Ever felt like you're running on a hamster wheel, constantly trying to please everyone else but yourself? Wrestling with my own insecurities and the unrelenting quest for external validation, I, Mariana, have been there too. Join me on this episode of MAMI on a Mission Podcast as we expose the detrimental cycle of approval-seeking and self-doubt that hinders us from achieving our dreams.
Remember, everyone carries their own unique set of values, beliefs, and perspectives. It's about time we accept that we cannot tailor ourselves to fit everyone's expectations. Inspired by my personal struggle with seeking my mother's approval, we explore the influence of individual experiences and insecurities on our perspective. Get ready to gain invaluable insight into trusting your decisions and pursuing your passions without the need for constant validation.
As we conclude our podcast journey, we shine a light on the importance of self-approval and spiritual faith. In an intimate chat with a young woman who seemed to echo my past experiences, we touch upon the crucial role understanding and empathy play in these situations. By fostering confidence and faith, we can combat the need for external validation and find true happiness within. Remember, ladies, it's time we stopped seeking approval and started trusting our own abilities. Listen in, and be empowered!
Ever felt like you're running on a hamster wheel, constantly trying to please everyone else but yourself? Wrestling with my own insecurities and the unrelenting quest for external validation, I, Mariana, have been there too. Join me on this episode of MAMI on a Mission Podcast as we expose the detrimental cycle of approval-seeking and self-doubt that hinders us from achieving our dreams.
Remember, everyone carries their own unique set of values, beliefs, and perspectives. It's about time we accept that we cannot tailor ourselves to fit everyone's expectations. Inspired by my personal struggle with seeking my mother's approval, we explore the influence of individual experiences and insecurities on our perspective. Get ready to gain invaluable insight into trusting your decisions and pursuing your passions without the need for constant validation.
As we conclude our podcast journey, we shine a light on the importance of self-approval and spiritual faith. In an intimate chat with a young woman who seemed to echo my past experiences, we touch upon the crucial role understanding and empathy play in these situations. By fostering confidence and faith, we can combat the need for external validation and find true happiness within. Remember, ladies, it's time we stopped seeking approval and started trusting our own abilities. Listen in, and be empowered!
Hello, hello and welcome to the Mommy on a Mission podcast, where empowerment meets inspiration. I'm your host, mariana, a life coach and author, on a mission to help Latina women, and all women, to reach their impossible goals, one dream at a time. Join me on this incredible adventure as we dive into compelling subjects that will uplift, motivate and ignite your passion. Get ready to be inspired, empowered and never give up on your dreams. This is the podcast where we turn dreams into unstoppable missions. Are you ready? Hello, hello and welcome to another episode of Mommy on a Mission podcast, the podcast that empowers Latina women and all women to reach their impossible goals, one dream at a time. I'm your host, mariana, and I am so thankful and grateful that you are here joining me once again this lovely Wednesday evening. And you know what? First of all, let me just say this I want to say thank you all so much. I know that a lot of times when I come on here, I'm always thankful and grateful and I'm always telling you guys, thank you, but I really do mean it from the bottom of my heart. We are in the month of November, which is the month of Thanksgiving, and I want to recognize so many of you for your support, for your dedication to this podcast, for joining me with all of the changes that have been made, from going from Saturday to now Wednesdays and now introducing the Spanish episodes and yet you all are still faithful followers listening, and to me, that is the most wonderful thing that I can ever experience, and if you are new to this show, I want to say thank you so much. I don't know how you got here, but I'd be interested in finding out how you heard about Mommy on a Mission podcast. Did someone refer you over to us or did you find me on the web? Please share that with me. Let me know how you were able to seek me out.
