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The Wrong Strategy
Episode 3 • 15th September 2025 • Unfolding: Audio Letters from the Middle of Becoming • Erica Voell
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What if the reason a productivity strategy didn’t work for you… wasn’t because you failed—but because it was never designed for your energy in the first place?

In this episode, I explore the hidden trap of trying to follow advice, plans, and routines that don’t honor how you’re built to operate. Whether it’s the 5 AM club, viral business tips, or yet another self-help book, many popular strategies are designed for different energy types—and often, they’re built around male cycles and assumptions that don’t reflect the lives, rhythms, and responsibilities of women.

Through real stories, Human Design insights, and personal reflections, we’ll explore how to stop blaming yourself—and start filtering advice through your actual energetic blueprint.


If you’ve ever said “maybe I just need to try harder,” this one’s for you.


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Transcripts

Erica Voell:

Welcome back to Unfolding.

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I'm Erica Voell and I'm

so glad you're here.

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I am a decision mentor and inner

trust guide, and I work with smart,

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capable women, often those who are in

midlife, who are stuck in overwhelm and

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feeling over committed and confused.

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I use human design coaching and Reiki

to help them trust their inner guidance

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and understand their unique strengths so

they stop saying yes to what drain them.

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My system gives them a grounded plan

that works because it's built for how

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they're designed to operate so we can

clear the noise and then their no feels

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powerful and their yes feels true.

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Ever since I recorded the last episode on

self-help books, I have not been able to

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stop thinking about strategy, specifically

the kind of strategy that's not actually

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yours and the one that fits your energy.

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Something about it would

just not leave me alone.

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I'm talking about the kinds of strategies

that are supposed to be these life

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hacks to survive and succeed better

in our fast-paced modern society, as

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if life really needs to be hacked.

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Or as if our worth is measured

by how much we can produce.

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Yuck.

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When I worked at the

library, we had seasons.

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I mean, don't mean summer and fall.

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We had library seasons.

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One of our big seasons was summer reading.

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Of course.

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But there was another kind of

season that happened whenever a

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group was reading a book together.

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Sometimes it was just the management

teams, or other times it was just the

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librarians, or it was more staff wide.

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And often these were self-help or

business books, the kind that come

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with a strategy or a framework

that we should follow and we.

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Would hear the buzz about these books,

we would see the managers referencing

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them and quietly the rest of us would

start to wonder what changes were going

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to be implemented, both good and bad.

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But then months would go

by and nothing would shift.

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And I began to like wonder why recently.

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And it's because the strategy in that

book did not fit our organization.

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And that's when I started noticing

about self-help books in general.

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The advice, while well-meaning doesn't

always fit you and doesn't fit you for

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a reason, it doesn't fit your energy,

your reality, or your responsibilities.

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So when you try to implement it, you bump

up against resistance and sometimes you

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might blame yourself for that mismatch.

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And I believe books can be so powerful.

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I mean, I was a librarian for 19 years, so

I still talk about one book in particular,

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Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert.

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That's a book that I actually still

reference in my workshops today,

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but that's really rare because

I've read so many that I've, I've

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actually forgotten a lot of them.

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And that kinda strategy I wanna talk

about today is the one that shows

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up in self-help books, coaching

programs, ads on Instagram for heaven

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sakes, the four hour work week,

or the work smarter, not harder.

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Or the wake up an hour earlier routine

or do this and go viral advice.

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I mean, how many of those have we seen?

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Those kinds of strategies say, here's

what worked for me and if you follow

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it, it will change your life too.

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And then when it doesn't

work, I mean, what do you do?

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I did this.

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I think "I just don't want

it this badly enough."

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Or "maybe I'm not following it the right

way," or maybe "I'm just not cut out

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for this," or "I need to try harder."

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That's the one that always got me.

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Does that sound familiar?

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That spiral isn't F failure.

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It's actually feedback.

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It is your energy telling you that

this does not fit, and just please stop

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trying to squeeze you into a little box.

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And another layer of this is conditioning.

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Conditioning from our

families, especially.

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Our parents didn't know about human

design, and often there's this assumption

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that you operate similarly to them, but

some of the deepest conditioning comes

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when you try to keep up with people

who move through life so differently

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and then ignore those signals to

you that something isn't right.

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Honestly, I used to think I was

really bad at making decisions.

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My family all made decisions super quick

and they would commit to something.

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And then they wouldn't back out.

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For me.

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I would commit to something and I

would stick with it no matter what.

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Even if it was wrong for me and

I thought I was the problem.

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And it turns out my decision making

process is completely different from

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my parents and even from my partner.

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And going back to that piece

of like what doesn't fit you.

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There's this photo of my daughter when

I think about this, it is so funny.

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She's 1-year-old and I really absolutely

laugh every time I see this photo.

