Any decision can be divided into what do I need to do versus how and when do I need to do it. For the what, that is intuition. And by intuition, I use the word energy. And the way to answer any question for yourself personally that you don't immediately know the answer to is to ask this question question, does it energize and expand my life or does it shrink it? If it energizes and expands your life, the answer is, Hell, yes. You should absolutely do it. That is what you should do. If the decision shrinks you or it deflates you, then the answer is, Hell, no, you should not do it. This is an incredible tool to use in deal making, by the way, because I'm in the middle of negotiating a massive media deal at the moment, and it's something I've always wanted to do. And when you're negotiating for something you really want, whether it's somebody that you're dating or it's a salary or whatever or in my case, it's a massive media deal, you can get really ego-driven, right? You can start to get very attached to the deal or to the person or to the whatever.

But you have to stop and ask yourself, is this deal or this person actually expanding and energizing me? Or are there aspects of it that deplete and shrink me? And if there's any aspect of it that depletes and shrinks, you either have to change that aspect of the deal or the relationship structure, or you have to say no. Period. If you decide that, Yeah, it energizes me and I really want to do it, then that's what you want. Next, you've got to think about the outcome, which is how and when you make it happen.Right.Does that make sense?Yeah, 100%. Cool. At what point did you find your purpose? Because for me, I'm an entrepreneur for 15 years, and most of my career, I chased the money.

Because of my upbringing, you talked a lot about how we were conditioned growing up, and I always felt I had something to prove to my dad.

I always-Was he really successful or why? No. He He wanted me to go to Princeton. He wanted me to be this smart kid.

He wanted me to play basketball. He wanted me to... He worked at Prudential, and that was the first company I knew of. He would just always talk about Prudential and how successful that was and how he wanted that for me.

He wanted me to become successful. He wanted me to become highly educated. He wanted me to become the best in my class. He wanted me to make high honor. And did you? No. Well, was it-But I tried. I always was trying to prove. Did you, really? Or was there a little bit of you resented the pressure, and so you acted out and didn't do it? Because clearly, I mean, come on. You founded Elite Daily. Everything you invest in goes and is a huge success. You're a really smart guy when you want to put the fucking work in. And so there was an aspect about your personality that I already know that you don't like being told what to do. Yes. Oh, forget it. If I feel like I'm put into a box, I'll freak out. I need that freedom, that flexibility for sure. Yes. One of the things for you to think about personally and as an entrepreneur is that your dad gave you the greatest gift in the world because when you realize any time that you're in a box that felt like what it was like to be with your dad because he had aspirations for you that looked a certain way.

This is not about making your dad right or wrong. It's about what you respond to energetically as a human being. No deal that you ever do and no relationship that you are ever in will ever work if you feel like somebody is setting the expectations for you. Full stop.

Yeah.

So it's not that... The new story for you, the what happened is your dad had high aspirations, you didn't achieve them. So you, as a kid, started telling yourself a story that you got to prove something to your dad, right? What I'm here to tell you is the new chapter for you is recognizing recognizing that what you learn from your father is that you're successful when you define the expectations for yourself. But for your dad, you wouldn't learn that. Yeah. No, it's so true. It took me so long to realize that.

I can't even tell you how many times I really felt I had to prove something to him because I didn't meet those other expectations. And I finally, it just took me to getting to my 30s to realize I don't have anything to prove in that I define what success really is for me in my life and what makes me happy.

And he loves me no matter what.

Both my parents do. And I'm blessed for the mentorship that he gave me as well as as well as my mother. But I feel that in my early 20s, when I first felt that school wasn't for me and I dropped out my first semester, I went all in to trying to figure out the Internet and the online business and all those things.

I chased the money for a really, really long time. I always was creative.

I loved creating content and marketing and all those things.

But I don't think I ever really thought about my purpose. I think that a lot of us in our 20s, we really don't. But I think now there's so much content on social media now. I don't think you should. I honestly don't think you should. So here's the thing. I think you should chase what energizes you. Everyone talks about passion, legacy, purpose. The one word to pay attention to is energy. I love that. That's it. Let's simplify this. Okay. So whatever energizes you, naturally expands you, feels like possibility, is exciting to do. It may be scary. That doesn't matter. It has to do with how it makes you feel. When you were in your 20s, money made you feel good. It expanded you. It energized you. Chasing the money, that was the game. That That was your passion. That was your purpose. There's nothing fucking wrong with that. Nothing wrong with that. I particularly want to say that to the women that are watching. Yeah, hell yeah. Because it is socialized into women not to chase success like that, not to go after the money. If what energizes you is amassing wealth, go for it.

The reason why I say that is because people talk about the word passion or purpose. The truth is, it's not a person, place, or a thing. It's not. It is the feeling of being expanded and energized. If you're pursuing your passion, it means that you wake up every day and are energized. So instead of trying to think, What's my purpose? What's my passion? What's my purpose? What's my passion? Fuck, I don't know. Instead of thinking like that, I want you instead to ask yourself, What's What could I do today that would energize me? What energizes me? If it's making money, figure out how to make money. If it is making a difference, figure out how to make a difference. It could be in any single shape or form. But if it energizes you, that's what you need to follow. And what happens is that passion also, because it's energy, it dissipates over time. Because when you first start making money, it's fucking thrilling. Thrilling. There is nothing more exhilarating than making your first million. Nothing more exhilarating. But what happens is once you learn how to do something once, you can do it over and over again.

And so it starts to become routine, which means it's no longer energizing, which is why every entrepreneur out there goes through the mode of chasing the money, and then you hit the money that you need to make. Then you're like, I'm not fulfilled. What's my purpose? I don't know what to do. Yeah, I went to that. I need to find the way. Everybody does. And it's because you were energized by the money, and now you're not. Now you got to be energized by the next thing. And for you, it's clearly service. It's clearly making a difference. It's empowering others. And so when I look back on my trajectory, the thing that energizes me is making people feel like they matter. It's that simple. It is giving people hope in a situation where they don't have it. It is shining a light on the path forward when somebody feels stuck in darkness. And now that I know that those moments are the things that make me get up out of bed and energize me, I can trace back all the way to the moment of being a public defender in Manhattan, 22 years old, straight out of law school, and defending a kid who...

And I met him for the first time. He had been arrested. I met him during night court in New York City. I was a brand new young attorney, and this kid had been arrested, and he had been arrested for throwing a champagne bottle in the middle of Times Square on New Year's Eve, and it had come down on a woman and had slice her face open. Oh, my God. And he had been IDed and pointed at by her friends as allegedly the kid who had done it. And he was a junior in high school. And he had gotten in trouble. I think he had a juvie record for some petty bullshit shoplifting or something when he was 12. But that was it. High school kid on his way to go to junior college. Mom, working hard, terrified, absolutely terrified. And I met him because he had been arrested, and the family couldn't afford a lawyer. And I was a legal aid criminal defense attorney, and I was assigned to represent him. And I remember walking back into the cages behind the judge, judges bench, because if you look at a judge in a courtroom, there's two doors, typically, one to the right, one to the left.

One of those doors leads to the hallway, which is what all the court officers and administrative workers walk to that's behind the court system. The other one leads to cages that are behind the judge, which is where they hold the inmates as they're waiting to come in and get arraigned or they're waiting for the trial. And so I walked back there and I called out this kid's name, and I just remember him asking, Is my mom out there? Is my mom out there? And I said, Look, I'm going to tell you something. I'm going to make you two promises. I'm going to get you out of here tonight, and I'm going to do everything I can. Because he was like, I didn't do it. I didn't do it. I didn't do I swear to God, I didn't do it. I promised him, I said, I'm going to get you out of here tonight, and I'm going to do everything I possibly can to clear your name. I remember the relief in his face. And he said, You believe me? I said, Of course, I believe you. Gave him hope. Holy shit. That moment, my heart blew open.

