Yet: A Simple Three-Letter Word That Changes Everything

What if I told you that by adding just three letters to the end of your negative self-talk, not only would your mindset change for the better, but so would every aspect of your life? Imagine how much more good you could do in this world if you believed in yourself more and felt like anything was possible. The word "YET" is a three-letter word that can make all of these things happen.

Don't be fooled by the simplicity of the word. The implications are enormous! For many of my clients, it's the shift from a fixed to a growth mindset. They go from believing that their capabilities are what they are today to knowing they can continuously improve and become better - at whatever they set their minds to. By adding the nuance of "yet" to your thoughts and inner talk, you will not only believe you can do it, but you'll also give yourself the gift of patience. You'll know there's still time to perfect your execution of whatever it is you're doing, even if it doesn't happen right away.

Fixed versus Growth Mindset

Carol Dweck presents an interesting case about mindset in her book Mindset, which I highly recommend. She distinguishes between the fixed and growth mindsets saying that those who have a "fixed" mindset believe their capabilities are not changeable - they're just what they are right now. They think things like, "I'm not good at math." or "I'm not a good writer." This mindset limits people from excelling in these areas because they don't allow room or time to improve. People with fixed mindsets believe that their abilities are static, not able to be improved upon.

On the flip side is those who have what Dweck calls growth mindsets. These individuals believe their abilities aren't set in stone. Instead, they think they can develop their abilities through many different pathways - so people with growth mindsets tend to take on challenges head-on and work hard because they know the benefits of doing so will improve them over time. They understand things like "practice makes perfect" or "the more you do something, the better you become at it."

"Yet" changes not just how we see ourselves but also what others see in us. Not good at something yet? No problem! There's always a way so let's figure out how to get there. Suddenly, nothing seems impossible anymore. When you add "yet" into your life, you no longer feel like you're not "good enough" or "smart enough," and everything seems reachable with some effort. That's an empowering thought.

And one that we all desperately need to hear more - nobody was born knowing how to do everything right away. We all have to start somewhere, and we're not going to be good at it the first time, but that doesn't mean we can't get better!

How to use the word "yet" to change your mindset?

Don't say, "I don't know what to do," instead say, "I don't know what to do yet."

Don't say...

• I'm not a writer

• I'm not good with money

• I'm not an entrepreneur

• I have no clue on how to make my idea work

• I don't know what I want

Instead, say...

• I'm not a writer yet

• I'm not good with money yet

• I'm not an entrepreneur yet

• I have no clue on how to make my idea work yet

• I don't know what I want yet.

"Yet" is not just for yourself; it's also great to use when encouraging others. If you're not good at something yet, does that mean someone else can automatically do it better than you? Not necessarily. And if they try and fail (which will happen), don't be so quick to point out their failure; instead, ask them what they learned from the experience or how they plan on doing things differently in the future. They can't do it yet, but they might succeed next time!

The three-letter word can help you make all these changes in your mindset, but only if you remember not to take it for granted - to go from "yet" to success, you must be willing to work at it. So be patient with yourself and not too hard on yourself when things don't go according to plan.

Believe that you can improve your capabilities, but understand that the amount of effort and work put into something directly correlates to how good or capable you'll become. Don't be afraid to take on challenges because those challenges will stretch you beyond what's comfortable and allow for personal development and growth.

In the end, "yet" is a little word with significant consequences. It will make you feel like you can accomplish anything in life and be better at whatever it is that interests you.

Your newfound belief in yourself will help you to take more action toward reaching goals and objectives because you won't be fear of failure or embarrassment if not everything goes according to plan.

Do you feel like you're stuck in a rut?

You want to be successful, but sometimes it feels like something is holding you back. Maybe it's fear of failure or the feeling that nothing will work out for you. If this sounds familiar, coaching could help solve those problems and get your life on track again.

My coaching packages are designed to ensure that you get what you need from your time with me so we can create real change together. I know how hard it can be to face some of these issues, and I'm here to support you through them all. Don't wait any longer, and book your free session with me today!

Schedule your free session!

Other people’s feelings are not your problem

I recently reflected on why it’s important for women to stop feeling guilty for choosing ourselves. Throughout a big part of my life, that guilt (often doubled with shame, anxiety, or fear) stood in the way of what I really wanted.

It kept me small. Silent. Like it does with so many other women. And for good reason.

We’ve been conditioned to think that we must bear the weight of the world on our shoulder, and do so with a smile, simply because it comes with the territory of being a woman. However – as I reflected in my previous article, incorporating values, and nurturing healthy boundaries will call on you to take responsibility for your own life, to demand more for yourself, to have more self-respect, and ensure that others do not trample on it.

