Wake up and Thrive

EP 80- A Powerful Mindset Shift for Your Relationships

February 12, 2024 Bridget Covill
Wake up and Thrive
EP 80- A Powerful Mindset Shift for Your Relationships
Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers

Our hearts are the compasses we use to navigate the complex seas of human interaction, and in this episode, I will share a powerful quote that could change everything. I stumbled across this quote a few weeks ago and it has resonated so deeply with my soul. It has helped me access compassion when my mind couldn't conceive it.

 When we can look at other people through the lens of love, our entire experience of them can shift instantly. I promise no matter what 'toxicity' you are experiencing, this quote will resonate.  Join me as we seek to answer life's most pressing calls for love, empowering ourselves to live with a sense of awakening and vitality.


I am also so excited to announce a free workshop where I will teach you three essential skills to communicate from your heart. Heart-Led Communication is happening February 23rd, and a recording will be available if you can't attend life. Register here!

**** This month's breathwork journey is all about 'Opening Back Up to Love'.  If you are someone that struggles to let people in or maybe you just want to experience more love then this session is for you. Register here. 

Let's Connect.

Free guide: 5 ways to find Calm: Get the guide here
Come find me on Instagram: @findherwildcoaching
Check out my website and my offerings here



Speaker 1:

Hello, good morning. I am so excited for today's episode. I actually recorded this episode about a week and a half ago and it was really, really alive for me at the moment. So I sat down and I just like poured my heart out. And it's so funny because the quote I'm going to share in today's episode is still so, so relevant with even just how my day went today. So I hope you enjoy the quote. I apologize, I don't know where the quote came from, but it's a really powerful quote, so make sure you have a pen and paper handy. You're going to want to remember this one and stay until the end. I have such an awesome announcement. So many of you guys have been asking for support around this area, so I'm really excited to share, so stay tuned.

Speaker 1:

Hello and welcome to Wake Up and Thrive. My name is Bridget and I'm your host. My intention for this space is to help women around the world live more awake, aligned and truly alive. I believe wholeheartedly that we are designed to live, feel and experience the full range that life has to offer, and in doing so, we can live fully turned on in all areas. My story began with sobriety and has since been an initiation into rediscovering parts of myself that I forgot about or had abandoned. Learning to reclaim all of who I am has been the greatest gift of living awake, and together we will go on a journey of helping you to do the same. You can expect to learn practical tools to help you connect deeper to yourself, your purpose and those in your life. All you need is an open heart and an open mind. So if you're ready, it's time. It's time to wake up and thrive. Hello, welcome back to another episode of Wake Up and Thrive.

Speaker 1:

For today's episode, I want to share a quote that I'd heard before. I'm honestly not really sure their original author of the quote, but it's such a powerful quote, it is so unbelievably powerful and it's been playing a big role in my life recently. I've been walking through my family, my extended family, some big right, some big life experiences and dealing with other people that have different agendas and different values, and it can just, and then also in my life, with the people I love the most, experiencing little triggers here, there or thinking there. I remember specifically getting mad at my husband recently because I was sharing my experience and he immediately jumped to devil's advocate and he immediately jumped to what I felt like was an attack on my perspective and my experience and I just really wanted him to listen. So I've been experiencing big triggers from like like, big things that really do affect people's lives, and then little triggers just in my everyday, with the people that I do greatly love, and both times this quote is going to be incredibly powerful and for you, maybe you in some of your relationships, maybe you label them toxic. Maybe you have people that you are related to. Maybe it's people that you are able to actually avoid because they are just not good people, they are evil. Right, we all have those people. Maybe it's in our work life, maybe it's in our family, friends, maybe it's just, you know, politically, we see those people and we focus and we give so much time, attention and energy on the toxicity that we are witnessing. And I was reminded today in church there is what's happening and then there's actually what's happening and it really it goes in line with the quote I'm going to share, but it's just made me sort of think, like, are people toxic? Are people truly, truly, truly evil human beings, or is it their way? They're only like failed, stupidly successful or effective way of trying to get love.

