10. Transformation to Being Your True Self: Building as you Evolve

The question of being yourself rather than the roles you play is what we are discussing. What are we willing to evolve from when we go through a transformation? Are you letting the conditioning dissolve? In this current season of Taurus and spring the seeds you planted are ready to grow. Or maybe you need help discerning your next step because you are overwhelmed.

Takeaways:

-Investing in yourself with support can help you move faster

-How do I no longer want to be?

-Who do I want to be?

-Who am I going to become when I make that choice?

Resources for this episode:

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Transcript

Sarah Swift 0:10

Welcome to the Integrative Mother Experience Podcast. I'm your host, Sarah Swift, wife for 27 years a mother of three teenagers. I want to have conversations about why so many mamas wearing multiple hats, working, serving others, or owning a business, especially in the beauty industry, feel like they need to choose between their work and their family. We'll also uncover common causes of overwhelm, lack of wellbeing and joy. I am here with over three decades of experience working in the beauty industry. Owning several types of businesses starting in my twenties, and sharing stories to help other mothers avoid feeling that they're always missing out. Time is an asset. We can't get back. I can't wait to dive into these deep conversations. I hope you will join me. Don't forget to check out my free checklist for joy and fulfillment on my website, the integrative mother experience.com, and join my free private community of mamas supporting each other. Welcome back. I'm excited as we are only a couple days into the new season of Taurus. Tends to be grounded, sensual, and stable, earthy vibe. I love this because we went through several seasons since we talked about the Capricorn energy, which is the time that I was born. And during this season, slowing down and building lasting foundations is exactly what I'm here to help other moms do, and today is a day where I'm reflecting. 21 years ago I lost my second child and going through that loss after having seasons of infertility. I have a different understanding of the desire that we may have and the feeling of not knowing if it's ever going to actually come into fruition. And as all of you that have followed me this far, know, I do indeed have three teenagers. So, it wasn't the end of my story, but definitely part of who I am today. And with that being said, today's episode is about transformation and it's about, how you evolve and to be yourself while you're doing so and so, this is perfect timing to talk about it. I read something in one of my little daily meditation books that talked about violating our physical and spiritual need for rhythm, for ebb and flow when we use it all up in one area of our lives. So today's episode will go deeper into my own story and hopefully, you know, because the reason I'm sharing my stories is for you to be able to relate and see it in yourself. I'm here to help and guide, not just talk about myself. The whole point is to help and so any version of success that requires you basically being a counterfeit of the real thing that you are and what you're here to do is not worth it. So I hope that this is helpful. We are in spring now and all the trees are budding. The seeds that have been planted are going to start growing. It's really an exciting season and I love the fact that slowing down to enjoy it and savor it is part of what this season is all about. We are here to find joy in life, to feel that fulfillment. We're here to have fun. So let's do it. Let's not make everything so heavy, and if you need help building your foundation so that you can get rid of those old patterns that are keeping you from being your best self. I have something super exciting coming up at the end of May, so make sure you go to my website and you get on my email list that will put you in my private mama's community. Which is where you will see all the details of all the things that I offer. We just completed a 40 day reset and renewal journal experience, and now I have something even more exciting coming up, so you won't want to miss it. Enjoy today's episode. Welcome back, my beautiful mamas. Today's episode is going to be about being yourself as you evolve and what it looks like to go through transformation. You may be asking yourself, what does that even mean? And I can tell you because now that I am in my early fifties, 51, as of January. I have lived through many decades, and because I continue to work on myself, I have evolved immensely. But really in the last five years is when my transformation really began to take hold, and it has gone quite quickly from there, and that's what I want for you. I don't want it to take decades for you. I want you to be able to move through these things with the ability to not have to quote unquote waste time. So as we dive in, I'm going to start by just sharing, when I was in my twenties, it was looked at that on my day off, I was expected to work. It was not looked at as a day of rest,and it's so interesting when I look back, I realize that it was so many people in my life that really kind of projected this on me. You know, not just my immediate family, which, you know, the conditioning there was definitely doing and, you know, I don't think they even realized that, probably came from their families or sense of worth. I don't know. But it was really, commonplace and I don't know that it was for everybody of my generation, but it was definitely for a lot of people that I knew, and for me it was this subtle pressure of, oh, you don't work on Tuesdays? I was becoming a hairstylist at the time. People would want me to do their hair, and it was like. Why would I want a day off like, resting? What is that even, it's so absurd to me now. I, I really just, I think it's so crazy because I had a lot of service-based industry jobs, if you will, prior to even becoming a hairstylist. I worked from a very young age. And there was never a concept that was normalized in my life of really the joy of resting and the joy of having fun, creating a hobby, just