If you're listening in to this podcast, chances are you are a woman who has big, bold dreams. You're done with settling for just a mediocre life. You want a life where you matter, your dreams matter, and your every day matters. And you know, deep down, you are meant for a big, bold life experience. But often, the thought of tackling those big, bold moves in your life seems so daunting that you end up staying stuck in the comfort and the safety of what you know.

The reality is, big and bold doesn't necessarily equate to hard and near impossible, like some of us tend to believe. Going from a millionaire's maid, to making my own millions, taught me the secret to making big, bold moves. It's the same secret I've used time and time again over the course of my life to completely transform my reality, and most recently, through my move from Australia to the other side of the world.

In today's episode, I'm sharing that secret with you so you can make those big bold moves you dream of and start living the kind of life you're excited to open your eyes to every single day. So if you're ready to escape the mundane and step into your biggest, boldest dreams, then stick around and let's talk about how to do exactly that.

Welcome to The Self-Creation School podcast, for women who are ready to ditch mediocrity, step up and get more of what they want, and finally say YES! to a life that sets their soul on fire. I'm your host Leanne Letica, Self-Creation Coach, founder of The Self-Creation School AND Queen of YES!. If you're ready to play life by your own personal rule book, and give yourself permission to say YES! to yourself and your wildest dreams, this podcast is the place for you.

Hello and thanks for joining me in today's episode for another conversation on creating a life you love, one YES! at a time. This episode is a special one for me, simply because it is episode 24. And 24 is a significant number for me this year because it is 2024, which marks 24 years with my husband, I was 24 when I met him, and he had 24 years up on me. I'll let you do all the math, but it's 24 all around this week and that really feeds into my perfectionist tendencies very nicely I have to say.

The other thing that makes this week special is I'm celebrating my two-year anniversary, and that is 24 months which I hadn't thought of, so it really is 24 all around today. So it's my two-year anniversary of picking up my entire life as I knew it and moving from Australia to the other side of the world to live in Europe, in a country where I don't speak the language, and I had never even visited. It was definitely one of my biggest and most boldest moves, and it's no coincidence that it is also right up there with being one of the most game-changing things I have ever done in my life.

And living in Europe had been a long-time dream for me. A dream that started way back when I met my husband those 24 years ago. At the time, he had not long returned from living in Europe and taking almost three years out to sail his yacht from Spain all the way back to Australia. He crossed two oceans on that trip, visited countless amazing places, and had experiences I had never even heard of people having.

His stories opened my eyes for the first time in my life to just what could be possible, if you dare to allow it to be possible. And from that time, I knew I wanted to experience a life like that. But we both had a daughter to bring up and family in Australia whose support and input was valued. And so I buried that dream under a long list of wouldn't it be nice someday dreams.

As the years went by, I had convinced myself that this dream was simply not something that I would experience in my lifetime for two reasons. One, my husband was becoming of the age where he questioned whether he wanted to make this kind of move again. And two, I doubted my ability to do it without him when, if life progresses naturally and considering our significant age gap, our time together comes to an end.

But in 2021, we found ourselves faced with a blank canvas. Our kids had left home, our business projects were all rounding out to completion, my husband was ready to take time out, and we decided to sell the only business that kept us tied to Australian shores. We also completed a five-year renovation project on the home we were living in, which was always going to be a home made for a family, and we sold that too.

And this was all just after the time in my life when I had what I like to call my midlife meltdown, or perhaps more positively, my midlife reinvention. So I was very much in this space of dreaming big again, redefining myself, rewriting the rules I lived by, and deep into the process of reinventing my world.

So all of a sudden we were faced with this question of what next and where to next. And realizing we had the opportunity to do whatever we wanted, we started living in the question of making the move to Europe. Now there's no question it would be a big move and it would be a bold move for both of us. But eventually we decided it was not only possible, but doable.

And this is the first takeaway I'll offer you today. Deciding is a very powerful energy to be in. When you decide without wavering, without allowing the what ifs to make you doubt your decision, your ability, you communicate to your brain that this is what's happening. And your brain will take that message and start rearranging your world to make it happen.

And what I mean by that is, your brain will help you see new solutions to problems you need to overcome. Your brain will begin to tell you new stories that support you and champion your ability to make what you want a reality. Your brain will literally point you where you need to go, if this is the only message your brain receives. If your brain thinks that maybe you're not 100 percent sure, or not 100 percent really all in on this, then it will likely steer you back to your comfort zone.

And listen, here's the thing. If you don't unwaveringly decide that this big, bold move is what you want, and that it is what you are going to do no matter what, when you are faced with the inevitable obstacles that will come your way when making big, bold moves, you are going to find it very difficult to stay on track and take the action you need to take.

