In the season of darkness near the Winter solstice, we notice the lack of light more than ever.

What about your inner light? Is it glowing and are you a light for others? Or is it buried under expectations and burnout?

Your brilliance has been there all along. If you feel disconnected or unsure of what lights you up anymore, this episode reminds you of your inner spark and why it's still there waiting for you to see it.

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Welcome to the Unfolding Podcast,

a space where we explore what it

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really looks like to trust yourself,

say no without guilt, and live your

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life like it actually belongs to you.

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I am Erica Voell, and in my work as

a Decision Mentor and Inner-Trust

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Guide, I help women in midlife trust

their inner guidance, understand

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their unique strengths and stopped

saying yes to what drains them.

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I help them dismantle conditioning,

regulate their nervous system and reclaim

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their authority so their no feels powerful

and their yes is unmistakably true a.

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On this show, we have honest conversations

about self-trust, boundaries, energy

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and identity, especially for women

in midlife who are done living by the

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"shoulds" and second- guessing themselves.

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You'll hear stories, insights, and tools

rooted in human design and coaching.

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And real life.

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This is not to tell you what to do, but

to help you hear yourself so you can stop

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overthinking and start making decisions

that feel clear, grounded, and true.

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So let's get to our episode.

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During this time of year in

the Northern Hemisphere, it

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is near the winter solstice.

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There is so much talk of light,

mostly the lack of sunlight

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. We start to celebrate the return of

the light during the solstice, but

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everyone right now is talking about

the late sunrise and the early sunset.

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When I was a little kid at

church, we learned this song.

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You might know this song, and it comes

to mind at this time of year, "this

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little light of mine, I'm gonna let

it shine this little light of mine.

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I'm gonna let it shine."

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I always imagined when I was a kid

that like I was holding this light in

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my hands, but what I never considered

was that this light was inside of me.

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No one had ever told me that I was

born with this light inside, like we

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sang the song in church, but it never

dawned on me that it was part of me.

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And do you know that light?

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Do you feel it inside of you?

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Or does it feel so dim, so dim that you

need a flashlight on high to find it?

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That realization that I had a

light inside of me did not come

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until I was an adult in my forties.

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We actually don't talk about it enough.

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What we tend to talk about is the

people outside of us who light up

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that room when we, they walk in.

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You know those people, they

just have something about them.

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People talk about how they light up the

room as soon as they walk in and you can't

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quite put into words what it is about

them, but they just light up the room

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and they light up the people around them.

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They even have this like

certain glow about them.

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And that light attracts others so much

so that you wanna be around them and you

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want to know what their secret is, but

you can't quite put your finger on it.

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But you just love who they are.

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You love how you feel when you are around

them, and you can tell that they love

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what they are doing in their life and

how they are just being in their life.

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So often we can see a light in others, but

how often do we recognize it in ourselves?

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One of the most powerful moments in my

life happened when someone saw a light

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in me that I could not see in myself.

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I was in a really dark place.

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I was so sad inside.

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I was in a job that I didn't enjoy

with a verbally abusive manager.

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I felt so lost and I like, I

didn't know what else I could do

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as a career, let alone in my life.

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Now, I loved my husband and my

3-year-old daughter at the time.

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But I felt like I was going

through the motions and I

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felt like a shell of a person.

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I felt so lost and so unlike myself,

and on top of it, I was sick a lot.

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My body was so depleted

along with my spirit.

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My husband was so supportive of

whatever I needed to do, but I felt

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so dark inside that I didn't know

what else to do with myself, and I

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began to wonder if I was one of those

people that, which just didn't have

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that spark that others seemed to have.

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That was until I met my first coach.

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Her name is Anne.

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I've talked about her

before on this podcast.

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At our first session, I felt so seen

in a way I had never felt before.

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What I noticed the most was that

after our hour together, my whole

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body felt physically lighter.

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I felt like this glow inside of me.

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It was a pin prick of light,

but it was there like maybe I

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did have a light inside of me.

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I just couldn't see it for myself

in the middle of all of this dark.

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The more I worked with Anne,

the more I could feel that

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light inside of me expanding.

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And the real turning point was

when I began to recognize that I

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was worthy of claiming that light

as my own, but it was not instant.

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It took me a while before I started

to feel that light emanating

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from me, that I was that person

that could light up the room.

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It was definitely not a quick

turnaround, nor was it like

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that bolt of lightning moment.

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This process was slow.

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It took me over five years.

