Turning Tragedy into Triumph: Using Improv for Emotional Fearlessness! With Rhonda Britten

Turning Tragedy into Triumph: Using Improv for Emotional Fearlessness! With Rhonda Britten

Are you tired of living in fear, constantly held back by self-doubt and past traumas? In this powerful episode, I sit down with Rhonda Britten, an Emmy Award-winning coach and bestselling author who has transformed countless lives through her groundbreaking work on fear. Rhonda shares her incredible journey from witnessing a horrific family tragedy to becoming a beacon of hope for millions.

We explore Rhonda’s innovative “Wheel of Fear” concept and how it can help you:

Uncover Your Hidden Fears

  • Identify your core fear and how it’s secretly controlling your life
  • Recognize fear responses that masquerade as personality traits
  • Break free from self-destructive patterns rooted in fear

Embrace Your Authentic Self

  • Discover your “Wheel of Freedom” and tap into your true potential
  • Learn practical strategies for living fearlessly in everyday situations
  • Cultivate self-acceptance and genuine connections with others

Transform Your Relationships

  • Handle challenging personalities with grace and understanding
  • Set healthy boundaries without guilt or fear of rejection
  • Create a supportive network that nurtures your growth

Rhonda’s wisdom extends far beyond simple motivational advice. She offers a comprehensive framework for understanding and overcoming the fears that hold us back, backed by decades of research and real-world application.

Whether you’re struggling with career decisions, relationship issues, or simply feeling stuck in life, this conversation provides invaluable insights to help you move forward. Rhonda’s compassionate approach and practical tools offer a roadmap to living the life your soul intended.

Don’t miss this opportunity to learn from a true expert in fearless living. Tune in now and take the first step towards breaking free from the chains of fear that have been holding you back!

Connect with  Rhonda Britten:
Website: https://fearlessliving.org/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rhondabritten/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/RhondaBritten
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rhondabritten/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rhondabritten/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@rhondabritten
X: https://x.com/rhondabritten
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/rhondabritten/

 

Connect with Dwight Heck:

Website: https://giveaheck.com (Free Book Offer)

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/give.a.heck

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dwight.heck

Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/Giveaheck

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@giveaheck

LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/dwight-raymond-heck-65a90150/
TikTok:https://www.tiktok.com/@giveaheck
X: https://x.com/give_a_heck

Chapter Summary of Episode(Full Unedited Podcast follows):

00:00:02
Introduction to Rhonda Britton: Emmy Award-Winning Life Coach
Dwight introduces Rhonda Britton, an Emmy award-winning life coach, author, and founder of the Fearless Living Institute. Rhonda’s background includes appearing on reality TV, authoring bestselling books, and developing innovative coaching techniques. The hosts engage in lighthearted banter before diving into the interview.

00:01:43
The Power of Laughter and Improv in Personal Growth
Rhonda discusses the importance of laughter and improv in personal development. She explains how improv exercises can help build trust, authenticity, and the ability to live in the moment. The conversation highlights how these skills translate to better communication and public speaking abilities.

00:06:27
The Value of Improv in Communication and Personal Development
Dwight and Rhonda discuss the benefits of improv classes for improving communication skills, authenticity, and personal growth. They emphasize how improv techniques can help people become more comfortable with themselves and others, leading to better relationships and professional success.

00:08:48
The Importance of Validation and Active Listening
The conversation shifts to the significance of validation and active listening in communication. Dwight and Rhonda discuss how these skills can improve relationships and personal growth. They emphasize the need to be present and engaged when interacting with others.

00:12:23
Creating Lasting Memories and Living in the Present
Dwight shares personal experiences about creating meaningful memories with family. Rhonda emphasizes the importance of overcoming fear to create connections and live authentically. They discuss how fear often prevents people from fully engaging in life and relationships.

00:14:21
Understanding and Overcoming Fear
Rhonda introduces her concept of the Wheel of Fear and Wheel of Freedom. She explains how fear operates in people’s lives and how understanding it can lead to personal growth. The discussion focuses on identifying core fears and learning to move past them.

00:20:39
Rhonda’s Origin Story: A Tragic Beginning
Rhonda shares her powerful origin story, detailing the tragic event of witnessing her father murder her mother and commit suicide when she was 14. She explains how this experience shaped her life and led to years of struggle with guilt, shame, and self-destructive behaviors.

00:28:44
The Journey to Healing and Self-Discovery
Rhonda describes her path to healing, including her realization that she needed to start over. She explains how she began giving herself “gold stars” for positive actions and eventually discovered her purpose in helping others overcome fear. The conversation emphasizes the importance of self-forgiveness and personal growth.

00:31:53
The Power of Forgiveness in Personal Growth
Dwight and Rhonda discuss the importance of forgiveness in personal development. They emphasize that forgiveness can be an internal process and doesn’t always require direct interaction with the person who caused harm. The conversation highlights how letting go of past hurts can lead to personal freedom.

00:36:00
Understanding Fear Responses and Building Relationships
Rhonda explains how understanding fear responses can improve relationships and self-awareness. She discusses the importance of seeing others’ behaviors through the lens of fear, which can lead to greater empathy and better communication. The conversation emphasizes personal responsibility in managing reactions to others.

00:40:40
Practical Strategies for Managing Fear and Building Confidence
Dwight shares personal strategies for managing fear and building confidence. The discussion focuses on practical techniques like self-reflection, creating supportive communities, and developing a positive mindset. They emphasize the importance of taking small steps towards personal growth and overcoming fear.

00:45:25
Rhonda’s Wheel of Fear and Freedom Concept
Rhonda elaborates on her Wheel of Fear and Wheel of Freedom concept. She explains how understanding one’s core fears and negative patterns can lead to personal transformation. The discussion covers how to identify fear responses and shift towards more positive, freedom-oriented behaviors.

00:56:45
Attractiveness and Self-Acceptance
Dwight and Rhonda discuss how self-acceptance and authenticity can make a person more attractive and magnetic. They emphasize that true attractiveness comes from being comfortable in one’s own skin and living authentically. The conversation highlights how personal growth can positively impact relationships and social interactions.

01:03:19
Living with Purpose and Creating a Legacy
The discussion turns to the importance of living with purpose and creating a lasting legacy. Rhonda shares her motivation to help others live fulfilling lives, inspired by her mother’s unfulfilled dreams. They emphasize the importance of self-reflection, gratitude, and taking action to live a meaningful life.

Full Unedited Transcript of Episode:

[00:00:02 – 00:01:24]
Good day and welcome to give a hack on today’s show, I welcome Rhonda Britton. Rhonda is an Emmy award winner, repeat Oprah guest and master coach, has changed lives in over 600 episodes of reality television, authored four bestsellers, including her seminal work Fearless Living and It’s translated into 16 languages. And founded the Fearless Living Institute, home of fearless Living life coach certification program considered the Ivy League of life coaching training. Rhonda was the first life coach on television in the world and appeared for three seasons as the head life coach on the hit daytime NBC show Starting Over. Rhonda was named its most valuable player by the New York Times and heralded as America’s best favorite life coach. She brings the neuroscience of fear down to earth, giving you a path out of not being good enough. Using the wheels technology she developed that saved her own life. She’s been read, heard and watched by millions, coached tens of thousands of clients, trains hundreds of coaches, and now wants to share all she knows with you. I’d like to welcome you to the show, Rhonda. Thanks so much for agreeing to come on and share with us some of your life journey.

[00:01:24 – 00:01:29]
My pleasure. I love it. Thank you so much for having me. I can’t wait.

[00:01:29 – 00:01:34]
I can’t wait either. This is going to be amazing. Buckle up, listeners.

[00:01:34 – 00:01:36]
Buckle up.