Speaker 1:
Well, listen, I wanted to talk today about five key points on seeking someone's approval. Well, first of all, not needing to have to seek someone's approval the subject matter has just been coming up lately and quite a bit, you know quite a bit, and it just kind of reminds me of that season in my life when nothing seemed right. It's almost like I wasn't living my life the way that God wanted me to live it, because I was always out seeking approval from everyone else, like always seeking my mom's approval, always seeking my ex-husband's approval for everything, just in general, even the jobs that I had. It's almost like I wanted to seek other people's approval in order for me to feel like I was doing things correctly or that I was doing it in a pleasing manner. But here's the deal the more and more I was seeking other people's approval, I still wasn't happy, like I always felt like I was either failing somebody or I felt like it was never good enough. And even with people like I wanted people to like me. And it's almost like I felt a very sense of insecurity when I felt like someone didn't like me, like I really wanted people to like me and perhaps it was because I just wanted to feel like I fit in, or the real reason is I was just very insecure with myself. I was very, very insecure of myself. I had no confidence in any of my abilities. Therefore, anything that I did, I wanted someone's seal of approval to let me know that I was doing a good job. Now I am on the other side of that, where I do feel comfortable and within my own skin. I feel comfortable about my abilities. I can understand or identify areas that need to be worked on. However, it's not in the same light of me trying to please anyone.
Speaker 1:
And I remember coming across this Bible verse, and it's Galatians 1-10. It says for am I now seeking the approval of man or of God, or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ. And this is so true, like am I really trying to seek someone else's approval or am I really trying to seek God's approval? Because if I'm seeking God's approval, then what does it matter what anyone else thinks? And here's the thing I had to understand too because it was something that I wasn't seeing for myself, because I was so blinded with the feeling of insecurity, with the feeling of lacking confidence within myself is that other people are not perfect. Everyone makes mistakes. But when you see someone who's walking that walk of confidence, who is walking with fearlessness, who is very shirms themselves, not afraid if they're making a mistake or not, it's like you're almost like wow, I wish I could be that person. I wish I could be just the way that they are. I wish that I could walk the way that they're walking, not even knowing what they had to go through in order to learn how to walk in that way.
Speaker 1:
So it took a while for me to really learn and understand that by me trying to seek someone else's approval, I was only making myself that much more miserable because I felt like I was never going to meet their expectation. But the truth is is that I didn't need their approval. I needed God's approval. It was his. That I and the more I started to dive deep into God's word, was because I needed to understand how he saw me. I needed to understand how he was viewing me, and I also had to understand that not everybody was going to be for me or a part of me. And so, as I was saying earlier, I'm on the opposite side of that now.
Speaker 1:
And I have there's a young lady that feels like I don't know that maybe perhaps she feels that like I don't like her, or she feels like that I don't care about her at all, and that's not the truth. The truth is is that I really don't know her, and perhaps I don't know her because she does remind me a lot of me all those years back, and it's almost like she's striving to make sure that she's doing everything right, or trying to overwork herself or overdo herself in order to seek approval, and it was brought to my attention on more than one occasion and whenever I hear it from one or two sources, because this person has gone to those people and they have come to me and said hey, you know, so-and-so feels this way. She feels like you don't like her, or you know that, you know, she's real, she really looks up to you. And I had to ask myself okay, what am I doing wrong? Am I talking down on her and did I say something rude? Did I say anything to make her feel a certain way? So I took it upon myself one day to offer her a ride back, because we were at a meeting and I offered her a ride back to our office and I took that opportunity to have a conversation with her, you know, and I extended her the invitation of giving her a ride because she needed one, and so I said, hey, do you want to just ride with me? And she says yes. So I said okay, great.
Speaker 1:
So we were talking in the car and the next thing, you know, I, you know said hey, you know, I want to know, is everything okay between you and I? And she started mentioning to me how she felt, like she felt like you know that I didn't care for her or anything like that, and I said well, what did I do to give you that impression? Like, did I say something to you? Did I, I don't know, did I disrespect you in any way? Because I need to know what is going on in order for me to be able to fix that, because that is not what I want to do. I never want anyone to feel like they are less than or not included, or anything like that.
