If you're feeling lost and uncertain about how to restart your life, then you are not alone! Maybe you've been trying to make changes but feeling overwhelmed by the lack of guidance and direction. Instead of finding your new path, you might be feeling stuck in the same old routine, craving a more powerful direction for your life.

The key moments in this episode are:

00:00:20 - Importance of Restarting Your Life

00:03:13 - Knowing Where You Want to Go

00:06:15 - Overcoming Fear of Making the Wrong Choice

00:11:46 - Embracing Change and Permission to Evolve

00:12:48 - Finding Your Why

00:19:00 - Finding Support

00:22:44 - Embracing Change

Welcome to the five year you podcast, a show dedicated to helping you become the best version of yourself one day at a time. I'm Andrew.

And I'm Cat. And we promise to keep it raw, real, and relatable.

Are you ready to grow? Do you find yourself at a point in your life where you're needing to restart? Today's episode is called how to restart your life, and it's all about the small and big things you can do to get started on taking your life in a new, more powerful direction. How are you doing, Cat?

I'm doing well. How are you, Andrew?

I'm doing good. It's a. It's a rainy day here, but, you know, rain is way better than snow, so that's what we get in springtime. So it's all good. I think in the last episode, I mentioned that I was in the airports and, you know, having nice, deep conversations with everybody I could find. One of the things that was weird was all three people that I spoke to in depths were all saying that they were needing to take their life in a new direction, and they weren't quite sure where to go. So when you and I were talking and we're like, yeah, how do you restart your life? Cause I think a lot of us do this without any guidance, but knowing how to restart your life is something that I think we really need to dive in because that's really what we do here, is becoming a new version of ourselves over five years.

Right. And I think that's the important part, is that we named this podcast five year you because we wanted to encourage people to become their best selves, knowing that it would take time, not forever. This is not the ten year you podcast because that seemed like too big of a time period. But there's also so many big changes that need longer than six months, longer than one year. For example, building wealth, becoming financially independent, paying off debt, losing large amounts of weight, developing routines. Sometimes these things are years in the making. So to us, we thought five years was the perfect amount of time. And that has a lot to do with the steps that we're going to teach people today about how to restart their lives.

That's why we're not tomorrow. You either, because though you can take a step in the right direction right now, you're not going to be ideally who you want to be tomorrow. But that first step is a key thing. So one of the people I spoke with, and you and I can both relate to this, it was somebody who was just feeling that he needed to go into this new direction. And the thing that I found was this overwhelming pressure that he had to do it right and he had to do it right now. I kind of gave him some grace and said, like, you don't need to know all the steps. You're going from New York to Los Angeles. You do not need to know every turn. You just need to know where you're wanting to get to and then accept that you might get off course. But when you have that end destination, I think that's a really good thing. So for me, I think a big part of it is when you're restarting your life, know where you want to go, because otherwise you won't get anywhere.

I was going to say the same exact thing, like having that vision, having that idea, the more specific, the better. Knowing that it can always change. For example, you don't want to say, oh, I want to lose weight. You want to say, over the next year, I would like to reduce my body fat by this percentage, increase my muscle mass by this, and see this on the scale, but I also want my energy increased and all of these different things. It's not enough to just have this broad statement. So have a vision of where you want to go. Be as specific as possible that will help you with the steps to get there.

Just the term losing weight, we both know from all of our mindset work it's not the greatest thing, because when you lose something, you're constantly trying to find it. You framed it perfectly as, like, I want to be this. I want to be this weight. I want to have this muscle mass. I want to have this energy. And that goes into that next part of, why would you want the thing that you want? When you're starting out, it's really easy to kind of say, like, well, you know, I want to have the biggest company on the planet. Okay? Why? Because, you know, the biggest company on the planet. That's a big goal. And, you know, we support you in your goals and dreams, but you need to know why you're doing it. And if it's to shove it in someone's face, that's not super great motivation. But if it's because you want to have this lasting impact on society and you want to elevate the world to this, this new height, that's a much more powerful why? I was listening to a book about Arnold Schwarzenegger, which I don't know how I got this book, but it showed up.

You've been quoting this book, like, nonstop since you started reading it.