[00:01:36 – 00:01:39]
Yeah, hopefully those in a car, you’re already buckled up.

[00:01:39 – 00:01:43]
Yeah. Hopefully you’re buckled up and everybody in the car is buckled up with you.

[00:01:43 – 00:01:50]
Yes. Yes. And those watching, I hope you’re not watching while you’re driving. Do it at home. Do it in the comfort of your.

[00:01:50 – 00:01:58]
Dog because we are both really cute. You know, we’re really cute. So if you haven’t watched and you’re listening, I think you need to get that video out if you can, because we’re both really cute.

[00:01:58 – 00:02:15]
Yeah. Yeah. But to be honest, one has a level of cuteness higher than the other, and it isn’t me. It will even go so far as to say one’s actually beautiful, one’s kind of just tolerable. We’ll let you. We’ll let you make that decision when you look.

[00:02:16 – 00:02:17]
Oh, my God. So hysterical.

[00:02:18 – 00:02:21]
You know what? Humor is good for your heart. Hubris.

[00:02:21 – 00:02:23]
Absolutely. Absolutely.

[00:02:23 – 00:02:26]
I’d rather make. I’d rather make people laugh than cry. Is that okay?

[00:02:26 – 00:02:40]
Yeah, absolutely. Well, there’s this improv, this improv thing that I do with my coaches and all the improv players out there will know it. But basically you put your hand out and you act like it’s a Cup, right? So improv is all about imagination. So you have to create a world.

[00:02:40 – 00:02:41]
So.

[00:02:41 – 00:03:37]
So you put a. You. You put your hand out and you pretend there’s a cup in it. And then you. The cup. What’s in the cup is laughing juice, okay? And so whenever you want to laugh, you just pour your laughing juice in your cup, and then you start drinking it, right? You drink it and then you go. And I. Sometimes at workshops, I do this, or with my coaches, I do it. And, you know, people are looking at me like, this is stupid. This is just the stupidest thing ever. And I’m like, yeah, stupid, that’s right. We got to be comfortable feeling stupid or we’ll never take a risk. So feeling stupid is good. So. But they do it. And then, of course, I start laughing, somebody else starts laughing, and then you know how laughing is contagious? So that grumpy old person over there that’s like, stupid is all of a sudden laughing. So you can laugh anytime you want. Just pour some laughing juice in your cup, drink it up, and laugh away.

[00:03:37 – 00:04:14]
Oh, that’s so true. I love that. And improv is great. As a side note, I have a good friend of mine, mentor, that’s helped me with my branding and. And just, you know, increasing and helping me level and climb constantly about life. And he’s. He’s. He’s a master at. What’s that speaking program that people take all the time. Oh, I can’t remember where they teach him how to speak. And then he’s gone and taken improv classes, and he’s done all this stuff, all to make him a better presenter, a better speaker, a better human to know when, what to do at the right time.

[00:04:14 – 00:06:27]
Well, I wish that every school in America and beyond would teach junior high students improv, because what improv does is it actually teaches you how to trust yourself. Because in improv, you have to go 100% in whatever you’re. Whatever you’re visioning, whatever you’re making up, whatever’s in the moment. You have to trust yourself. So improv is an incredible thing to do. I don’t care what your age is to take a class. Don’t take a professional acting class. Just go to your community college or something. And then the other thing is, you’re bringing up a really good point, Dwight, is. I had. I have people. I teach keynote. I teach people how to give keynotes. I help people craft their speeches. I help. I review keynotes to give them feedback to make it better. And the number one advice I always give is, if you want to be a better keynoter, go take an improv class. Because the difference between a speaker that’s compelling, what makes a speaker compelling, makes a human being compelling, is their ability to live in the moment. That’s what makes them compelling. Right. So what is it? What helps you live in the moment? Improv. If you’re not comfortable trusting your instincts and moving forward, take an improv class. And I’ve had so many of my coaches because I have, you know, again, I have that speaking class and the training class to teach them how to do workshops and give keynotes. I give each one of them the advice. I’d say, go and take an improv class. Go and do it, and it will always make you a better speaker. Always. I had one, one of my coaches, take an improv class, and he ended up doing improv for, like, five years and was in shows and everything. It was fantastic. Yeah, it was so great. But he’s. He is. He had all the raw talent and he had the intellect and he had the crafting of a speech, but, you know, he was stiff. Right? It’s stiff. And. And I don’t know about you, but the more authentic I am, the more loose I am. Right. I’m not stiff. Right. So if you’re feeling like you’re holding yourself back in, if you feel like you’re walking around with your arms by your side, a way to actually do it in a fun way to start loosening up is improv class. And that would be a fearless act, you know? And by the way, my. My st. My coach who went to. Took classes, I think was like 60 or 65 when he started.

[00:06:27 – 00:06:48]
Wow. But you know what? Out of that conversation, the thing that intrigues me the most is the fact that more than I shouldn’t say intrigues me, but more than one person has told me improv is great. And at the end of the day, those that don’t understand why just think improv is something that they’ll give you an idea, and you’re doing it off the cuff. You could be on a stage.

[00:06:49 – 00:07:04]
You literally have to say, okay, give me. Give me a movie. Okay. You know, and somebody names a movie and something else, and you’re what city? And then you have to. You have to match the two. You have to match the city. You have to create a world.

[00:07:05 – 00:07:05]
Yes.

[00:07:05 – 00:08:15]
And one of the key factors of improv is you can never say no. You can never deny. So that’s where if you hear in the personal development movement or speakers Say yes. Yes. And that’s where that comes from. The improv world is where. Yes and comes. So I’ve been on an improv stage because I’ve done it. Did improper years. Maybe they made the sky, you know, rainbow. Maybe the sky was purple. Maybe the sky, you know, whatever they made the sky or the sun was, you know, a different color. It was black, red. Yeah. Whatever it was. Right. Whatever they said, you have to say, yes and yes, I see it. And you know, so you must validate. And that alone is one of the most important communication steps you can learn. To listen to another human being, to allow them to feel heard, is you validating them. So when I’m coaching somebody, I don’t care what they say to me. I don’t care what they say to me. I say, aha, yes, Yes, I understand. Because they need to know that they’re not crazy, stupid, you know, lost, etc, that. Yes, I hear you. I know exactly what you’re saying. I. I understand it. And then you can go and let’s look at it this way. Or right. So. Yes.

[00:08:15 – 00:08:44]
And this issue, though, in society where people are seeking validation is because they’ve never. Most of them have never been validated or validated the right way. So you bring up a valid point. Validation is so important to acknowledge somebody isn’t. Is also eye contact. It’s being able to have them share with you and be able to actually communicate back with them. Not while you’re sitting in your brain thinking, that’s right. I wish they’d shut up so I could talk.

[00:08:44 – 00:08:48]
Your life not in your brain. Your life is not in your brain.

[00:08:48 – 00:09:48]
You’re actually listening and ab. Absolutely able to communicate. I know you talk about improv. For myself, one of the best things that helped me become a better listener is doing virtual stuff like podcasting the last seven, eight years, dealing with clients from all over the place. Right. Because when I have my headset on and I’m listening to Rhonda, I want to make sure I don’t miss anything. I want to be encapsulated. May sound silly, but encapsulated in you and hearing what you have to say and developing my brain to still have the thought of what I want to do after you’re done. Right. Starting to bullet point in my brain. Oh. Or on paper, like I do with a pen. Things that I want to respond to what you’re saying, but making sure that I do it in a tactful, kind way. So I’m always engaged and becoming a better listener. You Know, like that old adage, if you could tell your 18, 19 year old self something that would, you know, change your life if you knew it back then. Be a better listener.

[00:09:48 – 00:09:50]
That’s engaged. That’s right.