Now I can tell you, there were countless hurdles to overcome in moving country. And not just logistics like immigration or shipping out furniture, finding an apartment in this crazy shortage of housing we've been experiencing right now the way around the world, dealing with all the bureaucratic processes, both in Europe and in Australia, in tidying up all the loose ends.

But the biggest hurdle by far was overcoming other people's limitations. The freely flowing opinions that came at us from every angle, from people who had every reason under the sun, why we shouldn't be doing this. Why it wouldn't work out, why it wasn't possible, and how we would fail miserably only to return red-faced to Australia.

And I don't mean overcoming their objections, changing their mind, or convincing them that what we wanted to do was possible and the right thing for us to do. I mean managing our own mindset around other people's limitations. This is where deciding also plays a very big role.

For me, I had already spent years of my life living up to, or perhaps better said, shrinking myself down to other people's expectations. I had played life by the rules other people decided was how life should be played.

As much as I had pushed through the myth of what was possible, going from cleaning homes of multi-millionaires to making my own millions, for decades I limited what was possible in my world to conform to other people's ideas for life. To not upset the apple cart, to not outshine other people, and just maintain an even keel to keep everyone happy and comfortable in their own life experience.

Now, I know there's a good chance since you're listening into this podcast that you know exactly what I'm talking about here. And you also know how that all eventually starts to eat away inside you until it really feels quite raw. Until you're left with this inner emptiness and lingering sense of being unfulfilled, of knowing you're not living up to your full potential. And as the years start adding up, wondering if this empty kind of shell you're living in, where you're sidelining yourself and your dreams to keep everyone else happy, is all there is. And how that truly counts as a life well lived.

So, during my midlife reinvention, I decided that all of that had to change. I was tired of going where I tolerated being a fraction of who I really was, rather than being celebrated for every part of who I could be.

I decided I was done settling for less, shrinking myself and my dreams to keep other people happy. People who at the end of the day, didn't need to live my everyday life. They didn't need to live with the decisions they were making for me. Those same people who, if I'm honest, were not returning the same level of sacrifice for me. And yes, I'm talking largely about my family and friends too.

And at the time of deciding to make this big, bold move overseas, I had already had to put a number of boundaries in place for what I would accept moving forward. How I would accept being treated, cared for, considered. What I would no longer tolerate for myself and from other people. And how I deserve to be celebrated, not merely tolerated.

So when it came to all the limiting stories, opinions, ideas, whatever you want to think of them as, that came from mostly people who really didn't have my best interest at heart, who didn't need to live with the outcome they wanted me to live with, because I had put strong boundaries in place for me and for them, I was able to allow them to have their own experience and allow me to have mine.

I was able to let other people's opinions be other people's opinions, knowing that the only opinion that truly counts is mine. I was able to allow other people's limitations be their limitations and not allow their limitations dictate what was possible for me in my world.

Drawing that line in the sand and deciding made all of that possible. Deciding unwaveringly to say YES! to me and my biggest, boldest life possible.

Let me ask you, when you think about the big, bold moves you want to make in your life, what limitations are you buying into that aren't even your own? How much weight are you giving to other people's stories and opinions? How much power are you giving to other people who don't have to live with the consequences of what they decide your life outcomes are going to be?

Big, bold moves are going to bring with them hurdles, challenges, problems to find solutions to. They are going to require you to think bigger and more boldly, to see things through bigger and bolder eyes. And the bigger and bolder your moves, the bigger and bolder other people's opinions are going to be. So expect all of this will be part of the process and make a plan for your obstacles.

Are there people whose opinions are maybe a little too loud already in your life? How can you turn down the volume on those people? Are there boundaries you need to put in place? Perhaps you need to give yourself permission to stop outsourcing your decisions and what you can and can't do to other people for their validation or approval. What will you give yourself permission to think, to believe and do that other people are not giving you permission for?

I often talk about giving yourself permission since this was the very first thing that changed my world. Giving myself permission to say YES! to all of me and all of my dreams. But sometimes, going from not giving yourself permission to suddenly give yourself permission is too big of a jump. You've likely, like me, had a lot of practice in the not giving yourself permission department. So use that muscle memory you've developed.

Instead of trying to suddenly give yourself permission to make these big, bold moves, think about what you will not give yourself permission for. So for example, I will not give myself permission to shrink my dreams or my ability to achieve my dreams. I will not give myself permission to please everyone else at the expense of my own pleasure. I will not give myself permission to allow other people to make decisions about the outcomes in my life. You get the idea here, right?

So big, bold moves will bring big, bold challenges. The hardest often being managing other people's opinions by managing your own mindset around them. Expect there will be obstacles, hurdles to overcome, accept that there will be, and plan for how you can tackle these ahead of time.

I actually recorded a podcast on planning for your obstacles recently so you might like to have a listen in on that, but here's my main tips for you today on this point I've been talking about.

