371: Taking Back Your Power

The Art of Living Big | Subconscious | NLP | Mindset

Are you ready to redefine success on your own terms and reclaim your personal power?

In this episode, Betsy shares her revelations about embracing a more expansive view of success that aligns with your values and experiences. She also dives into the crucial importance of taking responsibility for your own emotions and reactions, rather than giving that power away to others. Through a poignant real-life example, Betsy illustrates how we unconsciously learn to make others responsible for our feelings, and how we can break free from that disempowering pattern. She offers eye-opening insights on how to communicate more effectively, set stronger boundaries, and heal the underlying triggers that keep us stuck. Don’t miss this opportunity to gain a fresh perspective on success and learn practical strategies to step into your power in relationships and beyond.

Transcription:

Betsy [00:00:05]:
Welcome to the art of living big podcast. My name’s Betsy Paik. I’m an author, a speaker, and a trainer of NLP and hypnotherapy. And I’m focused on helping you understand and design your life with the power of the subconscious. This podcast is designed to help you.

Betsy [00:00:22]:
Think differently about what could be possible for your life.

Betsy [00:00:26]:
Now, let’s go live big.

Betsy [00:00:32]:
Hello, everyone. Welcome to the art of living big. It has been, I think it’s been a month since we’ve had a show. It had. May was such a busy, crazy month. I’m going to tell you all kinds of things, but I didn’t record because it was so busy and crazy. But we’ve hired somebody new. We hired someone new in May, will be hiring two new people this month, in the month of June.

Betsy [00:00:58]:
And so my big goal for the rest of the month, for the rest of the year is to be really consistent with the podcast. It’s like the fun thing I get to do. I mean, all of the things I get to do are fun, but I really like doing the podcast. And so I have missed being here. So one thing that I have noticed really slows me down was my, my goal to record live.

Betsy [00:01:24]:
And here’s the thing. There are so many times when I.

Betsy [00:01:27]:
Record this podcast when I’m inspired, and I’m not always inspired when I’m, like, camera ready. Honestly, I almost laugh when I say that. Am I ever really camera ready? It’s not like I’m like a beauty queen. But regardless, I just decided today I was inspired and I’m gonna just record. And that’s okay. We’re not gonna have a video that.

Betsy [00:01:49]:
Goes along with it. And probably most of you are listening.

Betsy [00:01:52]:
To this on iTunes anyway, so. All right, so I’ve got baby birds. Did I tell you guys before that I had these baby birds? So probably a month ago, maybe five weeks ago, I started to notice that these birds were putting pieces of grass, right, starting their nest on my front porch. Now, if you follow along on Instagram, you know that I am really obsessed with my front porch. Like, I spend a lot of time out there. I have a day bed out there. I have a couch out there, a couple chairs. Like, I mean, it’s like a living room.

Betsy [00:02:27]:
It’s got curtains. Do you know what I mean? Like, I love my front porch, and.

Betsy [00:02:32]:
I truly spend a lot of time out there.

Betsy [00:02:34]:
I mean, on the weekends, I’m reading out there or napping out there. And during the week, there are times where if I’m with my coach being coached. I will take my coaching calls out there and in between calls just to, like, you know, regroup and. And make notes and all of those things. I like to go outside, and, of course, my dog Henry really loves it. So, anyway, about five weeks ago, I start noticing that there is this grass, right, that’s growing on top of the pillar. Now, when we moved into this house last year, we moved in. We bought it in May, beginning in May, and then we moved in towards the end of June, and there was an old nest there, and it was disgusting.

Betsy [00:03:15]:
Like, you know, bird poop. You know, it’s bird’s nest stuff. Bird’s nest stuff was happening, and there was this old nest, and so I had taken the nest down, and I was like, yuck. That’s really gross. So, when they started building this nest this year, I started to brush it away, and I would take the end of a broom and, like, push the grass that they were accumulating away, but they kept coming back and kept coming back. And finally I got to the point where I was like, you know, they would be working really hard during the time that I wasn’t out there and gaining momentum, and I felt like maybe it was me who was new to the porch, and they had been doing this on the porch for years. And so after putting up shiny objects and all kinds of things to thwart their efforts, I decided to just fall in love with the new edition.