[00:09:50 – 00:10:01]
Be validating, be empathetic. When you say something, Be genuine. You know what I mean? Things I taught my kids, which, you know, drives. Drove them nuts. Now they actually practice it.

[00:10:01 – 00:10:29]
So I always say, I don’t care if my kids hate me. They’re gonna love me when I’m 30. I have two stepchildren and so, you know, I don’t care. Like, I, I had no. Because again, they’re stepchildren. I had no problem disciplining them because it’s like, yeah, I don’t care if they like me. Don’t, don’t give a crap one bit. Because I know they’re gonna love me when they’re 30, when they have their own kids. And I’ve taught them something like, you’re saying that is so valuable, but they don’t understand it right now. But that’s okay. Go ahead and hate me. Really okay with that?

[00:10:29 – 00:11:16]
Oh my gosh. Like I get together with family commitments, like, you know, not. I shouldn’t say commitments, poor choice of words. Family gatherings and stuff. Like outside family gatherings. Like, I know you have that, you know, teaching people what happens if you have to go and deal with families and stuff. I do the same thing, but I love it like the Christmas time when I’m sitting around on Christmas Eve and with my parents, they’re both still alive in their 80s, and I have all the kids around, I have my kids, my grandkids, and we’re all hanging out and just having that communication, that authenticity that most people lack and just connecting with them and, and having those little moments where you whisper like you were saying, I whisper the grand grandson. Like, wow, you’re so great at Lego. How do you get to be so creative?

[00:11:16 – 00:11:19]
Or you love school. You love school.

[00:11:19 – 00:11:19]
Yeah.

[00:11:19 – 00:11:23]
You love learning and growing. Put stuff in their brain.

[00:11:23 – 00:12:23]
Well, yeah, just, just feeding the moment so that you can live the moment, the memory. For me, life is all about memory creation, but living in the present. I teach being a financial planner. I teach people to plan for the future. Most planners just teach them to plan for retirement. I teach them to plan for living a better today in comfort. You know, retire in comfort and die with dignity. And people are going, what? That’s, that’s weird. Why would you do that? Well, life’s in session. This is a, this is not a dress rehearsal. Is one of my favorite statements. I tell people that, don’t look at me. What do you mean? Life is in session. This is not a dress rehearsal. Do you think that if we don’t, if we don’t get past your, your monsters, your life monsters and your money monsters, that anything I help you do is going to stick? Is it going to make you feel better if you don’t understand it? Oh, let the wife take care of it. Let the husband take care of it. Right. You know, you have to be engaged in life, people watching or listening. This is not a dress rehearsal. Right.

[00:12:23 – 00:12:24]
Even if it’s not a dress rehearsal.

[00:12:24 – 00:12:40]
Even if you’re a single kind of strange, handsomely looking dude like me, you still have the ability to do stuff. But, you know, you look at improv, I think of my grandkids now, that’s the ultimate improv, right?

[00:12:40 – 00:12:40]
That’s right.

[00:12:41 – 00:13:28]
All of a sudden can snap their fingers and go from this to that and just make up the world. And I was like as a, a young dad, I used to. My kid, my son just told me that recently and it’s so great to hear memories. His dad, you’re one of the best people at making stories up. I remember it as a kid. It was one of my, I treasure the most, one of my treasured memories. And he just told me this recently at 25, and I’m just going, wow, I didn’t realize that had impacted you like that. Well, you made me believe, you made me dream, you made me think outside of things. And, you know, we got to a point where you wouldn’t even read out of books anymore, Dad. I just say, hey, dad, and you pick one of the storylines I had started and I start a new chapter. And it wasn’t. I didn’t practice it, I just did it because it was genuine connection to him and what he wanted. And it was what I wanted, a memory.

[00:13:28 – 00:14:19]
Yes, but most people are afraid to do that because they’re afraid of looking dumb or they’re afraid of being rejected or they’re afraid of, you know, that their kids are going to laugh at them or they’re afraid their kids are going to think they’re a, B or C. Right. So so many people miss connections and miss that opportunity to create that memory out of fear. So it’s, it’s. That is where my work is, is like, how can we, like you said, you know, remove the monsters. Right? I call it the Wheel of Fear. How do we, how do we build a relationship with that so that we can have the courage and the fortitude and learn the skills that are necessary to do what you’re describing, which is create those memories, create a living legacy, you know, live in the moment, you know, validate others without feeling threatened. Because validating others for many people is a threatening act. So. But can you validate without it being about you? Right, so.

[00:14:19 – 00:14:21]
Oh, that’s the key right there.

[00:14:21 – 00:16:04]
About you. Yeah. Things take courage, they take a. They could take a willingness to get beyond yourself and to really face your fears of your needing love. And again, we all need love. But that fear of I’m going to get rejected, I’m gonna. There’s gonna be failure, I’m gonna, I’m gonna be seen as stupid, I’m gonna be wor. I feel worthless, etc. Etc. Etc. Fear of rejection, fear of failure, fear of success, fear of loss, fear of laziness, etc. So all of those fears, those emotional fears are what drive too much of our behavior and because we’re unconscious of it, we’re not able to actually shift it. And a lot of self help, personal development is lovely and wonderful and teaches skills and tools and wonderful. I love it. And rarely are you really understanding or anybody really understanding how fear operates. It’s one of the things that I love to do and out of my own necessity had to learn how to map fear. So that’s what I do for people. I map fear. I chart their fear so that they can actually see their fear on a map, get really clear about it, so that then when it happens, they’re not shocked, they’re not surprised, they’re not off their game. Right? And more importantly, you have another map called the Wheel of Freedom, right? So here’s the Wheel of Fear land. And here’s the Wheel of Freedom Land. I’m going to teach you to get on that boat and go on over that water and get to the Wheel of Freedom. So you know everything we’re talking about here, taking an improv class, I’m sure people are listening right now and going, I would never do that. If your first response is I would never do that, that is not authentic. That is your fear talking. That you, you, you, a genuine human being would go like, do I want to do that? Huh? Is that something that would, that would be valuable for me. But if your first response is I, I could never do that. Just know that’s fear talking. That’s not you talking, that’s fear.

[00:16:05 – 00:17:05]
But even an improv class or any class like that, a lot of what people forget though is it may teach them a skill, it may teach them to climb outside of that fear. It also gives them associations of people that are similar, based in thought processes. And it can create a community that people don’t understand. So if you’re that person listening, thinking, I could never do improv. I could never do any of the. Anything that you’ve thought about doing, do it. Get. No success has ever been achieved in our comfort zone. Come on. Outside of our comfort zone sucks. You might have to put a band aid on your skin knee along the way. But at the end of the day, creating a community of like minded individuals is difficult. But it’s not difficult, right? It’s difficult in the sense that your 6 inches between your ears is going to be your biggest enemy and your biggest cheerleader. Which side do you decide that you want? You want the cheerleader side to say, rhonda can do it and you take class.

[00:17:06 – 00:19:03]
So those that are listening just, just stop and ask yourself, do you have enough support? Because that’s what you’re really talking about. Dwight is like, do people have support? And most people, sadly, research shows that they have one person and many people have nobody that they really. They might have people in their life, but they don’t feel that they’re supported or unconditionally loved or you know, validated by people in their life. They might have a lot of people, but nobody that I would call a fear buster. Somebody who’s really there and has your back. So in order to create that community like you’re saying, Dwight, that takes a fearless act, right? That takes a willingness to go. You know what? My need for connection is more important than my fear. My need for connection, I’m willing to pursue and to embrace. My need for connection more than my fear tells me I’m afraid of it. Right? I don’t, I don’t want to take that risk. I don’t want to take that class. I don’t want to go to that social event. I don’t want to, you know, A, B or C. I don’t want to talk to that person. Your willingness. The only way that anybody gets connected is by taking a stretch risk or die. What I call stretch risk or die outside your comfort zone. So you have so much power, People have so much power. So much. Most people do not access or know how to access. And I want everyone listening right now to really take in that you are so powerful, you are truly in charge of your destiny, like literally. And I’m not joking. So I don’t care what your background is I’ll tell you about mine in a minute. But I don’t care what your background is, I don’t care where you’ve come from, I don’t care what your situation is right now. The only reason that you’re not satisfied, content, connected, feel you, feel loved, etc. Etc. Feel empowered is because of fear. So my job and my opportunity is to, to support you in seeing that, you know, fear isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. And it’s actually not keeping you safe at all. It’s keeping you isolated.

