332 Joanna Hennon + Holly ~ How to Step Into a New Identity Even When You’re Not Sure What It Looks Like

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More About Joanna Hennon

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What You’ll Learn

• What is identity + why it’s important
• Can you change your identity + why would you want to
• How do we know what our current identity is
• How our current identity affects our life now
• How to get clear on who we need to be to live the life we want
• Why we’re sometimes afraid of shifting into a new identity
• What to do when it feels like life changes our identity for us + imposes something new
• What to do when you’re in between identities and feeling lost
• What this has to do with living proactively – not reactively
• What to do when we don’t want to let go of our old identity
• Why we sometimes we hang on parts of our identity that aren’t useful to us
• Why we need to be conscious of self-awareness + self-acceptance when doing identity work
• Why our true identity is our soul + whether or not we need to worry about that

Things We Discussed

• 251 Holly Worton ~ How to Step Into a New Business Identity(now with downloadable transcript!)
• The Sudden Wealth Solution: 12 Principles to Transform Sudden Wealth Into Lasting Wealth, by Robert Pagliarini 
• Slide Into Success – free workshop 
• Advent calendar – sign up

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Transcript

The transcript for this episode can also be downloaded here (no opt-in required).

Holly: Hello and welcome to the Into the Woods podcast, episode 332. This is your host Holly Worton and I am back with another episode with the fabulous Joanna Hennon. Today we are talking about how to step into a new identity even when you are not sure what that looks like. So I have been doing a lot of identity work lately which was why this was on my list that I wanted to talk about on the show. I have just listened to my friend’s, Cara Wilde’s, new masterclass on identity which will be available very soon and I have been doing a really interesting exercise with my coach Lisa Wechtenhiser. My guides, through Lisa, suggested that l get into the space of embodying my new identity and then fill out a diary or calendar based on what I would do if I were fully embodying that new identity. So it is kind of a fake diary, were it is like: here is what I am going to do today from this space. But the thing is that it is leading me to take different actions and to take actions which I wouldn’t be taking normally, which is leading me to different possibilities and really helping me step into growth and helping me step into this new identity. And this has been a fantastic exercise and I really love it.

So you know if you have listened to this show for a while that I am really into this identity stuff, I have talked about Cara’s new identity masterclass which I will link into the show notes many, many times.  It is free, you can download it yourself and listen to it. And I have also spoken about stepping into new business identities on episode 251 of this show.

So what are you going to learn? You will lean what is identity and why is it so important. We talk about can you change your identity and why would you want to? How do you know what your current identity is? How our current identity effects our life now, today. How to get clear on who we need to be to live the life that we want and why we are sometimes afraid of shifting into this new identity. We also talk about what it feels like when life changes our identity for us and imposes something new on us. We talk about what to do in between identities and feeling lost in life. We discuss what this has to do with living proactively and not reactively. We talk about what to do if we don’t want to let go of our old identity, why sometimes we hang on to parts of our identity that aren’t useful to us that we see as negative, but we still cling to them. We discuss why we need to be conscious of self-awareness and self-acceptance when doing this type of identity work because it is not always useful, even though it is. We finally discuss whether our new identity is our soul and  whether or not we need to worry about that.

I hope you find this episode interesting and useful; I think it is a really, really juicy one. And as always I look forward to your feedback.

Holly: Hey Joanna!

Joanna: Hi Holly!

Holly: How are you doing today?

Joanna: Good. How are you?

Holly: Good. I am very excited about our conversation today because I think it is timely for both of us.

Joanna: It is, and also timely for everybody else because it is the shift from 2019 to 2020.

Holly: Yes, very exciting! Today we are talking about stepping into a new identity and how sometimes we are afraid of stepping into a new identity if we are not sure what it looks like, but we feel like there needs to be a change, but we are in that weird murky middle place. So let’s start off by talking about: what is identity and why is it so important?

Joanna: I actually, as I said to you before we started recording, I did a lot of writing on this recently because identity has become the main focus of my work in helping people to have more fulfilling, more meaningful, more successful lives. And I was really considering, I keep talking about identity and identity shifts, but thought: do people actually know what that is? I just spend a lot of time thinking about really weird shit. {laughing}

Holly: {laughing} Well, I feel like identity shifts are something that you and I talk about and Cara, I feel like if you are in the coach-y personal development world perhaps that is something you talk about a lot, but it is certainly not something I ever thought about or talked about before I got into this world. I feel like my life would have been really different if I had been aware of this stuff at an earlier point in my life, because there have been points where I really suffered identity shifts that were unplanned, and it is confusing.

