00:00 

Hey there. Welcome to Intentional Living with Tanya Hale. This is episode number 362, "A Luxurious Life, part two." Welcome to your place for finding greater happiness through intentional growth, because we don't just fall into the life of our dreams...we choose to create it. This is Tanya Hale, and I'm your host for Intentional Living. 

00:23 

Alright, hello, my friends. So glad to have you here. Welcome to the podcast. I am excited to share with you a second week of luxurious living. And before we jump in, I want to remind you, Talk with Tanya is June 10th. And that is just a free webinar that you can show up. We just do coaching. We do talking. We do questioning. We do deep diving into content, whatever you want to do, you are in charge of what gets to happen. I just show up to be of service and to do some coaching and to answer questions and ask questions. And it's just great. We've had some some just terrific discussions and I hope that you'll join us there. 

01:03 

Also, are you getting my weekend win? I know some of you are not. And listen, if you love this content, I can promise you you're going to love the weekend win. They are short enough to be read in about two minutes or less. And it's just little nuggets of information to go, "huh, that's interesting." It's usually different than what I talk about on the podcast. And I think you're going to like it. And it's super easy to get on your email in there. Just go to my website, tanyahale.com and a pop up will come up and it'll just say, "want to get the weekend win" or something like that. And you just put in your email address and click "yes." And then I think it sends you like an email that you have to confirm it, right? Because we don't want weird stuff going on. So we do that. And then every weekend you'll just get this great little email. And I think you're going to love it. 

01:49 

Plus, if you're interested in classes or the things that I have going on. That's always a super easy way to get the information because I always put it out there first. And I have a link there for the Talk with Tanya. It's just an easy way to access my content if you want to. 

02:05 

So let's talk luxurious life week two. Okay. So let's start off by touching quickly on what we talked about last week. Luxury is a word that I got from one of my great coach friends and she uses it to help her decide what decisions she wants to make. Does this feel luxurious? And am I choosing to treat myself to luxury? And again, like we talked about last week, not in a monetary superficial type of way, but in life decisions. Does it feel luxurious? For example, when I was in college back in the late eighties, early nineties, I used a Franklin planner. Remember those? They were so great. And I always just got the plain basic green filler paper because it was like, I don't know, something like $12 cheaper than something that was fancier and prettier and I liked it so much better, but I just didn't feel like I could justify $12. 

03:03 

And one year I went, it was like November, and I went into buy my filler planner for the next year. And I was looking at this other kind that was different colors for every season and different flowers. And so the flowers changed every season. And I was like, "oh, this is so pretty, but it's so much more expensive." And when you're a college student, you know, back in the, in the eighties, nineties, 12 bucks was a lot of money. But then I went, "wait a minute, that's only a dollar a month to have something that looks beautiful and something that I love." And so I went ahead and bought the fancier paper. And every single day when I used that Franklin planner, I would just smile and I would think, look at this beautiful, it was so fun to have beautiful flowers. And I thought, I am worth a dollar a month. Right? 

03:56 

This is the kind of stuff. Like that was a luxurious decision. It did something that fed my soul. Let's talk about, um, like another example. Um, does it feel luxurious to go to lunch with my friends? Or does it feel like an obligation? Sometimes it can feel like both, right? Depending on what's going on. Does it feel luxurious to spend an afternoon watching the grands? Or does it feel like I'm keeping the peace and people-pleasing? Does it feel luxurious to shower my husband with praise and kindness? Or am I really just being manipulative and doing it because I know I'm supposed to? Does it feel luxurious to feel tough emotions? Or does it feel like I'm milking the situation and wallowing in victim mode? Okay. 

04:46 

So I see luxury as this space of self-care. Am I respecting my wants and needs? Am I choosing to see myself and my dreams and my desires? Am I making sure my bucket is full to overflowing? Am I treating myself like I matter? Because this overflow, the overflow part of our bucket, that's what we give to other people. What's in the bucket, that's for me. What is in the bucket creates my luxurious life. I never have to get low. I never have to be scraping the bottom of the barrel. I get to be full and present all the time. And doing things that keep my bucket not only full but overflowing so that I can give and serve without regret or resentment, that's luxurious. This creates for me a life that feels easy and fulfilling. A place where I feel strong and capable of handling anything that comes along. This is the luxury of life that we're talking about here. 

