Embracing Grace and Celebration in Your Growth Journey

Are you up for the challenge of embarking on a personal growth journey to become the best version of yourself? In today's episode, I’m sharing insights about the ongoing process of personal growth and leadership because, well, there are no shortcuts to success. Yes, we can tackle and overcome those deep-rooted beliefs and assumptions that often hold us back.

We look at the essential roles of grace and celebration in your personal growth, talk about giving yourself the grace to grieve and making room for new perspectives, all while understanding how celebrating your progress can shape you into an influential leader.

Finally, we look at the significance of understanding your Core Values to bolster your leadership skills. A firm commitment to this process will provide you with the clarity and purpose needed to make authentic and authoritative decisions, ultimately boosting your confidence and comfort in your relationships.

This episode isn't just about personal growth; it's about transforming into the best possible version of yourself. So, let's jump right into it!

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Chapters

• 0:02 The Continuous Journey of Personal Growth
• 8:52 Give Myself Grace, Celebrate Growth
• 13:22 Core Values for Exceptional Leadership

Transcript

Andrea Johnson: 0:02

You're listening to Stand Tall and Own it, the podcast for high performing female leaders who are ready to make an impact by discovering the safety that comes from understanding their own value and exercising their own authority. I'm your host, Andrea Johnson, and I'm here to tell you it is time to just truly be you, my strong friend. It's time to Stand Tall and Own it. You know, it doesn't matter how long you've been on a personal growth journey. If you are a leader who is interested in making any kind of impact, you are going to continue to be on a personal growth journey. It's personal, it's professional. I work with a lot of women in corporate and what I find is that many of them seem to think that you're going to grow in your personal life and not necessarily in your professional life, or you're going to grow in your professional life, in your skills and in learning how to navigate things in your professional life without growing in your personal life, and it actually doesn't work that way. There is no separating the two, because you have to grow as a person. So today's topic is just a little bit of a toe stepper, meaning I'm going to step on your toes a little bit, mostly because mine are bruised, all right. I have shared many times that I learn and I teach and I teach what I've experienced. And the topic today is . y

Andrea Johnson: 2:06

Now I have not been silent about the journey that I've been on for the last five or six years. I've not been silent about the fact that some of that has been a little bit of deconstructionism in my mindset for my spiritual life, for my cultural life, understanding the assumptions and the conditioning that I've had over the last 50 years or so. And every time I think I've looked at them all or deconstructed them all or figured them all out or gotten myself an answer to all of them, another one pops up. It's not quite like whack-a-mole, because in whack-a-mole you're just hitting them as they pop up and they keep popping up. Well, at least I hope it's not like whack-a-mole. If it's like whack-a-mole for you, we really need to talk because you need to actually deal with it when it pops up. However, for me, it's as if I catch one and then another one pops up another place and then I catch it and I deal with it. But I wanted to give you some encouraging words, just a little bit of this is what it looks like when it happens. This is what I do, or what I've done in the past and what I do now, and how I reacted to things in the past and how I react to them now, because something's going to pop up tomorrow, I promise.

Andrea Johnson: 3:29

I even said to my dear friend today. I said why is it every time I think I've dealt with all of the conditioning or all of my preconceived ideas or assumptions, a new one pops up that I absolutely have to deal with right now? Because I'm not exempt. Nobody's exempt, you're not exempt, I'm not exempt. So let me share I'm not going to share topic-wise, but I'm going to share kind of in general, what happens. So the reality is here's the main overarching principle. I want to share that all of your conditioning, every assumption you've ever made, everything you've ever been taught. If you are on a true personal growth journey to be a leader, if you wanna make any kind of impact, lead any kind of team, start your own business, even lead well in your family or community, all of your conditioning and all of your assumptions are going to be challenged. Even if they're challenged by someone close to you or if they're challenged by society, somebody or something is going to challenge who you are. That's what it means to be a leader, okay, so you need to understand that as the overarching principle, and I gotta tell ya, I did think that I already knew that, but it never, ever stops, because growth never, ever stops.

Andrea Johnson: 4:50

So what did I do in the past? I always reacted in a certain way, right, well, one of three ways that I can identify the biggest thing was the why me mentality, and you hear that why me, why me, why do I have to go through this? And it's just very common and very normal. But the very first thing I used to do was react. I would run right. I am definitely of the when it comes to fight, flight or flee or fight. What is it? Fight, flight or fawn or freeze or whatever. I'm usually the flight. I run away. And so, for me, I would run away from those feelings, I would run away from the uncomfortableness, I would run away from the situation. I even run away from the relationship or the people. When it would get uncomfortable all of a sudden, I'd be like I'm out, peace out. That's me.

Andrea Johnson: 5:42

The other thing I would do is get angry. You ever do that when you see it a lot right now in the political spectrum or in different cultural aspects of where we are in the world right now, if somebody's assumptions are challenged in a way that they don't care for, they just get angry. It's just automatic. I could give example after example, but I'm sure there are plenty popping to mind for you. The other piece was to just deny that it's happening. Nope, that's not me. I've never done that. I don't think that way. Or you might say that. You might think that that's what I am, but I'm not right, so it's a denial of it. So reacting in the past was either victim mentality or running away, or getting angry or just denying it altogether. And I will say that even though, as of today, they're still popping up, because yesterday and today a big one popped up for me, which is why I'm like I have to share this. They're still coming into my awareness.