Speaker 1:
But she couldn't give me a direct answer. So I said well, what is it? Because how do I know what to fix if I don't even know what to fix? If you don't tell me what it is that I did, then I need to. Then how can you expect me to work on this right? And it boiled down to that. She really just could not give me a straight answer.
Speaker 1:
So after a little while talking, you know, I said, well, listen, I don't know what it is that I did, but whatever it was that I did, I'm sorry. I pray that you know we can make things better, so that you know that there's nothing wrong, at least not on my end. And I even prayed with her. We prayed in the car, we gave each other hug. I asked her so, are we good? And she said, yes, well, now some months have passed and once again it's been brought up again. So I'm like, okay, all right. So we've got new people in the office.
Speaker 1:
I'm asking them hey, have, have, have y'all noticed if I've done anything or said? And they said, no, like we don't know what's going on, like we've never heard you disrespect anyone, we've never heard you treat anyone wrong. You know. I said, well, I'm trying to be very inclusive. Like, instead of leaving for lunch, you know, I go into the other room with the other young ladies and I even, you know, sit there, have conversations with them and things.
Speaker 1:
And someone pointed out it's not you, you're not the problem. I think she's seeking your approval. I said, mine, she goes. Yeah, she's. You know, she really admires you a lot and she really just wants you to like her.
Speaker 1:
And I said but that's the thing I don't dislike her. Are there things that about her that get on my nerves? Sure, but I'm sure there's things about me that get on other people's nerves. Right, not everybody who works together are we gonna get along every day, nor are we going to like what we all do. We all have flaws. It's just like a relationship. Right, we're about somebody. The things that, the flaws that we thought were cute, end up becoming very annoying later on. Right, but that doesn't mean we don't like you or that or anything like that. Nor would I even tell her those things, because that's being nitpicky, and I don't care about being nitpicky at all as long as we're all doing our job and we're working together as a team. That is what's important for me.
Speaker 1:
But when I heard that, I was like wow, okay, this is new. This is new territory for me, because now I'm the person that they're wanting to seek approval from. But listen, you don't. You don't need anyone's approval Not your moms, not your dads, not your sister, not your grandmother, not even your co-worker or your boss. You don't need their approval. You need God's approval. Because here's the thing you are the only person who knows what is best for you. No one else has lived your life or experienced the things from your perspective, and you are the best person to make decisions for yourself and determine what is right for you. That's it. No one could give me the advice. No one was going to be able to tell me what to do or how to do it right, because if they did, it was not going to come from my perspective. It was going to come from their perspective on the way they would handle things for themselves.
Speaker 1:
Another thing about seeking approval is that it can be limiting. When you're constantly trying to seek approval from others, you end up limiting yourself and your potential. You might shy away from taking risks or pursuing your dreams, but you're worried about what others will think, and the truth of the matter is that it doesn't matter what other people think. If you are trying to start a business, if you are going to school or because you want to start a career, if you want to take some chances, if you share that with someone who you know perhaps may not say something in the best way for you because they're going to project the way they feel they may talk you out of doing something because of their own insecurity, because of how they would react. Maybe they're scared to do something right, and so if you're seeking their approval, whoever that person is, it may stop you from accomplishing some awesome things in your life.
Speaker 1:
Also, other people's opinions are subjective. Everyone has their own set of values, beliefs and experiences that inform their opinions. So what one person thinks is important or valuable may not be the same for someone else. Therefore, it's impossible to please everyone, and seeking approval from others can be a never ending cycle. You're going to constantly want to seek that person's approval consistent, and you'll never, ever ever be able to get it. You won't, you have to just do it. Just do it and be successful at whatever it is that you are wanting to do. I'll just give you an example. So for a very long time, like I mentioned, I was always trying to seek my mom's approval. And now, mind you, I love my mom dearly. I really do. I love my mom with all of my heart. However, her mentality and my mentality on how we view things were complete opposites Once upon in my time, and perhaps because it was my track record and, as a matter of fact, I was reading this book by one of my friends.