Deciding is one of the most important factors in being able to make big, bold moves. You must decide, unwaveringly, what you want to do and that it is doable, even if you don't yet know how it will be doable.

You must decide whose stories and what stories you are going to buy into, including your own. You must decide what you will accept for yourself and what you will and will no longer tolerate in your life and be prepared to put boundaries in place to support that. And you must also decide to accept the outcomes of your decisions, whatever they may be.

Remember, you get to decide what you make everything mean. Which means you also get to decide that what other people make things mean doesn't have to be your story.

The notion to me that we would return to Australia red-faced if it didn't work out was crazy. Why would I be embarrassed about exploring and experiencing a different life, even if that turned out not to be something for me? Why would I be red-faced about the adventures I would add to my life story, the growth I would experience by living in the question?

No. Returning red-faced with my tail between my legs was simply other people trying to tear down my big, bold dreams because the idea that I might achieve them, or have fun at least trying, shined a spotlight in their own life on the big, bold moves that they were not prepared to make.

So deciding ahead of time, that no matter what the outcome will be, that this will be an amazing experience or an amazing opportunity for growth regardless of how it turns out, is something you get to decide for you. And it is a really great thing to decide ahead of time, by the way.

Now, deciding unwaveringly will come down to your why, your reasons for wanting to make these big, bold moves in the first place, and how strong that why is. If you don't know your reason for wanting to do something or experience something, when the going gets tough, you're going to find yourself wondering why it is you even got started and why you would keep going when it's just so hard.

If your why isn't strong enough to overcome all of your limitations, to drive you to put boundaries in place to protect your mindset and your dreams, to feel the discomfort that big, bold moves will bring, if your why isn't strong enough you will find yourself retreating back to your comfort zone and likely telling yourself this is evidence for how these big, bold things you want are simply not meant for you. Which really isn't the case. It's that your reason for having them isn't a big enough and bold enough match for how big and bold the things you want are.

The other thing that deciding will help in is building your self-belief, which is also going to be an important factor in making big, bold moves.

The energy of deciding unwaveringly to go all in on you and your biggest, boldest dreams is the stuff that self-belief is made of. And with self-belief comes resilience which will help you tackle those big, bold moves like the true queen you are. The more you tackle them and realize that you are capable of doing so, the more self-belief and resilience you'll build. Until eventually, you have the kind of big and bold self-belief and the resilience to match it that allows you to fully embrace your big, bold moves.

And this brings me back to the belief or rather the lack of belief I held for many years that making this move overseas and starting a life in another country far away from everything I knew was something that was possible in my lifetime, that it was something I was capable of.

I didn't believe in my ability to do such a thing. And a big part of this lack of self-belief was not feeling worthy of experiencing this kind of life. Worthy of being the kind of woman who moved across the world and lived in a different country.

I had bought into the story I was telling myself that living in Europe was not possible for someone like me. It wasn't who I am. I wasn't worthy of experiencing such an extraordinary thing in my lifetime because I needed to shrink myself to maintain the status quo. People like me didn't just pick up their life and make such a big, bold move.

Now, I talk a lot about self-worth in everything I do because here's what I've found to be true for me and for many of the women I've worked with. It's something so many of us are fundamentally lacking in. And when it comes to saying YES! to you and your biggest, boldest dreams, if you don't have a healthy bank balance of self-worth, then it is going to be very difficult to make those big, bold moves.

Worthiness for me again comes back to making a decision that you are inherently worthy. It's about deciding to see yourself as a worthy woman.

For me, I needed to see myself as a worthy woman first and foremost before I could change anything in my life. Because it is in seeing myself as a worthy woman that I could also see myself as a woman who is worthy of making her own decisions, of living into her full potential, of making big, bold moves, regardless of what anyone else thought about them, or my capability of making them happen, or how they would even turn out. Of being worthy enough of the outcomes I desired to be able to handle anything that stood in my way.

When you see yourself as a woman who is worthy of living a big, bold life, all the decisions you need to make to take your big, bold dreams from your someday, maybe one day list to your done day list become so much easier.

Which brings me to the secret I want to share with you today and the one thing that underpins your ability to decide unwaveringly in all of the areas I've discussed. What you want to do, that it is doable, that you give yourself permission to do it, that you decide what stories you will and won't buy into, the boundaries you need to put in place, your worthiness to have what it is you want and so on.

And that secret is your identity. Who you believe that you are and who you be as a result of what you believe.

When I saw myself as a worthy woman, I was also able to see myself as a woman worthy of living in Europe, of making that dream my reality. For as long as I told myself that life wasn't for someone like me, I was right. It wasn't. And my identity kept me stuck in being someone who didn't just pack up her life to move overseas. It kept me from making the kind of decisions I would need to make to make something like that happen. It kept me from taking any kind of action that would support this kind of life being my reality.