These rituals will lead you to realize that while it’s your responsibility to control your emotions and direct your life down the path you want it to go, it’s not your responsibility to do the same for anyone else. This will be a hard concept for many women to grasp, but as you grow into self-love and self-trust it will become easier.

When you enforce your boundaries, you take your power back.

You’re not Superwoman. Your duty isn’t to save the world. It’s not even to save your loved ones. Your duty – if ever there was one – is to be a caring and loving human. That’s all anyone could ask for. Even so, in the past, I often felt it was my responsibility to be the everything of the people in my private, and professional life. Perhaps you do to…

Making sure everyone around you is happy – at all times
Show the world how capable, reliable, always willing to help you are.
Never come across as too busy, or too tired
Especially not when you are – in fact – exhausted, stressed out, ready for a really long nap.

As you commit yourself to living your truths – making your own decisions, pursuing your dreams, creating your own path – you’re going to upset some people. In fact, you’re going to upset A LOT of people, especially if what you’re going for is bold and unimaginable to them. That’s precisely when you have to remind yourself: how others feel about who you are, the way you live your life, or what your dreams are is not your business.

You are not in charge of other people’s feelings.

Like me, you may have been socialized to believe that as a woman you exist to bring some kind of joy, support, care (insert expectation of choice here) to others, based on the roles society has tried to box you into. Understanding that you’re not responsible for anyone’s happiness but your own is a liberating experience. Often we don’t realize how the people around us suck the joy out of us when you overextend ourselves for them, breaking our back to be at their every beck and call. Living this way will drain you. I know, because I’ve been there.

It may take some time for people to come around to the fact they’re not somebody else’s problem but their own. In some cases they never will, and you’ll have to walk away, or see them leave when you no longer *make them happy* (in my experience often used as code speak to say you’re no longer able or willing to cater to their every need). Again, believe me, I know.

How to stop making other people’s feelings your responsibility?

• When people start demanding that you do things their way or blame you for how they feel or how their lives are, you don’t need to respond to them. This is a hard one for any people-pleaser, isn’t it? So if you feel the urge to go there, the conversation should be about boundaries, personal responsibility, and freedom. Not about what they need from you, or how you’re lacking in giving it to them. Because, well, it’s NOT your responsibility.

• Sometimes when people ask unreasonable things of you and have grandiose expectations, you may become so overwhelmed that you simple react instead of respond. It can help to ask yourself some questions: is what they’re asking something you would expect them to do for you? Is it fair to yourself to say yes when you know you should (and totally could) say no?

• When you’re being tested, remember to breathe and allow your emotions to flow through you. Oftentimes you’ll feel guilt, shame, or fear when you’re being put on the spot for someone else’s feelings. Don’t fixate on any thought. Instead, give yourself time to process what’s happening, and simply *pause*. It’s important to guard your heart and protect your soul. After all, you are YOUR OWN responsibility.

Not making other people’s feelings your responsibility requires courage, dedication, and discipline. I’ve been practicing this kind of detachment for a long time, yet I still fall back into my old ways so easily. Affirming my boundaries and being true to myself helps me to bounce back quickly, and recognize the signs when guilt or shame show up.

In the end, what works best is to remind ourselves that we’re responsible for how we’re feeling. Nothing more. But always.

Making that your priority will be so liberating. I promise

I’d love to what your experience has been with other people’s feelings. Let me know in the comments below.

How to learn from criticism without letting it take you down

I’m a recovering people-pleaser. For years, I’ve dreaded criticism more than anything else. Because every time someone criticized me, it was a reminder that I was not perfect – something that was really hard for me to bare – and a painful reminder that I wasn’t pleasing someone else.

The funny thing is, for all those years, I actually thought I could handle criticism pretty well. I prided myself on it. When someone would criticize me, I’d think I was handling it in the best way possible, listening and engaging in a conversation about it, and giving space to the opinion of those who criticized me, pretending it was for my own good. But I was wrong.

Constructive criticism was having the opposite effect on me. It wasn’t making me become a better person at all, it was just hurting me to listen to what someone had to say about me.

For many years, constructive criticism was something I really couldn’t handle, and it was totally wasted on me or, worse, it would take me down and I would need time to recover.

And that’s how it is with many people-pleasers. The need to please is so strong that anything that gets in the way of that – like criticism, even the good kind – will be devastating.

So how do you benefit from constructive criticism without letting it take you down?

#1: What people say about you – even if it’s useful to you – does not define you.

You are much more, immensely more, than the comments that someone makes about you. So don’t give those words more meaning than they have, or more power. It’s good to have an open mind and listen to other people’s opinions, even if it’s about you, and even if it’s not all that positive, but that doesn’t mean you’re a bad person, or not a nice person, or not worthy of love. People criticizing you has nothing to do with any of that, and should never define you. You define you; nobody else does.