Speaker 1:

And so the quote goes everything people say and do, everything people don't say and don't do, it is either an expression of love or it's a bid for love. So let me say it again If you could for a moment see the world through a fresh set of eyes, with an open heart and an open mind, right, we say that at the beginning of every episode. All you need is an open heart and an open mind. If you're ready, if you're ready, let's wake up and thrive. And so if you really want to wake up, you want to stop living in this loop of I'm a victim, or they're bad, or they're toxic or they hurt me, and you want to really like, just diminish your power in the situation, in the experience, then keep doing that, really keep doing that.

Speaker 1:

But if you want to live awake and truly be able to not be jostled by what's going on around you, not be taken under by the people in your life, how they choose to show up, then it requires this belief, it requires looking at people through this lens that everything people say and do, or don't say or don't do, it's an expression of love or it's a bid for love. It's a plea for love, subconsciously right Sometimes, it's consciously sometimes, and maybe these are the people we dub really evil when they're conscious of it. Right, this is their only way of attempting to get love is by doing XYZ something very hurtful to either themselves or the other people in their life. But that's what it is. When we hurt ourselves, it's our own attempt to get love to protect ourselves from what we think love might do. Right, to avoid love, to build up walls around love. It's either an expression of love or it's a bid for love, and sometimes our bid for love is wrong. It's misinformed.

Speaker 1:

A lot of times we walk around labeling other people bad, evil, wrong, toxic and again, trust me, my extended family is walking through a real life example of toxic people. It's really easy, really easy to get caught up in the evidence like what I'm seeing, right, but remember, there's what's happening and then there's actually what's happening. So there's this person in front of me. There's his whole life and his whole journey and what led him or her up into this place to show up in this way? Right, and it might take this experience to get through to him. It might take 10 more experiences like this, but when you can see it all as this expression of love or this bid for love. Then you will stop looking at people as evil, you stop looking through the lens of you are a victim, because there's no villain, there's just imperfect people navigating a really imperfect life and everybody is doing the best they can with the resources they have, and some people's resources just flat out suck.

Speaker 1:

But how would that shift things for you in your own life? Nothing people say do, don't say don't do. It's an expression of love or it's a bid for love. How is their way of pushing people away, their way of quote unquote protecting theirs, while from the outside in it looks like, oh, they're protecting their bank account or they're protecting their reputation. But is it that that bank account and that reputation is tied so closely to their identity and so closely to their heart that by protecting that they're protecting their heart, they're protecting love, they're protecting their false sense of love, right? So this very overgeneralized quote?

Speaker 1:

I recognize relationships in general are nuanced and very layered and there's always going to be a yes, but yes, but you don't know my uncle Timmy. Tommy, he's really, really evil. Or yes, but you've never met my mother. Right, it can be as close to that. You don't know how controlling she is. There's always going to be a yes, but, and my challenge for you would be instead of going to, yes, but what if it's yes?

Speaker 1:

And I wonder what happened in his or her life that led him or her to believe this is how you get love? By protecting your heart, your finding love. You're not finding love, you're blocking it, and so, even though the things people say and do might be miscalculated, they're actually not giving the person what they think they're going to get. It's coming from the same core need that you and I have. It's driven from the same organ. It's coming from our heart. It's an expression of love or a bid for love. And what about in your own life, you guys? What about the mistakes that you've made, the choices that you've committed to that have not turned out to be in your best interest? Go back to why you chose that. I even think of like.

Speaker 1:

I've spoken about friendships and I've spoken about how, from their perspective, they called me manipulative. They called me dramatic, because when I would get my feelings hurt, instead of saying something like we should as adults, emotionally mature adults which I was not just a few years ago I would just get really quiet and withdrawn, wouldn't come to girls night and the hope was that was my bid for love. I wasn't trying to cause drama, it was the only tool I had in my tool belt at the time to say I don't feel very loved in this moment, right now. I'll just say it Now, I'll just come out and go. You still love me, right. But it was an expression of love and had the people in my life seen it that way, it would not have perpetuated my behavior, it would not have excused my behavior, but it would have taken the sting out of it, right.