It's those moments where you give somebody hope, where you show them the path forward, where you're longer and clearer in that moment than they are, so now they can be. That's what I show up and do every single day. I've only become more emboldened because we have a platform. And what the platform on social media and on the speaking circuit, and now as an author whose work is in 36 languages. It's unbelievable. It is unbelievable. And that's happened in 16 months.Unbelievable, yeah.The book has been translated in six. And the podcast. I'm like, You got to number one, freaking like that, like lightning. Well, yeah, we did. It's incredible. Behind that. I'm just thinking about what it took to get to number one. I know. It took 10 fucking years of schlepping and failing and being a public defender and doing other things. And so...

What was the shift? I'm I was really curious about what was the shift for you that went from criminal defense attorney to saying-None of it was conscious.

None of it was conscious. And that's why I say, Follow the energy. Because if my husband hadn't gotten into a business school up in Boston, I'd still be in New York City making $19,000 a year as a legal aid attorney. That's what I'd be doing because I loved being a fighter for people that didn't have people fighting for them. I loved that, and I still do that today. The people that I... Our audience are people who want to do better. It's people that want to be happier, people that want to do more for their families, people that want to pursue their dreams. And I am fighting I'm fighting the bullshit for you. I'm fighting your self doubt. I'm fighting your anxiety. I'm fighting your excuses. I'm fighting the stories that you've had since childhood. And I show up every day to remind you of who you are. And to remind you that you can do this if you put in the work, and if you give up your timeline, and if you're good to people, and if you're positive, and if you cheer for other people. And the fact that our platform has grown so fast and our engagement is so big makes me better at what I do, because we literally hear from a thousand people a day who are either struggling or who have used some small thing that we've said, and it has improved their lives or their relationships.

That makes me not feel like- It gives you energy. It gives me energy. Thank you. It doesn't go here. It goes here. You know what I mean? It's also why I'm so intellectually curious, because if one five-second rule tool can help the millions of people that it's helped, imagine if we keep going and digging and sharing other simple things. Imagine the number of people that we can empower and help and encourage and help them make their own lives better. Mistake number one is that you think passion and purpose are the same thing. I hear those two words thrown around so much and swapped in and out of sentences that I need to say it is a major mistake to think that passion and purpose are the same thing because the fact is, they're completely different. And the other fact is, you need both passion and purpose in order to live an incredible life that you deserve to live. So let me unpack my simple way of thinking about passion versus purpose. So passion is something you feel. I think about passion as another word for energy. Passion is something you feel. Purpose, on the other hand, is something you do.

Purpose is something you do. I'm going to distinguish passion and purpose at a secondary level. You ready? So passion is something you you feel. Passion describes the energy that you feel. And the other cool thing about passion is passion is for you. Passion is simply anything that makes you feel more energized in life. I'll give you an example, and I want you to think about what is something that brings passion into your life. And as you think of the thing that brings passion into your life, share it. Because when you share something that you're thinking, it always ignites and empowers and inspires somebody else that's watching this, too. So for example, passion is for me. Passion is what I feel. Passion is the stuff that brings energy into my life. So here's my passion. You ready? I love to garden. I love to walk into a flower store. I love to savor a fabulous cup of coffee. I love and passionate about watching stand-up comedy. I am passionate about I am passionate about... Oh, I'm actually passionate about the Polar Plunge Challenge and doing cold exposure therapy. I'm passionate about getting together with our kids.

I'm passionate about walks on the beach. I am energized by making plans to go somewhere. I am energized by cooking. All of these things that I'm listing are things that I do or things that I think about that infuse me with this energy. That's what passion is. And you need that in order to live an awesome life. And passion is so simple to bring into your life because passion is literally just about getting intentional about It's about filling your time with things that bring you energy. It makes sense, right? That's all the passion is. And now that you understand this simple idea of what passion is, that it's something you feel, it's for you, it brings energy into your life, you now understand why people say, Oh, I'm living my passion. I would never use that sentence because I think the accurate thing is, I feel passionate about my work as a doctor. What they're saying when somebody says that is, is they're saying, I feel energized by my work. If you are one of the 89% of people that feel stuck right now, here's what I know. If you look at your day-to-day in your week-to-week life, you are not doing anything that naturally brings energy into your life, positive energy.

A simple way to flip the switch and bring more passion into your life is to become intentional about making time to do the things. Like Maryanne, she's passionate about running, designing, chilling with her friends, connecting with people, helping connect people in business, nature, sun rises, so many things. Even writing the things, did you guys notice? Even writing down what brings energy into your life actually makes you feel more energized. So that's what passion is. Purpose is something you do, and purpose is what you do for the world. Purpose is this anchor that you attach yourself to, and it is It's the thing that you do for the world. It's how you show up for other people. It is the reason why you're doing things. It's like... I'm going to give you another example. We've got the anchor, because when you're connected to why you do what you do, you will not feel adrift. But I'm going to give you another example about purpose. So have any of you ever had a situation where you're near a body of water and you either have your dog or somebody else's dog, and that dog runs into the water or the pond or the river or the river, or the muddy stream or the swimming pool, and then they come out and they shake, shake, shake, shake all over you.

And the water spreads everywhere, right? I also feel that purpose is that stuff that naturally shakes off you and hits other people. So I, for example, in the exchange That's what you're seeing. The challenge that you just saw with me talking with Brenda, when Brenda's around me and he's like the dog shaking wet, what you get hit with is his purpose of serving. It just flies from the guy because it's what he gives to the world. When you understand that purpose is just why you're doing something and how you're showing up for it and the way in which you uniquely do it, that's your purpose. That's it. Passion is for you. Purpose is what you give to other people. So, Mistake number one is that you think they're the same thing. You use the words interchangeably. You're not quite thinking about the difference and why both are so important. Now, let's jump into mistake number two. Mistake number two, I've hinted at already. Mistake number two is you think you're just going to bump into it. You think that purpose or passion just happens. That's not true. The biggest thing that people don't realize, myself included, is that it's something you have to be super intentional about.

That when you wake up every day, you have an opportunity to bring passion into your life. You have an opportunity to decide how you're going to show up with a sense of purpose today. And this lack of intentionality is the reason why you feel stuck. It's the reason why you feel adrift. If you're on autopilot, if you're just going through the motions, if you're accepting good enough, if you're just barely surviving, you're not anchored to anything. And you're not going to just float into what's meant for you. You need to have what I call a wake-up moment. You got to have a wake-up moment and go, I'm stuck, and I'm sick of it. And being stuck, by the way, is a great thing. It's a wake-up moment because you just woke up and we're like, You know what? I'm not feeling connected to something deeper here. I need to fix this. And so, mistake number two is thinking you're just going to bump into it, that somehow stand on autopilot, blah, blah, blah, blah. That's not going to happen. You got to make a decision that you're going to become intentional about infusing your day-to-day life with more passion, and that you're going to become intentional about aligning your focus, your attention, and your actions on something that you value.

That's how it's going to happen. I've been saying it a lot that every single day when you wake up, you can decide who you're going to be. And the reason why it's so important to wake up and either consciously choose, decide, or set an intention about who you're going to be. The reason why this is so important to start doing every single morning is because if you don't consciously decide who you're going to be, your habits, your old patterns, and the stress of the day will decide it for you. You see, human beings, this was so liberating when I learned that human beings are nothing more than a ton of patterns. We learn patterns from other people, And then we repeat those patterns. And so if you find that you're stuck in a rut, or you're overwhelmed, or you're in a negative place, and you are really tired of being there, the first step to getting the life that you is you must wake up every morning and interrupt the patterns and the automatic nature of how you go through your day, just going through the motions. And the simplest way to do that is to wake up and set an intention.