[00:19:03 – 00:20:38]
Oh, absolutely. We’re going to get into that, further into the conversation. But you’re right, we’re going to. My listeners are probably going, come on, Dwight. Usually go to the origin story. Lately though, I’ve had such great guests on that. It’s just been. The conversation starts and I go, oops, oops. I say it twice to myself, bad Dwight. Bad Dwight. Anyway, my listeners are probably laughing. Viewers are watching. I just smacked my hand. I, I give myself that little wake up call to get back on track. And I’m not apologizing because that wouldn’t be a unique me, right? So, Rhonda, we talked about this initially, our origin story. I absolutely love people’s origin story. My whole business is surrounded around getting to the meat and potatoes of people’s origin to understand what makes them tick, what helped them get where they’re at, what helped them stay stuck, what helped them, you know, what do they need, how can I support them and making it about their journey and that they have to make the decision, their, their sacrifices, their, you know, whatever they’ve achieved is them. I’m just a catalyst, I’m a mentor to help them. And I just absolutely love people’s origin story. My own book starts out the same way. My podcast starts out the same way because I love knowing people. So, Rhonda, do us a, do us a wonderful favor and please tell us your origin story. From your earliest recollections to your, where you are today. Whatever you feel like sharing, I just want to know. Share away, please.

[00:20:39 – 00:23:43]
Well, I will tell you about the worst day of my life because I do believe that the worst day of your life has the seed of your destiny. So we want to start shifting how we see the worst days of our lives. So your worst day, my worst day had the seed of my destiny. I didn’t know it at the time. It took me over a decade, two decades to really understand that. But now looking back, you know how we can look back? We can reflect and go, oh, yeah, that definitely was the seed of my destiny. So, just FYI, think of your worst days as seeds of destiny. So I’m gonna tell you about my worst day. I was 14 years old, and I grew up in a little, tiny, tiny town in upper Michigan. It got 365 inches of snow a year. But at two restaurants. The Douglas House Buffet Hotel in Big Boy. We didn’t have any McDonald’s. We didn’t have anything fancy like that. And my parents were in the middle of separating. They were getting a divorce. And it was Father’s Day. And so my mother was in the bedroom sprucing herself up, getting her blue eyeshadow on, rose color lipstick, fluffing up her beehive. Because my father was coming over. He was no longer living in the house, was coming over to take us out to Sunday brunch. Now, three kids, two adults, that’s five people. That’s a lot of money. So we, we never went out. Like, I don’t remember ever going out to a restaurant ever growing up. So this was a big deal that he was going to take us to the fancy Douglas House Hotel. And that means it had a buffet, and that means the boys in my grade were going to be there. So I. My mother made me a brand new dress. It was white cotton. I had a beautiful. She made me a scarf that went along with it. White scarf with black polka dots. And I wrapped it around my neck like I was Barbra Streisand for the younger people, like Beyonce or Taylor Swift. And I could not wait to flirt with the boys my age. So I was very excited to go because again, this is a very, very rare event. So my dad comes knocking at the back door, walks in. Come on, come on, girls, let’s go, let’s go, let’s go. Because that’s what dads do. My two sisters are in the bathroom, Our one bathroom, biting it out. Me and my mom start walking towards the back door, and my father notices it’s starting to sprinkle. So he goes, oh, I got to get my coat from the car. Now, this coat was a tan Nagahide leisure suit coat. And for those who are old enough to remember, that was hot. That was hot looking. And my father goes to his trunk. My sisters are still in the bathroom fighting it out. Me and my mom are walking out. My father’s opening his trunk. And I notice that he is not grabbing a coat from his trunk. He is actually grabbed a gun. And he starts yelling at my mother, you made me do this. You made me do this. And he fires. And I start yelling, dad, what are you doing? Dad, what are you doing? Yell, dad. Dad, what are you doing? And he cocks the gun again, points the gun at me. And I think I’m next. He blinks, I blink, he blinks, I blink, I blink, he blinks. And we’re frozen in time. And my mother, literally, with her last breath, screams out, no, don’t. And my father, realizing my mother is still alive, takes that bullet intended for me, points it at my mother and shoots her through the abdomen. And that bullet goes through her abdomen, out her back, lands in the car horn. And for the next 20 minutes, all I hear is.

[00:23:45 – 00:23:45]
Wow.

[00:23:45 – 00:28:43]
My father cocks the gun again, puts the muzzle to his head and fires. So in a matter of less than two minutes, I was the sole witness of watching my father murder my mother and commit suicide in front of me. Now, I don’t know how most people would react, but this is how I reacted. I blamed myself. I was the only one physically out there that could have done something different. I did not kick my father shin. I did not grab the gun. I did not jump in front of my mother. So from that moment on, when you watch your mother die and you did nothing, you don’t get to be happy. Happiness is off the table. The other thing that happened in that moment is I basically started to divide myself in two. The outside Rhonda and the inside Rhonda. The outside Rhonda. I’m fine. I’m fine, I’m fine. No, I’m fine. No, I’m fine. I’m fine, I’m fine. The inside Rhonda. Guilt, shame, demoralized self esteem. No permission to be happy. No permission to have anything good happen to me because I did not stop this thing. So for the next 20 years, I struggled. There’s this inside, outside Rhonda. I wanted to get help. I wanted to support myself. I knew that what I experienced was bad and wrong and horrible. But everything I did, you know, the books I read, the workshops, because I’ve always been a self help junkie. I read my first self help book when I was 12. So I was. And I wanted to be a minister when I was 13. So I. I was reading books, workshops, and went to therapy and did all these things and it gave me a lot of skills and tools which were lovely, but they never took away the feeling that I was not good enough. So while I was doing all this stuff on the outside, trying to find help in the inside, I was Destroying myself. I had started drinking. I became an alcoholic. I got three DUIs, and I tried to kill myself three times. And it was that third suicide attempt when I realized something. I’m not very good at killing myself. Not skilled at it. And oh, by the way, when you try to kill yourself three times, they do put you in a psychiatric ward for evaluation. So I went to the psychiatric ward. I was like this little tiny, little tiny cell locked down. And they deemed me not crazy and sent me back to my little studio apartment. And by the way, after the psychiatric ward, going to your little apartment studio by yourself is not a good idea. But there I am in my apartment, and I realize, you know, I’m not dying. I’m not dying. I’m not dying. And everything I’ve tried is not working. It’s not taking away the feeling that I’m not good enough. No matter how many skills or tools I’ve learned, I still have this, this gut. And just the whole feeling that there is something seriously wrong with me. So my, I lean back on the wall in my apartment, and you know how you slide down that wall and fell on my butt, you know, landed on my butt. And I said to myself, I have to start over. I, I, I, I have to start over. And I thought, well, how do you start over? What do they do in kindergarten? I remember that so vividly. What do they do in kindergarten? Well, they get a calendar with gold stars. Well, I need a calendar with gold stars. I took myself to the store, bought a calendar of gold stars. And what I did for the next 30 days is I gave myself a gold star. For any time that I did anything worthwhile, anything positive, any shift at all, any small, tiny thing, I gave myself a gold star. And we’re not talking like, amazing gold stars. I’m talking about got, you know, drank and didn’t break anything, right? I’m talking about, you know, didn’t sleep with somebody that night, Right? Like, I’m talking about not healthy behaviors. But, man, I was making improvements. And at the end of 30 days, my calendar was filled with gold stars. And I knew there was hope. I knew there was a reason to stay alive. I knew that I was here for a reason. I didn’t know why yet, but I knew that I was supposed to be here. So that journey, that, that 20 years of crawling through glass and living basically one life on the outside because I got a full ride to college, you know, I got a scholarship. I was class president. I played basketball. I went to state for track. Like, like on the outside, I looked like I was fine. I looked like I was fine. Yet on the inside, I was living a life that was anything but. You were seen on the outside. And to integrate those two beings, to heal myself, to move forward with myself, I had to admit that I was afraid. Now, I grew up in Upper Michigan, like I said, and I’m Finnish, from 100 Finnish and upper Michigan. And being finished, you don’t feel. You don’t have emotions, you don’t. You don’t talk about them. So just being willing to start admitting I have feelings. And, and during those 20 years, if you would have asked me if I was scared, even after my parents died, even the day after my parents died, if you would have asked me if I was scared, I would have said no, because I never believed that I was afraid. I never believed that I was scared. I just believed that I was flawed.