Your identity is what creates your reality. It informs your brain of who you are, your place in the world, and what is and isn't possible for you. And remember, your brain runs with whatever you unwaveringly decide to tell it and it goes about making that your lived experience.

When you identify yourself as being the woman who makes big, bold moves, who does the things you dream of doing, who has the life your big, bold moves will create, the action you need to take will become a natural part of simply who you are and what you do.

When you're faced with those challenges, those obstacles, the action you take, the decisions you make, will come down to who you believe yourself to be. The kind of woman you are. How you treat yourself, how you allow others to treat you, the standards you accept for yourself and expect from others. It all comes down to who you believe yourself to be.

And so today I've been talking a lot about deciding and the power of your decisions in helping you make big, bold moves. But the secret at the heart of all of this lies in deciding first and foremost who you be. What kind of woman you are. Because when you decide that, it informs all of the other decisions you need to make. The decisions we've been talking about.

You can't make different decisions without first deciding to be someone different. You can't hold yourself and others to higher standards if you don't first become a woman who has higher standards and understand her reasons for having them. You can't be the woman who makes big, bold moves and does whatever it takes to overcome the challenges along the way unless you first see yourself as that woman.

You can't decide on your why unless you first understand who you are in that why. How it fits with your values, your purpose in life, what matters to you, who the woman is that lives out that why. How will you know what boundaries you need to put in place, what standards you need to raise, what decisions you need to make, and why you're making them unless you know what kind of woman all these things is supporting you in being?

How will you know, unwaveringly know, you belong in the big, bold life you dream of unless you see yourself being the kind of woman who lives out that life.

Here's what I want you to understand. Just as your identity can hold you back and keep you stuck creating the same old reality day in day out, it can also move you powerfully forward. The problem is, a lot of you think your identity is fixed. And this just isn't the case.

Your identity is fluid. You can change who you be in this moment from being a woman who doesn't drink sufficient water to getting up and having the first of your eight glasses today right now. When you became an adult, you stopped living in the identity of a child, of a minor. If you are married, you stopped seeing yourself as a single woman and adopted the identity of a married woman instead. If you have children, you never used to identify as a mother, but you likely sure do now.

Your identity can and should evolve as your life evolves. And you can be whoever you choose to be. That is the reality. The only limitation to who you can be is the one you fight for. But you can fight for the possibilities of who you could be with the same effort as fighting for your limitations. When you stay fluid and adaptable in your ideas of who you can be, you can redefine who you be again and again and again every time you reach for that next bigger bolder dream.

So, to help you bring all of this together and make your big, bold moves easier, get clear on who this woman who has made these big bold moves is. Visualize yourself living out this life and use your journal to document every part of your day and who you be in that day.

How do you show up? What do you value? What characteristics and traits do you have? What do you tolerate and not tolerate? What is non-negotiable in your daily routine? What food do you eat, not eat? What conversations do you have and not have? Who do you spend time with? Who do you not spend time with? How do you spend your time? How do you dress? What's your style? What do you believe about yourself, your capabilities and what's possible in your world? How do you feel about the woman you see in the mirror each day? What decisions do you make? How do you approach your challenges? And so on and so forth.

If you will spend big, bold time to visualize yourself in the greatest of detail and create a clear picture of the woman you could be, the woman who is living out your biggest, boldest dreams, you will lay the foundation for being that woman and making your big, bold moves so much easier by simply becoming her one day at a time, one YES! to the future you at a time.

Decide who you are, and you will have decided every other decision you need to make to bring your biggest, boldest dreams into your reality. To make all of those big, bold moves that seem so daunting for the woman you are right now.

Decide your identity, who the future you is, and you will know the next steps you need to take, and the next, and the next. Decide who you are going to be and then go about being her. And I promise you, those big, bold moves will become easier and so much more possible than you ever knew they could be.

Decide, and then say YES! to nothing else. Decide unwaveringly, my friend, that you are a woman who makes big, bold moves effortlessly and watch how your wildest dreams become your lived reality.

With that, I'm signing off for today's episode. I hope I see you around making those big, bold moves and I'd love to hear what your biggest takeaway from this episode is. So drop me a line by email and tell me all the things or connect with me over on my socials. I'd love to hear from you. You'll find those links in the show notes.

Of course, I'll be back next week for another episode, and I can't wait to share that one with you.

Until then, be the woman who says YES!

Hey, want to know what's stopping you from saying YES! to you and a life you love?

Head over to https://selfcreationschool.com/yesblock and take my FREE 60 second quiz to find out what's standing in your way today and I'll send you my Self-Creation Shift process for shifting it. That's https://selfcreationschool.com/yesblock. I’ll see you there.