05:59 

So last week we talked about four things, using our thoughts in a way that creates energy rather than a drain of energy by focusing on the amazing part of life rather than on the drudgery of life. And I used the example of cleaning the kitchen. I can finish that task and think, "ugh, I hate doing the dishes." Or I can finish and think, "I love that I got that done. Tomorrow Tanya is gonna be so happy not to have to clean up today's dirty kitchen," right? 

06:27 

So I love that idea. The second thing that we talked about was cleaning up things in your life that are taking up way too much mental and emotional space. And I gave the example of the 50 gallon drums of water, or 50 gallon drums of not water, if you will, right? Giving your brain a break from having to keep track of so much crap. Do the two year 20 minute jobs and be done with them, right? Like let's clean up all this stuff so that our brains have the luxury of space. 

07:00 

Third, we talked about being honest with yourself and with others. And this frees us from the stress and the strain of holding back, of keeping the peace, of constantly feeling as though we are less than or better than, of constantly trying to manage other people's emotions and experiences. And it allows us to grow into our greater possibility, which always feels liberating and luxurious to me. 

07:25 

And fourth, we talked about figuring out how to forgive. Forgiveness can be super tough sometimes.Some of us have had some horrendous experiences, but holding onto things we can't control is super exhausting. We cannot control that the other person did what they did. And we cannot control how they respond or if they apologize or own it or any of it. Choose to forgive to give your own soul the space it needs to breathe. breathe, and relax, and grow. Not forgiving holds us back. It demands a lot of energy, and it keeps us chained to someone else's story. It keeps them in the villain mode and us in the victim mode. Victim mode, I promise you, is not luxurious. But hero mode? Moving into the hero's solution and empowerment? That feels luxurious. 

08:21 

OK, so we're going to continue on. So the next item we're going to add to our list is feeling and expressing more gratitude. Learning to live in a space of gratitude is energy-creating. Gratitude is like a magic pill. It liberates us from obsessive feelings of grandiosity, and it connects us to other people. And being connected is luxurious. It's something we innately crave as humans and desire, and it expands our world. Not expressing gratitude is a place of self-focused entitlement. It's a place that feels heavy and small. It shrinks our world into a hard-shelled nugget of selfishness. Instead, when we can look around us and see how others are blessing our life, when we can step into the vulnerability of verbally expressing that gratitude, and when we make the effort to acknowledge the impact others are having in our life, we expand our world and we create space for overflow. 

09:27 

There is research that connects gratitude directly to our happiness, and not just feeling gratitude, that helps increase our happiness, but expressing gratitude actually gives it another big bump. Happiness, I believe, is felt when we make steps in the direction of overflow, when we put things out into the world that impact others for the better, even something as seemingly small as an expression of gratitude. Gratitude helps other people to feel seen and heard. It lets them know that  we acknowledge their positive impact in the world, that they matter to us and to the world, and that feels amazing to the gratitude giver. It also feels amazing to step out of ourselves and our primitive selfish entitlement to build others, to make the world a better place. It makes us feel better, and it makes the recipient of gratitude feel better. That gives us positive energy benefits. It gives us positive numbers. 

10:38 

Second on today's list: strengthen your sense of self. Some of you may know that I just finished nine weeks of sense of self classes, and I'll tell you what, they were just so good. I think they were my best classes yet. The participants have shared with me how it has expanded their ability to show up better in their relationships, to stay in their own lanes, to circle back around, to not beat themselves up. Our sense of self is such a core piece of being able to live in alignment. And when we are strong in the sense of self, we have the capacity to grow and progress and not be restricted by thoughts of self-doubt and a lack of self-worth. 