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'cause here's why.

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One day her diaper leaked at

daycare and they changed her into

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the backup outfit that they had on

hand, and it was a little bit snuck.

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I mean, let's be honest,

it was really tight.

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She was wearing a six- month

outfit on her 1-year-old body.

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The shirt and the pants were

practically bursting at the seams.

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And what I love about this

photo so much is this big

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silly grin she has on her face.

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Because she knows she looks

funny, but she can't quite

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comprehend why she looks funny.

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It's so great and it's really one of my

favorite pictures, and that photo reminds

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me of like what it feels like when we're

trying to squeeze ourselves into a box or

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squeeze ourselves into a strategy that's

not meant for us in the first place.

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I mean, we do this all the

time, especially women.

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We did it with diets, especially

in the eighties and the nineties.

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We did it with schedules like our

schedule should be time blocked or we

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should fit into somebody else's schedule.

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If you're in business, you do

it with your marketing plans.

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And we do it with our morning routines,

especially if you are somebody

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who is like, I should have a good

meditation routine just like my mentor.

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Or we work with systems that actually

weren't designed with our lives in mind.

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And instead of saying, this strategy

isn't right for me, we tend to blame

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ourselves when it doesn't work.

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And here's something else I want to name.

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A lot of the productivity advice we

see getting tossed around from books to

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YouTube to podcasts were created by men.

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And they've been passed down.

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Women are trying to adopt it

because we're trying to fit into

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the boxes that men have created.

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And men, their energy doesn't

cycle the same way a woman's does.

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Their energy shifts or their

cycle is every 24 hours.

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And for women it's every 28 days, 29 days.

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And many men are not navigating the

realities of caregiving and raising

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children and managing households

or moving through those hormonal

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shifts throughout the month.

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And that context really matters.

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That rhythm matters, and it's almost never

acknowledged when we have this one size

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fits all strategy that's being sold to us.

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Here's the part I wanna be clear about.

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This is not me bashing

the coaching industry.

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I wanna be very clear, or even

the self-help book industry,

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there are incredible authors and

coaches who are doing work that

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honors people's unique rhythms and

capacities and seasons for life.

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I've worked with them, I've learned

from them, and I consider myself one of

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them, but I'm calling BS on this idea.

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That their strategy

should work for everyone.

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'cause it doesn't, and they know that too,

but they're trying to reach the masses.

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And some of the times they

don't say it out loud.

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And if it didn't work for

you, you're not broken.

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That strategy was not

made for your energy.

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One of my favorite quotes is from

one of my mentors, Julie Ciardi.

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She says, "every strategy works, but

not every strategy works for everyone."

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The first time I heard that, oh my

gosh, something seriously clicked.

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And that's what human design gives us.

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It gives us a way to filter

through all that advice, all those

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tips and tools, and finally ask.

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Is right for me?

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Does this actually work for me?

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Is this aligned with how

I am built to operate?

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Or am I just trying to force

myself into someone else's plan?

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When you stop blaming yourself and

actually start filtering strategies

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through your unique human design, that's

when you begin to find your way again.

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In human design strategy is actually a

term we use, and it's how your energy

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is designed to interact with the world.

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It gives you signals on what's right for

you and in alignment for you, and it's

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how your opportunities best find you.

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For generators and manifesting

generators, it's about responding

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to what shows up in your world and

doing things that light you up.

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You know, what it feels like when

there's that deep sense of satisfaction

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as opposed to the frustration of

that butting up against things.

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And for projectors, it's about waiting

for the invitation, but also letting

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people know that you're available so

that then your energy can be invited

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in, and importantly also is honoring

your energetic ebbs and flows.

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It's about feeling successful

instead of feeling bitter.

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And for Manifesters, it

is about going for it.

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Initiating.

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And informing others when your actions

might impact others, and getting

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that sense of peace instead of anger.

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Manifestors are the only ones

who should be initiating.

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We're all taught to go for it, but

if we meet that frustration or that

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bitterness, it's not meant for us, but

for Manifesters, when they feel that

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sense of peace instead of anger and they

are initiating and they're going after

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what they want, that is their sweet spot.

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And for reflectors, it's really

about being in spaces that feel right

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and allowing those opportunities

and relationships to come into you

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by tapping into your sensitivities

with the energy that resonates with

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you, while also being recognized for

your thoughts and your questions.

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Those are amazing, which then brings

you this sense of surprise and delight

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instead of that sense of disappointment.

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So let me give you a few

personal examples of this.

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As I was starting to build my

business, I followed everyone I

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could find or was recommended.

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If it was on Instagram and somebody shared

a story, I would go follow that person.

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I tried following so many social

media trends, especially with the

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reels, and I would try to post with

that trending audio and tried the

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scripts and try all the formulas,

and it worked, but it kind of didn't.

