, Miss Unstoppable. Welcome to the very first episode of the podcast for 2020. I hope you had a wonderful new year. If you’re listening to this right when it goes live, you may notice that there is a new release state. The podcast is now a weekly podcast. Yay, I’m so excited. New episodes will be coming out every Monday throughout all of 2020.

I cannot wait to give you so much incredible content. I already have so many interviews scheduled and some different things that are going to be bringing into the show. It’s going to be incredible. I’m so glad you’re here and I can’t wait to share what’s in store. Now, you may notice from my voice I sound a little different today. I have been so super sick throughout the past, gosh, a week and a half now.

It started with what seemed like maybe a little cold or allergies that turned into bronchitis. I had a few days where I was just coughing nonstop.

It was so much fun. Let me tell you. I had a very uneventful New Year’s Eve but that doesn’t take away all the feelings that I felt that evening. 2019 has been by far one of the best years of my life. It’s not like anything big happened. It’s not like I got married or I had a baby or my business did big, incredible things or anything like that. It just was a year where everything came together and solidified.

It was the best year ever for my husband and I financially. That doesn’t mean necessarily money we brought in, but the money that we saved and that we invested. Our net worth has gone up a lot in the past year. We were just going over it yesterday on New Year’s Day. It’s just incredible to see how our hard work is really paying off because, for a few years, it seems like man, we’re not really taking vacations, we’re not really shopping, we’re trying to get these new financial habits. It just didn’t feel like we were making enough progress to reflect that.

Of course, stuff came up along the way, our house needed different things and we had our baby and all that stuff. This past year, it’s just boom, all come together. Being able to do this while I’ve had my own business and just been working part-time and raising two very strong-willed children has been amazing. Now, of course, the year hasn’t been perfect. My husband and I have had some setbacks in regards to us connecting and we’ve since hired a married coach to help us through that.

I must admit, I think that is why I got sick because I’ve just had so much awareness lately about a different layer of my childhood and how that’s impacting me today that I thought it wasn’t as big of a deal as what it was. It’s kicked me in the butt a little bit and punched me in the stomach. I hear that a lot from clients when I’m working with them as, “Wow, the awareness I’m gaining has beat me up.” Sometimes they get sick along the way because it’s just a little bit groundbreaking, to be honest, to think of the world in a whole different way. It’s just been big.

That’s kinda me, in a nutshell, where I’m at. I again, hope you’re feeling good and feeling like you’re ready to start 2020. You maybe have some goals in mind or maybe you’re finalizing your goals. You know what you want to create more of the second year; you want to create less of. Hopefully, you listened to the last two episodes of the podcast called cut the crap and recap rewards that helped you recap the last year and get really serious about cutting some of the crop on your life. That’s keeping you from making your goals happen.

Now, today, I want to add another layer to that and I want to talk to you about starting strong and specifically three daily practices to help you create this next level of your life. Hopefully, you’re wanting a life that’s even more fulfilling and one that feels massively productive because these are what these three practices will help create for you.

I must admit they’re very simple practices. They won’t take up a lot of your time to do every day but they will make the biggest difference between you being somewhat or not even successful to being massively successful and the way that you feel in the process of up-leveling your life like I’m just talking about right now.

Sometimes when we up-level and we grow and we change, it feels really hard at first. Our body freaks out, our mind freaks out. We really need these tools that I’m going to share with you today to help us stay strong, get through it, stay focused on the things that are going well because at times it just seems like everything’s going against us. I’m excited to share it with you today.

Now, I do want to just give a quick shout out to everybody who has gone on recently and left a review for the show especially on Apple podcasts. I am so appreciative to all of you. We’re at about 71 reviews right now and I’m not going to quit asking for those reviews until I get to past 100. That’s my goal. You may think, “Lindsay is that even a metric that matters just to get reviews?” At the end of the day, it’s not the biggest metric of course, but it is in regards to somebody finding the show and saying, “Is this something people are listening to and they’re liking it and I want to hear what they have to say about it?”