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I needed to experience burnout in

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periods of my life, and it's just

been in the last couple of months.

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That I have started to see that there

were actually some gifts in my burnout.

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It really, really required me to dig

deep, to heal myself, which in turn

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helped me see what I have to offer,

not just to my clients, but the light

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I can offer to the world, and a light

that's been deep inside of me all along.

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I needed to be able to see it for myself.

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Within myself, outside of the high

expectations I had placed on myself and

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also outside of the jobs that I felt

like had sucked the life out of me.

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I was recently asked by my

current business coach, Julie

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Ciardi, what lights me up?

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What can I talk about for hours

with people and when I am able

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to share or talk, what about it

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lights up my whole body?

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So much so that others feel my

inner light and I'm reminded that

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I had that light inside of me?

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And I didn't even really have

to think about it too much.

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There are three things

that light me up so much.

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When she asked me that question,

I was like, oh my gosh, I

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know exactly what it is.

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So what are those three things?

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Human design, talking to people

about how they can make confident

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decisions using their human design.

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Oh my gosh.

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Decisions.

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Decisions.

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Decisions.

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And the other thing I can

talk about for hours is how.

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The self-help and the personal development

industry gets us stuck in a loop of

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believing that there's always something

about us that needs to be fixed.

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I was that person who was stuck in that

loop, and it was, when I discovered

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human design, I was like, oh, oh my gosh.

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There is something about me.

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I have that light.

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Anne saw that light in me, but it

was through me studying human design

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that I started to see that light in

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. It wasn't just about how I

make decisions or how doing

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work that I love lights me up.

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It was really when I started to see

my gifts, my own magic, that I started

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to really embrace my whole self.

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That I started to see my own gift of being

a leader who delivers practical solutions

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and helps others find their natural rhythm

and flow and move from a place of feeling

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on the extremes to a place of self-trust,

which then brings in this self-love and

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this feeling confident in their decisions.

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What I had struggled with so much

of my life was feeling this need to

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prove my worth, which is actually a

gift that I can now help others with.

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I was recently doing some work

around my business studying my own

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human design, and this sentence

came up and it gave me chills.

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I don't know where it came from.

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It was in my writing.

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It was that "I am not here to fix you.

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I am here to reflect your brilliance

back to you so that you can finally

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see what's been there all along so

you can see that light inside you."

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That's what Anne did for me.

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And this perfectly describes what

my work in the world here is to be.

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So I want to ask you something.

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What completely lights you up?

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When you talk about it

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what do you feel?

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Just lights up your whole body.

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It doesn't have to be your work.

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What really lights you up?

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Because that light inside you has

been there since the very beginning,

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and for most of us, unfortunately,

it's been covered up by layers of

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conditioning and expectations from others.

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Many times those who did it

with the best of intentions.

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And all of the stories you

have layered on yourself.

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The hurts, the traumas that keep you

from seeing your own light, and sometimes

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it takes someone else to see it in you.

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For you to see it.

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Many times others can see it in us before

we've even seen it within ourselves.

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And it's so unfortunate as women that

sometimes we need someone else to

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call out our brilliance inside of us.

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But when we start to see it

within ourselves and the unique

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gifts we bring into the world,

then something starts to shift.

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So I want to ask you again,

what lights you up so much that

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you become a light for others?

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Because that glow, that light has been

there all along, even if it feels like

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it's been buried by that expectations,

that doubt, and even that burnout.

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So I wanna remind you,

your light is not gone.

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It's there and it's waiting

for you to look inside yourself

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to see it for yourself.

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And if it feels like just that pin

prick and you're like, I don't see

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it, I don't know, Erica, then I want

to invite you to ask a friend that

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will give you such a pick me up.

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'Cause I guarantee you they

can see that light in you.

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It can shift your whole day.

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And if you're listening and thinking,

I can't keep living like this, I

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don't see my own light and I don't

trust myself to choose differently.

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I want to invite you into a Life & Energy

Audit, which is really a decision audit.

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Well look at how you make

decisions, what drains you and

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why your yes might not feel true.

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So that you can stop second-guessing

and start trusting your own

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direction again, you can find the

link to book in the show notes.

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And lovely listeners.

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I hope you have a wonderful day and that

you feel that light inside of you starting

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to grow brighter because it's there.

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It's been there since you were born.

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It's been there even before you

were born, and I want to invite you

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to take some time with yourself to

see that light, to feel that light.

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Until next time, I'll talk to you soon.