Andrea Johnson: 6:45

As a coach might say, I'm being made aware of something in my life that I do in my past, that I have assumed or that is a conditioning that I have, that I need to challenge. I need to look at and research and figure out why I think that and how I want to think in the future or believe in the future. The good news is that I have developed skills to do that. I no longer just run away. I no longer just get angry. Now I might have an initial response of anger right, but I'm learning to ask myself. Instead of why me, I'm learning to ask myself why not me, or why not this particular assumption or why not this particular conditioning? And there can be a grief that's associated with it and we can talk about that if you want to ask questions, if that brings up something for you, but feel free to just message me and say, hey, I want to talk about what happens when you have to challenge an assumption or a conditioning or a belief system that you have and there's a grief involved, because there is for sure, even if it's just grief of this is what I thought, and I have to learn everything all over again. So now I start to ask myself well, why not me, or why not this assumption, or why not this conditioning?

Andrea Johnson: 7:59

And the very first thing I do is I remind myself to expect these things. What did I say early on? We none of us get free passes. There are no free passes when it comes to growth. If you want to be a leader, then you will have to challenge all of your assumptions and all of your preconditioning. It just is gonna happen. But, number two, nothing should surprise me ever again. Just like yesterday and today, this new thing that has emerged for me to deal with or for me to think about or for me to understand. Oh, I had a real strong assumption there, or I had a I've been conditioned to think this way, and it's very uncomfortable me for me to think opposite of that, but that's what I do think. So how am I gonna deal with that? So I'm learning to not be surprised by Anything that comes up.

Andrea Johnson: 8:52

The third thing is I'm learning to give myself grace. Assumptions are just that. Conditioning is just conditioning. It isn't something that we have to hold on to. And I'm finding too that as I give myself grace, depending on what the issue is, maybe it's changing the way I looked at social justice or racial equality or DEI or women's issues, I noticed that the people who were already in that space before me I actually kind of went in like my head down and, you know, hat in hand, kind of like oh, I'm so late to this party, and they're like you came to the party, so give yourself grace, because other people will give you grace. And if they don't, then just find another group of people that are in that particular space already and they will give you grace.

Andrea Johnson: 9:46

So, number one, I'm learning to expect it, whatever it is, to come up. Number two, I'm reminding myself to not be surprised that anything comes up and that anything comes to my awareness, giving myself grace. And then, if the fourth thing is my coach friend Lee always reminds me that, and this is even a quote I said I have to go back to Jesus on this one, but it tomorrow Andrea will deal with this when it's time. Today Andrea can make decisions to get tomorrow Andrea ready to make that and or make that particular decision, and today Andrea doesn't have to deal with that issue, tomorrow, Andrea will get there, and and that's a beautiful thing. But when I say I want to go back to Jesus on this, he says tomorrow has enough troubles of its own. Deal with today.

Andrea Johnson: 10:33

And this is a nice way to tie in what it means to live as an Intentional Optimist, to live in the present moment, to be reminded that today really is all I have. Yes, I'm a planner, yes, I'm intentional, yes, I'm courageous and I'm all about adventure and I'm all about wisdom and and all of those wonderful pieces of intentional optimism. But when I have to deal with something like this, I have to remind myself that I only have right now and I need to be present in this moment, especially with myself. If it's an issue that maybe I've been conditioned or a belief system that I've been conditioned to believe for years and years and years, I need to be present with myself and I need to give myself that grace to allow the grief, if it needs to happen, or allow for a new way of thinking. And the last thing I wanna share with you, the last thing that I wanna do whenever this happens for me and I'm doing it now with this newest issue is celebrate, not necessarily celebrating well, I am breaking with that tradition, or I'm no longer thinking that, or I'm no longer believing these things. It could be that that's something to celebrate there have been a few of those in my life, for sure but what I celebrate is the fact that I am continuing to grow. That is a celebration every single day.

Andrea Johnson: 11:56

So if you want to be a leader, if you want to make an impact on your family, your job, your team, the culture that you're in with your business. If you wanna make an impact, not only do you have to know yourself, but you also have to be willing to allow these assumptions that you've always made and allow the conditioning that you've received and that you've participated in, sometimes like you've fed it, I've fed it myself. You have to allow those things to come up, to deal with them and then celebrate the fact that every time they do, that means you're growing. So, if you are where I am right now and you're dealing with yet another preconceived notion or assumption or conditioning, celebrate that you are leading and becoming a woman of impact. Are you one of those people who follows all the rules but still feel like you're getting nowhere? Like you're, boundaries are constantly under attack and you're busy with all this stuff that just doesn't matter, constantly choosing between what's right for you or what's right for your organization, and with all that self-help information out there, how do you know exactly what's going to work for you? To help you overcome this stuff?

Andrea Johnson: 13:22

Well, you can clear the clutter and become the exceptional leader you were meant to be when you know your core values. You see, when you don't, decisions are rough, processes can be muddy and boundaries forget it, but when you do, you live and lead with authenticity and passion. Just imagine feeling clear about your decisions, comfortable in your relationships and confident in your boundaries. That's what my uncovering your core values digital course will do for you. You'll reveal your foundational convictions, allowing you to navigate any situation with your identity and authority intact. It's time to make some real impact. My friend, head over to theintentionaloptimist. com/ values or click the link in the show notes and get clarity today.