When I’m going to pitch for interview guys, they’re looking at those kinds of things. I know I am when I’m going to do that. Please, if you haven’t left a review for the show, especially if you listen on Apple podcasts, it takes just a few minutes. Go do it. I would be so appreciative. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

All right. Let’s get into today’s episode as I said it’s all about starting strong and we’re talking about three daily practices to help you create a life that feels fulfilling. Let’s get into it. What is the first practice?

The first practice is counting your wins. This is something that has gotten more attention recently in regards to a lot of people are doing this now. They’re saying, “I know how to count my wins and different coaches are talking about it in different personal development people. You may even be doing this in a professional setting.” What I’m seeing out there are people are just counting external wins which is great.

When we are doing things like we’re making more money, somebody gave us a complements, we have an up-level of some sort externally, we lose weight, whatever that is, those are great. That is just a very, very surface-level stuff. We’ve got to be able to go in and look at what’s going on behind the scenes internally within us to see how we’re changing every single day because every single day, believe it or not, you are making teeny tiny little changes either towards where you wanting to go or maybe just keeping you stuck or keeping you going backwards.

Because the days go by so fast and we have so much going on in our heads and in our lives, we can miss these things. It’s so important we take just a few minutes every day to sit down and say, “What did I do yesterday?” Or if you’re doing this at the end of the day, “What did I do today to make progress on my goals?” As I said, find those internal things. You may be saying, “Well, Lindsay, what are the internal things?” Here’s the list that I give my clients of what internal wins are.

These are all changes you make within yourself. Its things like having breakthrough or an aha moment of just seeing something in a different light is huge. A truth you’re realizing about yourself like, “Hey, I realized that I really need this kind of alone time every day or I realized that when I do this, that I get this kind of result or I did this personal development and I realized that I’m this kind of person.”

Those are all inside wins. Some more are realizing a thought about who you are, reacting in a new way to an old problem. You’re going into a relationship or something that you’re just doing day by day by day and doing it differently and you’re getting a result from that.

Another internal win is a habit you changed. A lot of times when I’m working with clients they’ll say, “Well, Lindsay, I don’t have any internal wins this week.” I’m like, “Whoa, wait a second. You are doing habits with me right now to change your behavior that is a win. Every single day you’re showing up and counting your wins or doing other habits in your life that is a win. Believe it or not.”

Your brain may say, “But that’s so small, does that really even matter?” Yes, you could easily choose not to do healthy habits easily, but you are showing up. Count that. Every single day you’re showing up because what

you’re doing when you’re counting that win every day, you’re saying to yourself, you’re proving to your brain, “I show up for myself, I get things done. I achieve my goals.” When moments happen, where shit hits the fan in your brain, you have enough momentum there, enough proof to an essence, fight your own brain and say, “Hey, I show up for my goals. I make things happen.” You build a confidence in that way. That make sense? I hope so.

Another internal win is a goal you reached. If you finally reach a goal, please put that down on your wins-list. Another one is a feeling of progress concerning work on yourself. This is one that I find, I put on my wins list all the time because even if I don’t have the goal yet or I don’t have an aha moment that day or a truth I realized about myself, I tend to feel a feeling of progress a lot and so I’ll put that down because I want to just remind myself and say, “I’m heading in the right direction even if I’m not there yet.”

Another one is prioritizing your needs. Instead of maybe going out and people-pleasing because you want to go please somebody who wants to go to the movies that night, you instead say, “Actually, I’m going to stay home tonight.” That is a win. You also being aware of your own feelings. Anytime you’re aware of a feeling, any single time, I’m going to say that again, for those in the back, “every single time, you were aware of a feeling within you. That is a win.”