having some spaciousness to do whatever as the day unfolds. That just wasn't a thing for me, and I continued to just really work and work and work, and as much as that did create some financial opportunities, also it really created chaos for me because I didn't have the structure. Nobody had taken the time and no blame to anybody else, but this is part of my story as well, to show me any kind of financial structure. So I remember verbally hearing to save your money, but never like had any kind of guidance there. I am making up for that as a mom now. My oldest daughter, when she turned 18, we right away, you know, showed her how to start her retirement fund and to set up some other things that we thought were really important so that even if she doesn't necessarily understand it all, we're setting her up for the success at a young age, and so that she will have some of those foundational tools in place and maybe she won't struggle so much to try to figure it out as an adult. That would be my hope for all my children. So learning the lessons from our own mistakes, if you will. What I learned about not having rest and having the opportunity in my mind to look forward to a day off, to do something fun or whatever I wanted, was that this feeling of always doing has stayed with me for so many decades, and that's what I've been unraveling and trying to undo now later in life. And you still may say, but I like doing things. I have a lot of energy and that that works for me, and we can argue that some people's makeup is really designed to do more. I'm going to talk a little bit about human design in this episode as well. I am married to someone that is designed to do a lot and he thrives that way, and that is his makeup. My human design is not, I'm a projector and I learned a lot more about the specifics of my human design in the last few years and even deeper recently. That is not how God made me, and so it's no surprise now that I am understanding all of this stuff so much deeper. I remember, here's another example that I think you may enjoy, but I remember women in one of the first salons that I worked in showing all these photos of these amazing vacations. Most of'em were tropical. So you know, I guess it depends what you consider an amazing vacation, but it was a lot of women in that salon and it was the norm. And when I say that, I was in the minority for sure. When I didn't have vacations like that under my belt or planned, and that wasn't even something that was even accepted how I grew up, and I guess in the circle that I was in, it was considered like a luxury and that you would be wealthy to allow yourself that. And I would go on a limb saying I don't think any of the women that I worked with were wealthy. They were all very much normal and it was just a standard for them. I noticed also my older sister, and I really admired this about her, is she really prioritized vacations as well. And looking back now, I think, what a great example that she was giving me, she was giving me this new idea of really resetting, because she was also a doer for sure. Like we were in the grind and we pushed and we were rewarded for, doing more. And it was her showing me that, you know what? Everybody deserves a reset and I'm taking these vacations and I'm going to figure out a way to do them. And she did, and it was a priority and I'm grateful for that. I unfortunately did not follow the example of all these women and my older sister until very recently. I allowed life circumstances and other things to really take priority over the reset and the planning of a vacation. And that is a regret that I have and a lesson I will call it because you can't change what is in the past, but you can learn from it and that's great. And I have, so for me, I realized that my lack of fun and joy and not having something to look forward to as a reset. I was like a hamster just on a wheel and it just kept feeling like these cycles of burnout. And so I look at now as I am allowing myself the grace to be myself, to to live in the now and to really have the joy that we're all meant here, to have an experience. This isn't reserved for just certain people. We're all here to have joy and, it's interesting because I think too, it's like when I find myself noticing that someone will always ask for my attention. It just is. This started way back when, the second of four children in my family, I did a lot of caring for the younger children, which I always loved children. I deeply love them, but that evolved into babysitting for other families, very regularly. Like I was doing it all the time, and I did enjoy it for sure, but there was also an imbalance of having fun and being the age that I was. And so I just want to make sure for my own children, and they're beyond that age now. But I facilitated that they did have experiences where they could be their age and certainly, you know, they have responsibilities as well. But I want it to be a balance of both and knowing that you have to create your own sacred space because nobody is going to create it for you. They just aren't. Nobody is carving out my quiet dark mornings for me if I don't make it a priority. The people around me definitely know that I want it and they're happy for me, but they're not going to create it. They're not going to get me out of bed, they're not going to, make sure that I am getting my walk-in and all the things that I prioritize on such a high level now because it is what gives me space in my life, and it is what gives me that sense of renewal. And your conditioning can force outcomes if you're not aware of them. So that's also part of being yourself, not who people want you to be, not the conditioning and the patterns that you were so used to doing and hearing, and maybe even seeing others around you do. But truly being your own self and when you're rewarded for doing more, for me, it just never felt aligned. It just didn't. And there was this sense of unfulfillment there and I wasn't quite sure what it was, but I remember thinking from a young age to, oh, I wish I was older. I wish I was in my sister's class. She has all the cute boys in her class, or whatever it was. And that's not living in the moment, and