If you're listening in to this podcast, chances are you are a woman who has big, bold dreams. You're done with settling for just a mediocre life. You want a life where you matter, your dreams matter, and your every day matters. And you know, deep down, you are meant for a big, bold life experience. But often, the thought of tackling those big, bold moves in your life seems so daunting that you end up staying stuck in the comfort and the safety of what you know.

The reality is, big and bold doesn't necessarily equate to hard and near impossible, like some of us tend to believe. Going from a millionaire's maid, to making my own millions, taught me the secret to making big, bold moves. It's the same secret I've used time and time again over the course of my life to completely transform my reality, and most recently, through my move from Australia to the other side of the world.

In today's episode, I'm sharing that secret with you so you can make those big bold moves you dream of and start living the kind of life you're excited to open your eyes to every single day. So if you're ready to escape the mundane and step into your biggest, boldest dreams, then stick around and let's talk about how to do exactly that.

Welcome to The Self-Creation School podcast, for women who are ready to ditch mediocrity, step up and get more of what they want, and finally say YES! to a life that sets their soul on fire. I'm your host Leanne Letica, Self-Creation Coach, founder of The Self-Creation School AND Queen of YES!. If you're ready to play life by your own personal rule book, and give yourself permission to say YES! to yourself and your wildest dreams, this podcast is the place for you.

Hello and thanks for joining me in today's episode for another conversation on creating a life you love, one YES! at a time. This episode is a special one for me, simply because it is episode 24. And 24 is a significant number for me this year because it is 2024, which marks 24 years with my husband, I was 24 when I met him, and he had 24 years up on me. I'll let you do all the math, but it's 24 all around this week and that really feeds into my perfectionist tendencies very nicely I have to say.

The other thing that makes this week special is I'm celebrating my two-year anniversary, and that is 24 months which I hadn't thought of, so it really is 24 all around today. So it's my two-year anniversary of picking up my entire life as I knew it and moving from Australia to the other side of the world to live in Europe, in a country where I don't speak the language, and I had never even visited. It was definitely one of my biggest and most boldest moves, and it's no coincidence that it is also right up there with being one of the most game-changing things I have ever done in my life.

And living in Europe had been a long-time dream for me. A dream that started way back when I met my husband those 24 years ago. At the time, he had not long returned from living in Europe and taking almost three years out to sail his yacht from Spain all the way back to Australia. He crossed two oceans on that trip, visited countless amazing places, and had experiences I had never even heard of people having.

His stories opened my eyes for the first time in my life to just what could be possible, if you dare to allow it to be possible. And from that time, I knew I wanted to experience a life like that. But we both had a daughter to bring up and family in Australia whose support and input was valued. And so I buried that dream under a long list of wouldn't it be nice someday dreams.

As the years went by, I had convinced myself that this dream was simply not something that I would experience in my lifetime for two reasons. One, my husband was becoming of the age where he questioned whether he wanted to make this kind of move again. And two, I doubted my ability to do it without him when, if life progresses naturally and considering our significant age gap, our time together comes to an end.

But in 2021, we found ourselves faced with a blank canvas. Our kids had left home, our business projects were all rounding out to completion, my husband was ready to take time out, and we decided to sell the only business that kept us tied to Australian shores. We also completed a five-year renovation project on the home we were living in, which was always going to be a home made for a family, and we sold that too.

And this was all just after the time in my life when I had what I like to call my midlife meltdown, or perhaps more positively, my midlife reinvention. So I was very much in this space of dreaming big again, redefining myself, rewriting the rules I lived by, and deep into the process of reinventing my world.

So all of a sudden we were faced with this question of what next and where to next. And realizing we had the opportunity to do whatever we wanted, we started living in the question of making the move to Europe. Now there's no question it would be a big move and it would be a bold move for both of us. But eventually we decided it was not only possible, but doable.

And this is the first takeaway I'll offer you today. Deciding is a very powerful energy to be in. When you decide without wavering, without allowing the what ifs to make you doubt your decision, your ability, you communicate to your brain that this is what's happening. And your brain will take that message and start rearranging your world to make it happen.

And what I mean by that is, your brain will help you see new solutions to problems you need to overcome. Your brain will begin to tell you new stories that support you and champion your ability to make what you want a reality. Your brain will literally point you where you need to go, if this is the only message your brain receives. If your brain thinks that maybe you're not 100 percent sure, or not 100 percent really all in on this, then it will likely steer you back to your comfort zone.

And listen, here's the thing. If you don't unwaveringly decide that this big, bold move is what you want, and that it is what you are going to do no matter what, when you are faced with the inevitable obstacles that will come your way when making big, bold moves, you are going to find it very difficult to stay on track and take the action you need to take.