Even if it’s a feeling you don’t like, like, “Oh, I was so mad yesterday when X happened.” That’s a win, because it would be again so easy for you to avoid your feelings, to numb out your feelings, but instead, you’re recognizing those, that’s huge. A lot of people are not doing that, my friend, so by you doing that, that is so big.

Two, what you’re teaching yourself there as you’re doing that is saying, “Hey, it’s okay to feel my feelings. It’s okay to approach my feelings.”

Something I’m teaching my clients all the time, approach, approach, approach your feelings do not avoid. Many of us are avoiding. Then we go and we open up the ice cream bin or we go out and swipe a credit card to go shop or we sit and watch Netflix all day or we gossip about somebody. We go love on somebody to make us feel better, instead, really take in in when you’re being aware of those feelings, so big, so, so big.

Another internal win is having a shift in your mindset from a negative thought to a positive thought. If you’re going into an interview for example, and saying, “Oh my gosh, I’m going to bomb this. Why would they want me?” All of a sudden snapping out of it and saying, “Hey, actually, I’m great. I’m awesome. I’ve done so many great things. This is why they would want me.”

Actually, as I’m saying this right now, I realized that I did this recently, as I mentioned earlier, I’m going through marital coaching right now. I’m opening up this whole new world of awareness in that area of my life. I started to beat myself up a lot about that of, “Man, aren’t you more evolved than this, Lindsey? How did you miss this? How did you not know? All of those things.”

I beat myself up probably for days, if not weeks about it. Until finally one day I was like, “You know what? I am so fed up of beating myself up right now.” I started to change the thoughts of, “Everybody grows in different ways or how could I have not known? How could I have known this if I wasn’t taught this before?”

All those positive thoughts started to flood and allowed me to, in essence, really change my behavior and get into action instead of just sitting there beating myself up. Take in those moments, it’s so, so big.

Another internal win can be stopping a distraction. I mentioned those things earlier, things like gossiping, sitting on your electronics all day, shopping, loving on things to a point where you are doing it more than you want to do it. Many people love to sit at home with their cats. [chuckles] I used to be this person. Even though I love my cats and I love to being with them, there were points during that period of my life, where I was like, “This is unhealthy.”

I didn’t really know how to stop it though, because it made me feel so good just to be with animals because I knew animals really couldn’t hurt me and so on and so on. Just start to realize what your own distractions are and realize it can be bigger than things, than what society tends to teach us, which is like drugs and alcohol and being on our devices.

Another internal win is releasing old anger, that’s going to take some work. If you don’t know how to do that, either with a coach or a counselor. I do that with my clients, designing a plan for desirable change. If you are still working on what your plan is going to be for 2020, or just Q1 of 2020, that’s a win.

Stopping a toleration. In essence, that’s meaning you’re no longer tolerating something you don’t want to do or put up with anymore. Setting a boundary, cleaning out some mental clutter, changing a negative into a positive, realizing that something that is happening in your life is because of you. That’s a huge one. Just a little spoiler here to tell you, is everything that you’re creating in your life externally, is a reflection of who you are internally and how you’re thinking and your feeling and the energy you’re showing up as to make certain things happen in your life.

Anytime an external win happens in your life, like you get promoted, you make more money, somebody gives you a compliment, all of those things, that’s a reflection of you. I always encourage my clients to look beyond just the external thing and say, “Well, what are you doing to create that external win?” Because then you’re going to really feed into seeing that everything you’re doing for your own internal development is making a difference externally.

Those are just an idea of some internal wins for you there, and just keep in mind, I really want you to do this every single day. You’re going to see such a big difference. Again, this is a practice I have my client start to do every single day. When they’re actively coaching with me every single week, that’s how we start our call. I say, “Give me some wins. Let’s go.” Especially as they get to a more advanced stage of coaching, I say, “You have to give me five wins and I want a rapid-fire.” Because at that point, they should be doing their wins for a while and it should be easy to find them.