Joanna: I think that we do know the concept of identity, but I just think we generally don’t give it as much importance as it actually has. So what I have discovered over the years of deep personal development work, of teaching personal development work, of working with hundreds or thousands of people is that identity is at the core of everything. So whether you are talking about manifesting or in anyway creating something different in your life or changing something in your life, we always get it backwards. So we always focus on what we want to have, what we want to experience and then what we want to do, right? Or what we need to do in order to have that. So, I want this level of success, let me plan out the logical steps, what do I need to do to do that? And we forget about the be, we forget the person who is actually doing the doing. And in my years of really delving deep into this stuff I realised that we have it the wrong way around and you can’t do it that way. This is why most people will set these goals and make these plans and nothing will change, I am sorry if this is making you sad listening to this, listeners. {laughing} But that is the truth, most people will never make the changes they say they want to make, statistics show us that and look around you. Your whole community will show you that as well and I think it is because we have got that model the wrong way around and I think it is because we need to focus on identity. We need to focus less on what we want to have, what we want to experience, buy, have in the future, and more about who we are and who we need to become in order for those things to be in our lives, in order for us to allow ourselves to have those things. In order to have the confidence to take the action to get those things, all that kind of stuff, it all comes back to who you are.

Holly: So who you are is a big topic. What makes up, or how do we answer, we have talked about this before and I have talked about this before, but let’s recap, how do you define who you are? What is the stuff that makes up identity?

Joanna: Well you have to start with the basics right? What culture were you born with?

Holly: So identity it is the stuff that makes up who you are and as you said going back to where you come from, your culture but it is more than that isn’t it, it is like what are your beliefs? What are your values? What are your views?

Joanna: The best way I have found for myself, I think it is difficult to say: what is my identity currently? That is a really difficult question to write about or talk about and the best kind of fill in the blank thing that I have come up with for myself when I was trying to shift consciously from the kind of person who panics at the dentist, to the kind of person who does not. {laughing} You can use this stuff for some very small changes in your life as well. The thing that helped me most was journalling on, “I am the kind of person who…”

So I am the kind of person who likes this as opposed to that or I am the kind of person who gets angry easily… Once you start writing about that, about the kind of person you are, you will see what you see yourself as… and that is your identity. It is not like your true identity, your true identity is your soul and that is a whole different ball game, it is the identity that you have taken on.

Holly: Yes, yes.

Joanna: That’s an important thing Holly, I never thought about explaining it in this way but that is really important identity is important to you, you take it on and therefore it follows, it is really, really obvious that you can change it, like you can change your shirt.

Holly: Yes exactly, so the the next thing we wanted to talk about is: can you change your identity and why would you want to, so this is a perfect segue into: yes you can.

Joanna: So either you take it on consciously, right? So when I was 15 or 16 we moved countries (it was 16) it was for my senior year of high school and I was not popular in my sophomore junior years and I wanted to be. So when we moved I knew none of the theory behind this – none of it! – but I was just like: I just want something different, I want to be one of the cool kids so I am going to show up in my new school completely different. I think this was an immense shock to my parents because literally from day-to-day I changed completely and took on this whole different identity of cool kid vs regular high school kid. And so that was very conscious because I wanted to experience High School as a cool, popular kid.

Holly: Okay, let’s just pause for a second, how did you do that — because that is quite young to be making such a big identity shift? Were you just observing how the cool kids behaved and then acting like them, what were you doing to make that big shift?

Joanna: It is actually quite interesting, I cannot believe that I did it so consciously so young, but I really looked at the “mistakes” I made at the school I was at at the time that I had moved to and one of the mistakes I identified was that I wasn’t, that I didn’t consciously choose my friends, because I didn’t want to be there. We had moved to the Philippines from Poland at that time, I did not want to be there, I wanted to be with my friends in Poland. I was really mad, and I was, can I swear here? {Holly: yeah, yeah} just like, “fuck off. I don’t want any of you people as my new friends, I don’t want to be here.” So, although people were nice to me when I started, as with international school system people come and go and are used to new kids, I didn’t make any friends and I was just left on my own and then randomly made some random friends and yes it wasn’t based on that initial spark, that initial interest you know? Those were the mistakes that I identified that led me to end up in a certain social group right? So I was like: so I am going to do it differently I am going to show up as if I was already cool and popular and confident and I am going to get friends and identify the people with whom I want to associate. You know, it also depends on how you define because to me, the cool kids were the ones who were not super-well-behaved and didn’t follow the rules, so I fell into a totally different life because of the choices I made in the first days of school in my senior year, but it was very, very, conscious. I thought: I am not finishing high school without experiencing this popularity thing {laughing}.

Holly: Wow!

Joanna: So yes, it was a very conscious decision and you can sometimes change your identity consciously sometimes, it is still conscious but sometimes it is imposed on you a little bit like when you become a mother, that’s something that changes, it may be conscious or not, often in my experience you don’t think it is going to change you as much as it actually does. And sometimes you pick up just beliefs about yourself based on actions, based on your reactions, based on things people say. I don’t know, if someone in school called you bossy, you may still have this belief that you are a bossy person, that is how you perceive yourself and you probably try to tone it down, the natural way to react to it.

Holly: And I think that a lot of little girls get called bossy at a young age and get told that is not a good thing and that kind of shapes their beliefs about who they are. It is like whenever you hear people say: I am the kind of person who…they are stating their identity there, they are stating how they see themselves.

Joanna: Yeah, sometimes it can be apologetic, like, “I get irritated quickly”. Now, is that actually true or is that an identity that I have taken on because in the past even maybe for a prolonged period of time I did get irritated quickly and someone pointed it out to me, that is up for discussion.

