You Are Enough

I truly love finding inspirational women who I can bring to the show. It brings me so much joy to be able to sit down with them and share their wealth of knowledge and stories with you all!  Carrie Severson is another one of those women that you had to hear from.  She is so inspiring and is the author of Unapologetically Enough Reshaping Success and Self Love. I recently read her book and man it was so good!! Like how much of a bad ass she is. In her book she shares a very candid story about a man who told her she was too old to have a baby, her response was who the fuck are you to tell me what I can or can’t do!  I just knew right there I had to have a conversation with her!

This person said this to me in such a factual way, that it hung in front of me like a fog.  I had the opportunity to walk into it and claim it, or I could turn away from it! I kept thinking what if I chased my career for too long and I missed this opportunity and I just had to let that sink in.

Carrie turned to her writing community to help process what she just heard. She wanted to take this experience and write about it, write about her experience. She realized there have to be other 30 something entrepreneur with no kids having the same questions and doubts she was. She shared her experience, and their response blew her away! Women from all over the world were proclaiming her story as their own. THIS was a major turning point in her life! And this was a huge catalyst for how Unapologetically Enough began!

Many people say fucked up shit to us and we let them get away with it and we don’t say anything because we think we’ll come off as confrontational!  A lot of us shy away from hard conversations or fail to bring it up or say something because we just don’t want to go there, but as we navigate life, there are those red flags that we may not even identify as a red flag, or it falls under the category of I can fix that. If we are going to be unapologetic about our life, we have to see the red flag for what it is and MOVE ON!

For Carrie, she really had to go back and accept all of the decisions she made through her life to lead her to the space she was in. She had to come to terms with the fact that SHE WAS ENOUGH on that date and after. She was enough in the decision to get IVF. She owned her stuff, had a come to Jesus conversation, took accountability for why she was where she was and owned the decisions she made. The boundaries she put in place for herself and that concept of being unapologetic has been brewing inside of her for so long! And she took all of the things that she went through as the opportunity to write this book!

“Until you let go and really think about what it is I truly want, can you get to that unapologetic place.”

I talk about burnout often in my podcasts and Carrie is no stranger to that, just like MANY of us women.  She experienced burnout because she couldn’t handle the demands, she put on herself and she was consumed by her career. She let it become her identity which resulted in her losing all concept of what balance is.  When she gets off kilter or something has happened where she cannot function, it’s because Carrie has lost sense of her intuition and internal peace, and lost sense of her deeper knowingness of being unapologetically enough. 

So how do we work through that?

When I get the feeling, I have to go, go, go and I can’t stop or forget to breath past my chest, I am like, “Okay, I need to breath, tomorrow the stuff on my plate can wait and I will take mental health breaks.”  The concept of being unapologetically enough for me, anything I choose to do that day is unapologetically enough.  On the days I am running too hard or pushing I step back and remind myself that I am capable without grinding.  I also have days where I choose to sit back and relax, remind myself that it is okay to not do everything at the same time.  Some days you need the mental health and be okay with sitting around reading a book all day. And other days you can go hard and get shit done.  But what happens is that so many of us feel we cannot honor that natural rhythm we have of being here or here… And we have to start honoring ourselves.

One of the big things I took from this book was about redefining success.  Success can and will look different at different times in our lives.  And that is totally okay!  We can change old programming as we get older, and it is okay to do that.  Redefining what success meant for Carrie was creating hard boundaries within her career.  It meant that it was all about her feelings. It’s not about input or output.  Instead, she will give herself more or less tasks depending on how she is feeling. And if she feels good and she doesn’t choose to do anything else the rest of that day, it is still a success for her!  Carrie’s definition of success is how she feels each day!

It is okay to do this and define success this way.  It is okay to set strong boundaries and stick to them, unapologetically!  It is okay to do things for yourself and set boundaries around doing something for yourself.  Something that is ME focused.  There is absolutely nothing wrong with that!  There is a conversation for women a lot of times around putting themselves first. Is it selfish? Self-care? That is why Carrie is focused on the concept of self-love vs self-care. Self-care has always been something to pamper ourselves or buy something.  But self-love is saying yes to this or putting on a clean shirt, and it doesn’t have to be much of anything.

“I learned self-love bed ridden. All it was me giving myself permission to take a nap.  There isn’t anything wrong with putting ourselves first and it’s incredibly important. I really hope more women speak up about it and talk to their friends about it. Lead into the idea of loving ourselves intensely!”

Set boundaries and rules in your life and be unapologetic for them. Work towards personal development and ways to look at yourself and form better relationships with yourself.  Because it all starts with yourself, it all starts from within.  If you feel better about yourself, that is the energy that you put out.  That is what you will attract into your life. YOU are the CEO of your life, and only you.  So, start making it known and allowing yourself to be unapologetically enough!!!!

Carrie’s book Unapologetically Enough: Reshaping Success & Self Love is out now so you HAVE to grab it and read it! I know women all over the world are going to relate to this and just LOVE it!

What makes you feel magical?
I love that word! Honestly this. This book. Putting this out into the world.  Having the guts and courage to see this through, feels magical. The Enough is pink rose gold glitter, what my wedding dress looked like when I got married on zoom and we carried it through the chapter headings. THIS is magical for me. And I am so grateful for the opportunity to be able to talk about it.

LINKS

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Stress-Free Summer Waitlist:
https://www.fitgirlmagic.com/stressfreesummer22_waitlist/

Carrie Severson Website:
https://unapologeticallyenough.com/

Carrie Severson Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/the_unapologetic_voice_house/

Carrie Severson Tiktok:
https://www.tiktok.com/@carrieseverson

Carrie Severson Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/carrieseverson.storyteller

Carrie Severson; Unapologetically Enough: Reshaping Success & Self Love:
https://amzn.to/3Mr3qXT