So when I say, decide who you're going to be, what I'm talking about is, what mood are you going to be in? How are you going to behave? What are you going to show up and do today? Are you going to be motivated? Are you going to be patient? Are you going to be present? Are you going to be grateful? Those are decisions that you can make. And when you wake up in the morning and you set an intention, today, today, I am going to see the good. Today, I am going to be optimistic. Today, I'm going to turn off the television when I get home. I'm going to spend an hour on my dreams. When you wake up and set an intention and you decide who you're going to be today and how you're going to show up and what it's going to feel like to be you, you take control of the day and you give yourself an anchor to keep coming back to so that when something stresses you out or you catch yourself thinking negative things, or you get a text, or somebody doesn't respond to you and you start to feel discouraged, come back to your intention.

Today, I said I would be optimistic. Today, I said I would see the good. Today, I said, no matter how I am, when I get home tonight, I'm going to find an hour for me. That's what I mean, Night Queen B, when I say, decide who you're going to be today. And that's why I think it's so powerful when you wrap your mind around the fact that every single day, you get to wake up and decide who you're going to be today. And it's the first step in taking control and creating the life you want. Hey, it's Mel. How are you? I am so excited to jump on this live because I'm going to share something with you that is deeply personal and that many of you probably don't know is something that I love to do. If you want to get in touch with your intuition, if you would like to feel a deeper connection to source the universe, spirituality, buckle up, because I'm going to share something with you that I have started doing every morning. It was introduced to me by my friend Amy. Amy is somebody that has come into my life in this new chapter.

It's like, Have you ever had a new friend that feels like you've known them an entire lifetime? Well, that's who Amy is for me. Amy has introduced me to this really fun practice of pulling cards that help you answer questions that give you guidance. I thought It would be really fun to have Amy introduce you to this practice. It helps you get in touch with your intuition. She's going to pull a card for you to give you guidance for this month to tell you what you need to know right now. I think you're going to see something really incredible through this. How many of you know what I'm talking about? That you pull cards, that you are really into reading the signs. I was somebody who has always looked for signs, for guidance. I asked the universe to give me a sign. I looked for signs in my day-to-day life. But this practice of pulling a card has truly transformed my connection to something greater in life, my connection to magic, my connection to my intuition, And so I thought, What the hell? Let me introduce you to my friend Amy. Let's let Amy explain how she got into this.

And let's learn what the cards, what the spirits, what the universe. Oh, my God. Here comes my Yolo, come here. Yolo, come here. You want to be part of this? Hi, buddy. Come here. Oh, here's my dad, everybody. I know. He does not want to stay. He will not play. He won't play? Get the bubbles out, dad. I mean, I've been trying to get him to chase this and bring it back to me and tug it, and he will not. He will not. Well, we're going to pull some cards, dad, for everybody online. Tell him what to think about. Who are you talking to? 1900 people right now. Oh, okay. Dad's like, And I'm out of here. You got a busy day then. If a guy I recently met forgot my birthday yesterday. Is that a sign? Yeah, it's a sign that you are an option, not a priority. I've been telling a lot of women, in particular in my life, that there's a big difference between being an option, not a priority. All right, let's get Amy on here. Here How did you go? I'm so excited to see what Amy teaches us today.

Okay. Hi. Hi, Amy.

I was a little too excited last time, I think, and it just blew the whole thing up.

No problem. No problem. So I'm really excited. Hopefully, I will not bounce out on everybody. I'm here by the beach, and so the internet is in and out. And so I was explaining to everybody that about four weeks ago, I was going through a rough time, and you said to me, Well, do you want me to pull you a card? And I'm like, What is that?

Why would you ask me about cards? Yeah, exactly.

Yeah. So explain to everybody what it is and how you got into this.

Okay, right. I I pull I pull Oracle cards. People have heard of tarot cards, and most times, they don't really hear of Oracle cards. And when they hear of tarot cards, it's like, that's a thing that certain people do. Or it's magic or whatever. But all of these cards, Oracle or tarot, they're all just tapping into your intuition to what's already inside of you. And they are just tools, literally tools that help you understand what's going on in your world. Because sometimes we were so in our heads, and we can't understand the big stuff that's going on in the world, and we miss it. It's like missing the forest for the trees. So Oracle cards give you a lot of clarity in life. So they say, Oracle cards help you see the bigger picture. And that's what I always love to do, because when you're from that 30-foot view or that 3,000-foot view, you can see life a lot more easily, and you can understand better what you need to do.

Well, that makes a lot of sense because I feel like even when I wake up in the morning and I dump all my thoughts in my journal, and maybe I read a passage that is a book, and sometimes that passage is like, Whoa, this hits me today. Sometimes the passage is like, That doesn't really apply. Something about the intentionality of having a specific card that you pull from a deck that almost, for me, it's like a sword that slices through the overwhelm and the emotion to give me a grounding theme to truly focus on for the day. And so I found them to be really powerful because of the fact that you're pulling something specific from a deck. Now, you're not like... I think what's really cool about this is we're just good friends, and this is something that you have been doing, and then you started doing it for me. And it's not like you have to be an expert in this to introduce this practice, right?

No, we all have this ability to tune in to a higher power within us. I feel like when you give that power away, it's number one, recognizing that there is a power in the universe like that. And also, you're just before that step for doing it for yourself, right? So like you said in the other livestream, I had somebody pull this for me. I had somebody a card for me every day. I pull cards for myself, but when I feel like I'm too in it, I like to have other people do it. But you can cultivate this practice for yourself. It's nothing to be... I have people who say, Can I touch your cards? Is it okay? Can I ask a question, Yes, have fun. Play with this. It's you getting to know your own intuition and your own life situation. I think it's a lot of fun, and you can definitely cultivate it within you. I have learned to do that when When I first started working with this stuff, I was very hands-off. I felt like everybody else knows how to do it. I don't know how to do it. It's not a gift within me.

But it was something I really wanted to do. It was something I really wanted to know more about. So I studied it, and I tried to learn as much as I can, still thinking like, this is not my gift in the world. But as time went on, I did cultivate it, and everybody else can, too. It's definitely something that you can learn how to do. That's awesome.

I see so many of you saying, oh, my God, I pull Oracle cards, or, oh, I read tarot cards, or, oh, I have this practice. And yes, it is like a mirror. I thought it would be really fun because Amy has already sent me my card this morning, and it There's a card that keeps reappearing, which means there's a lesson at... Yolo, come here. There's a lesson in there that I clearly need to go deeper on if it keeps reappearing. But I thought it would be really fun, everyone, for Amy Amy to pull a card for you. Yeah. That right now, this month, what do you need to hear? What do you need to know? You asked this, but that's the question I want to know. I want to have Amy pull a card and to have that card give you guidance for this month. What do you need to know?

Right. Mel, the questions are really important because when you If you ask, Hey, should I break up with my boyfriend? That's not really the best question to ask the card. The questions are really important to begin with. That's a great question that you had. What do I need to know right now for my highest and best good? What's the guidance that I can have? I want you to know, if you're watching this video, no matter when you're watching it, this is the message for you. That's how these cards work. If you're hearing it, there is something that you're going to get from it. What I'm going to do right now is just shuffle my deck, and I should probably let you know I'm using this deck by Colette Baron-Reed. This is what I find to be a very powerful deck. You can get it on Amazon. I'm just going to shuffle these cards twice, and I'm just going to go quiet for a second because I'm just going to put the intention about the question into these cards.