It's because I had a lot of views on this person that were provided to me from the media, and it was kind of nice to have his views on it. And the book is called be useful, and that's really what it is. But the thing he would say is when he would be at the gym, he would see some people kind of walking around from place to place to place. And, you know, I was guilty of this before I owned a gym of like, you know, you just kind of, you walk around aimlessly, and then the question becomes, what are you trying to do? It's like, well, I want to. I want to get strong. Why do you want to get strong? I don't know. Well, that's not great. But when you have the why of, like my doctor said, I need to lose weight because my blood pressure is too high. I need to get off my medications, I need to have more energy to play with my kids. Suddenly having that why gets you out of bed. It gets you taking the steps to where you want to go, whereas if you don't have a why, the next morning you wake up and you're like, I don't feel like it. Well, right, because you didn't know why you were doing it in the first place. So know where you want to go and know why you want to get. There are two really, really powerful motivators and factors in getting to restarting your life.

Yeah. And I think that those are two great places to start. Inevitably, once you start heading this way, going towards that, you're going to encounter what the gentleman Andrew spoke with in the airport encountered. He was so afraid of making the wrong choice. And so what we want to convey to you is that there are no wrong choices. There are only lessons. That's it.

Life is a learning opportunity.

Absolutely. You might. And it's possible you could go back to school for four years to do something completely different, and you find out that you hate it. But no education's wasted. No experience is wasted. We learn something from everything we do, even if it's not right for us, we learn. And don't let the fear of making the quote unquote wrong choice hold you back. Look at it as an opportunity to experience a new aspect of life and try to make the decision right. Like intelligently. Right. Like, don't use all of your savings and liquidate your four hundred one k to start a shop with no business experience. You know, like, you know, try to plan and things like that, but don't stop yourself from trying or making the plan because you're worried it's the wrong thing for you.

I agree. I think one of the things we commonly see inside of ourselves, and I see it in my kids, and I see it from every person, and we're so afraid of getting it wrong. The Thomas Edison quote that we've heard all a million times about when he was creating the light bulb, you know, it took him like 10,000 attempts to get it right. And he said, like, I've only, when somebody was asking him if what it was like to fail so much, he said, I haven't failed once. I've merely found, you know, 8088 ways that don't work. And. But let's examine that for a second. Not the light bulb thing, because that's been done to death. But let's. Let's just look at it. You go, I'm trying to get this into my daughter because she's starting to think about university and stuff. And I just keep to the idea that you are not going to make a mistake. You may find out that you don't want to do the thing you're going to do. I think that happens to a lot of us when we go to university. And what happens in that moment is, you know, the fear of failure being wrong, doing something wrong kicks in. But it's better to know that on day one, year, one, year five, and adjust.

Absolutely.

Then it is to stay with it for the rest of your life. So when you find out that, you know what, I thought I really wanted to be a house painter, but I turned out I would really rather be like an artist. That's a good thing. Even if you built up a business that didn't have the passion, you still gained stuff. You gained experience, you gained contacts, you gained growth inside of yourself. And all of those things are tools you're going to use later on. And sometimes we have to go through those, and I'm using air quotes right now, like those failures or the wrong things to put us on the steps of the right path. And then you look back and you're like, I couldn't have got to those next steps without doing those other steps that I thought were wrong at the time, but they actually weren't. They were the steps I needed to take at that time. But give yourself grace.

Yeah, we're talking about choices. We're talking about restarts. There's this feeling amongst us that we make a choice and that's it. But the truth is, if you make a choice, you can just make another choice. There's no limitations on the amount of choices and changes that you can make. Remember, we say this in so many podcasts, but if this is your first time tuning in, the rules are fake. If you have this idea that you're supposed to go and do this one thing and work this one job for life, the rules are fake. Who says? Who says? And you get to decide what's best for you. You get to decide where you want to live, the type of job you want to have. Andrew and I, if you don't mind me speaking for you, we've both been through divorces. I could easily sit here and say, oh, was that a mistake? And, like, did I make the wrong choice? And marrying this person? Well, no. I learned so much from my marriage. I learned so much from experiencing divorce that I take with me into my next relationship. Not only that, I have two beautiful children from it. And it wasn't a wrong choice, you know.