Holly: Or, our teachers told us, when we were in school:you are the bad kid, you are the smart kid, and you know we get it from our parents, I am an only child so I obviously didn’t get compared to anyone but I think for people who have siblings, you know what kind of kid you are in the family.

Joanna: Yes, so I have a sibling, I have a brother, he was the one who saved money and I was one who spent everything I had. Now how do you think that showed up later? I think of myself as the kind of person who loves spending right? How do you think that shows up?

Holly: Shopping! {laughing}

Joanna: I love shopping, oh my god, that is number one on my list of fun things to do, I love shopping. Isn’t that…I was going to say: isn’t that awful?

Holly: Well, not only that, it is clear where that has come from, because you were told as a kid that you were the spender and your brother was the saver and your brother really valued saving over spending.

Joanna: And on top of that, it is judged, right? So on top of that, the saving was good, and the spending was bad, and, on top of that, it was gender-role-related. So girls spent, girls just buy shoes, they are not responsible with money, girls just buy shoes, so it took me a very long time to come to balance: yes, I love shopping and I love spending and I am also really responsible with money and I also like saving. I can do both of those things.

Holly: So, how do we know what our current identity is? As we have said we get it from parents, we get it from teachers, we get it from people around us, and we also build it ourselves, so we come aware of it ourselves based on how we label ourselves.

Joanna: The best way to find out what you think your current identity is, because let us not forget it is all illusion and it is all taken on, it is a suit you have put on,and you may have layered a couple of different suits, but it is still just put on, right? The best way to see what you are currently wearing – if I put it it that way {laughing} – is to get a piece of paper and get a notebook and just write about: who are you? I am… I am a mum, I am this, I am that, I am the kind of person who… I don’t believe in that… and you will get a very clear picture.

Holly: Yeah, look at all the different roles you play in your life, like as you said: mum, sister, brother, whatever…

Joanna: And what you associate with those roles.

Holly: Right, your roles and responsibilities that come with those roles.

Joanna: And how you view that. I am a mum… what kind of mum? Are you a good mum or a bad mum? What do you view yourself as and why? So I could say: I am a bad mum because I get irritated very quickly…  I am not saying that.

Holly: Good, I was thinking: I don’t know how to respond to that one! {laughing}

Joanna: My sweet little boy told me, he told me he loves me just the way I am, so I am all good, I am feeling all loved up! {Both: laughing} But for a long time that was part of my identity.  I am maybe not a bad mum, but a not good enough mum. The mum identity was associated with patient and loving, and you know just the you know flow-y, and kind and overflowing and all the good stuff, that is not what I like, I do get impatient really quickly. {Both laughing} But you see how that already the way I am taking about it reveals to you what identity I have taken on that I am impatient, yes.

Holly: And then it is like a self-fulfilling prophecy so once you develop these beliefs about yourself then you act accordingly because that is who you are.

Joanna: And that leads us to the next point in our outline here that we are using to structure slightly, this episode: how does our current identity effect our current life? So all this stuff you believe about yourself plays out because your mind is always looking for proof for the beliefs that you hold.  So if I believe that I am impatient every time I snap I will be like: see I am really impatient.

Holly: And it reinforces and reinforces and reinforces.

Joanna: Yes, our identity, what we have taken on, it plays out in our life, the actions we take, the things we say yes to, the things we say no to. The things we even notice are available to us are all based on the identity that we currently hold. So, if part of my identity is that it is hard to make money, right, then I am not going to see the easy opportunities to make money, those are not even going to enter my consciousness. When you look at brain science stuff it is incredible, every time I read about this concept it blows my mind that we filter out, I can’t remember the percentage, but it was really high, 70%, or 90%, or something. Even if it is 70%, we filter out 70% of the stuff that is coming into our awareness.  So it is deleted. It is not like we consider it and think: is this useful or not useful? We just immediately delete it because it is not part of our current world view, it doesn’t fit with making money is hard, I could have a gazillion of super-easy-money-making opportunities floating all around me and I am literally not going to see them. I find that scary that they are there.

Holly: Yes, but the thing is we have to filter stuff out because otherwise we would be overwhelmed with all the information and all the details and all the useless stuff so it is really important to tap into who we need to be to live the life that we want, to experience the things that you want, so that we can start receiving the stuff that is useful to us because right now we are only receiving the stuff that fits our current identity for the life that we have currently got.

Joanna: And this is why most people will never get any further, this is the scary bit about this, if we just leave things the way they are, you may think that you are creating big changes but you are not, but there will be a certain ceiling on the amount of change that you can create and after that you will just go back down because you are comfortable with a certain identity, you think things are a certain way and even if something gets given to you it will just get taken away again. It sounds really harsh but…

Holly: It is like lottery winners they have the identity of the person they are; they get this sudden windfall of money and that should bump them up into a new identity but if they don’t do the work then they are going to lose it all. I am reading this book now called, The Sudden Wealth Solution, which is specifically about like what to do if you receive a sudden windfall of money whether it is through inheritance, whether it is through the lottery, if you get a sudden big chunk of money, how to deal with that, both practically through hiring adviser and by changing your mindset. This book was leant to me unexpectedly by a friend who said: I am not expecting a windfall of money, but I want to have the mindset that I need to have so that I am ready in case this happens to me.