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It really didn't.

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I got maybe a few likes, but it

didn't feel like me, and it was

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obvious that other people noticed.

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And my audience doesn't reach

out based on a single reel.

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They want depth, they want real deepness.

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They want to know that

I have done the work.

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They don't want more noise.

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They want something that

resonates with them.

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And morning routines.

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Okay.

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When I was doing them regularly, I

loved my quiet time in the morning, but

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then my daughter, when she was little.

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I would start to say, mommy's gonna

go upstairs and she's gonna do her

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thing, and can you leave me alone?

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That was like giving her permission

to invite in all of the antics.

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She would come running up the

stairs, she would knock on the

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door, she would peek under the door.

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It was crazy, and my mornings

actually became more stressful

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instead of feeling sacred.

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And then.

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I realized that I need to make my

morning routine fit into the time I have.

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And some days I journal.

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Some days I sit in silence.

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And some days I will write about

what followed me in from a dream.

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Sometimes I just need to release what was

in my dream so that I can start my day

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and other days I have to wait until she

and my husband actually leave the house.

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When I stopped trying to be rigid and

stopped trying to fit into something

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else that somebody else had told me

about, and I leaned into what feels

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most nourishing for me in that day,

Ooh, things start to feel really good.

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And you know, I talked about the self-help

books in my previous episode, and I

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invite you to go back and listen to it.

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But I would read those self-help

books and I would work through all the

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prompts and all the chapter questions.

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And honestly, by the end of the

book, I would have a lot of words

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on the page and nothing would stick.

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The nuggets were great, but the strategy

that they were giving me, the advice

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was not fit for me, and I couldn't

put things into practice, so I would

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feel frustrated that I had read so

many books and nothing had changed.

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I mean, small things had changed, but

it didn't come from one particular

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book or even all the books.

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It was working with someone who

I felt connected to and help

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me be accountable to myself.

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And then at work.

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A lot of times I was asked to

lead a project or take something

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on, I don't know how many closets

I have been asked to clean out.

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It seemed to be a theme every

time I started a new job.

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Can you clean out the supply closet?

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That would be a great way for

you to get to know all of the

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programming supplies we have.

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Or they would ask me to create a

spreadsheet for them or do their website.

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And I would think, oh,

they see this in me.

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They can see that I'm good at it.

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And so then I would step in and I

would be like, sure, that sounds great.

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'cause I thought that they

could see something in me

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that I couldn't see in myself.

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So I thought, oh, it's a

gift and I have to follow it.

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And then I learned my

human design profile.

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I learned that I'm a five in that profile

and people project things onto me.

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They see me as someone who can

fix or save a situation, but then

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when I can't or I don't fix the

problem the way that they wanted,

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I experienced that fall from grace.

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Now I know better, and I still fall

into that trap sometimes, but I've

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really learned to check in with my

energy before I agree to things.

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So how do you know what works for you?

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This is where human design

becomes really powerful.

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Not as a new rule book, but a filter

for you to see things through.

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And we can look at your type.

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How does your energy

interact with the world?

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Are you here to respond, to

be invited or to initiate?

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And your authority is how

you best make decisions.

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It's your process.

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Do you need more time?

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Do you need a gut check or do you

need a sounding board to feel how your

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decision and those words are landing?

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Or we look at your centers, which,

how are you picking up that pressure

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to prove or that urgency to fix

things that aren't even yours?

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And this is a quote

that was shared with me.

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I don't know where it came from, but it's.

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It resonated with me a lot.

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You're not failing the routine.

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The routine is failing you.

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So like why are we trying to keep

the routine if it's failing us?

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So if this is resonating, I invite

you to also go back to season two,

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episode two, which is all about the

self-help books keeping you stuck.

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That episode laid the groundwork

for this one, and you can see

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the thread that's happening here.

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Because you don't need

another guru system.

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You don't need another checklist

that's not gonna feel like you, or

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that you're gonna feel like you have to

fit into or that actually drains you.

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You don't need to push

through and make it happen.

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You need something that actually

really works for you, and that

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starts by learning what that even is.

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I invite you to grab my confidence guide.

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It's a simple, grounded intro to working

with your human design type, not as

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a system to follow perfectly, but as

that permission slip to start doing

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life on your own dang terms, and then

book your free coaching call with me.

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We will explore your chart and what's

coming up for you right now, and you can

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find the links to the confidence guide and

the free coaching call in the show notes.

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Thank you for joining me, and if you

enjoyed this episode, I would love if you

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would tap the plus sign to follow the show

so that you don't miss what's coming next.

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And if you're feeling generous,

leave a quick review that helps

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more people find Unfolding.

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I would be so grateful because

your support means so much.

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If there is someone in your life

who would love these conversations,

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please share them with them.

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Be well, and I will talk to you next time.

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