11:23 

Having a strong sense of self doesn't mean we won't have the expected ups and downs of life. Because come on, that's just life doing what life does. It's great and it's difficult. It's both, right? It's that 50-50. We are constantly being presented with great times and with super challenging times. But what a strong sense of self does is give us a healthy perspective, whether we're in the up or in the down of life. It helps us to see and understand that we are capable of figuring things out, that our worth is not dependent on us never making a mistake, and that when we do, we will circle back around. We're going to clean things up. 

12:03 

The constancy of this perspective is a luxury to be sure, because we're not frequently vacillating between feeling strong and weak, between feeling worthy and not worthy, powerful and weak and unpowerful, feeling capable and not capable. Luxury is knowing that even though we may not have all the answers right, that we are capable of figuring it out, and we don't have to go into a huge drama response every time things go awry. We can handle things in stride, and though life will present us with huge ups and downs, we don't have to internalize these ups and downs. We can stay focused and present. We can have confidence and compassion. We don't have to give into our primitive brain freaking out with protective measures. 

12:54 

And guess what? When it does freak out, because it will sometimes, we will not always going to catch it, right? We can recognize it. We can be compassionate towards it. We can give it space to breathe, and then we can rein it in. And we can show up the way that we really want to, whether that be on the behaving well end, or if it gets beyond us, on the cleaning up the crap after we haven't behaved well end. Either way, we give ourselves the space to be human, and to know that we have what it takes to do life, and to do it in a way that feels amazing. 

13:33 

Okay, so this leads me to the third luxurious thing I want to talk about today, and that's the grace that we offer ourselves and others. The gospel of Jesus Christ is built on a foundation of grace. God gave us agency to make decisions in this life. And with our limited knowledge and experience, we are going to make a lot of mistakes, as is everyone else in the world. It is inevitable, and it's also part of God's plan for us. So offering us grace in the form of a Savior, someone who can help us clean up these mistakes and continue to move forward in life, is a huge part of what the gospel is about. 

14:17 

And this grace is an amazing part of the example that Christ set for us—grace for others when they are human, also grace for ourselves when we are human. It is such a luxurious concept to understand that we can be forgiven of our human formalities, that we can be cleansed from unkindness and unawareness, that we can let go of the weight of our sins and move to higher places. Being able to genuinely offer ourselves this grace and compassion. That is definitely luxurious. It's not that we're expecting perfection in ourselves. In fact, it's quite the opposite. We are embracing our humanity and the gift of a Savior who allows us to repent and move back into alignment. 

15:02 

What a luxury it is to know about and understand this concept. And what a luxury to be able to offer a similar type of grace to others. It feels so much better to give people a safe space to make mistakes and then to move forward, than to hold their feet to the fire. Allowing others the grace to be human and to be able to do it with an open heart and open arms feels amazing. It creates more energy than it expends. It puts us into a space of overflow, a place where we expand with self  worth and respect. 

15:42 

And the overflow from this allows us to offer respect to others and to treat them as their worth deserves. Grace is the place that embraces humanity in all of its amazingness and in all of its dysfunction. It's all part of the journey. And leaning into this humanity for ourselves and for others grows us and feels us, whereas resisting our own humanity and the humanity of others around us feels constricting and exhausting because it consumes us. Whether we accept the human condition or not, guess what? It's there. It's part of what's going on here. Resistance is futile and it drains our buckets. Accepting and even embracing humanity liberates us from constant annoyance and irritation, judgment and anger, and it creates space to feel greater love and gratitude for us, for others, and for God. 

16:45 

And this is absolutely energy-creating because it aligns us with behavior that God exemplifies for us. And I believe God is abundant in this space of overflow rather than a space of depletion and scraping the bottom of the barrel. Anytime we are thinking, feeling, or behaving in ways that God behaves toward all of us, we are living in the luxury of abundant overflow and offering grace is something that God does for us. So when we do it for ourselves and for others, when we behave in God-like in Christlike ways, we get to tap into that same abundant overflow. 