Joanna: Yeah because it is not even sudden wealth it is just wealth in general, if you don’t have that mindset, even if you build your wealth slowly, you are still going to either squander it or not let yourself…you know let it grow. This is something I considered recently as well, that difference between manifesting something, bringing something into your experience, or noticing that something is there or receiving something and the ability to actually hold it in your life and not lose it again. I received some money through an error, and I was like: oh my god awesome and the next day it was gone. Instead of thinking: oh, I am crap at manifesting I really made myself consider what actually happened and I understood: I am not crap at manifesting, I am super at manifesting, look what I manifested, I just didn’t have the identity, the belief system to be able to hold onto that. Because if I believe that things like that don’t happen to people like me, then it is not possible for me to hold that. So this identity stuff is really, really, really, important.

Holly: So I would say that some people are happy exactly with their lives right now, and that is all that they ever want, but some people want something different, they want something more, they want something different.  So, how do we get clear on who we need to be to make these changes that we want to experience in our lives?

Joanna: Well that’s my speciality, Holly. {laughing}

Holly: {laughing} That’s why I asked you the question, Joanna.

Joanna: It takes a little bit of a process, it is really difficult stuff, when we talk about it we want to make it seem easy and like when we are selling something we want to make it into step-by-step, so people know what you are talking about. It is actually quite a difficult thing because from your current identity you can’t even see what is possible for the identity because you are not in that identity yet. So your brain is still filtering that stuff out, even at the ideas phase, so it is difficult to tap into it from your logical mind. The way I do it is from the energetic space, so I have this process that I will link to, which is a free a workshop which is called Slide Into Success, where you tap into the identity of super-successful you, however you define that, whatever that means. It is not necessarily goal-orientated, it is just however you define that successful life for yourself, that fulfilling, fully-aligned life. And you tap into that energy first and then you start seeing what that person is doing that you are not doing and it could be really, really, small things, right? What that person believes that you don’t believe, what that person is focussing on or not focussing on.

And the way I like to talk about it is in terms of parallel version of you, rather than some kind of future. You that you need to become, although I use the word become. I was talking to someone recently who said: actually, it sounds like your work isn’t about becoming but more about sink in into who you already are, and I thought that is exactly it. I thought that was really perfect but yeah, it is a matter of tapping into that energy, everything in this world exists in the energy field first, then manifests in the physical so you have to tap into it at the energy level first otherwise your brain will just filter it out, your brain will just delete it.

Holly: Yeah and I think it also really helps to get a clear vision of who this new is and what that feels like.

Joanna: Yes it has to be based on feeling. I knew someone once who did something really fun, where she wanted to make a decision, if she had two different things, she was deciding between. She would spend one day as if she had decided one thing and then the next day living as if she had decided the other thing and she would compare and see which one felt better. I thought that was really fun because it really helps you be in that energy I think that’s what is difficult, we can talk about the theory of it and what that version of you is doing forever, it is a matter of actually doing the stuff that the other person is doing that you are not and really being in her energy. There is a difference there.

Holly: There is, and I think it is important to go back to something you said at the beginning of how most people are unsuccessful because they set the goals and they make the plans and they do but they leave off that important first step which is the identity bit, so you still need to take the action and you still need to do the stuff but you also need to add that identity bit before you start creating the plan and doing the stuff.

Joanna: Because otherwise it is likely that you will be doing the wrong stuff. From your current identity you can only make a plan based on your current identity.  It is a slightly chicken and egg thing, right? So it is not the easiest of things to decipher and I am not pretending that I have already figured it out, I teach what I know, and we build on that and I learn along the way as well and I pass that on, it has to be that way. But you have to open up to this other person, to this other version of you before you decide what to do and often when we tap into the energy of this alternate version of you, this alternate identity, we find that the thing that comes as the next thing to focus on or the next thing to take action on is counterintuitive for us from our current point of view. I get this all the time, people are like: oh this popped into my mind, but it can’t be right.  But it is because it doesn’t fit with what we think is going on, where we think we are going and what we think we want to do and what we have been told is the process. So if you have the courage to let that go and do the thing that the energy of that version of you is telling you to do, that is when you can make those leaps between identities.

Holly: Yes, I think that’s…it is a big shift but at the same time it is very subtle.

Joanna: It is, I was reading something about the quantum side of this, this year, actually, and I had this big awareness that felt so right to me, of course it makes sense that what we call quantum shifts, that we want to experience, so a huge change in our life circumstances: from poor to rich, from failure to successful, those big shifts that we we are stating to call quantum shifts, quantum leaps, they are not about big changes — as the quantum level is the smallest possible level. Those leaps, those quantum shifts are actually caused by some very small things, some very small shifts and very small choices. The example that was given when I was reading about this, if you want to be a healthy person, rather than an unhealthy person, as soon as you choose an apple over a snickers bar, you are being the healthy person and if you keep doing that you will be the healthy person, right?    

Holly: It is all a series of choices, yeah.

