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Hello and welcome to Find Yourself, Change Your Life. I'm your host, Mary Clavieres. This podcast is here to help you rediscover yourself and become the leader of your life, however you want that to look.

Something that I've been thinking about a lot recently is that it can feel really hard to tell when you're going through a change that is going to be such a life-altering change. I mean, in some ways you might be really aware because the process is painful, but in other ways you might not be able to see it until you look back. It's like hindsight 20/20 is a phrase for a reason.

As I work with leaders that are going through different types of transitions… changing jobs or getting expanded roles or leaving a job to start their own business, pivoting a business, there are points where the road can feel very hard, but when you're in it, you're not even really sure what to do next because you're just in it. And you can't kind of see through the trees.

I wanted to share a couple stories of what this process looked like for me and how I see it show up for other people, because it is a big deal to live your life in alignment with who you truly are, especially when the world around you is not really supportive with that process. It's much more about conformity and kind of fitting certain standards or fitting in a box or whatever the thing is.

"Is This All There Is?"

Years ago, I had about 15 years in corporate before I started my own business and then went out on my own. And in that time I was in manufacturing, very technical type of field, and really very much climbing the corporate ladder and working within the constructs of what it means to be in corporate America.

I remember one day… I can even picture exactly where I was. I was walking down the hallway. At the time, our offices were kind of on the ground floor, half between a basement and a regular level because of the way the outside sloped. I was in this ground floor hallway and I heard this voice say, "Is this all there is?"

And I was like, what? It was kind of like this can't be all there is, or is this all there is? Something like that. And I was like, what is happening? I just heard this, but it was so loud. It was so loud in my brain, in my being. It was an internal voice. Someone didn't actually walk by and tell me that.

I was so confused in the moment. I was like, huh, that's weird. And I was a completely different person back then. I had not remembered even a fraction of the things that I remember now, in the ways that I am being now. And you could say some of that comes from experience and years and age and all of those things. But there's another aspect to it of I was very much living in this very structured, follow this path, do these things type of way.

I heard this voice. I didn't think much of it, but it stayed with me. I mean, I still remember it vividly. It has stayed with me for quite some time. This was one of those experiences that you don't forget, because you're like, what is happening?

But at the time, I wasn't doing anything different. I wasn't even trying. I didn't think that I wasn't in alignment. I heard this voice and I just kind of was like, oh, that's weird. And then I went about my day. And over the years, I would think about it from time to time.

When Your Body Tells You

Years went by and then my job shifted. I started traveling a lot more doing internal consulting work. I eventually became a mom. Talk about a life-altering experience. All of these things started to happen and started to impact me and I eventually, after becoming a mom, I started a product business because I saw a need on the market for postpartum recovery.

I built it on the side. It was just something I said, women don't have the supplies they need for recovery. Why isn't this available? And I said, let me just bring it to market. I know manufacturing, I know supply chain and the process, and how hard can it be? Well, famous last words. But in some ways it wasn't that hard because I knew the process.

I was doing this side business and I still had my corporate job. And eventually the side business was growing a lot. And I was like, oh, I didn't really expect that. But it got a lot of traction and I started to feel the rub with my corporate job. And I started to feel that, actually, is this in alignment for me? Is this what I'm meant to be doing? And I remembered that voice from time to time. And I said, I'm searching for more meaning at this point.

I think we all get to this point in our lives through different things that happen to us, through different changes that we live through. And if we don't arrive in a certain way with a specific experience, it could be that then when we get to our 40s and 50s, we have more of what's known as the midlife crisis.

I personally believe that the midlife crisis is really just people waking up to recognizing that they're not in alignment and that they're searching for something different, or they want more meaning or purpose or any of those things. Can look different for different people, but that's all it is, really. It's that disconnect within them. And then they say, well, now it's time. They search for that connection.

For me, as I was doing all of this, I eventually—and I've shared some of this before—but the way that I knew that things were really not working for me anymore was when my body started to tell me.

And this brings me to a story of for the first time recognizing so much more about the mind-body connection in a way I hadn't before. One day I woke up with extreme pain in my mouth. I actually felt like all of my teeth were going to fall out. It was so bizarre, but I remember it and I woke up and I ran to the mirror in the bathroom because I was holding my jaw and I was like, what is happening?

I had to go to the dentist and have an emergency appointment. And basically he told me that I was grinding my teeth. And I had been for some time. And grinding teeth is usually a sign of stress.

There's so much that happens in sleep time and dream time. I want to do a podcast episode about this at some point too. There's so much that happens that our subconscious is trying to work through for us when we don't allow ourselves the space to do it during the day and during our waking hours. So it will do it for us during our sleeping time. And in this case, I was grinding my teeth, the stress, all of the things were processing. I was trying to process them all and it showed up in this way.

And this is where I really knew, our bodies are so wise and so powerful and we usually just use them on autopilot, taking them for granted. Pushing them through everything that we can push them through just so we can achieve the next thing that our human self wants us to achieve. And it's wild when you really see that and step back from it and say, oh wow, what's happening here?

Understanding Your Operating Manual

I share this because it's part of what happened for me for understanding my operating manual. And what my life was trying to tell me in different ways. We have the story of when I heard this voice about, is this all there is? And that was the first inkling of searching for that deeper meaning. And over the years it evolved. And I found deeper meaning with this side business that I had going on. And I was fine with that until my body actually told me, hey, this isn't in alignment anymore.