I must admit at first for most of my clients, it’s very hard for them to find wins at first. They struggle with it, especially those internal ones, but just keep showing up and keep doing it. Know if you work with me too, you get things like a wins journal and I give you a printed list of what internal and external wins are. I give you a training on it. This is just the very top of the surface of what we’re talking about with wins here. There’s so much more to this, but just get in the practice of doing that every single day.

You may hear me say this a lot, if you follow me, but our brain is not wired for positivity. It is only wired for survival. Every single day, we’re just going to be looking for things that could hurt us and harm us in essence, the negative things and starting to spot our wins and find them every day is going to start training your brain to live at a different level. You’re going to see a momentum with that, you’re going to feel so much confidence and you’re just going to start becoming addicted to winning in essence of what can I find the next day that I did well?

Even on those really, really crappy days, it’s so important for me to count my wins because I see, “Okay, it wasn’t as crappy as maybe it felt, there were some little nuggets of greatness in there. Some little bitty baby wins that are showing me I’m still heading in the right direction even if today felt really hard.” Hopefully, I convinced you there to start counting your wins and that’s the first habit of starting strong.

The second habit is counting your gratitude, and this is very much out there in the personal development world. This may be no surprise to you, but you may not know all the research behind counting your gratitude and what the research has shown as the benefits of counting your gratitude. I teach my clients all about this in one of my courses, but I’m going to teach a little bit here.

There is a man named Dr. Robert Emmons and he is considered the father of gratitude, believe it or not. The reason he is, is because he did a longitudinal study on over 1,000 people on the benefits of expressing gratitude. He studied them for over 10 years. He found, how they were when they started this experiment and they weren’t counting gratitude. Then what changed over those 10 years when they started a daily practice of gratitude.

What they found in their research, where people who express gratitude daily, they started to have stronger immune systems, they were less bothered by aches and pains, they lowered their blood pressure, they exercise more, and took better care of their health. They slept longer and felt more refreshed when waking, they have higher levels of positive emotions, they’re more alert, alive and awake, they have more joy and pleasure, they have more optimism and happiness, they’re more helpful, generous, and compassionate. They’re more forgiving, they’re more outgoing and they feel less lonely and isolated.

If that’s not enough motivation right there for you to start expressing gratitude, I don’t know what is.

Another thing I want to mention here is, there’s a book by David Hawkins called Power vs. Force. In that book, he talks about the levels of our emotions. Meaning what kind of frequency they have shown that it feels like within our bodies. I don’t know how they measure this to be quite honest, but they found that the lowest emotion that we can feel is shame and humiliation.

No, doubt about that, right. If you’ve ever felt shame before, I always feel like I want to just curl up in a ball

and never be seen by anybody again. It is a horrible emotion to feel. On the flip of that, the highest emotion that we can feel that’s even higher than joy and peace and empowerment and forgiveness is gratitude. Out of all the things we can feel, gratitude is what feels the absolute best and creates the highest emotional frequency within our bodies.

What you want to do is you want to hold space daily to count your gratitude. Granted, this will only be a few minutes every day that you’re doing this. What you’re going to be doing as you’re counting that gratitude is you’re going to be growing that muscle or that part of your brain that can hold space for that positive emotion.

Every day, what you’re going to do is an essence make a space that’s bigger and bigger for more gratitude to go in there. As I said earlier, our brains are only wired for survival, not for happiness. It’s so important for us to hold that space every single day to grow this because naturally, our brain is not going to do this. This is very easy to do. Go in and get grateful for very little things. I’m grateful I’m breathing today. I’m grateful my heart is beating. I’m grateful I have another day alive. I’m grateful that the sun is shining.

It doesn’t have to be these huge, big things. The more specific you get with that gratitude, the better. There was a time I remember when my car’s transmission went out and I remember expressing gratitude for a healthy car transmission for a while there because if you’ve ever had to replace that, that is not a fun and cheap thing to do. Get very creative with it. It doesn’t have to be over the top, get specific, do whatever you want here really. Just show up and make that gratitude happen every single day in your life.