17:31 

A fourth way we can live in luxury is making space for self-care. Now as we've talked about on so many times in other podcasts, self-care unfortunately is not manis and pedis and massages, right? But it's living in ways that feeds our souls, that cares for our body, that nourishes our minds, that builds our spirituality. And I believe we all have our own unique concoction of what does this for us. For me, this work, this podcast, and my coaching is absolutely a piece of self-care. This work fills my soul. It taps into my creativity and it connects me with what I feel is my God-given purpose. 

18:17 

Also, working with my coach, capital W work, right? Working with my coach, creating greater awareness around how I'm showing up in the world, implementing tools that treat others with kindness and compassion with grace, learning to love more cleanly and wholeheartedly. This is all self-care for me. And I do these things by listening to podcasts, reading books, joining discussion groups, chatting with my husband and other friends, doing self coaching, being willing to circle back around when necessary and processing and developing my understanding through writing this podcast and my weekend plan every week. These things keep these tools front and center for me and they keep me focused on my growth and my progression. 

19:05 

And self-growth is a huge part of self-care for all of us. And we get to decide where that growth needs to be focused in our lives. I like to think of self-care as inner thriving, as feeding my soul, as nourishing me in ways that fills my bucket to overflow. Engaging in physical exercise is a huge part of self-care for me. Reading books for pleasure and not just business is fun and engaging. Having a clean home is self-care for me. Maintaining relationships with people I love, getting enough sleep, cooking and eating really good food, having a great sexual relationship with Sione, putting out a weekly podcast. These are things that I consider self-care and they are all things that create more energy than they expend. Yes, they all take energy to make sure that they happen, but what I get back is more than what I put out to make them happen in the first place. All of these types of things fill me to overflowing. It is important that you understand what are your self-care pieces and you do the discipline to make sure that you are taking care of them. 

20:30 

Okay, a fifth way we can live a luxurious life is by having boundaries. I know that for many of us the word boundaries gives us a little jolt of fear and I get it. It can be super hard to set clear boundaries, especially with people who scare us a little bit or who we are afraid of upsetting because the relationship seems so tenuous, and yet boundaries protect us from resentment. They protect us from the underlying feeling of being taken advantage of, a feeling as though we're being walked all over, a place where we sacrifice our own self-respect. Boundaries are a necessary part of creating a life of luxury, a place where we can rest and bask in the self-respect of living in alignment. 

21:19 

When we don't set boundaries, we allow ourselves to engage in relationships that are hurtful to us. And at the same time, we are not letting the other person know that how they are behaving is not okay with us. And when their behavior is not okay with us, it eats away at us from the inside. That resentment starts to fill our heart and it pushes out the love. We might continue to mow over the situation. We might continue coming back to what's happening is not fair. It's not right. We keep it all inside. And every time that happens, we feel that jolt of angst, that fury of frustration, the rise of resentment. We may keep our mouths shut. We may be keeping the peace, but we are anything but peaceful underneath. 

22:13 

That is not luxurious. That drains our energy. Or maybe we don't feel angry about it, but we accept that we're being treated wrongly. And maybe we think that we deserve it or that we're too weak to do anything about it. And then our self-respect takes a hit. It is so important that when we notice these types of responses in us, that we figure it out, that we courage up and set appropriate boundaries. Otherwise, we are living in a place of constant energy depletion as we are not taking care of our own self-respect. 

22:53 

A lack of boundaries might show up in people-pleasing tendencies, which are meant to appease others and make them like or approve us. They might show up in perfectionist tendencies, thinking that we should always be able to say or do the right thing in every circumstance. And maybe for some of us, our belief that we are an introvert because we need time to recuperate after being with people is not so much that we actually are an introvert. But maybe it's partially that we are expending so much energy trying to show up perfectly, making sure we're never overstepping or saying something that would be construed by anyone in the room as hurtful. 