Joanna: I want to eat the snickers bar and still be the healthy person, but that is from my current identity, but you know that the healthy person that you want to be, that person who gets exercise, that person who eats differently, and you can see it from observing people who are already living in the way you want to be living.

Holly: Yes and I think that is why it is so powerful what you did back in high school observing these people that were living the life that you wanted to live, and you just acted like them, you shifted to that new identity, that is super self-aware for a teenager.

Joanna: I think it is my slight Aspergers, the trying to imitate, not knowing how to act so trying to imitate everybody else. I was helped along the way.

Holly: I agree, I agree. So sometimes we can be scared about shifting into a new identity because it involves losing our current identity, grieving that loss, because we can be excited to shift into something new and still be sad about what we are leaving behind. So why are we sometimes afraid or sad about making this shift into a new identity, even though that is what we want?

Joanna: Change is scary right? You don’t actually know what is going to happen, I have had clients who worked with me for a while and things happened in their lives that they weren’t expecting, like their marriage broke up. So any kind of change, any kind of growth, you don’t know the ripple effect in their life and that is scary maybe we don’t want to deal with that. And let me just say that that is ok, if you are choosing to stay in your current identity with your current reality even though you might know that there might be something available to you, you are still choosing this consciously. That is totally fine, it is totally fine to choose comfort over growth.

Holly: As long as it is a conscious choice and not a default mode that you are in.

Joanna: Or complaining, if you choose comfort over growth….

Holly: …then stop complaining.

Joanna: But you shouldn’t be complaining because you are choosing it. So that is the only caveat to that, but generally if you are choosing comfort that is totally, totally fine and actually there are lots of days when I choose comfort over growth and sometimes I am like: come on Joanna you know what you need to do, why are you choosing comfort? And I am like: today I just want to be comfortable in my current, beautiful, life. And that is ok.

Holly: So sometimes it feels like life changes our identity for us, these identity changes are imposed on us, you mentioned the client whose marriage broke up, maybe it was her partner who initiated the break up so that kind of feels like life has changed things for her, I was a wife and I am no longer a wife. Or when your children grow up and move out of the house or when your business goes bankrupt or whatever that can feel like: shit I am not ready for this, I don’t want this, but life did this to me and it can be really disorientating. What to do when we feel like life makes our identity shifts for us. I am no longer a teacher, mother, or whatever.

Joanna: It does feel disorientating you know, and I don’t really have an answer that will satisfy because really the only thing to do is to be kind to yourself and compassionate and gently move through and create a new identity, take on something new.

Holly: Give yourself permission to mourn the loss of the old identity, and then give yourself time to get clear on what you want moving forward. I think sometimes it is hard even when we make the decisions for ourselves. I remember when I left my first business and stepped into nothing, and took my extended sabbatical as I call it, it was a hard shift for me because I had been this business owner for ten years and I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life which was precisely why I took time off and gave myself permission to have the space, but still it was really confusing, it was like: who am I?

Joanna: I think, I think the problem is that often we feel like what we need is space, and to a certain extent I think that is true, you have to make the space to think about this stuff and consider things, or whatever. But I also think that you have to, you can’t figure out what you want theoretically, so really you have to just try stuff and see what you like. I think not only just based on what you just said but I think what you said reminded me what a client I spoke to yesterday who said that she had basically taken a month off everything because she felt like she needed space and she is not feeling good. She is just like: meh, because there is kind of nothing happening and I think it is easy to get into this feeling that something should clarify but things can’t clarify out of nothing. There is only so much journalling you can do before you need to get out in the world and try stuff and see what you like and what you don’t like with that consciousness, if you have changed in the meantime, you need to try stuff again and see now do you like being with people or on your own, do you like to write or do you like to do videos?

Holly: That’s the thing, I used that time, I was like: well, I like baking, so I started baking gluten free stuff and selling it to people and I hated that, so that was not a thing. And I really liked blogging so I kind of kept blogging, and I liked. As I had just come out from having Eco hotels, and so I started consulting {laughing} I can’t believe I did this! I started this blog on Eco hotels and this person came to me, that wanted me to consult on them for the hotel and I hated that. I was doing stuff, it was like trial and error, trial and error, I liked doing all those things, I have all this knowledge and experience and I didn’t like anything.

Joanna: But I think what you did was slightly different, because you have added an extra layer to that and that is the money-making-layer.  You weren’t just focussed on seeing what you like, you were focussed on like finding something that you like that you could also bring in money with. That changes the conversation because it is more than identity then, it is just that everything that you like is conducive to a business idea. I think that is slightly different which is why you didn’t feel satisfied or you achieved what you wanted to achieve because you though you were doing one thing but in fact you were looking for the next career move, instead of figuring out…

Holly: Exactly.

Joanna: You know?

Holly: Yeah, yeah, yeah, and I wasn’t aware of the identity thing, now in retrospect I can say that I had lost my old identity of entrepreneur, but I was left with nothing and I wasn’t aware of that, I wasn’t aware of the fact that I had lost my identity, I just felt really, really, lost. And I didn’t know who I was.