Really just take those moments. I can’t express them more. It’s going to make such a difference in the way that you feel every single day. It’s going to take a while too, to feel that. Once you start to get in a habit of that, you’re going to start to notice gratitude moments all throughout your day. When you have a really good periods in your life, they’re going to feel so much better because you are able to get in that high level of gratitude.

I’ll give you an example of my own life. When I went on my honeymoon a few years ago, we went to Bora Bora, which if you know, Bora Bora, it is a dream vacation. It is amazing. We went and we did it very well. We went to one of, if not the best resorts there, and it just felt magical. Getting off the plane and getting to that resort. They knew us by name, somehow, we have no idea and they just swept us away.

In those first few moments that we were there and I was taking in all the magic in the beauty around me, I felt so much gratitude for, gosh, I don’t know, hours, maybe days, even of, “I can’t believe I’m here. I can’t believe this is my life. I can’t believe this is happening.” It’s a feeling that really felt like heaven on earth in essence. I can’t even explain how incredible that felt.

Now, if I would’ve gone Bora Bora, and I never expressed gratitude and I hadn’t been in that practice of that, would I have felt great? Yes. I mean it’s Bora Bora, right? I don’t think I would’ve been able to get to that very, very high level as I was there. I just really hope you can find that for yourself. I wish we had put it in a pill and give it to you so you could feel it because it’s incredible and you doing this daily exercise of counting that gratitude will help you get there.

That’s my number two, daily practice in order to start strong, to create a life that’s fulfilling and massively productive. The last and final little practice I’m going to give you is something called brags. Brags are a concept I learned just within the past year from Regena Thomashauer. I think it’s how you say her last name. She’s referred to often as Mama Gena. She wrote a book called Pussy that I love. It’s one of my absolute favorite books of all time and I read a ton of self-help books. I really encourage you to read it. It’s great.

In that book, she talks about bragging and why it’s important to do it, and how to do it. I’m going to share with you a little bit from her words on what bragging is. Bragging is really a way to feel. I’m going to say that again, feel, I’m going to emphasize that, feel, you got it? Feel value in yourself. When you brag, you take up space for just a few seconds or minutes to say, “World, look at me, I am awesome.” Not only do brags help you own your own power and goodness but if you share them with others, they are open to seeing something powerful too. It takes a listener higher.

I follow a coach named Julia Wells. She was actually on this podcast on the own your power episode and she’s has a Facebook community where people are bragging all the time.

Granted, I don’t really pay attention to everyone in there who’s bragging but every once in a while I’ll see a brag and sometimes they say things and I’m like, “Wow, that’s so incredible that they’re doing that or that they’ve done that.”

Just seeing that somebody else has done that and they’re owning it and they’re stepping in their power of saying, “Hey, what could I’ve done,” it takes me higher. I don’t know why but it’s just so cool to see that especially a woman owning that because many women want to shy away from their goodness and their amazingness and brags help us start to see, “Hey, we can be out here, we can be seen in everything’s going to be okay.”

When you’re starting to state your brags or just write them privately, you are showing yourself even what’s possible and you are starting to build a confidence muscle within you. You may already be a confidence person but it will take you to a whole ‘nother level. I must admit, I only do this specific practice with my most advanced clients. I find that with my more beginner clients just doing wins and gratitude alone can be a lot for them. Once they get in the habit and build that muscle within a few months of doing those then we add in brags.

You may be somebody who needs to start with wins and gratitude too and then do brags later. I will say this, even when I add in brags in my advanced clients, this is the hardest one for them. They’ll start counting wins like nothing and tell me their gratitude and I’ll say, “Okay, give me a brag.” “Oh,” is what I typically hear. “Brags are so hard for me.” I’m like, “Come on, give it to me,” because brags are really like, “I AM” statements. I brag I am beautiful. I brag I am this, I am confident. I brag that I’m an amazing mother. I brag, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I’m not just saying that about me, those aren’t my brags, personally.