No, it wasn't. It's a path that you needed to go on and without getting too deep into our own personal journeys and the stuff that we've learned, because I think everybody that goes through these things has their own journey through it, it's very easy for you to look back on your life and go, maybe I shouldn't have gotten married. But when you take out that Jenga block on the building of your life, everything on top falls away. And that means that, you know, then you don't have the kids, then you don't get the experiences, good and bad. I think we kind of look at that. We look at the things we've gotten again, air quotes, wrong, wrong. Yeah, that doesn't exist. It's just a learning opportunity. Now, if you make that same mistake over and over and over and over again, chances are there's a lesson that you're not learning. And sadly, that comes from experience, too, in life. You know, like, I still have that with certain foods. I'm like, I know I'm going to feel bad, and I feel bad the next day. And it's like, why? Why do I do this? And the answer is always, hopefully not one more. But, you know, it happens. But I give myself grace when I make these mistakes. And you know that there's these lessons that you are absorbing and you just have to awaken to them. So you're listening to this because you want to know how to restart your life. So now we've covered, where do you want to go? Why do you want to go there? And knowing that there's no right order in those two, it's just, you know, I want to get healthy. Why? Because I want more energy or I want to be my own boss. Why? Because I like the freedom and autonomy, and I would rather work 10 hours a day hard for myself than 8 hours a day for someone else. Whatever. The why is, is important. The why is going to change. And the destination can change, too. As you're going through it, give yourself permission to do that. You started ringing when I said that. When it comes to, like, today's stuff, I think we should get into that because that's really the important things for people right now. So you've. You're sitting there and you're like, okay, I want to give me something big. Like, something not something for you or for me, but, like, something like moving.

To a different country.

Ooh. Okay. So you decide. You know what? I want to move to Portugal because it looks cool. I want to be on the ocean. I want to. I want to know what it's like looking like looking at the Statue of Liberty from across the ocean. At this point, whatever it is, you have your why, but in more deeper, it's why I want to experience a new culture. It's time for a cultural shift. You got a lot of stuff that you got to do. So now it becomes that point of, okay, what are the first steps I'm going to do? And for me, one would probably be learning a bit of Portuguese, because that's going to be important.

I would be me, and I would deep dive so hardcore into expats in Portugal. I'd find what kind of jobs people are doing. I try to find a lot of information on the different cities and the cost of rent and can expats buy homes and all of these different things. What are the visa laws like? I would probably be opening 50 tabs on Portugal and bookmarking them all and trying to, like, I would do a data gathering phase. Me personally, you'd be like, I'm gonna learn Portuguese. I'm going. And I'm like, let me figure out every single thing I did.

It's a good example of how different people do things differently. Yeah. But, you know.

Yeah.

The next thing would be, maybe I should go visit Portugal.

Yeah.

Rather than upend my whole world to see that I actually.

In the summertime or whatever.

Yeah, exactly. You know, the. Maybe you don't like the heat. I mean, one of the worst sunburns I ever got was on the coast of Spain in the summertime. Turns out you do need sunscreen when you only see the sun one month a year in Canada. But, yeah, it burnt me bad. But that's the pole. Point is, you know, to go and experience it. So you dip your toe in, is really what we're saying, and you start to do the research and see what happens. Maybe you start to learn the language, maybe even just go to a portuguese restaurant in your town or city that you live in to go, do I like this kind of food? It might be a really weird thing to say, but when you hear people speaking that language, you know, does it feel good to you or does it grate on your nerves? Because if it grates on your nerves, that might not be the place for you to move and you may need to adjust, and that's okay, right?

If you still need to work, you know, if you're not financially independent, it's, can I work in Portugal? Will my current job let me work remotely over there? If I'm a few hours ahead, am I able to create a business on the side? Because Portugal is so affordable, where I really only need a much smaller amount to live each month, can I create something within the next year that I have when I go there to sustain me? What's my plan for it?

I think we're bringing up something that I just want to bring to light. Once you've made your decision, you have your why and you're starting to make these little steps, the restaurant, the deep dive. I'm hungry right now, so I might come back to the coffee, all these things. Once you have that stuff, what happens next is you're going to get questions, you're going to get roadblocks, and you're going to get tested in this idea because it's new. And something very different happens when you're going from your mind and just imagining something to starting to take tangible steps towards it. Sometimes the universe, world, whatever you want to label it, is going to test you to make sure you actually want this. And other times there might be these roadblocks and detours that are there, like, you know what, they're broadband Internet. I don't know anything about Portugal, for.