Betsy [00:04:15]:
Right?

Betsy [00:04:16]:
We were gonna have babies. I was gonna be like a foster mom. I bought a very fancy birdbath and a special kind of three tiered farmers market with all different kinds of food that I researched that they would like. How did I research? Am I a bird person? No. I downloaded an app to record their sounds so that I knew what kind of bird it was, so I’d know what kind of food to get. I mean, I was like, I’m gonna take such good care of this, mama, and this is gonna be great. And it all has been great until. Well, they were born.

Betsy [00:04:54]:
They were born over memorial day. They’re about ready to leave the nest today. So it’s June 3, so it’s only been, like, a week. I mean, I guess they grow up and kick themselves out of the nest pretty fast.

Betsy [00:05:06]:
But it.

Betsy [00:05:07]:
The mess. I swear, I don’t know if they just, like, back their butts up over the edge of the nest or what happens, but it’s just awful. And there’s bird.

Betsy [00:05:19]:
You know, birds have mites.

Betsy [00:05:20]:
I saw a huge tick out there today. On the curtains. I mean, I’m just thoroughly disgusted. I cannot shower enough to. To, like, but I got some rubber gloves, and as soon as those birds are really gone, like, really, really gone, and I’ll make sure they’re really gone, I’m going out there and removing the curtains and, you know, doing all the things that need to be done. I thought I would clean the curtains, but I actually think I’m gonna have to just buy new ones because they are pretty raunchy. So birds are about ready to fly the cooper, and they’re all hanging out there. They’re little fluff balls now, and they’re on the edge of the nest, like, on the edge of the curtain rod out there, and they’re ready to go.

Betsy [00:06:06]:
So that has been taking up so much of my attention as I was anticipating their arrival. And now I feel deeply, deeply betrayed by the amount of dirt and disgustingness out there. So that’s what I’ve spent my may doing, I guess. That’s what I’m telling you. There’s been a lot going on with the birds. I got a couple times this past month where I got to go to the ocean, and if you’ve been here for a while, you know that that’s just such a fun thing for me. I turned 53 in May, and so we went to Key west for just a long weekend, and it was really fun and relaxing, and I got to be by the ocean, and I love Key west, so it was just really fun. We usually go probably every year.

Betsy [00:06:53]:
I try to go every year, and I’ll tell you, may was really, really full for me. And I want to share this because I don’t know if this might help you, too. Sometimes we have this idea of, like, what success is and what it looks.

Betsy [00:07:09]:
Like, and I think how we experience success, right? We’re supposed to experience it in a certain way. And, you know, at the end of the month, at the end of May, I was like, oh, dang. This month really humbled me. And then I was like, wait a minute. We did so many things. We got testimonials this month. One of the most testimonials we got said, let me just pull it up. This program has been nothing short of life changing for me.

Betsy [00:07:38]:
I’d been in therapy for a year and a half, and nothing moved me forward. Like, this world has, like, impact, right? Making impact. And we moved a lot of things forward that are, like, silent things, right? The things that maybe nobody would notice necessarily on the back end, but things that we’re doing to streamline things and make things easier and make things go smoother for people. And, you know, the way people are brought into the program so they have this really incredible experience. And, you know, we made so many big strides in all of those places, but you wouldn’t see them. And we don’t typically think of that stuff as success, right. Trying to make things better. And so this.

Betsy [00:08:22]:
And. And I got to go to the ocean twice, which, if you’ve been here for any amount of time, you know, that that’s a big deal for me, so living my life the way that I want. So I offer you this thought, because sometimes we have an idea of what success looks like, and when we’re at the end of the road, we go, oh, this isn’t what I thought. This isn’t what I had decided. But we get to choose. We get to choose, and we can look back and then make a list and point out all the things that did go right, all the things that did move the needle in the direction that you wanted, all the ways that you learned lessons right, all the ways that you created balance for yourself or had special moments. I think sometimes we define success in a certain way. And although there’s nothing inherently wrong with that, I just want to open you up to the idea that it can be defined however it is that you want.