[00:28:44 – 00:28:49]
But how many of us, though, in life have that facade, though? We present.

[00:28:49 – 00:28:50]
Most of us.

[00:28:50 – 00:28:54]
Yeah, exactly. We present being all right.

[00:28:54 – 00:28:54]
Yes.

[00:28:54 – 00:28:56]
But inside we’re dying.

[00:28:56 – 00:28:56]
Yes.

[00:28:56 – 00:29:31]
We. We become that person. And I’ll use parenting as an example. I go to bed when the kids are really young and quiet, desperation, not knowing how I was going to pay the bills, you know, get an ex client, just get ahead, get them to all their extracurricular. And I. I’d lay in bed, couldn’t sleep. I’d wake up the same way if I did sleep, and then I’d put on. Put on the mask of happy dad. Everything’s just lovely. And when I was dying inside and, you know, so your. Your story, though very unique, is sadly, so many of us.

[00:29:31 – 00:31:15]
That’s right. And we live these two lives and the work that I do and the work that I was destined to do, but I didn’t know it. And definitely when it first got presented to me, I was like, you’re crazy. I can’t do that. Because I believed, you know, I. I was working with one of the very first life coaches. I owned my own little PR agency. I worked with solo entrepreneurs, and he was one of my clients. And he would say to me, oh, you’re going to be a better coach than me. And I’d look at him. I go, don’t you remember the suicide attempts and the DUIs and the alcoholism? Nobody’s going to listen to me. I believed that I had that tattooed right on me. And I absolutely 100% believed that nobody would want to get coached by me or listen to me or read something of mine that was off the table. And he would just say to me on a regular basis, oh, you’re going to be a better coach than me. You’re going to be a better coach than me. And I would look at him like he’s a crazy person. Because don’t you remember, again, the suicide attempts, the DUIs and the alcoholism. And I think that also is so many people that we believe that our past is who we are, and my past is not who I am, and your past is not who you are, and those listening to your past is not who you are. So allowing that shame, admitting I have fear, letting that shame be released through the act of forgiveness, which was so vital to my future. And of course, getting sober was a very important decision. But forgiving my father, which was the easiest person to forgive, then forgiving my mother, which was harder to forgive, and then forgiving myself, of course, which was the hardest of all, doing that forgiveness work, admitting I had fear, that I was afraid, that I was run by fear, were the turning points of me eventually becoming who I am today and doing what I do today.

[00:31:15 – 00:31:53]
The forgiveness part of what you just said, there’s so many other points I wrote down, but that is what I want to key on in that part of the conversation. So many people don’t think they can forgive without approach, meaning that they have to approach somebody. That’s not true. You can. You can have. I had a forgiveness coach on. That’s all she focuses on. And I knew a lot of what she talked about, but oh, my gosh, she opened my eyes up too. And since then, that was only like four or five months ago, I’ve learned to release those in my life that are not some of them. 15, 20 years. Forgive. Right? Forgive.

[00:31:53 – 00:31:56]
That’s right. Without having to approach daily forgiveness.

[00:31:56 – 00:32:34]
Yeah. People understand. Those listening are watching. You can forgive somebody without. Even if you were the catalyst or the consequence that was created by your own hands or your words or whatever you can forgive them for and forgive yourself and move on, because we. We. Oh, that person did that to me. And you sit around a coffee table with coffee or drink and a bunch of people, and they’ll. They’ll tell stories about somebody that hurt them 12, 15 years ago. They’ve never let go of it. It’s still, well, this. And that’s the same story the next time you see them, because they have. They’re caught on that hamster wheel. They just can’t.

[00:32:34 – 00:32:35]
That’s right.

[00:32:35 – 00:32:36]
Get off.

[00:32:36 – 00:36:00]
That’s right. That’s right. And. And this is one of the huge benefits of Understanding how fear works, I’ve developed to a mental model called the Wheel of Fear and Will of Freedom. One of the great benefits of understanding how fear works is, is you also see how fear works in others. You start seeing their bad behavior through the eyes of fear. You get that they did that out of fear. It wasn’t because of you. You didn’t, they didn’t do it to you, right? That person that hurt you so bad, it wasn’t to you. Even though it impacted you, even though it impacted you, it was driven by their fear. They didn’t know how to respond to their fear besides attack. I actually had a friend of mine, a long term friend of mine recently do this to me. I was at, I was with her and all of a sudden we’re leaving. I’m, you know, we’re like, bye, you know, bye, see you later. And all of a sudden she just started yelling at me and I’m like, what, what’s going on? You know, what’s happening here? And she’s like, you’re not a good friend. And I’m thinking to myself, not a good friend. I think you’re, I’m the one that you call when you got robbed. And I think I’m the house that you sleep in when you’re scared. And I think I take care of your dog. And you know, I mean it. It was so, but so insane that she was telling me I’m not a good friend, right? Like, like it’s so, so mind boggling, right? And but in that moment she had a need. She was afraid and she lashed out even though it hurt. And I actually started crying because it was just so shocking and so painful. But I also knew this wasn’t me, this wasn’t about me. Now mind you, did I do a self inventory? Yes. Did I go, huh? What did I do that she would say that, like, was there something I did? You know, And I kind of went through my like. And you know, there’s a couple things that I thought, well, maybe that’s it, maybe that’s it. But what, but, but putting those things aside, you know, like, yes, that I have to self examine in order to be like, well, how can I be a better friend? But more importantly, just understanding that she has an unfulfilled need. That one I didn’t recognize that she didn’t recognize that we didn’t know existed. And she did not have any other way to communicate that need except lashing out and telling me I’m not a good friend. And so people do that not because you’re a bad person. Right. Or they’re trying to, you know, ruin your life, I. E. Really. But they’re doing it because they don’t have any other skill set and they are not aware of what’s really going on inside of them. So then you can see, like, parents, come and study with me because they want their children to be fearless, you know, and they don’t want to model for them fearful behavior. And that is critical and key. It’s so important. So, yeah, so we can decide if we want to open our hearts and see people through the eyes of fear and know that it’s fear and it’s not about us, or we can keep our heart closed and keep repeating that painful event over and over again. When I released my father and I forgave him, and mind you, he’s dead. But my father and I are closer than ever. Like, I love my father and I know he loves me, and we are closer than ever. And it’s been, you know, 40 plus years, 40 years since he died. And that can happen. You do not. They do not have to be alive. You do not have to see them in person. You do not have to have a conversation with them. This is all internal work for you to let go of the chain, let go of the. The connection, let go of the blocks that you have between you and your own heart.