The record, but let's just say we're just spitballing here.

We're spitballing here. So one of the things might be, yes, my work does let me work remotely, or they have like an expat visa or, you know, like a remote work visa, but what they don't have is Internet that can keep up with the job that I have.

Right.

So suddenly that one is off the list and you might have to adjust, and that's okay. Or you might just have to go. Maybe that's not the job I want to have when I'm over there. Maybe I want to do something else.

It's quite possible you'll mention it to family and friends and they will shoot down your idea. Say, that's a terrible idea. Oh, a single woman can't go live in another country. That's too dangerous or whatever it is. Be prepared, once you make your decision to pursue it, be prepared for the resistance, because sometimes the universe tests you to make sure you actually want to do what you want to say you want to do.

There's the conviction test, right. And you're going to get that internally and externally. And if my mom said that to me, I would say, mom, I'm not a single woman. I am a single man. And sorry, I know my mom listens to this every time, so I was trying to make her laugh. I believe when you have those little objections that come up, there are bricks on your path that you're laying for yourself. And it's, do I really feel this way? Am I willing to leave those people around me and step out? Because most people in the case, like moving away or doing something that is completely different when you are restarting your life. Average person is so, I don't say growth avoidant, but they're so set in their ways that to do what you're doing, you may as well say, I'm going to be the one person that colonizes Mars on my own. It's just, it's not going to register for them. And that's okay. But you got to understand that they're coming through it through a paradigm that is not your own. And some people are going to be approaching things on an emotional basis that they may not be aware of. And it might be. Did you know that there was an earthquake in Portugal, you know, 50 years ago? Again, knowing nothing about this country, probably, probably should have fleshed that out before we went. But whatever. We're down this road and here we go, people are going to have these odd objections to you. They're going to throw things in your face. I think part of it is just kind of knowing that these people just care about you and what you're saying is so foreign to them, or they just don't want you to go in some cases, or they don't want you to get hurt, or they don't want you to experience pain, that that might be something that is coming out. And it's coming out in different ways than simply saying, please don't go, I'll miss you. And the other thing I was going to say is they will be doing a lot of self reflection when you say something like this, and they'll think, I could never do that. And, like, there'll be these things that come in. So everything that they're saying to you is really about them. It's not about you. Just know that as you take these first steps.

Yeah. So that brought up another good step in the beginning is to find one person who supports your vision. Sarah Blakely, the founder of Spanx, recommends that entrepreneurs not tell anybody what they're up to for at least a year until after they've already fleshed it out. Because she says, you don't want people to talk you out of it. Right. So it's good idea, if you can't find support in your immediate circle, to reach out again, using the same idea that we're talking about, reaching out to people on Instagram who have moved to where you want to move or reaching out to. If you're changing careers, let's say you want to go to a boot camp and learn how to be a coder. Reaching out to people like finding on LinkedIn, who went to this eight week boot camp, and I can see that on their LinkedIn. Let me ask them what they thought about it. Whatever it is, whether you want to try a new type of fitness regimen, whether you want to go vegan, whether you want to leave your marriage or whatever it is, have some kids, that is one that is sort of hard to undo once it's done.

That is the bell that doesn't get unrung.

Unfortunately, folks, you cannot make a new choice with that. They're just. They're yours. But all that to say is there are people likely who have taken a similar path, started their life a year or two ahead of you, and you can go to them for support. It's really important to surround yourself with people who share your vision because it might be a lonely road. But if you could just find one person that will help you and sort of be your advocate along the way, then I think that goes a long way in helping you achieve your new version of yourself.