Everybody's ready. Everybody, set your intention. You are about to hear something. I want to say something about this, because even if you're watching this video, and it's 11 years from the date that Amy and I filmed it, there is something insane. I don't even know how many hundreds of millions of videos get uploaded to YouTube every week. So the fact that you're actually watching this one at this moment in time, there's a reason why, and it's because you were meant to hear the message of what this month that you're living right now, what you need to hear in order to be your highest and best self. So let's all listen that this is meant for you right now in your life.

Right. And if there is a special intention that you have that you want to know more about, what I see is put that in your heart, meaning just feel it. Don't think about it. Just feel it. And then this card will give you some guidance. I'm just going to put a ton of light into these cards and ask what is the best good for everyone to know right now for this month.

What card?

I got this card. What is it? The Garden of Venus. I got that card today. I know. Isn't that a tool? I know. You just got I got that card this morning. Yes.

Okay, that's freaky.

So when that happens, people ask me, Okay, wait, how many cards in the deck? Because they want to do the math on this.

Can you hold up the deck so they can see how many?

Yeah, there are 64 There are four cards in this deck. There is only one of every card. And I read it two or three times, and I did a reading in between yours this morning. And this is the card, again. So this is called the Garden of Venus.

Show them how thick the deck is so they get an idea.

These cards are absolutely beautiful and really, really powerful. So this is what the deck looks like.

Okay? Wow. All right. So she's going to tell you what the deck means. And yes, everybody, Don't you worry. This has become such a huge part of my life. We are going to start creating these kinds of decks for the work that we're doing to help you tap into your intuition, your confidence, your knowing, your courage. Don't you And it doesn't matter what deck you buy, by the way, because you'll be drawn to a deck. And no, we don't make money off the deck if you decide to get this. But let's talk about this card, because here's what I already get. If Amy blindly pulled this card for me this morning and texted it to me, everybody, and the message was meant for me this morning, and then I pings her afterwards, and I said, I think we need to do this for you. I want you to know that this is something that I do, that Amy does, that creates deeper connection to self, deeper connection, intuition. The fact that we come here, she shuffles the deck again, she randomly pulls that one card out of a deck of 52. It tells me that my connection with you is so powerful that my instincts, that I needed to share this with you, and we need to do something about this, Amy, that I'm dead on.

That's what this card says to me. But let's have Amy read the card and the message for you, and then we're going to talk deeper about what that actually means.

Absolutely. Somebody just said, What's the Deck? It's the Shaman's Dream by Colette Baron Reid. And so this is the Garden of Venus card. And did you see people were saying in the comments, I'm getting goosebumps, this is a great card. I love this card. Okay, so the Garden of Venus, the place of all is well, rest and renewal and self-acceptance. When the Garden of Venus appears, you are invited, actually Summined to return to the pleasure garden of love. So it's a return to love. It is time to leave the field of battle. Put your sword away. There is nothing for you. You need to defend anymore. Step through the gate into the garden of earthly delights. Bask in the joy of the wish-fulfilling trees and the sense of the healing flowers. You have returned home. There's more to read, but I just want to say this card is very fanciful and very magical, and very sensual in the sense that you're using all your senses, and you're relaxing into this rest in this place of all is well, which I think a lot of us don't hang out in. A lot of us are like, There's something wrong.

I have to fix this. There's not enough. I'm so scared. And so this is saying, Get into that place where everything is just fine. You are weary, and it is time to rest deeply and be renewed. Go into the sacred garden alone, and there is no need for another to be present to experience its pleasures. So you're going in on your own on this. Don't look for anybody else around to say, Oh, look at that beautiful thing. Do this with me. This is your journey right now. Really stop looking for another. Enter by yourself. Allow your senses to intoxicate you. So what that says to me is be present, right? Feel all of your senses and be really present. Leave all thought behind. Yes, this is me talking now. Get out of your head, right? You really want to get into the here and the now with this card. Lose your analytical mind and return to your body. In the garden of Venus, there is a still pond that shows your reflection when you stoop down to drink. Who is staring back at you? Look at who you have become. Rince your face with these healing waters and practice deep acceptance.

That's really what this card is asking of you. Get present and accept your sofa who you are. Love who you have turned into with all your imperfections and blemishes. The Goddess Venus holds a mirror that allows you to see yourself in all your flawed beauty. Do not become caught in its spell. After a quick glance, take the mirror with you and return to the battlefield that you may reveal to others who they are becoming, and then you will no longer have a use for your sword. What are you getting from that, Mel?

Here's what I'm getting from that. First of all, I love the put down the sword and the battle. Go to love, and rest, and restore. And like that, I saw a ton of the comments, too. People going, I'm done with the battle. I need to put down the sword. And what I just realized in hearing you read it again is that the battle was a battle with self, and the gripping and the struggle that we have with ourselves, and that the return to love that that card is talking about is love of self. And then the second thing that really hit me, I don't know if it hit anybody else, is the analytical mind. Yes. And going... Like quieting the analytical mind. And I don't know about you, but my mind is constantly freaking going. And So going into the body. And for me, these next four weeks, this is the first big vacation and time off of work that I've ever... I've taken in, I don't know, 70 years. And so this is all about rest and restore and being quiet. And I'm telling you, my mind is freaking fighting me on it. I got to go do something.

I got to do this. It's too hot. And that's the sword I need to put down. And then the final thing was this idea Yeah. Will you read that line about the mirror again?

Oh, yeah. At the end.

It was like in the last third.

Yeah. Do not become caught in the spell of the mirror, right? After a quick glance, take the mirror with you and return to the battlefield that you may reveal to others who they are becoming. Then you will no longer have use for your sword.

What does that say to you in terms of this period of rest and going back to the battle? What does that mean?

I think this period... For me, this card is all that beauty. When you see that card, you're like, Oh, my God, that is gorgeous. What you should be saying is looking inside and saying, oh, my God, I am gorgeous. I totally accept myself, and I don't need to worry about the flaws anymore. I am not concerned with anything that detracts from the beauty that's within me. I need to accept all of these things about myself. So that card invites you in, and it's like, oh, this is so magical and beautiful. But the beauty is you, right? And so the mirror is once you see yourself and the beauty of you, you can go out to everyone else and reflect their beauty back to them. You become the mirror, and you no longer need that sword, right? The sword of the mind. You put that down. And the mirror is your only tool, showing other people their beauty or their greatness. Sometimes maybe their flaws, too. Sometimes maybe not showing them their flaws in a pedantic way, but just showing them like, Hey, this is what's showing up for me right now. You're using a really harsh tone right now, or something like that.

So the mirror and the sword, to me, are the two tools that are... One is greater, and the mirror is the greater tool. That's what I see from it. Does that make any sense?

It does. So if you had to bottom line the message to you, the person watching, on how to be your highest and best self this month, what does this guidance mean? How do I take this into my life for the next month? Are you there?

Oh, you're talking to me?

Yeah. How do I take this? I'm new to this livestream.

Okay, cool. What would I bottom line it for them? I would say I really think that that self-acceptance and finding the beauty in everything and really telling the brain I mean, we're not going to look at that right now. We don't need to talk flaws. We don't need to talk imperfection. We are really going to look at the beauty and the rest part of this card, because if you remember, there's that rest aspect of it. The rest is the rest of the mind. If you talk and you say, But Mel, I can't stay in bed all day today. I cannot just cook a great meal for myself and do a detox and Love care. That's not what this card is talking about. It's saying, rest your mind and allow yourself to really experience yourself as you fully are. Become present, right? Check into all your senses, become present, and and accept all of the beauty, because that's a lot of what we reject, right, Mel? I mean, that's a lot of what we're not looking at. Look at the beauty.

