Well fam, it’s episode 10 of the Unlock Your Life podcast. This is Lori, and I’m here to talk to you about building a stronger self-image. You need to have a great self-image in order to get to the next phase of your fantastic life. Let’s get going.

Welcome to the Unlock Your Life podcast, a podcast for highly successful visionary women who want more out of life. If you feel that ache of unfulfillment in your soul, you’re in the right place sis. Join life mastery consultant Lori A. Harris as she teaches you how to stop living for others and finally put yourself first. Let’s dive into today’s show.

So how are you doing? I’m doing really well. The biggest thing that’s happening with me right now is I changed my hair. I had a variation of the same hairstyle for almost 30 years. Maybe 26/27. Basically, I’ve worn my hair in a hairstyle for a very long time. I decided to make a radical shift. I cut all of my locks off, and I have a short natural now. And I changed my hair color, and I lightened quite a bit. So it’s pretty radical when people are accustomed to seeing you a certain way, describing you a certain way, and then you do something as drastic as cutting off all your hair.

I fundamentally believe it’s a very healthy thing for women to do. I wore my hair very short when I was much younger, and I remember what it was like to get in touch with seeing my face, my real face. No hair to distract and to look at my face on a regular basis, which was kind of a window into who I am and what I’m thinking about on a regular basis.

So have you ever done that? Have you ever done a drastic change in your appearance that caused you to self-reflect and remind yourself that you are not your body? You have a body, but you’re not your body. When’s the last time you checked in with yourself and remembered to love on yourself, the real you. That core center you. That’s what I’m going through right now. I’d love to hear about it from you. So let me know.

So this week we’re talking about building a stronger self-image. Building a bigger and stronger believing, a believing in ourself. We are designed to continue to grow and expand and have a more expansive life all throughout life. If you look at nature, you can see that it goes through a spiral of expansion and growth. That’s the typical indicator of life. We are designed to be the same way. We’re not supposed to just stay the same all the time. What makes us unique and special individuals is placed inside of us. So it’s our job to grow and explore and to find out more and reveal more of ourselves to ourselves.

When we tap into our heart’s desires, that thing that lights us up, that makes us want to do more, be more, have more is going to require a bigger self-image. So in order to have more, it’s important to constantly build and notice our thoughts and the way that we talk to ourselves. We want to build a powerful and strong self-image.

According to Maxwell Maltz, a famous author of The Magic Power of Self-Image Psychology. He was a plastic surgeon. What he discovered in his work was he could completely transform whatever it was on a person’s body that made them feel less than. That made them feel ugly or out of sorts or out of alignment or somehow not in sync. He could do the physical work on their body to tweak and bring more symmetry to a person’s face or facial features. He could do that work for them. He could do the physical work, but the mental work had to be done by the person themselves.

So I live in Los Angeles. So it’s not uncommon to see people on a regular basis who have had obvious plastic surgery. Some changes to their physical appearance in an effort to improve their physical appearance. Some of it is quite successful, but some of it goes a little bit too far and things become out of sorts, out of alignment, out of symmetry. It becomes very obvious that this person is grasping. Grasping for something that appears to them out of reach. So they continue to change their physical appearance in an effort to have something that they don’t yet have.

The truth is to be more, do more, and to have more is going to require some level of growth and some level of changing your self-image. We’re going to need to build a stronger sense of believing because we’re going towards something that we’ve never yet had, never yet done, never yet experienced. So it would be natural to feel a little bit of hesitation, to feel a little bit of doubt, and maybe even a little bit of fear. That would be normal too.

The voice of doubt, shame, and guilt can come into our heads at very inopportune times when we are building something new. It’s important to distinguish that voice and know that it’s not always your voice. That voice feels like it is coming from inside of you is actually an outside voice. That’s an outside voice that comes from societal conditioning, from the patriarchy, from white supremacy. There are images that we get in our daily media diet from television and radio and social media that will sometimes suggest to us that we are less than. Suggest to us that we are wrong the way that we are born, the way that we came into this world.

So it’s important for us to be conscious of that and confront it head on. Because whatever’s going on in our subconscious mind is going to direct our outward lives. So we need to be able to notice those voices when they bubble up and confront them with the truth.

Now if you’re like me, you probably grew up in a household where your family told you you can do anything you want. You can have anything you want if you’re willing to work hard for it. If you’re willing to do the work, you can have and be and experience anything you want. At first, I didn’t understand what they meant by the work. When I reflect back, I can remember that my very first personal development book was introduced to me at age four.

When I was a little girl, I spent most of my time with my mother. We lived on Guam, and my mom had taught me how to read by the time I was four. My first self-help book was introduced to me by my mom, and it was The Little Engine That Could. I recently just repurchased that book in honor of my mom because it has this message. The message is I think I can. I think I can. I think I can. I can remember my mom telling me, “You can do anything you want if you think you can.”

So if we remember the messages from our family, you can be, do, and have anything you want if you’re willing to work hard. Somehow, we’ve lost that message along the way, and we’ve confused the message of work hard. The work hard wasn’t get good grades, be a good student, work hard in getting extracurriculars in high school so you can have a fantastic college application. So that you can get into the right school. So you can do the right activities. So you can get a good internship. So you can get a good job. So you can get that, that, that, that. Whatever it is. That is not the hard work.

The hard work is to manage your mind and to stay in touch with your thinking, and to remember that first book. That first self-development, self-coaching you ever got was your mom standing on the other side of the room saying, “You can do it. Come here little baby. Walk to mama. Walk to me.” When you had that very first coach who was encouraging you to do it and telling you you can, it was, “Remember, believe that you can, and you will.”