Speaker 1:

And maybe I like to think, just maybe, had we been there, if we ever meet again with different, open heart, open mind, we might have a different experience, because I don't think those women that cause so much pain in my life are bad or evil, because I even see their own discard, disregard or discard of me and our friendship. It was again their own bid for love. I can't read Bridget. I don't really feel super loved and important to her right now. She's sort of like pulling back, which I was for other reasons, and I'm kind of being vague. But many of you who've been around have heard my story. If you haven't, you can go back and listen to my episode on friendships. I think it's one many people can relate to. Mine just felt like it was on steroids.

Speaker 1:

But again, when I so taking this quote and applying it to the people in your life, but also taking this quote and applying it to the people or to you, everything you do, everything you say or do, don't say or don't do to yourself and to others, it's either an expression of love or a bid for love. And so the question really is is my bid for love working Right? I even think. Just just last example I want to give you is like in my own marriage I was. I was always mad at Paul for being passive, but the truth was I was incredibly passive. Like you know, if I wanted to cuddle, I would be like I'm going up to bed now, you know, and I'd like kind of like shake my hips and he'd be so enthralled in the TV. I'd like walk upstairs, I'd stop my feet and I'm like he doesn't love me. He doesn't love me. Right, expression of love or bid for love? That was my bid for love. Now my bid for love is a little more clear and direct. It works better for both of us, you know, because bid for love definitely requires an open heart, it requires vulnerability and it's hard, it's really uncomfortable.

Speaker 1:

But I just wonder how that quote would shift things for you in this moment, in your relationships again with other people and with yourself. How would it shift things? What new insight, new perspective can you glean from seeing their behavior as an act of love, an actual expression of love? Maybe it doesn't feel very loving to you, but maybe this is their way of showing you that they love you. Sometimes their boundaries that we perceive as really hurtful are actually their way of loving us, because the alternative is we're in relationship with someone who presents us, and so they're choosing to hold their boundary, they're choosing to honor their yes or no, not because of a disregard for us, but as a way of saying I love you and I savor this relationship and this is the best way that I can do that. Yeah, that was kind of what was on my heart today and I know many people needed that. So sending that out to all of you guys, sending you guys so much love and thank you, thank you for allowing me to share this quote.

Speaker 1:

It was really alive for me what I'm experiencing in my real life again, in big ways, but also in small ways. And every time I rehearse that line in my heart and say it again it brings a different perspective. Again not in a way of excusing what's happening around me. I still get to have my boundaries, I still get to have what I'm tolerating and what I'm not, but I don't have to let their words sting any more than they already do. I don't have to carry around a sting, right, a constant sting, when I think about them. I don't have to let them occupy space in my head.

Speaker 1:

I remember one time my mentor always said if you don't like them so much, why are you spending so much time with them? And I'm like I'm not, I'm like freaking, avoiding them. She's like maybe in reality, but in your head you're not. And I'm like, yes, that's so good. So I think part of you sort of choosing to see it with love, because the neighbor to love is curiosity. So if you're in the realm of love, it's pretty easy to access curiosity. Judgment, on the other hand, lives in the foreign country when it comes to love. So you can't access love and judgment together and, to be honest, at the way end. You win If you choose love. You win because your experience will feel enriching and empowering it's. You won't feel like you've let somebody walk all over you. You will hear the words, you will feel the sting. You will clearly decide this is a relationship you may not want to be pursuing anymore and you will continue to live on in your life without the sting of the words or the actions. That's part of this power of that quote. So I hope it blessed you in some way. Again, I'm sending you love and we'll see you next week.

Speaker 1:

Thank you so much for tuning in. If you liked this podcast, would you share it on social media and tag me at findherwildcoaching? I will give you a shout out and I just love to connect with my listeners. If you listen to it on Apple or Spotify and scroll all the way to the bottom, you can rate the show and even leave a review. Love, love, love rereading the reviews and just seeing what's really resonating for you guys. So I would greatly, greatly appreciate that. And then, before I let you go, I have such an exciting announcement. So on February 23, I will be hosting a free workshop. The name of the workshop is Heart-Led Communication. So coming in and learning how to communicate in a way that bridges connection versus separation, which is oftentimes the way that we communicate. We repel one another, and so we're going to talk about Heart-Led Communication, specifically within your marriage. So there's a free workshop. You can join by clicking the link in the show notes, and I hope to see you there.

The Power of Love in Relationships
The Power of Love in Relationships