I just totally got it because it's interesting. When I first heard it and I heard put down the sword and rest and restore, I immediately thought, take a nap. Don't work so hard. Don't break the work, which I need to do. But I think the deeper meaning is put down the sword in terms of how much you bash yourself.

Yes.

Rest your mind.

That's what I get from this.

I totally hear it. Stop the self-criticism.

If you're listening to this and you saw this card and you're thinking like, Oh, there's a garden near me. I'm going to go look at that garden. Yes, action that. Go into that garden and do those sorts of things that this card felt like it inspired you to do. Right, Yolo?

Right, Yolo.

Good spirit, animal. But really, it's the inner garden that we're looking to explore. The monkey mind is what you need the sword for. I love this. It's a deep card. It's a really deep card. You can get it. The thing about these cards that's so great is you can get it on so many levels. And so you can get it on the level of like, Okay, I need to rest today. If that's your message, take that message. That is the message that's meant for you. Sometimes we don't need to go deep. Sometimes it's like, Yeah, put your feet up for a little bit. That's the message. If the message is, I need more self reflection for you. If that's what you're picking up from this card, that's the right message for you. And that would be my message to everyone is like, whatever you're getting from this, trust that you are getting what you need from this. It doesn't need to be this life-changing thing. It's just these little course-corrections. Maybe if you take a few minutes extra for yourself today, you'll be more patient with your kids, and then things will move in a different direction in those relationships or other relationships.

So if If you're getting rest, great. If you're getting the idea of beauty, great. If you're getting the idea, I'm going to stop beating myself up, awesome. If you're getting the idea like that, I am going to go so deep with myself and just have radical acceptance today, phenomenal. All of those things are meant for you.

Amazing. I want to talk to you watching, and in the comments, tell me, what did this message mean to you? What did you get? A lot of people are asking about the Is there a number, Amy. I don't know. Is there a number on the deck?

Five? It's number 25. Let me just double-check that. I'm wondering if you all have this deck already. Yeah, it's number 25, but maybe you're a number of people, and you want to know what the number is. I'm definitely in service to that. It's 25.

Okay. And do we know what... Well, there's a five in it, clearly, so that's meant for me.

So that's meant for you. See the card again? Yeah, this is what the card looks like. I wish I were this for this livestream, but okay.

It's beautiful. You got it.

It's a I remember when you first got this card, it was absolutely just mind-blowing. We all looked at it and we said, Oh, my gosh.

Because I've gotten this card. This card keeps showing up for me.

I think it's the third time you got this card.

Yes. Yes, it must not be listening.

You're listening. You're just getting it at a different level. You're just getting it at a different level. It is a good card for you, too, because that's part of your sign, right? You're a Virgo?

I You're a Libra.

Oh, you're a Libra. Okay. But beauty is a part of you and who you are. You love to have that. And simple, too, right? It's all within the thing. Somebody's asking for the deck. Oh, They couldn't see the card.

It's the Children's Dream deck. And let me tell you, you can get them on Amazon. We're not making money off this. For those of you that have joined late, Amy is a very good friend of mine, and she, in the past four weeks has started pulling a card for me every day to give me guidance through a very big life transition, and I have found it to be wildly helpful. There is something about having the intention of shuffling a deck and letting that intention of pulling one of 52 cards be a specific message meant for you that has helped me tap into my intuition, trust myself, and to take whatever the message is. And for those of you who joined late, today's message was Garden of Venus, drop the sword, step toward love, quiet the analytical mind, get into your body, stop looking in the mirror and trashing yourself, and instead, reflect on how far you have come and grown. It was a huge message about self-acceptance.

Love yourself, right? Love yourself.

Where you are are, what you're in. And I personally am on what Amy and I refer to as the Bridge. You see, I believe that we all have two lives, the one you're currently living and the one that you have yet to create. And you're always on this Bridge, crossing from one life to another. And sometimes the Bridge is exciting. For me, it's been terrifying. And these cards have been almost like rails on the bridge that have helped me steady myself as I continue to move forward. And so absolutely beautiful, Amy.

Yeah, I love that. And I will say this, too. When I moved to Vermont, it was a very difficult time in my life. I needed that steadiness on that Bridge, and I would pull a card for myself every day. And I just needed to hear every day, we need to go straight ahead. And Sometimes my husband and I would be apart. He would be in New Jersey, out in Vermont, and I would leave my card deck in New Jersey with my husband, who is very analytical. I always say, you can talk to that man without a spreadsheet in your hand and knowing how to deal with a pivot table. He is incredibly analytical, but he started pulling them for me, and he was just like, oh, my God. And so now he gets a card whenever he wants one. The messages are there. I see a couple of people in here talking about I was raised Catholic, and and about religion and stuff. If you want a message, and if you're listening to this, it's there for you. And it doesn't have to feel heavy or like, I should do this. It's a really beautiful piece of guidance that is for you and almost like from you, for you.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Awesome.

I'm so glad to share this with everybody. I am, too.

I'm so excited because this has made such a big difference in my life in just four weeks in Amy's life that we're putting our heads together, and we're going to come up with our own version to help you tap into your intuition and your guidance. And if you all love this, we will make sure to do these once a month for you, maybe even more. Who knows?

I love it. I'm happy to do it whenever it calls Mel, I'm there because I know, and this is my deep knowing in my heart, I know that when you feel like you're lost, you don't know what you're doing, or you know what you're doing, but everybody else is like, you're not doing the right thing. It doesn't seem like the right thing to be doing whatever it is, or thinking whatever, or deciding. You just need that little bit of extra confirmation. And it makes all the difference. I know I have stepped into a bigger, better life because I had that love and confirmation behind me. So I'm happy to share it whenever. I know how helpful it is.

Amazing. Well, I love you, Amy, and I really appreciate you being here. I had something happen yesterday. It's something that I'm not proud of. It's something that I felt really bad when it happened. I had a crazy overwhelming day. Everything was coming at me from a million different directions. I was being pulled in a million different directions. Chris and my daughter was home from college, and she's sorting out her summer plans, and she was getting extremely stressed out. Meanwhile, I've got a million emails. And so that's how I felt yesterday. And all of a sudden, I looked at my phone and I realized, Oh, my God, I was supposed to pick up our son almost an hour ago from school. My heart sank. I mean, who forgets their kid? I did. I lost track of time. And so I immediately started texting our son. He wasn't responding. I called the school. He calls me. I said, dude, I'm I'm really, really sorry. I was doing something with Sawyer, and I'm running really late. Where are you? Well, I'm about 10 minutes away. No problem. I'll meet you in the front of the school. And he got into the car, and I burst into tears.

He's like, What's wrong? And I said, I just feel like I failed you today. And I just feel like I am not the perfect mom that I should be. That's the words that fell out of my mouth. And he looked at me and he goes, Mom, if you had been on time, you You would be one of those perfect moms that are all over their kids, that are up in their business, that never do anything wrong. And I don't want a perfect mom. I want my mom. Oh, my God, I'm getting really upset. And then, of course, I started crying more. And I was like, That is the most beautiful thing that you've ever said to me. Because it's true, the world doesn't need another perfect person. The world needs you. And you're trying your best. You're doing what you can. And I think it's really important that you cut yourself a and that you stop thinking that you have to be perfect. There are going to be days where you're an hour late to pick up your kid. There are going to be days when you can't get to every email, and that's okay.