Now I can tell you, there were countless hurdles to overcome in moving country. And not just logistics like immigration or shipping out furniture, finding an apartment in this crazy shortage of housing we've been experiencing right now the way around the world, dealing with all the bureaucratic processes, both in Europe and in Australia, in tidying up all the loose ends.

But the biggest hurdle by far was overcoming other people's limitations. The freely flowing opinions that came at us from every angle, from people who had every reason under the sun, why we shouldn't be doing this. Why it wouldn't work out, why it wasn't possible, and how we would fail miserably only to return red-faced to Australia.

And I don't mean overcoming their objections, changing their mind, or convincing them that what we wanted to do was possible and the right thing for us to do. I mean managing our own mindset around other people's limitations. This is where deciding also plays a very big role.

For me, I had already spent years of my life living up to, or perhaps better said, shrinking myself down to other people's expectations. I had played life by the rules other people decided was how life should be played.

As much as I had pushed through the myth of what was possible, going from cleaning homes of multi-millionaires to making my own millions, for decades I limited what was possible in my world to conform to other people's ideas for life. To not upset the apple cart, to not outshine other people, and just maintain an even keel to keep everyone happy and comfortable in their own life experience.

Now, I know there's a good chance since you're listening into this podcast that you know exactly what I'm talking about here. And you also know how that all eventually starts to eat away inside you until it really feels quite raw. Until you're left with this inner emptiness and lingering sense of being unfulfilled, of knowing you're not living up to your full potential. And as the years start adding up, wondering if this empty kind of shell you're living in, where you're sidelining yourself and your dreams to keep everyone else happy, is all there is. And how that truly counts as a life well lived.

So, during my midlife reinvention, I decided that all of that had to change. I was tired of going where I tolerated being a fraction of who I really was, rather than being celebrated for every part of who I could be.

I decided I was done settling for less, shrinking myself and my dreams to keep other people happy. People who at the end of the day, didn't need to live my everyday life. They didn't need to live with the decisions they were making for me. Those same people who, if I'm honest, were not returning the same level of sacrifice for me. And yes, I'm talking largely about my family and friends too.

And at the time of deciding to make this big, bold move overseas, I had already had to put a number of boundaries in place for what I would accept moving forward. How I would accept being treated, cared for, considered. What I would no longer tolerate for myself and from other people. And how I deserve to be celebrated, not merely tolerated.

So when it came to all the limiting stories, opinions, ideas, whatever you want to think of them as, that came from mostly people who really didn't have my best interest at heart, who didn't need to live with the outcome they wanted me to live with, because I had put strong boundaries in place for me and for them, I was able to allow them to have their own experience and allow me to have mine.

I was able to let other people's opinions be other people's opinions, knowing that the only opinion that truly counts is mine. I was able to allow other people's limitations be their limitations and not allow their limitations dictate what was possible for me in my world.

Drawing that line in the sand and deciding made all of that possible. Deciding unwaveringly to say YES! to me and my biggest, boldest life possible.

Let me ask you, when you think about the big, bold moves you want to make in your life, what limitations are you buying into that aren't even your own? How much weight are you giving to other people's stories and opinions? How much power are you giving to other people who don't have to live with the consequences of what they decide your life outcomes are going to be?

Big, bold moves are going to bring with them hurdles, challenges, problems to find solutions to. They are going to require you to think bigger and more boldly, to see things through bigger and bolder eyes. And the bigger and bolder your moves, the bigger and bolder other people's opinions are going to be. So expect all of this will be part of the process and make a plan for your obstacles.

Are there people whose opinions are maybe a little too loud already in your life? How can you turn down the volume on those people? Are there boundaries you need to put in place? Perhaps you need to give yourself permission to stop outsourcing your decisions and what you can and can't do to other people for their validation or approval. What will you give yourself permission to think, to believe and do that other people are not giving you permission for?

I often talk about giving yourself permission since this was the very first thing that changed my world. Giving myself permission to say YES! to all of me and all of my dreams. But sometimes, going from not giving yourself permission to suddenly give yourself permission is too big of a jump. You've likely, like me, had a lot of practice in the not giving yourself permission department. So use that muscle memory you've developed.

Instead of trying to suddenly give yourself permission to make these big, bold moves, think about what you will not give yourself permission for. So for example, I will not give myself permission to shrink my dreams or my ability to achieve my dreams. I will not give myself permission to please everyone else at the expense of my own pleasure. I will not give myself permission to allow other people to make decisions about the outcomes in my life. You get the idea here, right?

So big, bold moves will bring big, bold challenges. The hardest often being managing other people's opinions by managing your own mindset around them. Expect there will be obstacles, hurdles to overcome, accept that there will be, and plan for how you can tackle these ahead of time.

I actually recorded a podcast on planning for your obstacles recently so you might like to have a listen in on that, but here's my main tips for you today on this point I've been talking about.