I had things at work that were happening that I was like, yeah, this is not my place anymore. This does not feel like who I am. I decided to eventually—my husband and I had a few talks, but one of them was really around this stress. And he was like, why are you doing this?

And it was something that I really spent a lot of time with because it can feel challenging to feel like you're kind of moving on from a certain identity. But that's what living in alignment is really about. It's about evolving your identity and finding those ways where you feel more like you and not who other people told you to be.

Because we all have our own manual. We all have our own path or blueprint, whatever you want to call it. We have our way that we want to work. We came here with certain gifts. We want to show up and do these certain things.

But then we also end up absorbing other people's manuals, if you will, and we start to take on their things and we use those as our templates. We get certain things from our parents, we get certain things from our teachers or friendships and relationships, and over the time we're just adding all of those in.

And it can be very easy to lose your own blueprint, your own manual, and you realize, oh, actually my manual is a compilation of all of these other people's manuals of who they want me to be and their expectations, or even if it's well-intentioned, their ideas, their beliefs, all of their things.

And this process that you're likely going through, if you're listening to this podcast right now, is a process of undoing all of that and getting back to your manual and who you are and how you want that to look.

reflection questions for living in alignment

How This Shows Up for Leaders

And it can feel very hard sometimes. I just want to name this. It can feel really challenging to do things or to try to step out of a certain way of being or a certain identity and step into something that feels more aligned to you when you're following your internal compass. It can feel disorienting, and it can feel scary, and it can feel like, oh well, what will people think?

But it's not about any of that. It's about who you are, and it's about honoring that and living in a way that appreciates that and respects it and welcomes it into your life.

This could be, I mean, if you've been building a business based on what you think will work or what the market wants in some way, and you wake up one day and you're burnt out. I've seen this with clients. You build a business, you spend all this time building it a certain way because you think it's really the way that you should do it. You wake up one day and you say, actually, this is not aligned for me at all. I don't like to work this way. My body is tired from trying to work this way.

It could be that you're offering a done-for-you service when really you're meant to hold space in a container. It can look so many different ways, but it's what happens on our journey is that we can get lost in what we think we should do instead of what really feels aligned for us.

It also shows up in work. I work with executives a lot, and sometimes there can be times as a leader when you end up taking on from other people, from taking on from your team, taking on their emotions, wanting to support them and having the best intention, but then taking on their emotions and their perspectives as your own instead of saying, wait, actually, is this mine or not?

Because if it's not mine, I will lead from a much better place when I identify that that's not mine and I put it to the side. I've had that happen with leaders, very well-intentioned. We want to show up and do well in our jobs and lead our teams in the ways that will support them. But it actually means checking in with communication and accountability and behaviors and values and all of those things to say, actually, am I showing up in a way that's aligned leadership? Or am I unintentionally taking things on in a way that makes me not aligned and then has me not show up correctly for my team?

Because when you take on all those emotions, it's going to cause you to be more stressed out or aggravated or overloaded, and you won't be able to guide people in the way you're meant to guide them. All of these things.

It shows up differently along the way. And I'm not saying, oh, you need to leave a corporate job. That's not what I'm saying at all. I'm saying, how can you check to see where you're in alignment and where you're not in alignment? And can you keep following your path? And can you keep staying true to yourself?

decision making session for living in alignment

Tools to Help You Get Back to Your Manual

One of the ways that I like to work with people on this—I have a few, but one of them is using a tool called Human Design. Human Design will show you a lot of how your energy works, how you're built before the world gave you all their different templates and manuals, and you made your patchwork of all of the different things.

There are ways to work through this. Any mind-body work is super helpful to start the awareness of the process of really looking at who you are. What is it that will help you stay true to you versus doing what other people want?

And I can tell you, when I felt like my teeth were falling out, I was not in alignment. I was not in alignment in a very big way, and it has completely changed my life to start to pay attention to that and work from that in a different place. And yes, geez, it's probably almost a decade ago now, and it keeps evolving and changing and shifting, but it's really a journey.

If you're feeling like you're in a tough spot or things feel challenging, trust yourself, trust the process, and try to embrace in whatever ways you can taking a few minutes for yourself, checking in with what you need, honoring your body, paying attention to it. All of these things may seem very small in the moment, but they really add up to something big. And over time, you will see that this process really can change your life deeply in so many ways.

Invitation to look into this for yourself and to figure out where you are on your journey and just knowing I'm here telling you there's a different way and you can trust yourself and you can love yourself through it and you can do it and you can work from a place that feels so much more aligned.

Even if you're already in a career that feels aligned for you, I would argue that there's other ways you can still feel deeper in alignment within that space. Or maybe it's how you're showing up at home with your family or something else.

There are tools if you want to take a look at your Human Design chart—you can get a free chart on my website. I also offer decision-making sessions where I speak through some of this stuff to help people with the mind-body connection and learn about how they make decisions so that they can use that to make more aligned choices.

But wherever you are right now is great. I just want to name that. And if you're looking to go deeper with it, there are ways to go deeper. So you're invited to check out any of my offerings if you feel called.

But just know you're on your path, you're listening to this for a reason, you're doing great. If you just needed a little bit of being seen, heard, and understood in a way, then I hope this episode helps you with that and serves that to you so that you know you're not alone in this process.

While it can be hard to choose to live in alignment, it really is the best thing you can do for yourself. Keep working on your own operating manual and how you feel and how you stay in alignment with self. Because really, truly that's where so much of the joy is within your life experience.