Joanna: And I think that introspection is part of the solution there, if any of the listeners are feeling like this, in between identities, but lost, then I think introspection is a good place to start, what would you want to experience in life? Even if it is something vague like to be happy, it gives you a starting point, because you can start figuring out what makes you happy. What I always do is start with feelings, how do you want to feel? How do you want to feel in your life and then make a list of things that make you feel that way or might make you feel that way. Do those things and then see how you get on.

Holly: Like how am I feeling this day, this week, in life and how do I want to feel instead?

Joanna: Indeed, I think the danger is that you might get lost in the feeling lost, right?

Holly: Exactly.

Joanna: And you take that on as an identity.

Holly: Exactly I was going to say when you think: I am lost, I don’t know who I am, it just feeds itself.

Joanna: When you take that on as truth then your brain filters out everything clarity related and all you can see is that you are lost. And we see these people either you could be a person like that who perpetually feels lost in the world or if you are not you will likely know someone or know someone in your life who always felt perpetually a little bit lost. It is a useful thing to be aware of as well that that is also a choice, that is also based on a set of beliefs instead of things that your brain filtered out that clarity is available to you.

Holly: And I think we see that a lot in young people who maybe went to university, or is about to university or got out of university, or never went, and they don’t know what to do with their lives and so they are just at home and maybe they have a crappy job and they hate their job and it is like: I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what to do, and that kind of perpetuates.

Joanna: That also demonstrates the difference between living reactively and proactively, which is the idea that started my whole personal development obsession because you kind of fall into things, don’t you? You go to college that is maybe near your home, or that your friends go to, or in my case the one that gives you financial aid and then you meet people there and certain opportunities are available to you. Sometimes if you are living consciously then you can take this to mean that this was your fate, or that this was what you were supposed to do, or these were the choices that you were supposed to take, but a lot of the time we are not living consciously we are living reactively. We are not actually proactively considering those choices or even considering them as choices…

Holly: Yeah we are just kind of drifting..

Joanna: Yes we are drifting and the things that we are living we don’t consider that we have a choice and we think that is just the way things are and it is kind of like a stuck thing. Like, I go to this college right? I don’t think that maybe I could quit this college and go to something else, in this reality this is what I am doing, this is what I am, I am a college student. Same as, I work in marketing and I don’t think oh maybe I could retrain as a nurse. Things don’t usually come into our awareness but if they do then we think: that is not possible and it closes that off until someone in your community, in your environment, does something like that and then suddenly things open up and you think: oh if that is possible for her what would be possible for me? And then you can start to be more proactive about your choices.

Holly: So sometimes we don’t want to let go of our old identity, sometimes we hang onto parts of our identity that aren’t useful to us, that we label as negative, they feel bad, but that is how we define ourselves and we hold onto it even though we don’t really want it. What is that about?

Joanna: I just think we identify with things; it is knowing yourself or thinking you know yourself is a very comforting place to be. I am kind of thinking through this as you ask the question, Holly, I think it is important to understand that we are encouraged to go through this whole journey of self-acceptance and now that we are talking about this I think that is wrong. {Both: laughing} Let me see where my…how the information is flowing. Let’s take my example of being irritated too quickly, right?

Holly: Okay.

Joanna: So, this is a part of me I don’t like, I say in the past I don’t like this part of me, I feel guilty when I lose my temper, or when I get irritated I feel bad. So I go through this journey of self-acceptance and I think it is okay, it is okay that I react this way sometimes, I am good enough, I don’t have to change, I am not broken etc. etc. etc.. However, what that does it reinforces in me the identity of being impatient and easily irritable. So all it does I accept that this is how I am but that is coming from the assumption that there is a thing called just how I am, which is actually untrue. Ah, this is so cool!

Holly: That’s interesting because I see self-acceptance in a different way; so let’s say that I am really impatient or irritable or whatever. To me self-acceptance is not: it is okay for me to be irritable, I am accepting the fact that this is how I am today, this is what it has been up until now. But I don’t necessarily play it, to me self-acceptance isn’t not necessarily placing the value judgement on: that’s okay. It is just being able to look at myself and see that part of me clearly that I don’t like.

Joanna: That is not acceptance then, you are still judging yourself for being something that you are not.

Holly: To me self-acceptance is accepting the reality of who I am today, rather than being like: that’s okay.

Joanna: Alright, so not being at peace with who you are, you still want to just change yourself… Pick an example that is actually about you, not the irritability thing, what would be an example of something that you have had to work on in the past to accept in yourself.

Holly: No in the past I have been irritable {Both: laughing}. I am not like that now but there was a time in my life where I was overworked, over-stressed, in a bad relationship, in a bad situation, and so the slightest little things would get on my nerves and I was always on the edge of aghh because everything was kind of shit.

Joanna: So self-acceptance would be: it is okay that you were irritable because you have all those things going on, it is okay, let’s not judge that part of you. I think that we need to have another conversation about self-acceptance.