that's not being your true self. So no wonder I never felt fully fulfilled in my roles because there was a void there. And I know too that some of us just continue to play the roles that others want for us. And for me, playing a masculine role and doing and forcing, always felt out of alignment. But I was really praised for it in a lot of ways. I noticed that also when I was in jobs or just environments where people were probably meant to by design do more than I was. I would feel like, oh, if I would just do more, I'll be acknowledged and so I could, because I had the ability to, but it was out of alignment. It didn't feel right. So I think just noticing that, I love to say the word audacity because when I think about others demanding, you should do something. And I also don't like the word should, but you should do something and then you realize they're not living the example, they're not willing to do it. But you should do it and what is that? If you really think about it, it's just not in alignment. It's not them being the example, it's them wanting you to do something they're not willing to do for themselves. And I am, by nature, more feminine, more sensitive, more motherly and nurturing, and I don't want to repress that. I am allowing that to come out, and I knew I had that deep desire inside of me to be a mom and to be around my children more than I was away at any career or job, even though I did enjoy some of the choices I made for jobs and careers. But the deep desire was truly not that, and that is just me and how I integrate that now feels aligned and I don't want you to wait again, decades to have this happen for you. So another thing I'm just going to say is knowing that we are all designed a little different. In the Enneagram world, I just found out from my beautiful friend Kelly, I'm a two, which is a helper or a giver, and this really makes sense because I do like to help and I have always enjoyed giving to others. I just let it go too far on the realm of there was just, depletion, like nothing left. I would overgive, to the point where financially I had nothing left for myself. And then later, you know, when I was married and eventually had children, it was just this cycle because I had done so much overgiving that it created, a lack and that is not healthy. I overgive physically, I overgive with just my time of not having resets and renewal. And so as much as it is a positive thing to be a helper or a giver within balance for sure. And then my human design type being a projector, I'm also what they call a five one. And, and we'll dive more into human design on another episode. But for me, I'm an emotional authority, which I can really relate to. That was no surprise when I learned that. And clarity comes over time. I like to solve problems and I like to investigate, and I am not meant to be rushed. So this was really apparent to me early on in my career, I would take longer to do things than some of my friends, but the quality definitely wasn't lacking. It's just that that is my design. I'm not designed to do things quickly. I also resonated with the deep conversations of certain people, and that isn't my personal and my career. And. I think that's really aligned to me as well. I felt so aligned when I would have the deep conversations over the actual just doing of service after service and not reconnecting with that person again. So of course in beauty school, that was the case. We weren't seeing these people again and they were awarding some of my fellow classmates for quickly getting the services done, and they would get put in a special area and get these certificates. And I remember the owner's son asking me, we were friends and he didn't work in that building. He was in another building, but he was like, how come you're not over there? And I actually got moved over there from, one of the directors just to be near all my classmates because I didn't push out the services fast enough. I really wanted to do quality and it's not that I was the slowest, but I wasn't going to be the fastest because it wasn't how I like to do work and it wasn't how I'm made. And I also notice about my human design when they say I'm here to guide and I see what others don't. That is interesting as well, because I do like to quote unquote fix things and help. But projectors have to wait to be invited. And that's something that, now that I understand it, I realize why there's been so many times where I have this deep insight and I can see things and I just can't understand, why can't the people that I'm noticing these situations to happen and why can't they see it? Like it's just right there. It's a pattern. It's happening over and over. And I'm learning more now that waiting to be invited is really important because of what I see that others don't. And I'm good with that because I really am at a point in my life where I want to only work with people that want to work with me. I only want my personal relationships to be with the people that it's reciprocal. In my private life, and I want deep, joyful relationships with those in my family. So it's fine. It's, it's really, it's not about more, it's not about faster, it's not about forcing, it's about alignment. And for me, that's really what I want to do as I evolve. I've tried being an entrepreneur versus an employee and they both had their pros and cons, but I don't know that one really was better for me than than the other. I think the freedom of the entrepreneurship definitely was and still is alluring, but the freedom can get filled up really quickly if you aren't keeping your standards because. You're creating the spaces you are in charge, so you have to abide by that. Otherwise, I noticed for myself until my transformation within the last five years, being an entrepreneur actually gave me more responsibility than being an employee in many ways. And yes, I was able to, you know, make some decisions on what I wanted to do with my family, but it still created a lot more work until I understood how to create those foundational elements. And then just being authentic to yourself. And that means being the unique person that you were designed to be, as I've talked about previously. So are you being