Deciding is one of the most important factors in being able to make big, bold moves. You must decide, unwaveringly, what you want to do and that it is doable, even if you don't yet know how it will be doable.

You must decide whose stories and what stories you are going to buy into, including your own. You must decide what you will accept for yourself and what you will and will no longer tolerate in your life and be prepared to put boundaries in place to support that. And you must also decide to accept the outcomes of your decisions, whatever they may be.

Remember, you get to decide what you make everything mean. Which means you also get to decide that what other people make things mean doesn't have to be your story.

The notion to me that we would return to Australia red-faced if it didn't work out was crazy. Why would I be embarrassed about exploring and experiencing a different life, even if that turned out not to be something for me? Why would I be red-faced about the adventures I would add to my life story, the growth I would experience by living in the question?

No. Returning red-faced with my tail between my legs was simply other people trying to tear down my big, bold dreams because the idea that I might achieve them, or have fun at least trying, shined a spotlight in their own life on the big, bold moves that they were not prepared to make.

So deciding ahead of time, that no matter what the outcome will be, that this will be an amazing experience or an amazing opportunity for growth regardless of how it turns out, is something you get to decide for you. And it is a really great thing to decide ahead of time, by the way.

Now, deciding unwaveringly will come down to your why, your reasons for wanting to make these big, bold moves in the first place, and how strong that why is. If you don't know your reason for wanting to do something or experience something, when the going gets tough, you're going to find yourself wondering why it is you even got started and why you would keep going when it's just so hard.

If your why isn't strong enough to overcome all of your limitations, to drive you to put boundaries in place to protect your mindset and your dreams, to feel the discomfort that big, bold moves will bring, if your why isn't strong enough you will find yourself retreating back to your comfort zone and likely telling yourself this is evidence for how these big, bold things you want are simply not meant for you. Which really isn't the case. It's that your reason for having them isn't a big enough and bold enough match for how big and bold the things you want are.

The other thing that deciding will help in is building your self-belief, which is also going to be an important factor in making big, bold moves.

The energy of deciding unwaveringly to go all in on you and your biggest, boldest dreams is the stuff that self-belief is made of. And with self-belief comes resilience which will help you tackle those big, bold moves like the true queen you are. The more you tackle them and realize that you are capable of doing so, the more self-belief and resilience you'll build. Until eventually, you have the kind of big and bold self-belief and the resilience to match it that allows you to fully embrace your big, bold moves.

And this brings me back to the belief or rather the lack of belief I held for many years that making this move overseas and starting a life in another country far away from everything I knew was something that was possible in my lifetime, that it was something I was capable of.

I didn't believe in my ability to do such a thing. And a big part of this lack of self-belief was not feeling worthy of experiencing this kind of life. Worthy of being the kind of woman who moved across the world and lived in a different country.

I had bought into the story I was telling myself that living in Europe was not possible for someone like me. It wasn't who I am. I wasn't worthy of experiencing such an extraordinary thing in my lifetime because I needed to shrink myself to maintain the status quo. People like me didn't just pick up their life and make such a big, bold move.

Now, I talk a lot about self-worth in everything I do because here's what I've found to be true for me and for many of the women I've worked with. It's something so many of us are fundamentally lacking in. And when it comes to saying YES! to you and your biggest, boldest dreams, if you don't have a healthy bank balance of self-worth, then it is going to be very difficult to make those big, bold moves.

Worthiness for me again comes back to making a decision that you are inherently worthy. It's about deciding to see yourself as a worthy woman.

For me, I needed to see myself as a worthy woman first and foremost before I could change anything in my life. Because it is in seeing myself as a worthy woman that I could also see myself as a woman who is worthy of making her own decisions, of living into her full potential, of making big, bold moves, regardless of what anyone else thought about them, or my capability of making them happen, or how they would even turn out. Of being worthy enough of the outcomes I desired to be able to handle anything that stood in my way.

When you see yourself as a woman who is worthy of living a big, bold life, all the decisions you need to make to take your big, bold dreams from your someday, maybe one day list to your done day list become so much easier.

Which brings me to the secret I want to share with you today and the one thing that underpins your ability to decide unwaveringly in all of the areas I've discussed. What you want to do, that it is doable, that you give yourself permission to do it, that you decide what stories you will and won't buy into, the boundaries you need to put in place, your worthiness to have what it is you want and so on.

And that secret is your identity. Who you believe that you are and who you be as a result of what you believe.

When I saw myself as a worthy woman, I was also able to see myself as a woman worthy of living in Europe, of making that dream my reality. For as long as I told myself that life wasn't for someone like me, I was right. It wasn't. And my identity kept me stuck in being someone who didn't just pack up her life to move overseas. It kept me from making the kind of decisions I would need to make to make something like that happen. It kept me from taking any kind of action that would support this kind of life being my reality.