Holly: Maybe that is our next topic. {laughing}

Joanna: I say this… true acceptance is being at peace with that, truly accepting that means not needing it to be different. I learned this during the intuitive art course I was doing in Dutch, a language that I don’t speak, that is a different story, but I do remember them saying in Dutch there are two words for accept. I use this a lot and I think of it myself a lot, it was explained to me that there are two levels of acceptance, one is: really accepting, unconditionally that it is okay, it is okay that I am irritable, it is okay that I yelled at my kid, it is okay that I did this. It is alright. It doesn’t make me a bad person, it doesn’t mean anything, it is okay. And the other is: I accept it, but I wish it was kind of different. I think the conversation at the time was about some behaviours of my mother, and I was like: but I accept my mother and they were like: no you don’t, because you kind of wish she was different.

Holly: So then, is acceptance a good thing because as you said when we truly accept our things, not: I accept it, but I wish it was different, but I really accept it, that just reinforces this thing that we don’t want?

Joanna: I think in a way it is good, because self-judgement is one of the most horrible things in our world, it keeps us feeling crappy all the time. And it is also not useful, if you are judging yourself for being a certain undesirable way then that is not going to make you want to change, or make you want to change from this horrible, ‘I hate myself’ perspective, which is not conducive to real change. So you do need to accept, maybe that is it, you need to accept yourself first in order to be able to change?

Holly: To me the way I see it is that I need to accept the reality of who I am before I can change, but not necessarily be 100% at peace with it.

Joanna: So I just need to accept that I am a really shitty person?

Holly: But you are not.

Joanna: Okay, but that’s the example…I am a shitty person so all I need to do is just know that I am a really shitty person?

Holly: To me it is the awareness.

Joanna: I disagree, I really disagree.

Holly: So maybe that is self-awareness and not self-acceptance.

Joanna: Both have their place, but I think we have to be careful that self-acceptance doesn’t just root a certain identity that we don’t necessarily want, stronger into our being, because self-acceptance, the way we are talking about it now, it is actually a springboard for change. We have concluded that we can’t really change until we have that self-acceptance, self-awareness first, then self-acceptance, so we are coming at it from good energy, that’s when we can make changes. But we need to complete that process, to make the change if we want to, because otherwise we become the kind of person who is just like: I am just a really shitty person… and that is fine.

Holly: Yes, and a lot of people come to life from that place: it is just who I am, you are going to have to deal with it.

Joanna: You have got to love those people!

Holly: {laughing} Or not! Like those people who are like: if you can’t handle me at my worst then you don’t deserve me at my best. {laughing} I hate that saying, every time I see it online I am like: agh.

Joanna: I have never heard that before!

Holly: You are kidding? It is like a thing, like an attitude some people have: If you can’t handle me at my worst then you don’t deserve me at my best, because you should just put up with all my shit! {laughing}

Joanna: I think I just snorted, I don’t think it is good, I am trying to contain myself, but it is really hard.

Holly: {joking} You should accept your snorts, love your snorts! {laughing}

Joanna: Which brings us to the next point, which we kind of mentioned already, be careful of this identity stuff, because it is all false, right? All identities we take on, are things that we take on. It is all ego stuff, it is all personality stuff, your soul doesn’t have… I mean it does have some identity it seems, it does seem that some souls are better at this and worse at this and more have more of these qualities than others, so there is an element of that as well.

Holly: But does that have to do with just the amount of lifetimes that soul has experienced and the different variety of experiences that it has had?

Joanna: As far as I can see from my very limited vantage point, yes; {laughing} but I can’t obviously give a definitive answer.

Holly: No-one can. So you said at one point that our true identity is our soul, because that is who we are at the core, lifetime through lifetime. So this is probably branching onto a bigger topic, but I feel like we need to just address it. So what does that mean then? But then we have got the true identity that is our soul, but we don’t really know what it is, most of us, and then we have got our human personality identities, how can you reconcile these things?

Joanna: Well, the soul at that very deep, true, level, we talk about the energies of love, of joy, of peace, right? So this is who you are truly, who you are truly and everything else is learned or added on top, right? So this is why it is so important to come back to being at peace, acting from a place of love rather than fear and all those kinds of things. To be honest, for our earthly goals of living the best life we can live, I think that is all you need to know, really – about the soul in terms of identity, there is a lot of other souls stuff that is useful, but for identity you just know that you are not “Holly”, that is a very small part of what you actually are.

Holly: You are the soul that has been through all of these different lifetimes and all of these different experiences, and this is just your current experience in physical form.

Joanna: That’s it, but I am not sue in the context of this particular identity conversation if we need to go into more detail. I like to keep it very useful, right? I am very purpose and goal-orientated, I also want to create more in life, whatever and we take what is useful and we leave the rest. So I think there is enough in this conversation to get into the meat of identity and you know, really focus on what identity they have taken on. The only think that is important is that you try on identities, so your true identity is the soul and anything else is taken on, so if it is taken on, it can be changed. I think that is the most important piece of information.

Holly: If you don’t like it, you can change it.

Joanna: Yes, you have taken it on originally, whether because your parents said this, whatever you took on when you were a baby, a child, and so you change it, because if you put it on you can take it off.

Holly: All right, so you have got this offering that is going to be live by the time this podcast goes live, so could you tell us about tat, because it is related to this.

Joanna: So, what I noticed was the usual influx at this time of year of planning events you know, “sort out your whole 2020in three hours” and it just got me thinking because I love planning, I love planning.