Speaker 1:
It's called Dear Fearless Mojad. You were created for more, and in there the author was talking about how she was considering herself a runaway girl, and what she was talking about is that, no matter what was going on in her life, when things got hard, she would run away from it, and so that was the same. I resonated with that because that was the same for me Anytime. I was wanting to do something or trying something new and it started to get hard. I wanted to quit, because it's easier to quit than to keep going. Why? Because you don't want to feel a certain kind of weight, right.
Speaker 1:
So I had that track record of starting something and not completing it. Quite a bit, and even to this day, sometimes I do it. But I can recognize why I do it, and it's not because it's hard, it's because it's not something I really am passionate about. In that moment I think I just want to do it, just to do it. But it's not something that's passionate with me or resonates with me, because when I really want to do something, I will put my whole heart into it.
Speaker 1:
Now, but, as I was saying in the past, that was something that I would do. I was known for that right. So of course that is what my mom was seeing. So I remember I would say oh, mom, you know, I want to go to college and I want to go do this, and she goes in for what she was, because you're not even going to finish it and I got mad, I got upset and I started crying because I wanted to hear oh yeah, you can do it, you know, no matter what. But and mind you again, my mom's coming from the perspective of because I was never finishing anything that I said I was going to do, it took me a while to realize that my thing was is that she thought that I was not good enough to do it, because that was how I was perceiving things. For the same reason that I was seeking her approval, I wanted her to give me those words of saying yes, you can do it. You can do it no matter what you set your heart out to do, right. But, like I said, that's not what I was giving her, that's not what I was demonstrating to her, that's not what I was showing her. I was showing her that I quit when things got hard, that when I didn't like it, I was just going to run away from it altogether. So naturally, her response was going to be that Same thing.
Speaker 1:
With my ex-husband I would say the same thing oh, I want to go back to school, or I want to go do this, or I want to go do that. And he was just like laughing. He was like, yeah, okay, whatever, and I would get again upset about that. But once again, I was not. I was giving that message of I was never going to finish anything Right, and so I had to start realizing that I was learning that with time.
Speaker 1:
So when I did leave that marriage and I started to do things, I no longer shared it with them. I never shared my next steps with them, and instead I was sharing it with new people who were telling me you can do it. It's going to be hard, it's not going to be easy, but if you dedicate your time, organize your time, you'll be able to do it. And I took that message in a completely different way, meaning I no longer was looking at it as a negative way. They were telling me it's going to be hard, right, it's not going to be easy, but you can do it. And so once I started to change my mindset, once I started reading scripture the other scripture that I would read constantly over my life, which was my life verse for a very long time, and that was Philippians 413 that says I can do all things through Christ, who gives me strength, because I knew that it was going to require His strength, not mine, in order for me to do it. I knew it was going to require His dedication, not mine, in order for me to do it.
Speaker 1:
It was going to take a lot from God to help me to get through those hard times and no longer run away, and when that started to happen, I started enrolling in school. I went back to college. I was able to face the charges that were put against me right after I left my second marriage because of something that happened within the marriage, and so I was able to confront that. I was able to work at Jack in a Box while going to school and now moving back to Texas and living with my family and giving up everything that I had, because at this point, I had nothing anymore. I had lost everything. So now I was able to go back and I was able to keep pushing through. It was no longer me running away from the hard things. I was no longer becoming a runaway girl. Instead, I was starting to become a stronger person, a stronger woman, a dedicated woman.
Speaker 1:
Now you can't even get me to stop doing things. I'm doing this podcast. I'm building my business. Has it been hard? It's been a year. Have there been times that I say you know what? For what? I'm just going to throw in the towel. I haven't had any clients come out of any of this. My audience is not as high as I would love for it to be. Okay, the book sales are not, as you know, going as quickly as I would like them to be, but the truth of the matter is I'm still here and I'm still going, and I don't need anyone's approval, because if this is the platform that God is using for me at this particular time in my life in order for me to get a message out to you, then this is the platform that I'm going to be on.