[00:36:00 – 00:37:40]
Well, on that piece that you experience by doing, everything that you’re talking about is good for your mental, your physical, your emotional state of being, people that. That are listening. Everything that Rhonda is talking about is you’re capable of getting to that point. It takes effort. You got to be willing to take that baby step. But knowing that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Having that, you know, person that has faith in you and then you develop faith in yourself. You can, you can basically climb any mountain if you have the self inventory ability, like you mentioned those words, self inventory. You have to have the ability to listen to that friend that’s freaking out. Don’t take it personal though. Immediately you will. It’s just our amygdala is freaking out and take that self inventory. It’s all about critical. Being a critical thinker, though. That process of getting from A to Zed and realizing, okay, I’m taking, I’m listening to her, I’m hurt. Self inventory. It’s not about me and dealing with a situation for an untrained person because it is training, it’s working on you. It can crumble, crush you, or you may never recover from it. Friendship over. And the trained person that’s worked on themselves has the ability to look inside of Rhonda and go, we’ve done all this stuff. I’ve done this. She’s been at my house overnight. I’ve been there, watched her. Her pet. I’ve done all this stuff. And just having that all going on, people are going, that’s impossible. I’m here to tell you. No, it’s not around.

[00:37:40 – 00:37:40]
No, it’s not you.

[00:37:40 – 00:37:41]
It’s not either.

[00:37:41 – 00:37:42]
No, it’s not.

[00:37:42 – 00:38:07]
It’s working on you. It’s working on being able to have realizations and do reflections. I do reflections multiple times during the day. The most I do them, though, is at night when I’m laying in bed. I’ll go, okay, what went good? What went bad? How did this person respond? You talked about that, too. Listening to a person’s words and thinking, did I say something wrong to her? Did it create this? Or did I?

[00:38:07 – 00:38:08]
That’s right.

[00:38:09 – 00:38:13]
But maybe I had the right message. Wrong phrasing, wrong word.

[00:38:13 – 00:40:39]
Yeah, and clean it up. You know, Clean it up. Have the courage to clean it up right away. Yeah. And so many people have. Have the. Do not have the ability to say I’m sorry or please forgive me. Some people will just not say it. I remember when I was going on my book tour for my book Fearless Living, and this guy, I was in Atlanta, Georgia, at a bookstore, and this big guy, like 6, 4, comes into the store, comes in the bookstore, and, like, I just came here for my book signing to tell you I’m fearless. And I’m thinking, okay, all right, well, that’s interesting. And I go, good for you. Validate, remember? Yeah, good for you. You’re amazing. That’s amazing. I say, hey, can I give you a quiz? And they go, yeah, go ahead, give me a quiz. Because I’m fearless. I’m like, all right, great. So can you say I love you first? Have you forgiven? Have you released your grudges? Do you genuinely know your needs and can you take care of them? You know, And I gave him all these, like. I asked him all these emotional questions, all these emotional fear questions. And of course he went, what? What? Because most people think of fearlessness as jumping out of a plane or, you know, being physically fearless. We’re talking about. What I’m talking about is emotional fearless, being emotionally willing to emotionally risk. Because that’s what it feels when you go outside your comfort zone. What I call the stretch, risk and die zone. That’s an emotional risk. Most of the time, there’s nothing to do with a physical risk. Even though your body might shake, even though you might get a lump in your throat, even though your back might start hurting, even though your hand, you know, your hands might shake, you’re having a physical response. But those are just physical sensations based on what you are moving through. And actually those will change, by the way, over time because as you get more skilled, those things, they’ll feel safer, your body will feel safer, and it will not have to get that lump in the throat. It will not have to do the shaking. It will not have to feel like your stomach, you’re going to throw up. So those things will alter. But in the beginning, when you start taking the risk that we’re talking about right now, even just standing up, speaking, you know, thinking, doing that self inventory, reflection, that might even be scary. But just know that as you’re doing it, I promise you that fear will be replaced with self love. That fear will be replaced with, oh my gosh, I love myself. And I know right now, I know if somebody said that to me at different times in my life, I would have been like, you’re a crazy person. That’s never going to happen. But I’m here to tell you it does.

[00:40:40 – 00:42:09]
Well, absolutely it does. For those listening or watching, this can seem overwhelming. There’s many different things, and people don’t like the word, but I do. There’s. There’s tricks and there’s different things that I do to control my mindset. My fear indicator stays low because I have specific things that I’ve triggered within my mindset or will trigger part of me within 40 to 50 seconds of something happening. And if I can’t get it under control, I need to time myself out. You know, we talk about kids, they don’t like being timed out as an adult. Time me out, baby. I’ll go. You could time me out so that I can readjust so I can re fill my tank of and push out despair or sadness. It takes time. Pick somewhere within what we’re talking about. Get a hold of Rhonda. Get a hold of somebody, even myself. I’m certainly not at the same level as Rhonda, but there’s certain things that we can teach you to not let fear control you or encapsulate your body like you’re literally that you have a shield of fear. That is not having a shield of faith about who you are in yourself is what you need. You need that shield of faith, that shield of I can Accomplish anything. Oh, why did that person react to me and admitting to yourself I said the wrong thing. I didn’t realize their body language they couldn’t deal with at that right now or.

[00:42:09 – 00:42:10]
That’s right.

[00:42:10 – 00:42:20]
I said the right, I said the right thing. And they need more of me than I was willing to give at that moment. Twenty minutes later, two days later, text, phone call.

[00:42:20 – 00:42:21]
That’s right.

[00:42:21 – 00:42:33]
Hey, Rhonda. You and I were communicating and I noticed this and it’s taken me a while. I apologize, Rhonda, that I didn’t notice it right away. How can I be of service? How can I support you, Rhonda, you.

[00:42:33 – 00:42:34]
Know, and how can I love you?

[00:42:34 – 00:42:53]
Ner not necessarily taking responsibility for the improper reaction, just accepting it, realizing your part in it. And if you need to apologize with sincerity and genuine and be genuine. So many people those ice. I’m sorry, my one daughter’s terrible for that. There’s no sincerity in it.

[00:42:53 – 00:42:55]
She just got sorry.

[00:42:55 – 00:42:57]
Yes, thank you. Right, yes.

[00:42:57 – 00:44:42]
Well, you’ve been talking about, you’ve been talking about the comfort zone and I do have something that I would love to gift your listeners. It’s called Stretch, Risk or die. And I’ve mentioned it a couple of times. It is how to move outside your comfort zone. And it, it’s my cure for procrastination. Course it is three 15 minute videos, super easy. It’s got worksheets and examples. Super easy. So if you have a dream or a goal or something that you want to move forward in and if you feel stuck anywhere in any area of your life, I don’t care if it’s finances like Dwight works with or whether it’s health or relationships or whether it’s loving yourself Stretchers can die is going to support you in knowing what has been holding you back as well as to give you the necessary path for you to start taking those small actions in order to become fearless. And then the third video, just FYI bonus is I actually, at the very end of the third video, I actually talk about the wheel of fear. And I’ve mentioned that a couple times because that’s the mental model I’ve created in order to support you and understand how fear works. The way I map fear. So you’ll be able to see the wheel of fear. It’s three 50 minute videos. You got a worksheet. You can put any dream up there, you can put any goal up there. You can put anything you want. And I will through the videos, audio transcripts, et cetera. And the worksheets support you in moving forward. So be willing to take that stretch risk or die. And by the way, that cures procrastination. So go to fearlessliving.org risk fearlessliving.org risk R I S K and you know, go grab it. Put your name in your email and go get the course. You’ll get access to the platform my fearless you platform so that you can go in and take stretch risk and die. I know that it will support you and please do it in the next 24 hours.