Holly: Yes, yes, my podcast listeners will know the same about me. {laughing}

Joanna: Yes, I really love planning, but I think that sometimes we jump into planning too quickly, and I was trying to think why that thought was coming to me. It is because planning is super-sexy, right, because you no longer have to be here. I think it is important to talk about this right now as the year closes and a new one starts, and in fact a decade closes and a new one starts. We have ended up here in this current space, there are some things that you are happy with, some things that you are not happy with, some things you are judging yourself for, some things that you wish you had achieved but didn’t. It is really attempting to ignore all of that and move forward in 2020 and be like: woohoo new decade, new year, look what I am going to do, big goals, big dreams, make a change etc. Who is ready for change in 2020, these are really easy and tempting and sexy places to go to.

But are they the most useful? I don’t think so. And it comes back to identity, first of all when you plan your 2020 from your current identity, as we have said before, you won’t even have access to what’s possible in a different identity, right? So even if you have a plan, taking that action, you will still be taking it from the vantage point of your current identity, so your current limiting beliefs, your current limitations, the current thing that you think about yourself and so results cannot be different. They actually, literally, cannot in physical reality be any different to what you have been getting so far. So if you have been moving forward slowly that is what you are going to get, moving forwards slowly. If you have been feeling lost that is what you are going to get , you are going to be feeling lost, you will have clarity for a second, but you won’t be able to hold it because your identity is lost. So what I came up with, and what has been coming through the channel of me, this has been kind of soul-inspired action for sure, this wasn’t something that I sat down and would be like: I want to sell something in December what should I sell? This was something that came to me pretty much fully formed is an advent calendar,  because I like to make things fun, a virtual advent calendars, where every day you get a prompt or a question or a little message that will help you to make peace of and release the parts of the 2019 identity that you don’t want going into 2020. That’s not aligned with the success that you want. And we are doing this first, before we go into planning for 2020. If you have already done your planning that is fine you can do it on the side and just see your planning changes based on the things that you realise about your identity and how things are fitting in and what you need to let go of. Super simple process because I have also come to the conclusion that a lot of energy and beliefs and limiting stuff can be released simply by making in conscious. We are actually not doing complicated energy practices, although I have included something where I will go in and make sure that your energy is aligned enough for 2020, so anything that is not released I will release for you kind of thing. But this is not super-complicated because once you make it conscious it can go. That’s when you can make the change.

Holly: I have really been feeling that lately. I have done so much PSYCH-K® over the years and so many belief statements and I feel like I have got to the point where I have rewired my brain so much into thinking and being clear about what I want instead that I feel like things are shifting even without having to do the work. But, I have had to do the work to get to this point. So really getting clear on the stuff is a first step.

Joanna: Yeah, but I think there are lots of ways that you can get clear on that stuff and rewire your brain to do these things. I just think it is simpler than some people make it out to be and I have definitely noticed in myself I think the power of intention is the biggest power you have. So if you want to make these changes and if you want to adopt new beliefs, as long as you are clear on what you are letting go of and what you are taking on as the new one, so what you are filling that space with, it is all good.

Holly: Yes.

Joanna: So the advent calendar is a really simple thing where you are just going to answer a couple of questions every day, for yourself and something about 2019 to help you make conscious some of the stuff that has been unconscious so that it can be released so that you are actually starting 2020 with an actual clear state.

Holly: So how does this work? Do you get an email every day with a journal prompt?

Joanna: It is a little video, like a 1-2-3 minute video every day and some journal questions and we have a Facebook group for discussion if you want to join in that and that is that. Super simple and super effective because I think we tend to overcomplicate.

Holly: I agree.

Joanna: So we will link to that in the show notes and I think I am going to keep sign ups open up until December 4th, but if you go onto the page and find that it is closed message me.

Holly: You could get caught out pretty easily.

Joanna: Yes.

Holly: Good, all right, so identity, get ready for your new 2020 identity!

Joanna: Decide but first release 2019, do not forgot that step, so sexy and tempting to go into 2020 without doing this. It really and I am not any better by the way, I am the person who you know like in planners you always have the token one-page that says: what are you celebrating about this year? And even the token page I would usually skip, I would be like: ah don’t need that I am all good! New Year that’s what I want, new start, new beginning! {laughing}

Holly: It is tempting but..

Joanna: It is tempting.

Holly: But you have got to know where you are coming from and what you want to get rid of.

Joanna: Yes and where you are today, so I think the marketing around these things doesn’t make it super easy to make these decisions but if you are listening to this and it is deeply resonating with you then make sure that you follow that.

Holly: Yes exactly and if you have questions then email Joanna. Alright, so! I think this was a good one!

Joanna: I think this was a good one.

Holly: Let us know!

Joanna: If you have questions about identity I love talking about this and I think this is so fascinating so if there is anything that is unclear then maybe Holly and I could do a separate episode on to go deeper then please let us know we would totally love to that.

Holly: And if there are any other topics that you want us to talk about please let us know. I find it really useful when listeners give us the topics because then we know we are talking about something that you want to know about. All right so I will have all the links in there show notes and you can see us there.  {ENDS}