that person living it in action, or are you just giving it all away and you're just playing too many roles and behind the scenes you're doing all these tasks? That's not being transparent, I'm living the example. I'm not playing the roles. A friend of mine had made mention of this last year on our salon owner's business trip. And she's like, you really do all the things. And you know, was asking me a lot of questions about some of the products that I use and just even organic living in general because I am, I living, I'm living the transformation of what I want for myself and my wellness and it's in many different areas and I did appreciate that she made mention of it because I already knew that, but I didn't have anybody necessarily point out to me directly. I've used so many tools and modalities over the years for my health and my wellness, and I'm so grateful for all of them. There's been so many, you know, because I really started more with the physical and and environmental part of this journey, and I lived in those areas for several decades. But then in 2022, that's when I really dove deep into the spiritual end of it. And I've always been religious and spiritual, so I don't mean that that's when I started, but that's when I dove in very deeply. And it was the mindset and the the being and living it out and going deeper, and it's just been so interesting to dive so deep and to really evolve along this journey and let the light shine from within. Because what we don't know, we don't know. And when we're living unconsciously, we're just doing things without having any idea how it's affecting us, and that could be in our physical health and our mental health, and even spreading to those around us in a negative way, and I certainly don't want that for anybody in my life. And I also want to embrace the uniqueness that I'm here to live and how God wants me to experience my life. And I don't want to wait for the tragedies to come anymore. I don't want to wait for the illness. I don't want to wait for the accident, for whatever it is, the big event when I look back, because that's truly what it was. It's like something big would happen and then I would move, and not always right away, but I've made huge strides and it's because I would. Unfortunately, looking back, wait for something negative or big to happen. And then I did have the courage to move. So you know, I'm not sitting in all of that now decades later, but I definitely could have moved faster. And I realize that now, and I am moving much faster. What I've done in the last five years, oh my goodness. It's just like I could shave decades off for anybody that wants help in this area, and I'm so excited to do that. I just, I don't want to be stuck in the fear that keeps me in old patterns, and I don't want that for you. And so I'm so proud of everything that I've been able to evolve to and understand and be surrounded by. I am so grateful for the groups and the courses and the coaches that have helped me. I'm not afraid to invest in myself and I've invested immensely in all these areas and the support has been absolutely amazing. And so with that being said, my resources on my website, I do share some of the modalities and oils that I've used. I like the company, young Living because they're based on seed to seal, and so the quality is there and I really do like that they do have a spiritual foundation behind their oils as well. And they have some really great opportunities this month for savings. So if you go on my website in the resources, I have some of my favorite oils. If you click the link, it leads you to be able to shop and then you can save thereafter. And for this month only, I will include it in the show notes. There's an additional savings through the end of the month. I have a lot of knowledge in this area and support, so reach out if you have any questions. But some of the blends that have really helped me physically and emotionally, I just can't imagine not sharing that with others. And then I also want to say too, that if you have things that can help people. Sharing is the gift that you're giving, and you never know when you share something with somebody else, how that could affect somebody in a positive way. So the takeaways for today are going to be, how do I no longer want to live? So that's the question that I asked myself when I really started going deep. How do I no longer want to live? And it was just that simple for me. From there, it's about not doing more so who do I want to be? It wasn't doing more for me. It was who did I want to be? Who was I going to become at that moment? And then being your true soul self. So that means not playing in roles anymore and being transparent, which means. You're just being you. No matter what you're doing, who you're with, you're, you are just you. You're being transparent. So my decision to stop being my old self had all of these questions around it, and I challenge you to ask those questions to yourself, write them in a journal, ponder them, and if you want more help in these areas. I have some exciting news coming the end of May, and you will want to get on my email list so you can get all the details. So when you go to my website, there's an area where you can add your name and your email and become part of my private mamas group. And from there you will get the details of what's coming next. And as always, I hope you enjoy the rest of your day. And blessings be with you. Thank you so much for joining me today. If you found this episode helpful, please follow or subscribe to the Integrative Mother experience on Spotify, apple Podcast or wherever you listen, so you're notified about the new episodes coming up. Please also take the time to leave me a review. This really does help me. I would love to see your beautiful faces. If you want to take a screenshot of this episode, I would love it. Take me on Instagram or Facebook at time with Sarah Swift, period between the word time on Instagram, so then I can reshare your post. You can also start today by grabbing my free checklist and check out some of my favorite things on my website, the integrative mother experience.com. Until next time, my beautiful mamas, thank you so much.