#2: You are not here to please others, you’re here to love yourself first.

It’s good to listen to constructive criticism, because depending on what it’s about, it can really help you: to be a better version of yourself, to have more meaningful relationships, or to improve on pretty much any area of your life and business or career. But, you’re not here to please others. That’s not your purpose on this planet. So it’s not because someone criticizes you that your world should end, or that you even have an obligation to listen. I believe that you’re here to love yourself first and foremost, and that means that you only need to listen if you feel it will help you, and that that in turn will make you a happier person.

#3: Keep your ego out of it.

My ego has been one of the biggest struggles for me to overcome in order to move past people-pleasing (and many other things, believe me). That little voice, the everlasting critic that really makes your life difficult and unpleasant, does not come from the outside, but from within. And when someone gives you constructive comments about yourself, that little thing is going to kick and scream. The best way to really profit from what is being told to you is to let your ego out of it. It’s a hard thing to do, I know; it is a constant struggle for me. But it really is the best way, and it really will make you happier and more fulfilled in the end.

#4: Don’t confuse plain old cheap critique with constructive criticism.

Never forget that constructive criticism is meant to create, not to destroy. As a people-pleaser, it’s difficult to understand the difference, and to know what to listen to and what not to. My rule of thumb is to always try and see things from the other person’s perspective. I ask myself: What would I think if I was in her shoes? And that helps me to listen with an open mind and see the experience as a way for me to grow.

In the end, it’s up to you what you do with constructive criticism. You can choose not to listen to it. But, ever since I’ve started listening better, I’ve been able to “handle it” better, and I’ve profited from it. It’s helped me to get to know myself better, and to explore parts of me that were more challenging to get in touch with. And overall, it made me happier.

How about you? How are you dealing with constructive criticism?

How to be happy for others and why it matters

I was at a family wedding last weekend when my husband’s cousin and I started talking about the power of happiness. My husband’s cousin is a wonderful woman; beautiful, well-read, she has been places and seen things. Life hasn’t always been easy for her, yet when she’s around, even the darkest room brightens. She was talking about how happy she is with her baby boy, how her husband is a keeper, and how they’ve now found a house they love, have made an offer, and are praying for it to be accepted. All good things, for sure. But then the mood changed, as she recalled telling a good friend about her treasured house just a day earlier, and getting a nasty, jealous comment back.

The friend she was talking about is not very different from her. She’s not a refugee from Syria, she’s not on welfare, and she isn’t sick or even remotely in a bad physical or mental place. On the contrary, she has a good and steady job, lives a great life, and only differs slightly from my husband’s cousin: she just has a tiny bit less than her, is just a tiny bit heavier than her, and to her own standards, she’s just a tiny bit less attractive. But all of these little tiny bits together make that friend unhappy and envious.

I could see that my husband’s cousin had given this issue a lot of thought. And in the interesting and heart-centered conversation we had, she said something that really stuck with me.

If only my friend was happy for me, that would make her happy, too.

And I think that is so true.

We live in a competitive world. We live in a media-driven world. We live in a world that wants us to believe we are not enough the way we are, and that we are flawed and need extensive fixing. There isn’t a week that goes by without us being bombarded by countless messages telling us what a wonderful and perfect life lies a tiny little bit ahead of us, if only we can have, do, or take up the latest fashion fad. I believe that envy and jealousy are byproducts of those deceiving lies. And although they are not the goal of what the media and corporations want us to believe about ourselves, they are a welcome byproduct of that messaging. Envy and jealousy make us unhappy, and unhappiness is the breeding ground for our need for stuff, and always more stuff. Because we are meant to believe that we can cure unhappiness with things. And when we see others obtaining items that we think we need in order to be happy, our envy and jealousy are there to remind us of that lie.

But with awareness and practice, you can learn to see through this veil of misleading beliefs and become genuinely happy for others. And once you do that, a new level of happiness emerges for you, too. And guess what? It all starts with loving yourself first.

Looking back at my own life, I know I’ve had many moments where I was envious or jealous, comparing and wishing I could have the life, body, or boyfriend of someone else. For a big part of my life, I tried to achieve the unattainable and I was miserable. Those moments were amongst the worst of my life. When I think back on how I felt, what I remember is bad. In most cases, I was depressed, stressed, anxious, frustrated, or scared. And I definitely didn’t love myself. And it’s only when I changed from within – when I started to love myself, my body, my mind, my soul, and my life – that I was able to be happy for the fortune and blessings of others. And thanks to that shift, I became happier myself.

Because when I started doing that, showing more love and compassion for the person who I was, I noticed I wasn’t that envious or jealous of others anymore. And once I was happy for them, more amazing things started happening for me. And that’s no surprise.