[00:44:43 – 00:45:25]
Yes, I’ll make sure that for those that are driving, don’t, don’t try to write it down. Please don’t be distracted. Those that are familiar with my show, go to give a Heck.com go to the top podcast, put click on podcast. You’ll see Rhonda’s beautiful face and below there will be all the detailed show notes where all the links for her social media, including the links she just shared with you as well as unedited show notes. Complete unedited show notes will be there along with chapter summaries. If there’s a specific part of our conversation that you wanted to listen to again, again, just go to giveaheck.com to find out everything that is Rhonda and go from there.

[00:45:25 – 00:45:27]
Right, there you go. There you go.

[00:45:28 – 00:45:47]
You know, one of the things that you talked about this your wheel. Let’s get into that. Can you what do you feel comfortable sharing? I know it’s hard because where people listening are watching. What would you share that is most key about the wheel of what you’ve created to help individuals or groups, you know, climb in life?

[00:45:47 – 00:56:45]
Well, we’ve been talking about what I would label fear responses. So people have quote unquote problems. So you know, character flaws they would call them or things that they hate about themselves or however they describe them. So whether that’s procrastination, perfectionism, comparing, judging. Actually I have a little quiz here that I can, I can give us so if everybody wants to shut their eyes except the people that are driving, do not shut your eyes and just give yourself a little nod if you do any of these things or feel any of these things and this is we’ll talk about them on the other side. So do you ever deny yourself? Do you ever isolate? Do you ever pretend when things that if things are better, okay, then they’re not? Do you ever hide out? Do you ever whine and complain? Do you ever settle? Do you ever compare? How about manipulation? What about get defensive? Do you ever judge yourself or others do you ever complain, procrastinate? Do you ever worry? Do you ever feel like you’re struggling? Do you wait and call it patience? Do you blame? Do you try to control? Do you deflect? Do you ever feel bitter, entitled, powerless? Do you ever feel resentful, guilty, indifferent? Do you ever feel overwhelmed? What about ignored? What about annoyed? Like now probably. Do you ever feel self pity? And do you ever feel victimized? So go ahead and, you know, open your eyes and Is it over 50%? Yes. Is it over 70%? Yes. Is it over 80%? Yes. Most of my audiences, I don’t care if I’m speaking to a class of 10 in a master Mastermind or if I’m talking to a thousand in a keynote. Most people have over 95%. So these are what I call fear responses. Most people call them character flaws. Most people think, oh, I gotta quit doing that. I just hate that I judge. I hate that people, please, oh, I gotta stop that, I gotta stop that. I gotta stop that, right? Well, you’ll naturally stop it once you understand where it’s coming from. So one, those are fear responses. So instead of blaming yourself and shaming yourself and calling them character flaws, I want you to relabel them as fear responses so that you can know, oh, when I worry, I having a fear response. Oh, when I’m complaining, oh, I’m having a fear response. Oh, when I’m judging, oh, I’m having a fear response. So that is the simplest first step to just start relabeling all those things that you think are wrong, bad, wish you could change about yourself. Fear responses. And those fear responses are born and birthed out of what I call your trigger, your core fear. And that core fear is something that you, that, that really like took form by the time you were 6, by the time you were 7. So my wheel of fear was formed before my father ever took that gun out and shot my mother. So we do things when we’re younger. By the way, the way our brain works is our fears might be handed down through our DNA. So they are literally doing research now that it may not even be in your lifetime. So people come to me and go, why am I like this? Why am I like this? Why am I like this? I don’t, don’t focus on why you’re like this. Instead, let’s learn the model of the Wheel of Fear and then the Wheel of Freedom so that you know what to do when it’s happening. There’s not one event that created your wheel of fear. There’s not. You may not even have an event that created your wheel of fear. So sure. Is your environment impactful? Yes. Is your heritage? Of course it’s impactful, all those things, but it does not create it solely. Again, it might be through your DNA. So go to your core fear. Now I’ll tell you my core fear. And by the way, if you’ve ever been called lazy and you think your core fear is lazy, not true. If you’ve ever been called selfish and you think your core fear is selfish, that’s not true. Anything you’re used to, anything that people have called you or you’ve named yourself, trust me, that is not your core fear. Your core fear is a heck of a lot smarter than that. And your core fear is slippery, it is tricky, and it does not want to be found. And that is why I’ve created a series of exercises to help you unravel it so you can nab it in that moment of clarity when you do those exercises. So mine is loser. My core fear is loser. My core fear. Again, hidden from me. Remember, I was class president, I was straight A student. I got a ride to. I was. I’ve never been called a loser in my entire life. Yet when I look at my life, once I discovered my. My wheel of fear, my core fear, which was loser. First of all, just hearing the word loser was like a stab in the heart, right? Like a punch in the gut, like couldn’t breathe. And once I knew that, now when I get those fear responses, are these fear responses, worry, judgment, etc. I immediately know, immediately I go, ah, okay, loser. A warning is happening. There is something about this environment, something within me, something without that is bringing up loser. Got it. I might not be able to identify it specifically, but I know it’s here. And that moment when I can recognize that is when I jump on the wheel of freedom, which I’ll talk about just a minute. So we have the core fear, which for me is loser. And when, if you do not pay attention to it, it will end up causing fear responses. So you’ll start doing the things on your fear responses if you’re not aware of it. And then when you do those fear responses, by the way, those fear responses, many of us get loved that way, right? We’re people pleasing. That’s how we get love, right? We give too much. We don’t put boundaries up, right? We get love. So it might feel like, oh my God, I’m not going to get any love. Trust me, you’re going to get love. You’re going to get genuine love, you’re going to get different types of love. But just don’t, don’t worry about that at this point. So those fear responses, if you keep going on that wheel of fear responses, you get down to your core negative feeling. And that feeling you already know the feeling you do not want to feel. Above all else feelings like you’ve already had that feeling many times in your life. And my feeling though, I’m going to identify mine. Because you’re unique, your wheel is not going to be like mine wheel. Exactly. So my wheel of fear, my core negative feeling is worthless. So I, I’m, I’m, I’m going out, right? I, I’m going to a networking event or I’m going to a party or something. And some, I walk in and some person looks at me, kind of what I would interpret as a dirty look. Don’t know that person. Losers could be completely triggered. I start doing fear responses, oh, do I want to leave the party? I don’t belong here, I don’t belong here, right? Or do I give them a dirty look? Do I avoid them the whole night, right? So I’m in fear response. So then I end up, if I continue to do those fear responses, by the time I leave that party, I’m feeling worthless, right? I’m feeling worthless and I’m judging, right? And I’m overwhelmed. And then when you start judging, when you, excuse me, when you start doing your core negative feeling, I’m just going to show those who are right here can look at, can see the, and watch. You’re going to go into self destructive behaviors now. Self destructive behaviors again. You know, you know your fear responses already. You know your self destructive behaviors, you already know your core negative feeling. What you don’t know is your trigger, what your core fear is. So once you identify this map of fear, you can, you can actually, you can actually map it. You can actually see what’s happening. And this is the good news, you can stop it at any time and jump over to what I call the wheel of freedom. Now I, for me being the Midwest, I, I have something called righty tighty lefty Lucy. I’m sure you learned that maybe when you were growing up when you’re doing the screwdriver, right? Righty tighty lefty Lucy. Well, the wheel of fear goes righty tighty because you’re tightening up, right? You’re getting more stressed, you’re getting, your muscles are tightening, right? You’re getting more anxious, right? So it’s tightening you, anytime on your wheel of fear, you can actually, because you’re aware of it now because you got your wheel fear, you know it’s happening. You can jump over to your wheel of freedom. And the wheel of freedom is lefty Lucy. And it also has four components and the first one is essential nature. Now your essential nature, and again, it’s not going to be the same as mine. My essential nature is authentic. Now I want you to, now I want you to catch this. If you have a fear that you’re a loser, is authentic a good idea? No. You know why? Because now you think they’re going to think you’re. They’re going to know you’re a loser. So my entire life, what I admired in others, what I valued in others with authenticity. But it’s the very thing I could not express out of my fear that you’re going to see I’m really a damaged human being, that I really am that person that. So I cannot expose myself. But being authentic actually activates my will of freedom. Immediately activates my will of freedom. And from my essential nature, I’m going to do the proactive behaviors. By the way, you’re going to have proactive behaviors already formulated. You don’t have to you because your brain freezes. You need to have those already pre planned and one of them is, you know, a timeout. So you’re going to do your proactive behaviors which is going to reignite, realign you, get you back in line with your neural pathways that are all about freedom. Which then once you start doing your productive behaviors, you are going to start feeling your wholeness. Now, wholeness for me. Again, these are, this is my wheel is self acceptance. So when I accept myself, everything else works out. And yours might be intimacy, it might be passion. You know, yours is going to be different than mine, most likely. And then once I am in self acceptance, well then self affirming behaviors. The fourth fourth spoke on the wheel is simple. So proactive behavior might be. I have to. Oh, I have to practice being patient right now. I have to. Okay, Rhonda, be patient. Put your patient hat on. But in, in self affirming behaviors, I don’t have to practice being patient. I am patient. I already am patient. Now I want to say one more thing about the wheels. Most people are not on their wheel of fear 24, 7. There’s areas of your life that your wheel of fear may be more activated. So your wheel of fear may be more activated in intimate relationships, or it might be doing about money, or it Might have to do with your body image. Right. So there’s part of your life right now that you’re already on your wheel of freedom. You’re already living it. You’re already living it. Awesome. So you’re already doing it. What I want to address is the areas where you’re not. And so you can identify that fear, that wheel of fear that is tricking you into believing that you are damaged, not good enough, unworthy, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. However you describe those dark moments in your life that why you’re the way you are, why you can’t have what you want. There’s. We describe ourselves in many ways, and for most people, it kind of accumulates with. Culminates with not good enough. And I say that not good enough is a generic version of the wheel of fear, but it is not your specific wheel. So you want to take that generic and actually make it personal so it really has. So it has feelings. So you know how to. So you know how to move forward for you, rather than just simply saying, I don’t feel good enough. Okay, that’s nice, but that’s not going to get you out of that feeling. We want to get you out of it and onto your wheel of freedom.