Betsy [00:09:18]:
And so I talk to women every day that are at this juncture in their marriage, and they’re like, oh, my God, I feel so much regret about stuff, like, why did I wait this long? Or, why did I do this this way? Or sometimes they’re even like, why did I even get married? Like, I knew? And I want to offer the idea that that’s success, because you’re seeing things through different lens than you did in the beginning, which means you’ve grown and changed, and now you get to choose new things, and you get to learn new lessons and create a new experience for yourself, either inside or outside of your marriage. I think we’ve got this structure, right, of what success is and what it’s supposed to look like. And if we open it up, we’re having these big and small successes in our lives every single day. So the last thing that I kind of wanted to talk about was a TikTok that I saw, and I don’t. And this is the thing that inspired me, where I was like, oh, I want to jump on the podcast. This is. Okay. So I want to talk about this TikTok that I saw that was, in a lot of ways, really, really sweet.

Betsy [00:10:34]:
It was a really sweet TikTok. And there’s nothing, I’m not criticizing this creator. You’ll probably never see this video to even know who the creator is. But it was basically she was picking up her kids from grandma’s where they had been for two weeks, and the kid was crying and like, oh, no, I don’t want to leave. I don’t want to leave. Which is actually so sweet, right? They had a really good time with grandmas. And, you know, when you go to grandma’s so many times, you get away with lots more things. And it’s sort of like being on vacation, right? The same rules don’t necessarily apply because you’re not in the same environment and you probably get more snacks or whatever the case is, right.

Betsy [00:11:15]:
But what I actually want to talk about is the mom’s response to the little girl. And again, I’m not criticizing, I’m just using this as a teaching moment. And I didn’t obviously want to leave a comment, even though I was sort of dying to bring this to her awareness because I think it’s so, so important. And her reaction to her little girl was, why are you making me feel so bad? Why are you doing this to me? Why are you. Why are you just breaking my heart? And although I totally understand, like, she’s coming to pick up her kid, I know there was times where I would pick up my daughter from daycare and she would cry because she loved the daycare teacher. And I actually, that was painful for a second until I realized it was really nice that she liked her daycare teacher that much, and what more could I ask for? But that’s a whole other, that could be a whole other podcast. What I want to talk about is this idea that other people are responsible for how we feel. You know, she was like, you’re breaking my heart.

Betsy [00:12:25]:
You are breaking my heart. And I could go into the whole thing of how she’s teaching that little girl that she has to be responsible for everybody else’s feelings, right? That her actions, and I’m not saying that we’re not. The way we act doesn’t impact people, right? The way we respond and act impacts people, but we’re not responsible for other people’s reactions because she could have had a different experience, right? She could have been crying about not wanting the daughter, could have acted in the same exact way, and the mother could have had a different experience. Like, that isn’t the only option, which is like, you’re breaking my heart. You’re hurting my feelings. It could have been like, we love grandma. This was like vacation, and now I get to bring you home and love on you and, like, you know, make it something different. There was an infinitely number of different ways that could have gone.

Betsy [00:13:32]:
And the way that it went was teaching that little girl that her actions are what are responsible for other people’s feelings. And that’s not necessarily true. And on the flip side, the mother was giving away her power to her daughter. And here’s what I mean by that. She was giving. If somebody else is the one breaking your heart, if somebody else is the one making you feel bad, then you don’t have control over how you feel, and that disempowers you. I work with women every day where I try to undo what’s happening to that little girl, right? I work with women every day who feel like they’re responsible for everybody else’s feelings, and we can’t handle that. That is way too big of a load to hold.

Betsy [00:14:31]:
We can be responsible for ourselves and how we show up and how compassionate we are with people and how we express ourselves, and we can be mindful of being kind. But in the end, I can’t be responsible for somebody else’s emotions, and I wouldn’t want to be. That’s too big of a burden. And I would want them to be empowered to be in control of their own emotions, because if that’s true, then they get to heal whatever it is that’s being activated in that. I say this thing sometimes if you just heard a snippet of it, it might sound bad, I guess it might sound harsh. It might sound harsh. But the truth, right? The truth is that we’re all experiencing the world through our own lens, right? We’re all experiencing the world through our past. Hurts, our beliefs, our values, things we’ve been taught, other experiences that we’ve had, good or bad.