I agree. I think when you're restarting your life, it's very helpful, actually, to see yourself as a baby in this phase. The nice part is you get to choose your quote unquote parents that can support you in this, and they don't actually have to be your parents. They can be people on the Internet, friends, you know, whoever you want to support you. You get to pick that. But like a baby, there may be days where you're up all night crying because it might be a hard thing that you're trying to do. Give yourself grace when you're a baby. It didn't fall down when you were learning to walk and just give up. You didn't turn to mom and dad and say, guess what? You're carrying me for the next 80 years. Have fun with this. You actually had the resolve to be like, no, I'm going to get this and I'm going to keep going at it until I get it because it's important to me have that resolve in you as you move forward with the ability to adapt and change. You know, when you're walking, you might be like, I wonder what happens if I just go, right foot, right foot, right foot. Well, you might fall and that's okay. You just don't know until you try. But I still make that mistake most of the time. Like, there's definitely once a week I do that. But that's, you know, give yourself grace. Find those people that are supporting you and see the eyes through it as you're getting to restart your life, whether it's like just a small thing, like eating healthier or a big thing, like moving to a new country or starting a business or whatever, you're on an adventure. Yeah, that's exciting. And I think as we get older, and maybe it's just me, but I find that as I get older, excitement and anxiety feel very, very similar. And I felt the anxiety my whole life. And I'm just trying to embrace things as, like, excitement now and like, no, this is fun. This is what life is supposed to be like. You're constantly making a choice to change and yeah, it's nerve wracking, but enjoy the excitement that comes along with it because life is meant to be an enjoyable adventure with lessons that you learn as you go when you're restarting your life. That would be my suggestion, the first few steps, and then you just keep adjusting as you go. You take the next step, you figure out if you like it, you adjust if you don't, celebrate the wins, celebrate the losses even more.

Most importantly, continue to make your choices as your authentic self because we truly believe that when you are authentic and you stay true to your actual desires and hopes and dreams, that is the path to happiness.

Absolutely. Is there anything else you wanted to add about the whole restart your life?

I think we covered it all.

Always. Good. I think this is one of those topics that you and I have definitely touched on a lot in our conversations, but we've never actually recorded it or kind of formalized it at all. That brings us to our glimmers. And for those of you that are new to the show, every episode we like to share something that is lighting us, whether it's a good Amazon find or just a little moment with our kids or family members. Just something that made us smile. Cat, what is your glimmer this week?

Well, I have the pleasure of having Mother's Day and my birthday exactly one week apart. And so I feel like I have been just showered with all kinds of gifts. And my favorite ones come from my ten year olds because they're so funny and, like, they're at this age where they pick out stuff for me themselves. If you're watching us on YouTube, I'll show you what my son got me. It's this, like, rainbow knitted flower. Because my kids know. My kids know I love rainbows. They know I like rocks and crystals and fossils and so I got a lot of rocks. I got some hand painted rocks. I got some, you know, crystal earrings. And it's just so cute. It just delights me to think that, you know, when they're walking around with their dad and they see something that makes them think of me, that they can scoop it up. So I really enjoy. There's, you know, birthdays are kind of a weird thing. Sometimes they're great, sometimes they're a little meh. I'm sure others can relate. So it's a glimmer for me that my past birthday was. Was a good one. And I got a little bit spoiled, for sure.

Happy birthday and, yeah, it's nice to have Mother's day. It's kind of. It's kind of like, I guess having, like, your birthday and Christmas close together.

It was a boom boom, for sure.

Yeah. And for those of you wondering, I got Catherine a load of gravel and it turns out those are not the rocks she likes to get. So anybody needs gravel, just head on over. No, I'm just kidding.

We'll have to talk about it. Andrew got me the 23 andme kit. So in about six weeks, I'll report back on that glimmery thing. We'll find out if I'm an alien or not.

Yeah, I got mine a while back and it's been very interesting. I didn't realize they could get so much out of you. Just give them a spit. I'm like, I didn't know there was that much information in it. It's very wild. I guess it's my turn. My glimmer is this podcast. I was feeling a little down before we came on this podcast, and as we've been sitting here talking, I just realized how much I really love doing this. And I'm very grateful for whoever listens to this. I'm always grateful to have a conversation with you, Catherine. You know that. You know, I get as much out of doing this podcast than I hope anybody else does gets listening to it. It just feels really right. And I think that's, you know, when you're restarting your life, much like I have been this past year, and you find something that is such a good feeling vibe and feels like a good fit for me, I'm just really, really grateful for it. And that was just kind of coming up inside of me as we were talking today. Very grateful for it. So thank you for doing this with me, Catherine, and thank you for listening. The pleasure is truly mine.

I think that is a great note to stop on.

Thank you, everybody, and we'll see you next time.

Oh, and don't forget, if you want to get that advice from your future self, head on over to fiveyearyou.com future to get signed up.

We're rooting for you. Just a reminder, we're two people on the Internet. We're not doctors or anything else, but we do want to help. If you feel that you need professional medical care, please see a licensed medical practitioner.