In today’s episode of The Whole Circle Podcast we talk to the lovely Mish Pope about how powerful mindset can be and how learning to say one simple little word can have a massive impact on your life … NO!

Mish is a Life Coach, Speaker and Business Owner and she is passionate about empowering women from all walks of life to not only live their best life, but to be their true authentic selves, have self-compassion, a cracking mindset and radiate joy in the process.

Mindfulness – What is it?

Mindfulness brings about the following questions that we all need to ask ourselves:

  • Are you living a life that feels aligned?
  • Are you living a life that you’re happy to be in?
  • Do you know who you are within that space?

To Mish, that is what mindfulness is all about.

For a lot of us, mindfulness is a term that has only been heard about in the mainstream in the last few years or so and is quite often referred to in the wellness space.

Other ways you can be mindful are:

  • Taking a step back and assessing the situation at hand
  • Seeing how you feel about the issue
  • Putting yourself into someone else’s shoes
  • Looking at the issue from a different perspective

As we age we often find we can be less apologetic and incidentally more mindful because of past experiences in life and learning from the mistakes made in our past or situations we haven’t enjoyed being in and not wanting to repeat again.

However, having said that in this day and age we have also become more disconnected from our sense of self which can be especially telling with suicide and addiction rates being incredibly high and for which these do not discriminate between gender, race, income or education levels.

For Jo and Tracey, they learned a valuable lesson in mindfulness when they realised earlier in 2018 that they had bitten off way more than they could chew by launching their new Additive-Free Lifestyle website on the same day they launched a new round of Additive-Free Made Easy as well as starting on a new email platform.  It was a horrible time and one that they wouldn’t want to repeat.  So from going through this they are now more mindful in their business that you can’t have everything you want all at once even though, as Jo admits, she can tend to be a ‘holic’ and needs to get everything done now! And with 150% effort! Whereas Tracey can tend to let things take their natural course of action.  Thank goodness we got Mish on for this episode so that she can help Jo! Haha

How do we learn to say ‘No’?

Life can be so busy and we simply don’t have any time left in our days yet we take on more and more because we can struggle to say no to things that are asked of us when really we need to be slowing down.

The thing to remember is being busy is a choice, you can absolutely be busy because you have to for financial reasons to pay the bills or may finances aren’t an issue for you and you are still busy because that’s your life in its present moment.  But you have to ask yourself if you are happy with that? Because regardless of life circumstances or how packed our calendar is, it is actually our choice to be as busy as we may or may not be.  When we pack our calendar beyond what we feel comfortable with or we feel sustainable with, then we have to ask ourselves:

  • Why is that?
  • What am I trying to prove?
  • Do I really have to get all this done by a certain deadline?
  • Do I want to compromise my family for that packed calendar?

When we want to say no but we feel we have to say yes, what is the resistance?  Where is that coming from? What is that actually trying to tell me?  You will often find it usually comes from guilt, shame, FOMO, keeping up with the Jonses etc.  So it usually has nothing to do with honouring who you are but everything to do with making sure that people around you like you.

You will need to figure out what your intentions are and this goes back to what Mish calls ‘the non-negotiables’.  Having realised from her own negative personal experiences that something had to give, she allows herself the time to do what’s important to her such as going to the gym and working out four times a week because this is what she wants to prioritise as a non-negotiable to fit into her week.  She also doesn’t like to work Friday nights or Sundays.  So unless the house is burning down or something needs her urgent attention or there is an opportunity she really wants to say yes to then she won’t negotiate her time anymore.  It’s a non-negotiable.

So when we try and figure out why we are so stressed, we need to ask ourselves why are we choosing to be stressed?  And what are those non-negotiables that actually refill your tank and restore yourself physically, emotionally, spiritually and energetically.  Trying to figure out what your top three things are that aren’t overwhelming to you but that you need to accomplish each day and then crossing those off the list can make a huge different to your mindset.  This will help you find your rhythm to make yourself accountable to get stuff done.

Overwhelm

Overwhelm often comes because we are not organised and with so much going on in our heads we can often not even know where to start

There can be such a glorification of hustle especially for women and how we feel like we have to do it all and show that to the world.  On the flip side of that there is also a glorification of burnout when the reality is neither of these serve us well.  Instead think of your intention around your life instead of the winning or losing aspect.

When you are burnt out you’ve worked yourself too hard, so think how you can lessen your load to give you restorative rest.  Can you push out that deadline a bit further? Or outsource tasks to someone else to give you more balance?  Whereas overwhelm is you don’t know what you want to do and maybe you’ve said yes to too many things so you’re feeling weighed and only capable of doing a half-hearted job on each task.

This cycle is exhausting because you feel like you are not getting anything done and that’s when you don’t rest.  So at that point it’s time to go back to the drawing board, recalculate and get really clear on your vision and start producing.

When you look back on your life what do you want to remember?

These days we are always so busy doing things, in a rush to get places and worrying about what we’ve done or haven’t done that we don’t take time to live in the moment and spend time doing the things we love or with the people we love.  Being present in our lives is incredibly important and rewarding.  If this means letting things slide and not getting things done like the housework, then don’t worry about it, it will get done eventually.

Things you can do each day to be more mindful or help keep you centred

  • Tracey loves to practice Yoga to help keep her mindful and centred
  • Mish recommends taking a sheet of paper and writing down what you need to give yourself restorative rest. For example, after a long day maybe a nice hot bath would give you some much needed restorative rest.  Identify what your needs are and write them down.
  • Head to the gym and work out. Mish especially loves F45 classes.
  • Being aware of your diet to ensure that your body is getting the fuel it needs to sustain you.

Links and Resources