Those are what you want to do. Those I AM statements. It doesn’t have to be these huge things either. Some of the examples I give is I brag that people tell me I have a calming voice. I brag that when my hair is done it looks amazing and I get so many compliments on it. I brag that I’m a powerful coach and I stand in that one. I brag, I know it. I know I’m a powerful coach.

Own that stuff every single day, just hold a space for yourself and say, “What am I? What am I amazing at? What am I good at?” It could just be simple ones like, “I brag, I showed up and did my three practices today of my wins and my gratitude and my brags.” “I brag that I’m even thinking about bragging.” Really, again, those are I AM things, things that you are, things you want to own about yourself, and you can even combine these with wins.

You can say, “I brag that my podcast is in the top hundred in the self-help charts.” Well, that’s a win of mine, not a brag. I’m a win that it’s in those charts. I brag that I am an amazing podcaster. I bragged that people are listening to me. I bragged that I have so many people listening that I’m on the charts. That was one I had earlier this year.

You can say, a win could be, “I’m in more of my positive state of mind this week.” Then, a brag on top of that can be, “I brag that I’m resilient because I got to this place in my life.” One more example for you is I have a feeling of progress toward my goals in my marriage. I brag that I don’t give up when things get hard, I keep going. Hopefully, that gives you an idea of what brags are.

Again, pickup Regena’s book Pussy, if you want. I must admit even the name alone is a little bit out there. Some of the book it does go into maybe some deeper things that are uncomfortable for you at least it did for me, but there were really great nuggets in that book that I think you’ll love as well. Check it out, but, really, start on these three practices my friends, so you can really start strong in 2020 or whenever you’re listening to this episode and release too that January 1st, start of a new year is great and fun, and I love the energy of it but every single day could be a new beginning for you. We don’t have to wait until the start of a new year or a new month or a new quarter or whatever your birthday, you can start changing your life and making amazing things happen at every single moment of your life.

Start these practices, get going. I promise you, after about 21 days, you’re going to feel the first

boost of a little momentum. Then after about two months, you’ll feel another boost, and then around about six months you’re going to feel so flipping incredible and strong that you’re going to be addicted to doing these things. I must admit, in my own life I was addicted for a while and I got out of it because of having the baby and all that other stuff. Now I’m getting back into it, hardcore, and phew, it’s making such a difference already.

I hope this episode helped you. I hope you loved it. Again, go leave a review for the show if you haven’t. I’d be so appreciative. I will be back next week. It’s so exciting to say that, ah. We’ll be talking about something different next week. I’m not quite sure where we’re going to go, if I’ll have an interview ready or what, but I’m so excited that you’re here and I’m so grateful that you’re here. I can’t wait to spend 2020 with you, helping you improve your life.

Thank you, thank you, thank you, as always, for listening and allowing me into your ears. I don’t take this lightly. I am so grateful for you and that you have chosen me to help you out, so thank you, thank you.

I must leave you on our favorite little nugget of wisdom and that is, “You’re only as unstoppable as you believe you can be. So believe in yourself. You got this.”

[music]

Hey there, Miss Unstoppable. Thanks so much for tuning into this episode. If you enjoyed it, share it with a friend. Send them a picture of this episode via text, via email, share it on social media, I’m sure they would be so appreciative to know these strategies and tips on how to accomplish your dreams. If you are ready to guarantee you’re going to accomplish your goals and dreams, then it’s time to start coaching with me.

In my nine-month simple success coaching system, I am going to walk you every single step of the way to ensure that you get the goals and dreams that you want. The first step is to apply for a free 60-minute consult call. Just go to LindsayEpreston.com/apply to get started. As always, my friend, remember, you’re only as unstoppable as you believe you can be, so believe in yourself. You got this.