Speaker 1:
Is it going to be hard? Absolutely Nothing is easy. Whenever you're starting a business, it's not going to be easy. It's going to take time, it's going to take dedication, it's going to take sweat, it's going to take tears, it's going to be take time. It's going to take you pulling your hair out because you want to make this successful.
Speaker 1:
I want my podcast to be successful, but I know that God is bringing the right person to listen to the podcast, the person that if maybe that's you, maybe it's you who needs to hear this message. Maybe it's you who's seeking approval, maybe it's you who's always trying to please other people, but I'm here to tell you that you no longer have to do that. Okay, you don't have to do that. And the final point of all of this is that it can lead to anxiety and stress. Constantly seeking approval can be emotionally draining. It can lead to anxiety and stress. You may worry about what others are thinking, how they perceive you and whether you're doing the right thing. This can take a toll on your mental health and well-being. Is it worth it? No, it's not. It's not worth it. It's not worth you stressing and feeling anxious about whether or not someone likes you or not.
Speaker 1:
So if this person who I am talking about is listening to this message, listen, you do not need my approval. You do not need my seal stamp of approval. You do not. Your approval is going to come from God, and if God is putting you on the path to do the thing that he needs you to do, then that's the only approval you need. You don't need mine. I am not perfect, by no means. I am not some. I'm still working on me. I'm still making strives to change myself each and every day, because I want to be a better version of myself than I was yesterday Not last year, yesterday, because yesterday I made mistakes and I want to be better than I was yesterday and every day. That is what I'm striving for is to be a better version of myself from the day before.
Speaker 1:
So, amiga, I'm telling you, if you're listening to this message today and you can identify with any of these feelings, listen, you are not alone. You are not alone. We've all have felt this way one way or another. Okay, or one time or another, but I'm here to tell you you do not need to seek any one's approval, it does not matter. It just reminds me of Tu Wang Fu. I know, probably I'm older, so I don't know if you're young years and you've never seen this movie, but it's a movie with Patrick Swayze and Wesley Snipes and John Langezamo and they were a set of drag queens. But anyways, and they were having a discussion and I just remember Ms Vita Bohem said you know your approval is not required or is not desired or required, and that's true, it's not. It's not, it's not desired or required. You don't need anybody's approval for anything. Just know that you are doing the best that you can and you have to live your life for you. So, Amiga, thank you so much for spending this evening with me.
Speaker 1:
I hope that this message is helpful. I hope that you got something out of it. If anything, I hope that you got encouraged. I hope you got motivated and I hope that you know that you are loved and that God loves you and that he wants to see you succeed. He knows the plan said he has for you to prosper you and not harm you. He knows exactly what he wants for your life, and it does not matter what I think and it does not matter what anyone else thinks. What matters is how you feel and how you feel about how God sees you and how you feel about how he is viewing you. That's it. That's it.
Speaker 1:
So if you enjoyed this message and you know of someone who can benefit from this message, please share this episode with them. Don't forget to subscribe to the Mommy on a Mission podcast and leave me a rating or a review, and also, in Spotify, leave me a comment. On there. There's a place where you can leave me a comment, and until next Wednesday I will see you again. Thank you for joining me on Mommy on a Mission podcast.
Speaker 1:
If you are hearing this message, you've listened to the entire episode and for that I want to say me gracias from the bottom of my heart. If you would like to dive deeper into today's message and would like to connect with me, send a DM on Instagram, at olamommyonamission, or Facebook at Mommy on a Mission. You can also find me at mommyonamissioncom. I hope you've enjoyed this new episode and if you did, it would mean the world to me If you would subscribe, share this podcast and leave me a review on Spotify and Apple Podcast or wherever you listen to your podcast. Tune in next week for some more words of motivation, inspiration and encouragement on Mommy on a Mission podcast.