It is my conviction that what we send out into the world, and the thoughts that we have over and over again, materialize into this world. No exceptions.

On a level of energy, thought can be positive or negative, and depending on what we send out via our thinking, that is what we attract back into our lives. Fundamentally, that’s all there is: either you send out and receive positive and uplifting energy, or you send out and gain negative and depressing energy.

When you are jealous, you are tapping into and sending out negative energy. And by definition, that is what you get back. But that’s not all. When you’re jealous or envious, you’re creating the negative energy within yourself – in your mind through negative thinking, and in your body by producing emotions to fit your thoughts. And by doing that, you push self-love away. When you think of it that way, what it means is that, when you’re having negative thoughts or feelings towards someone else, you’re really having them towards yourself. When you’re jealous of a friend, they might be out having a great time, while you’re sobbing, or frustrated, or sad even, that you are not them. Wouldn’t it be much more fun to be out with them, so you could have a good time too?

But thankfully, the opposite is true, as well. And that is what my husband’s cousin meant when she said her friend could be happy too. Because if you are genuinely happy for the success, achievements, blessings, and lives of others, you are creating that positive energy within yourself, too, bringing more self-love into your life. And to live a happy and fulfilling life, that is what you must aim to do, always.

What it means to really love yourself

What does it mean to really love yourself?

I find this to be one of the most difficult questions you could ever ask yourself, because loving yourself is such a complex and deep state of being.

In what follows, I offer you my vision of what I think loving yourself really means. It has taken me many years to understand what self-love is, and a number of years more to be able to give myself this kind of love. But once I began, I finally felt free. I had found a new way of being that brought me peace, happiness, and joy. And the magical thing about it is that I didn’t need to search outside of myself to find all that. After a decade-long pursuit of unattainable ideals, the search was finally over. I had found love, deep within me, where it had been waiting for me all along.

Because the magic of self-love is not something that overcomes you, but rather something that you create for yourself, I invite you to do the following. Find a quiet and peaceful spot to sit yourself down, pour yourself some of your favorite tea or make yourself a cup of your best coffee, and unplug yourself from any possible distractions. This exercise will help you to give yourself the time and attention you deserve. Grounding yourself this way, and being fully present for what follows, you are already taking a step towards self-love.

A word of caution is necessary before we move any further. The love I will talk about, and try to untangle and explain for you below, is not the same as romantic love. Of course, it is heart-centered, beautiful, and warm, but it is also much, much more.

Loving yourself means putting yourself first, even being selfish at times, and making sure you are well taken care of by you, yourself... before you even think about taking care of others. It is putting yourself at the heart of everything you do.

Loving yourself also means accepting yourself with all your flaws, all the negative aspects of you, and all the things you don’t really like about yourself. Maybe you procrastinate sometimes, or you get upset when you’d really rather not. Or perhaps you would like to be less emotional or sensitive all the time. Whatever it is, loving yourself means understanding and accepting that you cannot be whole without those sides of you, too.

Loving yourself is showing compassion for the person that you are. And by this, I don’t mean the perfect version of you that you aspire to be, but rather the imperfect version – the real you, as the vulnerable human being that you are.

Yes, loving yourself can be difficult. It requires consistent thought and determined action, especially because it’s so easy to slip back into a state of not loving yourself so much, and of fear, resentment, and even hate. With this in mind, loving yourself is also very courageous, and requires you to be brave and strong, as the process asks you to be honest with yourself and to really look at who you are and what you stand for.

Loving yourself demands that you accept your faults, your mistakes, and all the wrong turns you ever took, along with all of the bad decisions you ever made, and demands that you embrace all of that – with no exceptions – as an integral part of you. Knowing and accepting that you are perfectly imperfect, just as you are.

Loving yourself means being thankful for your body, your mind, your soul, your feelings and emotions, your unique way of seeing the world, your way of interacting with others, and your way of being in the world.

Loving yourself means loving absolutely everything about yourself: the light, the dark, and all the shades in between. It is saying to the universe: look at me, here I am, this is all that I have to offer, all that I am, all of this is me.

And then, after all is said and visible, after taking a good look at yourself in your entirety, it means deciding to befriend, accept, trust, enjoy, protect, grow, and nurture all that you have seen.

To me, that is what loving yourself really means.

But, however beautiful it is to think of you as a complete and self-loving human being, loving yourself is a never-ending journey. Whether you accept your flaws or not, whether you show compassion for yourself or take good care of yourself or not, if self-love is what pulls you forward, that is all you need. And if you don’t at times, even that is okay. Self-love never goes anywhere – it’s always there, ready for you to go back to.