Your identity is what creates your reality. It informs your brain of who you are, your place in the world, and what is and isn't possible for you. And remember, your brain runs with whatever you unwaveringly decide to tell it and it goes about making that your lived experience.

When you identify yourself as being the woman who makes big, bold moves, who does the things you dream of doing, who has the life your big, bold moves will create, the action you need to take will become a natural part of simply who you are and what you do.

When you're faced with those challenges, those obstacles, the action you take, the decisions you make, will come down to who you believe yourself to be. The kind of woman you are. How you treat yourself, how you allow others to treat you, the standards you accept for yourself and expect from others. It all comes down to who you believe yourself to be.

And so today I've been talking a lot about deciding and the power of your decisions in helping you make big, bold moves. But the secret at the heart of all of this lies in deciding first and foremost who you be. What kind of woman you are. Because when you decide that, it informs all of the other decisions you need to make. The decisions we've been talking about.

You can't make different decisions without first deciding to be someone different. You can't hold yourself and others to higher standards if you don't first become a woman who has higher standards and understand her reasons for having them. You can't be the woman who makes big, bold moves and does whatever it takes to overcome the challenges along the way unless you first see yourself as that woman.

You can't decide on your why unless you first understand who you are in that why. How it fits with your values, your purpose in life, what matters to you, who the woman is that lives out that why. How will you know what boundaries you need to put in place, what standards you need to raise, what decisions you need to make, and why you're making them unless you know what kind of woman all these things is supporting you in being?

How will you know, unwaveringly know, you belong in the big, bold life you dream of unless you see yourself being the kind of woman who lives out that life.

Here's what I want you to understand. Just as your identity can hold you back and keep you stuck creating the same old reality day in day out, it can also move you powerfully forward. The problem is, a lot of you think your identity is fixed. And this just isn't the case.

Your identity is fluid. You can change who you be in this moment from being a woman who doesn't drink sufficient water to getting up and having the first of your eight glasses today right now. When you became an adult, you stopped living in the identity of a child, of a minor. If you are married, you stopped seeing yourself as a single woman and adopted the identity of a married woman instead. If you have children, you never used to identify as a mother, but you likely sure do now.

Your identity can and should evolve as your life evolves. And you can be whoever you choose to be. That is the reality. The only limitation to who you can be is the one you fight for. But you can fight for the possibilities of who you could be with the same effort as fighting for your limitations. When you stay fluid and adaptable in your ideas of who you can be, you can redefine who you be again and again and again every time you reach for that next bigger bolder dream.

So, to help you bring all of this together and make your big, bold moves easier, get clear on who this woman who has made these big bold moves is. Visualize yourself living out this life and use your journal to document every part of your day and who you be in that day.

How do you show up? What do you value? What characteristics and traits do you have? What do you tolerate and not tolerate? What is non-negotiable in your daily routine? What food do you eat, not eat? What conversations do you have and not have? Who do you spend time with? Who do you not spend time with? How do you spend your time? How do you dress? What's your style? What do you believe about yourself, your capabilities and what's possible in your world? How do you feel about the woman you see in the mirror each day? What decisions do you make? How do you approach your challenges? And so on and so forth.

If you will spend big, bold time to visualize yourself in the greatest of detail and create a clear picture of the woman you could be, the woman who is living out your biggest, boldest dreams, you will lay the foundation for being that woman and making your big, bold moves so much easier by simply becoming her one day at a time, one YES! to the future you at a time.

Decide who you are, and you will have decided every other decision you need to make to bring your biggest, boldest dreams into your reality. To make all of those big, bold moves that seem so daunting for the woman you are right now.

Decide your identity, who the future you is, and you will know the next steps you need to take, and the next, and the next. Decide who you are going to be and then go about being her. And I promise you, those big, bold moves will become easier and so much more possible than you ever knew they could be.

Decide, and then say YES! to nothing else. Decide unwaveringly, my friend, that you are a woman who makes big, bold moves effortlessly and watch how your wildest dreams become your lived reality.

With that, I'm signing off for today's episode. I hope I see you around making those big, bold moves and I'd love to hear what your biggest takeaway from this episode is. So drop me a line by email and tell me all the things or connect with me over on my socials. I'd love to hear from you. You'll find those links in the show notes.

Of course, I'll be back next week for another episode, and I can't wait to share that one with you.

Until then, be the woman who says YES!

Hey, want to know what's stopping you from saying YES! to you and a life you love?

Head over to https://selfcreationschool.com/yesblock and take my FREE 60 second quiz to find out what's standing in your way today and I'll send you my Self-Creation Shift process for shifting it. That's https://selfcreationschool.com/yesblock. I’ll see you there.