There are going to be days where you feel so underwater, and that's okay. You'll get through it. You'll figure it out. And you've got to understand that it's not about being perfect. It's about just being you. And that means that you got to be willing to start before you're ready. You got to be willing to do what I do every damn day A, which is show up in my rollers or start a livestream and disconnect myself or start it and be talking and not even know that I'm broadcasting. You've got to do that version in your life or you're not going to get ahead, period. One of the things that I've learned in my business is that the mistakes are where all the learning is. Actually, the mistakes and the imperfect stuff, that's where the gold is, everybody. And so as you're sitting there and you're thinking about doing stuff and you're trying to make it perfect and you're trying to come up with the right script before you make that cold collar. You're trying to make sure your body looks perfect before you put yourself out there on match. You are missing out on your life, period.

And so I hope that if there's one thing that I consistently inspire you to do, it's to start before you're ready. I am going through a major life change right now, and I consider myself to be a very confident person. And this major life change has literally rocked my world. And I am in a daily battle with self doubt, with fear. And maybe you're watching at home. You've experienced your time, or you can relate to this idea that You have made a decision. Maybe it's to end your marriage, or it's to change your career, or it's to move across country, or it's to heal yourself or to not have kids, or in my case, my husband and I made a decision to sell the family home that we have raised our kids in for 24 years. I've lived almost half my life here. My parents, Lisa, never moved from the home I grew up in. My grandfather was born in the house and died in the house that my mother was raised in on a big farm. This has never been modeled for me. And so when I made the decision, everybody, it felt right, and I knew it was the right decision.

But now that we're on the back side of it, and we're a couple of weeks away from closing and packing this place up, I feel my heart shrinking. I feel these massive hot waves of anxiety. I felt waves of anxiety that feel like electricity. I don't know what your waves of anxiety feel like, Lisa. Do they feel like electricity? This is like lava coming through my body.

It feels like I've got a beating drum in my chest, and it's like, and it almost vibrates throughout my whole body. That's how it feels to me.

Lisa, I have not felt this anxious and scared in decades. Decades. And so you wrote this book, Radical Confidence, and I do not feel radically confident right now. I feel like the Mel Robbins that I know has been knocked on her ass, and I'm wallowing, and I am doing all the things that I know to do. Get up, get moving, don't drink, move your body, reach out to friends, journal, go to therapist. I am so busy. I think almost trying to outrun the fear.

Yes.

And I don't know if you've ever had this experience, but what were you going to say? Because I just saw you go.

Yeah, literally. So there's this thing in the book about squirrels, like filling Filling your life. I think it was the movie Up, where the dog sees a squirrel and it runs off, and then it sees another squirrel and it runs off over here. It's like they become distractions, but almost the distractions help you not look at the realities of what is actually happening within you. So you even said you're filling your days up so much with almost these strategies that you're trying to overpower the actual thing. You're trying to beat it out versus actually letting it speak, letting it have a voice, and then addressing it with no judgment in yourself. Because that's the point, though, right? You even said, I haven't felt anxiety in years. And so in those moments, I actually go, Oh, she's back again.

Are you kidding me? Because I'm like, What the fuck is this What are you bitch doing here? I thought I got rid of you in law school, and I was like, What? And so I'm like, Get out of here. And now I'm going to get busy and clean the house and do this. And radical confidence is something else. And it's something that I don't think I've actually ever practiced. You and I know the same, and I want to unpack this using my story, okay? Because I know that there are times in your life where you make a decision. You're going to break up with that person, or You're going to actually say yes to their proposal. You're going to change your job. You're going to lose somebody love. So it might not even be a decision. It's something that's happening, and you don't want it to be happening. You get a diagnosis. It's terrifying, right? In my case, I make this decision. I think I'm confident about it. But the second the decision becomes real, I feel like I'm now a no. I feel like I signed up to go skydiving, And I was all excited when we were on the ground, Lisa, because you were going.

And then Lisa is all excited, so I get excited. This is great. And Lisa and I are going skydiving. And Lisa gets on the plane, and she's off. And I'm standing down there like, this is It's exciting. And then I watch Lisa go out, and I'm like, oh, my God, she made it look so easy. And then the plane pulls up, and I'm like, it's my turn. Okay, I'm in. I strapped to the person. I got my thing on. And now I'm like, I don't want to do this. Don't let me out. I'm like, Oh, no, no, no. And I'm backing away. And that's where I am right now in my life. Yeah. Right now. And so how can I face this situation and find or use radical confidence to help me navigate through one of the, literally, most emotional decisions I've made in my life.

So, Gail, Well, thank you for being so vulnerable and honest. And in situations like that, the thing that I will say a lot is give yourself grace. Give yourself grace that maybe some part you're trying to push her out like, No, oh my God, I thought I got rid of her. I I tried that, too. I really did. And anytime I tried something new, anytime I made a different decision in my life, she would come back again. And I would beat myself up over the fact that she would come back again. And so I realized, what if I just embrace her? What if I'm just like, Oh, okay. Hey, you're back here again. That's okay. But remember, I'm not going to let you drive my life. And just reminding yourself that instead of beating yourself up, allowing her to come back and say, why is she back again? What is she trying to tell me? So You're taking the negative voice that is the bitch and then saying, How on Earth can this be my best friend?

And maybe she's gone- How the hell do you do that? Because when that fear comes up, Lisa, it is terrifying. When you hear that negative voice and the negative voice and the negative voice in this scenario. I know it's so stupid, but I literally go, you're selling this house in suburban Boston because you're lonely. Your kids have left. You've been under construction somewhere else. You work here alone. You live here alone. This chapter of your life has ended. You are a ghost in an old chapter. It's time to move on, woman. I know that. It is time for something bigger. I know that. But when this fucking bitch shows up, she's like, You think you are lonely in suburban Boston? Wait till you live on a mountain, woman. You're not going to say anybody. Oh, you thought it was hard to work virtually during the pandemic outside of Boston? Wait till you try to launch a podcast alone on a mountain, woman. You're fucked. Like, I literally, What are you done? What are you done? You screwed it up. You screwed it up. How do you You have this no BS method. You talk a lot about the why.

How do we use these tools in moments like this to find our radical confidence, Lisa?

Yeah. So you've got to know your why. You have to be so ingrained in that that anything that comes your way can pull you through. So the negative voice, the fear, is the ego speaking. The ego is trying to say, Hey, I'm here. You don't want to do that because Everything you just said, But Mel, what if you don't have Wi-Fi up there? So it's trying to protect you to say, Don't do it. Don't do it.

You just taught me something, Lisa, and I'm sorry to interrupt you. No, please.

When I hear the word ego, I always think strength, or I think being conceded.

I've never thought about the ego and the voice in your head as being something there to protect you when you're scared. Never thought about it that way. So if I can understand this, and I would love to hear where you've done this in your life, where you've been paralyzed, that you have to, A, One of the key principles of practicing radical confidence, particularly in moments like ones I'm going through right now, is you have to, A, attach yourself to why do you want to jump out of this airplane? What is the bigger thing that you're up to in life that caused you to be pulled to do this, to long to do this? Have you ever had this moment for yourself?

When? Absolutely. So when And I, well, multiple times actually in my life, so going from being the stay at home wife, supporting my husband for eight years, cooking, cleaning for him, then helping Quest, like my husband, Oh, I'm a good Greek wife. I'll help you. And not realizing it would grow at 57,000 And in that growth, having transitioned into, oh my God, maybe I love business. Maybe this is actually something I love. The idea of tearing apart my identity of being the good supportive wife. This identity that I was told my whole life I would end up being. I got accolades for it. I got pats on the back for it. I was getting all the validation of what a great wife I was. And yet it wasn't fulfilling me. And yet it wasn't giving me the life I actually wanted.