So what’s the first step in building a bigger and stronger believing? Notice the thoughts that you’re thinking. When something comes in that kind of reflects a body shaming image or a negative image about your capabilities or what’s possible for you, confront it directly. Say, “Well, no. That’s not true. I’m merely growing. I’m going to take this first step.”

When you’re trying to do something new, it’s important to not get bogged down in the how of it all. How will you ever do all of those things in order to get to your destination? When you’re starting out, you don’t need to know all of the steps. You just need to know one. The first step. What’s one first step I could take in order to move my vision forward? And then take it.

When I say that, I know that that makes it sound overly simplistic. The decision to take the step in the direction of your dreams when you don’t know all of the steps can be daunting. Dr. King said, “I don’t have to know the whole stairway. I just have to get on that first step.” So you get on the ladder, that first rung. You keep going from there. Then you learn what the next step is when it’s time for you to take the next step. That next step will be revealed to you.

So I’ve got all the metaphors for you. The breadcrumbs, the rung on the ladder, the steps that you need to take. All of those things are true. All you have to do is step number one. Take that step with a sense of believing. A sense of knowing that it is going to work out. You don’t know how it’s all going to work out, but train yourself to believe that it is. Visualize success. Imagine what it would feel like if it were all working out. Put pictures together in your mind.

That’s how I prepare to do anything. I imagine what success looks like, and then I build a few pictures along the way. Signposts. It’s as if you were going on a trip, and you were going to drive from your current location to another location. You knew that there’s certain signposts along the way to get to your home, to your next location.

Now back in the day when I first bought my house, this is before we had MapQuest. Before we had Google and Waze and all the GPS devices that we’ve come to rely on. When I first bought my house, I would tell people how to get there, and I would give them sign posts. I would say you know you’re going in the right direction when you get to the 7-Eleven. Then you turn left. Then from 7-Eleven, you’ll come to the very first streetlight. At that streetlight, you turn right. Then you’re just gonna take one more left and then come to my house number. Then you’ll be there.

The same is true with life. You know you’re going the right direction when you see those signposts. These indications that I’m doing the right thing. I’m going the right direction. Then it’s important for you to celebrate those successes, to celebrate them as you go along.

So when you have a new idea, a new vision, a new dream, it’s important to build a sense of believing within yourself. To know what are the signposts that are going to tell me, “I’m going in the right direction along the way.” If I’m going in the right direction, what am I going to be doing? How am I going to be feeling? What’s it going to feel like? Smell like? Look like? Make sure you know those signposts.

Then when you see them, check them off as success. Check them off as I’m doing the right thing. Notice yourself going in the right direction. Visualize success. Then celebrate it as you continue to grow. Build on it, and then take time to notice the stories you’re telling yourself. Then do a truth check. Check in with yourself. Make sure that you’re telling yourself the truth. Be expectant.

One of the things that I love to tell my coaching clients is when you go to Starbucks, perhaps you have a signature drink. You tell the barista exactly what you want. You tell them. You make your order. Then you go to the end of the counter, and you expect to receive it exactly the way you ordered it with your name on it. So whatever is your signature drink, you go to the counter, and you order it. You don’t go behind the counter checking to make sure they’re doing it. Nope. You just walk to the end of the counter and expect to receive.

So in life, you can put in your order. You can ask boldly for the things that you would vote to have. Then you start being the kind of person that is receiving and living that life. You make decisions from that point of view. You act from that point of view. You do the things that that person does in order to have the life that that person has. You act like that person, and you do those things. Soon thereafter your life out pictures the things that are existing within your soul, your mind, your vision. Be the person that is being and then watch what happens.

Now one way you can build yourself up and build a stronger self-image is to check in with your friends. Ask them maybe on social media or start a text message thread. Ask them. If you were to describe me, how would you describe me? What’s three words you would use to describe me? Then have them give those back to you. Then you will learn how other people see you, your personality, your character, your skills, your talent. What kind of energy you bring to things. You can make a word cloud out of it, and keep it maybe as a screensaver on your phone. Think about it.

I’ve done this before. Most of my words that come back are authentic, loving, and fun. Sometimes sweet. Authentic, loving, and fun. Those are the words that people use often to describe me. It is helpful because it helps you keep going when you might feel discouraged.

So every time you think and say something critical about yourself, pause. Take a deep breath, and replace that critical thought or self-talk with self-complements. Make yourself a list of all of your 20 best attributes, and bring it back to mind whenever you feel low or feel tempted to be self-critical. Watch what happens. You will start the work of building a bigger believing. That is foundational to building an even better life than the one you have right now. Life can be great. Good is the enemy of great. We all want to live our very best life right here, right now in this moment. This is my invitation to you.

So we’ve done it again. We’ve reached the end of another episode of the Unlock Your Life podcast. I continue to celebrate the launch of my podcast. What I’m looking for from you is reviews. I’d love for you to tell me how you’re receiving the podcast. I recently received an email from a listener that said, “Oh my goodness. I’m crying listening to your podcast. Thank you for sharing your gifts. It’s incredible, and I’m sharing it with my family. The best part is I took a step immediately, something that I had been avoiding.”

So these are the kinds of things that really keep me going. I love hearing from my listeners. So what can you do to help this show grow and become an even better podcast? Go to loriaharris.com/podcastlaunch. Subscribe, follow, rate, and review this show. I would love to get a five-star review, but more importantly I want to hear your awesome feedback. Let me know what I can do to make this show even better and bring even more value to you and your life. Perhaps your family too. Thanks for listening. It’s your life. Make it a great one.

Thanks for listening to this episode of the Unlock Your Life podcast. If you want more information on how you can transform your life and do it quickly, visit loriaharris.com. See it on the next episode of the Unlock Your Life podcast.