23:31 

And we are people-pleasing by doing things we don't really want to do, but that make others happy. Maybe we're expending so much energy there. that of course we will be exhausted by the end of our interactions. And we're interpreting that as being an introvert rather than merely a depletion of energy in our bucket because we're not living in alignment. I know that there are actual introverts out there but I think there are people who interpret their energy drain as them being an introvert or a larger introvert than they think when actually it's just that they're living out of alignment and depleting energy. 

24:19 

So learning to set boundaries and stop the people pleasing and letting go of perfectionist ideals is another brilliant way to start not just conserving energy, but creating energy. Because when we show up clear on what is okay and not okay with us, when we are able to say "no" to what we want and "yes" to what we want, when we are okay with people not liking us, we develop greater self-respect. And that adds energy to our bucket and we end up living a life that feels so much more in alignment with who we really want to be and actually are at our core. Boundaries are a necessity if we are to live this luxurious life. 

25:11 

So let me ask the question that I asked at the end of the last podcast. What is it going to take for you to start living in luxury? What have we talked about here that you feel drawn to? You don't have to implement all that at once but hopefully there will be a few pieces that have stood out to you that seem to have your name written on them and that you can commit to working on. And here's the thing...when you commit to working on them and when you make progress, you will be creating more energy than you are expending and you will be stepping into into the abundance of overflow luxury. 

25:46 

Maybe you can do all of this work on your own. If so, great. Get to work, clean up your stuff, and move into more luxury. Maybe you need some assistance and you can have discussions about luxury with your spouse or a friend, and you can move forward on this together. Awesome, do it. And maybe for whatever reason, you need some more serious intervention. And working with a coach is the jumpstart that you need. If that's the case, get on my calendar, step into your personal growth, and let's get you moving toward a life filled with luxury, energy, and overflow. 

26:28 

We really don't have to live our lives feeling like we're in constant stress with the ups and downs of our bucket. And we don't ever have to be scraping the bottom of the barrel, even. We really can live our lives from a place of overflow, a place where we feel confident and secure in who we are and how we are, knowing we can handle what comes our way, knowing we are creating the life we really want to be living. Let me remind you of the question that Glennon Doyle asked. She said, "what is the truest, most beautiful story about your life you can imagine?" For me, this luxurious life we've been talking about is the answer to that question. It feels abundant, overflowing, and connected. 

27:18 

So how about you? What other things have you thought about that help you move into overflow? What in your life already feels abundant and beautiful? How can you add to that? If you're not creating it yet, today is your day to start. You've got this, my friend. And if you need support, I've got you. If you feel like you really want to step into this overflow, and you just cannot get the traction you need, let's talk. Go to tanyahale.com, go to the "free consultation" tab at the top, click on that, get on my calendar, let's work through this together. This is what I am trained to do. It is what I am good at. In 12 or 24 weeks, you could be living so much more of a luxurious life than you are today. And moving into this luxury, this is middle age. This is growing up. This is brilliant stuff. 

28:25 

Okay, that is what I've got for you today, my friends. Good stuff. Live a luxurious life. Choose luxury. And it doesn't have to be....like, we haven't talked about needing to buy anything, but choose luxury. Choose what is going to make the tomorrow you just go "dang girl, thank you yesterday you! You set me up for an amazing luxurious day today." It's going to make all the difference. Okay, love you. I really really do love you and I am just so grateful for this community that we are creating. I'm grateful for those of you who send emails, who show up for Talk with Tanya, who come to group coaching or other classes that I talk. Thankful for emails that you send me, thankful for reviews that you put on my podcast. I just feel so in love with this life that I'm living. It feels luxurious to me and I'm so grateful to have it, and I'm grateful to share my journey with y'all. Have an awesome, awesome week, my friends, and I will see you next time. Bye. 

29:49 

Thank you so much for joining me today. If you would love to receive some weekend motivation, be sure to sign up for my free "weekend win" Friday email: a short and quick message to help you have a better weekend and position yourself for a more productive week. Go to tanyahale.com to sign up and learn more about life coaching and how it can help you get to your best self ever. See ya.