I hear you. Sorry.

And it wasn't... I heard something else. I wasn't sure if that was.

Oh, I thought like you, you got somebody calling you.

No, no, no, no, no, I'll get my line.

If it wasn't, I don't know where we are here. Okay, got you. It's fine.

I was holding my identity to the validation that I was getting. And yet, as Quest was growing more and more, I started to love it. I loved the challenges. I loved seeing what I was made of. And now here I was in a moment when my voice is telling, Well, Lisa, you don't know anything about business. Are you really going to give up this identity, the thing that gives you the accolades, the things that give you the validation? What if you fail? What if you make a transition and you try this business thing and you suck at it? And what happens if you're God awful at it? Where are you going to get your validations from? Where are you going to get the pats on the back from? Where are you going to get the the feel that you have now while it doesn't make you happy? It didn't make me happy, but the validation and the feeling I got from doing it becomes the velvet handcuffs. So knowing that, I had to say, what is the life I want? So attaching yourself to the why, attaching yourself to this goal emotionally. So I started to realize I had the thing over here where I'm supporting my husband, and I was feeling good about it.

But on this other side, in pursuing the hard things, in overcoming obstacles, Quest became a mission. It became I was actually helping women. We were getting letters from women who were in the Anna Brexit community. And they said, this one woman, specifically, I remember, she sent us a letter. She said she was in the hospital at £40, Mel. She was on her deathbed. And she said, Thank you for bringing Quest into my life. You have now made me okay with calories again. Now, when you hear that thing and you attach yourself to the why, that when you step in, all these hard things to do actually deliver on this why, I now know I have to make the change. So I know my why now. I know that I really want to change from being the supportive wife into helping build Quests.

All right, so let me unpack mine. So I, like you, it's interesting because your story went from you were the supportive wife for eight years, supportive supporting, as many of you know, Impact Theory, that is part of the Impact Theory global brand that Lisa is the co founder and president of, the Impact Theory studios. But a lot of people know Tom, your husband, because he started that show. You guys have seven and a half million people in your Impact Theory audience. You supported Tom for eight years. You guys are cofounders then of Quest Nutrition. You went from bucking all of this stuff that you were told to do, being raised in a grief, Orthodox family. You're going to get married, you're going to support your husband, you're going to have children, and discovering that you love business. And the impact that you were making and the fulfillment that you felt became your why. The why you were going to not do what society and your upbringing and what you thought you were supposed to do. I have something that's almost like the reverse. As the more successful I've become, the lonelier I've become, and the more stressed out I've become.

And my why is to create more peace. It's to create more ease. It's to create more fun. It's to be much smarter about my business so that I can accelerate and magnify the impact without accelerating and magnifying the stress. And a big piece of me deciding that it was time to sell this house is because I race back and forth and back and forth and back and forth and back and forth and jump on planes, and I am never anywhere, which is why I'm lonely. And It's just like it probably scared you to not do what you had been told you should do and had been doing forever. It scares me to slow down and to approach business very differently so that I can have all the things that I really want, which is more more time with my family, more peace, and a bit of separation between the empire and the impact that I love building, and the peace that I need and the connection that I need in my personal life. And when I say that, I'm like, Fuck this house. I'm out of here. Back to, Shut up. Let's go. Right? See?

Yeah.

It all depends in the moment, right? So for instance, if we even know hungry is a thing, right? You don't eat, you get mad, and all of a sudden, you may say something you shouldn't have said. So if we think, if we understand that one little thing by not eating has an impact on how we feel about ourselves, now think about all the other things that come along with what you're doing. You're having to look back at 25 years or however long you've been there, right? So all of that is emotional, of course. And so now it's like, how do you separate why you're trying to do it with the emotion you're feeling?

Oh, I love this, because here's what I just got from this. The grief is completely appropriate.

I A thousand %, Mel.

The fear is not necessary. The fear is something through radical confidence. If I'm able to separate the process of breathing, which is an emotional process that you cannot attach a timeline to that is so healthy and so important. And it's also all about the love and the loss and all of it. And you can't outrun it. And that is something that's really a big part of this major change is the grief. But what I've done is I've collapsed the fear of the unknown and my lack of confidence in knowing whether or not this next thing is going to be successful. So if you look at that, the why, right? So you've got the why. So everybody, the first piece of advice from radical confidence. If you are in the low, if you're in a big major decision, if you're scared about something. You did not lose your confidence because it's in you. We're going to tap into it. And if I'm hearing you correctly, step one, when you hit that moment, is you got to attach yourself to your why. And my Why, why, is that I want to make a greater impact and have much more peace and ease in my personal life and more time with family and friends.

And that's why I've got to remove this variable of a house that my entire family has outgrown, even though I don't want to give up the memories. I'm still walking around here because it keeps me close to my kids. And then you're also saying, though, and this is the really important part that I've actually never heard anybody say. I'm sure lots of people have said it, but I've never heard somebody say it in a way that I really understood it, Lisa. And that is that the fear is your ego ego trying to protect you from something you're scared of. And when you feel the fear, you need to detach it from everything else, and you need to turn towards that fucking fear. You write this chapter. I'm so glad we're talking about this because this is my favorite chapter, everybody. This is make your negative voice your bitch, and then turn it into your BFF. And I'm telling you right now, my negative voice is my bitch right now. I didn't make it my bitch. It is bitching at me. Yes. Scaring me. And so the voice that's scaring you going, I can't do this.

I'll never make friends. If I was lonely here in Boston, then I'm going to be really lonely on a mountain. What the fuck have I done? Bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch. My daughter has this right now. She got into this great program in London. And she's pursuing her dream of being a singer-songwriter. And she's five days away from leaving. And her fear, so her ego, is going, You're not going to like it. You're going to be homesick. This is going to be terrible. So what do you do when that fucking bitch is bitching at you?

You literally listen to her. You go, All right, she- What?

I don't want to listen to her. Mel, she's your best- I've been listening to her, and I'm crying in my bed.

How do I stop listening to her? Okay, I love it. So here's the thing, just like a partner, your spouse, your best friend, she's going to tell you the hard things. You don't sometimes want to hear it, right?

I ignore Chris. I'll listen to you. Okay.

All right. There you go. So your friend is telling you, Hey, girl, you may want to watch out for this. Hey, you know what? This actually could be a bad thing. What if you are lonely? So now I go, Oh, she's actually a friend trying to warn me of something that may happen. Now as my friend, because she cares about me, because she doesn't want me to get my ego dented. She doesn't want me to be embarrassed. She doesn't want me to feel shame or guilt. So she's warning me. So if she's warning me, Hey, you're going to be lonely. Okay, great. Thank you for letting me know. Maybe I will feel lonely. So what I'm going to do right now is I'm going to have radical confidence, and I'm going to put something down. So let's say you have a list, right? On the one side, what is that bitch telling you? And now, if it was your BFF, what is she trying to help you come up with a strategy or a tactic to mitigate that when it happens? So here's the thing, Mel. Maybe you do get lonely. That's very real. And now here's the thing.