Betsy [00:15:45]:
And so if I have a totally different experience, right, I have a totally different life. I had totally different parents than somebody that lived in Switzerland, let’s say. And that person is with me, and we experience the same thing, we’re probably going to have really different experiences, different reactions. The way we experience a certain something will be very different. That’s doesn’t have anything to do with the event itself. It has to do with our reactions to it. So I say this a lot, but I say the event itself is a neutral, but how we’re reacting to it is what makes the difference. And how we’re reacting to it is about us.

Betsy [00:16:36]:
And if that’s true, then that gives us so much power because it allows us to heal whatever it is that’s being activated in us. It allows us to see things in a new way. It allows us to communicate with people way on a way higher level. It allows us to have better standards for people that have access to us because we are able to decipher what’s just an activation in us and what’s our truth, what’s our beliefs and values so that we know who we are. I wanted to share this example because when I was watching it, I was like, oh, my God, this is where it begins. Like, this is the creation of that experience that I work with women about every single day. And it’s not this mother’s fault. She’s living life the way that she knows it.

Betsy [00:17:35]:
But I want to offer you this thought, is that if somebody is really activating you, take your power back. Take your power back and start to move through this experience, understanding what’s happening inside you so that you can communicate clearly what you need without being activated. You can have standards, which means that person might not get access to me anymore. But it’s not because I’m triggered and freaking out. It’s because I have a standard, right? And I guess the final thought would be like, watch where we’re laying that power. You know, this woman. And again, I am not criticizing this creator. I’m just using it as an example because I think what she does is something that we all do.

Betsy [00:18:28]:
And I’ve probably done many times in my life. I probably still do it from time to time, right? Because so many things are unconscious to us. But when I saw it, I was like, oh, that’s where it begins, and that’s what’s happening. And when we can become conscious to the unconscious. You know, sometimes people come into my program the first couple weeks, they’re like, all I’m doing is noticing all this stuff, like, what are we doing? And I’m always like, that’s, you can’t fix anything if you don’t see. See it, right? You can’t make any changes if you don’t have an awareness. So I want to offer you this thought to lay. Don’t lay your power at somebody else’s feet and to recognize what’s yours and what’s not.

Betsy [00:19:16]:
Heal your stuff so that you can hold standards of what’s important to you without being activated or triggered. And I think that is how you live a big life. If you’re curious on how to do this, work with me. You know, I have a free video if you go to my website, it’s right there, right at the top. But you can go to betsypake.com. five shifts. I give you five shifts that you need to really create a new path in or out of your marriage. You know, I really focus on that relationship.

Betsy [00:19:50]:
I think marriage is such an amazing relationship for having things reflected back. Right. For healing and getting that awareness of what’s going on. Right. It’s an incubator to be able to see all your stuff. And then when you start to heal your stuff, you start to notice your calm, even in the face of upheaval. Right. Your partner may be activated and upset or sharing something or getting loud, and you can still feel really calm just observing.

Betsy [00:20:24]:
It’s a powerful place to be. So much more powerful than being emotionally activated and feeling like you’re being tossed all over the place. So I’m going back out to check on my birds. Keep me in your prayers that they are gone soon, and I can hose off my porch and go outside without feeling like I have creepy crawlers all over me. I love you guys so much, and I will see you next week because I am confident in my dedication to bringing you a weekly show. All right, y’all, I love you so much. I’ll see you guys next week. Hey, thanks so much for listening to today’s show, and thank you for sharing the show with your friends.

Betsy [00:21:07]:
I love when you guys do that. I appreciate it so much. And thank you for leaving me a review on iTunes. I know that it matters because when I go to find a podcast, I always look to see what the reviews are. So it really means a lot to me that you take a minute to, like, figure out how to even make that happen. Now, if you want to find me, find me on social media. I’m usually on Instagram, starting out on TikTok. It’s just my name, Betsy Paik.

Betsy [00:21:34]:
And that’s my website, too, betsypake.com. and you can find out all about the work that I do, having me speak for an event that you might be helping to plan or getting trained inside my alchemy institute. But to make it really easy, if you want me, just shoot me a DM. Shoot me a direct message on Instagram, and I will be at your service. Thanks again for listening, and I will see you all next week.