What are you going to do about it? You're going to say, All right, I've got a game plan. I've said, I've pings Lisa And I've told her, Hey, look, I'm actually really worried about going. I may feel lonely. Do you mind that you become my partner in crime? Or whatever word you want to be. It's like, Okay, of course, Mel. So now you can go by the fear and you go, Cool. Thank you, Faye. You've just warned me of something that may face, that may deter me from loving the new decision that I've made. And so taking that down, piecing it together, everything you just said. So even your daughter, it's like, Well, I may feel, what if I get there and I miss my family? Okay, great. That's actually a very valid fear. What are you going to do if you miss your family? Instead of wallowing, like you said, right? And it's like, Oh, my God, I miss my family. You go to your cheat sheet, which is your radical confidence cheat sheet, and you go- Which, everybody, I'm making mine right now.

Oh, I love that. I'm making mine I'm turning this conversation into a coaching session for myself, which, by the way, I would have paid thousands of thousands of dollars for by the minute, because if you can get me out of bed not wallowing and terrified of this big decision, Then that changes everything. And I think you just did.

Yeah. Taking that critic, right? Because I tried to stop the critic in my head. I tried to, but I couldn't. So I'm like, Okay, what if I can turn the critic into my a coach. And that's exactly what you've just written down. The critic is saying this, but your coach is telling you what you can do if you're fearful of this. So you've really taken this thing that used to be crippling. It was your kryptonite, and now you've made it your superpower. And the other thing I really want to hammer home, Mel, you said it, and it's so beautiful, is the grief thing. This is so powerful because I think we live in a world where we think just because we're moving towards something we love, that we don't have the right to more own the life we are living behind. And when I decided I didn't want children- I was just going to ask you about this.

Okay. I literally was like, I have to ask her because you on social media are You are such an empowering voice for anyone who has decided that they're not going to have kids. They're just not what they want in terms of the way that you want to live your life. So is there grief for you? And how did you come to that decision for yourself? And why are you personally so vocal about the decision?

Yeah. Thank you, Ma. And even in my decision talking, it really isn't whether I think people should have kids or not, right? It's really about when you think you are going to have one life and you change your mind. So I married Tom thinking I was going to have four. Like, literally, I told him I wanted four children because I come from a big Greek family. I always love the big grand family. And 10, 15 years in, when I realized I love entrepreneurship, I have a chapter called Open Up the Can of Worms and Embrace the Ick. Now, Open Up the Can of Worms is me asking myself the hard question, do I actually want children? And so many of us hide from asking us ourselves that question, or a question, a hard question, because the ick is what comes with the mess that is the hard question. So let's say, for instance, do I actually want children? And the answer is no. The ick is, now I have to talk to Tom, my husband, who may still want children. Now what happens, Mel, is he going to say, Well, babe, you promised me. And so it's a, I want children, or we have to get a divorce.

I don't know. That's the ick that you have to face when you ask yourself the hard question.

What was the moment when you They were like, Wow, I actually realized I don't want four kids. How did you get to that decision?

So do you ever feel like it's a whisper in your head first?

The house was.

Yeah.

It becomes- Yeah. Keep going.

So it becomes this little whisper that maybe we try to ignore because it's uncomfortable. It's like, I don't want to ask myself this hard question, because if I say to myself, to your point, do I really want to live here anymore? Now you have to deal with all the emotion that comes What's behind it. You have to tell your kids, what if your kids are upset? Now you've disappointed your kids. What if your husband doesn't want to move? There's so many things that come with you saying, maybe I don't want to live here anymore, that ends up people living in the same house that they didn't want to live in for 10 years. So it's making sure that you ask yourself the hard question listening to the answer, which is the whisper, right? So the whisper is, do you still want to live here? Do you still want to live here? And in fact, let me back up. So you listen to the whisper, and then you let it speak.

Do you remember the first moment and where you were when it went from a whisper to speak?

The interesting thing is someone else saw it in me before I did. I didn't want to acknowledge the whisper. And one day, one of Tom's business partners turned around and says, Lisa is not going to have children. Because he had seen me go from a supportive wife to now business. And I was like, No, of course, I'm going to have kids. I'm just going to do this entrepreneurship thing until I'm ready. And so he turned around and he It was like, Lisa is not going to have kids. And it was so upsetting. It was so upsetting. And I went to Tom, I was like, I can't believe that he said it. Who does he think he is? Why the hell did I have such an emotional reaction to it? That was the thing. I was Because Tommy even said, Babe, why does it bother you? Who cares what other people think? And I was like, Why does it bother me? And it was because I was ignoring the whisper, and he just called it out because he saw in my actions how much I was thriving in business. He saw. But because of my belief system, the belief system that I had as a Greek woman, I was going to have children, I didn't want to ask myself the hard question.

So when he said that, I actually stepped back and said, why do I believe that I'm going to have kids in the first place? Like with no judgment, assess my belief system. And once I started to write down, literally almost like, what are the first things that come to your mind? And I was like, all right, legacy. Chatting something out as quickly as possible. So I was like, All right, legacy. And I was like, Well, what does legacy mean? So I wrote it down, legacy. What does legacy mean to me? All right. Well, I said legacy because to me, it was about having children to pass on your wisdom. That was what my dad used to tell me. And I was like, But do I actually believe that? I'm like, Well, a legacy to me could be making a mark on your life now so that when you're gone, you're remembered. All right, do I actually need to give birth to my own children to do that? Oh, no, I actually don't need to. And then it was like, why else do I believe that I want to have children? I really love the idea of having a little Tom running around, a little mini Tom.

I love the idea of having a daughter that one One day, I could help her mindset not be crippling like the mindset that I had growing up. So all these emotions were real, which is why I didn't want to necessarily say, but is this worth? Is this something I really want to have children over? And so once And I looked at that and I said, You know what? I actually still want that. But what I want more than that is the life I'm experiencing in business. And in that moment, Mel, going back to your grief, I realized I had to mourn the life I was leaving behind. It didn't mean that I didn't want the life. It didn't mean that some of the decisions I was making weren't going to be heartbreaking to me. But I realized that what I wanted more than having children was actually not to have children. And so I had to sit with Tom, and we had a whole as a relationship, our communication. And I said, Babe, I need to give you the space for you to mourn the wife you thought I was going to be that's going to take process.

What can I do to do that? And so I, with respect, said, he's used to me taking care of him, putting his clothes out, cooking for him every day. And so there is a grief process when you lose someone, right? Those first moments where it's like you're surprised by all the changes. So I said, Babe, I need to give you the space to have this grieving process. So what does that look like? All right, I take care of you seven days a week. So next week, babe, I'm going to take care of you six days a week. And then the following week, I'm only going to cook for you five days a week. And then the week after that, I'm only going to give you four days a week. And what ended up happening was I embraced that both of us were actually sad that we were giving up this part of our life. But we know our why because we knew we were going to do it to move forward to the life that we really wanted. And so giving yourself the space, Mel, right now to grieve all the things that are very true to you.

But to have that why, which is where we start, wanted, but to make sure that the grief doesn't deter you from your why.

This is so beautiful. This is so beautiful. I can't tell you how much I've gotten out of this. I want to try to unpack it because I think it's so valuable what we've just discussed. And as somebody who has spent a lot of time running and a lot of time being faster, I mean, even just think about the five-second rule. If I move faster than the anxiety, I won't be there when it hits. The problem that I faced, and it has worked for decades, but the problem The problem that I've now faced in making this massive life-changing decision is that in those moments when you get the diagnosis or somebody that you love dies, or you make a major, one of the major changes, your anxiety catches up. And that's exactly what's happened in this moment. And you've explained so beautifully and so simply how to practice this skill of radical confidence, particularly in these moments where doubt, or fear, or uncertainty take over. Hey, it's Mel. Thank you so much for being here. If you enjoyed that video, by God, please subscribe because I don't want you to miss a thing. Thank you so much for being here.

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