[00:56:45 – 00:57:21]
Well, yeah, I. I kept on triggering a word, was triggering my brain in this last part of what you were saying. Attractiveness. And why do I say that word? Attractiveness? Everything that Rhonda’s talking about, if you can get a hold of it now, when you talked about going into a group situation where you’re, you know, maybe there’s a hundred people, people, a thousand people in the room I walk in. And now in my not 100 healed self, but my. Where I’m at now in my healed self, I can see those groups or individuals hiding that are living in that. Where you’re talking about.

[00:57:21 – 00:57:21]
That’s right.

[00:57:21 – 00:58:16]
But people listening or watching. When you get a hold of you and you like you, you can look at the mirror and say, hey, I’m a pretty good person. Whether or not I’m overweight, whether or not, whatever you want to tell yourself that’s negative, which a lot of people do, a lot of negative reinforcement. You become more attractive. So you talked about relationships. All of a sudden you’re going to attract people that are. That are going to think, wow, Rhonda’s the real deal, Dwight’s the real deal. Look at. They’re an attractive person. And attractiveness. I’m not saying you’re visual of what you look magnetic yes. The energy, magnetic. You walk into a room and you’ll start seeing that. 100 people will all turn a look at you. It won’t even be. Because it’ll be something that you give off the aura, the magnet. Like, you talk about magnetism, and they’ll turn, they’ll look.

[00:58:16 – 00:58:16]
Yes.

[00:58:16 – 00:58:33]
They’ll approach you. You can’t even avoid them. And if. Yes, that’s not a bad thing. People coming over to you and wanting to communicate with you because you give off the sense of comfort, the sense of, you know, you’re. You really know who you are. Doesn’t mean you’re not.

[00:58:33 – 00:58:37]
And you’re not. And you’re not. You’re not somebody to be afraid of.

[00:58:37 – 00:58:37]
Yes.

[00:58:37 – 00:58:43]
You know, you look at those comfortable in their skin. Yeah. People comfortable in their skin are not scary.

[00:58:43 – 00:59:34]
Yeah. Well, and. And I look in. I intentionally been doing this for more than 20 years, and I’ve been to 300 or more conferences. You’ve probably even been more to more than that. But I’ll go into. I’ll. I’ll go and I’ll seek out those people. I’ll go up to them and go, hi, I’m Dwight. You know, whatever. If, you know, it’s a pleasure to meet you. Well, you know, they look at you. Well, they haven’t even said anything yet, you know, because I want to put them in a state of, what. What’s this person about? Because all of a sudden, if they’re thinking about what’s this person about? Are they thinking that they’re nervous or scared? No, I’m deflecting their thought process so that I can break down their shield a little bit. Right. Maybe. And I’m genuine. I’ll look at something about them. Wow, I really like your blouse. That’s a nice necklace. Oh, you got a beautiful tie.

[00:59:34 – 01:01:50]
You’re talking about something. You’re talking about something so important. Because basically your, you know, people who are magnetic are comfortable in their own skin. Right there. I. I should say people who are comfortable in their own skin have a magnet. Magnetism. But they’re also approachable and also in their approachability, that is actually power. So in our culture, we’ve got power all mixed up. We think power is being intimidating. We think power is being tough. We think power is kind of bulldozing the room. That is not power. That’s actually fear in motion. So we want to be able to be that place that can connect with anyone anywhere, at any time and be true to ourselves and shine our own light and live Our destiny. And what I say, live the life your soul intended to. Live the life your soul intended. And so will you feel. Will you be more powerful? Yes. Will you yield it wisely? Most likely, yes. Will your heart open and you’ll feel more loved and connected with the world? Yes. All the things that most of us say we want are, as the saying goes, on the other side of fear. And it’s not. You can’t just talk yourself out of fear. You can’t just go, I’m, you know, can’t feel the fear and do it anyway. I love that book, of course, but many of us can’t feel the fear and do it anyway. I could not feel the fear and do it anyway. I couldn’t do it. And so that is why, you know, the wheel of fear for me is. Is kind of my bridge to be able to take the risks that I want to take. Once I can see it, I can move forward. So what you’re saying, Dwight, about walking into a room and. And having that different energetic field that attracts different types of people, and I love your willingness to, you know, go up to somebody and shake hands. My. What I do is I do something similar. The person that I’m most intimidated by or the person that I’m like, oh, my God, right. Whatever reason, I immediately go up and shake their hand and introduce myself immediately. So the person that I’m like most intimidated by or worried about or concerned about, again, whatever that word is, I need to neutralize that immediately. So I immediately go and address that. I do not walk around that room without going, going, doing that right away.

[01:01:50 – 01:03:19]
Oh, yeah. And you know, and never forget your origin where you come from. I was that person at one point in time. I’m always honest with myself. The worst thing you can do is lie to yourself, break the promises you keep to yourself. And people going, what do you mean, promises? Well, if I promise I’m going to do things, it goes back to you talking about the calendar with the gold stars. If you’re a person that needs that, do it. Whatever it takes for you to see. For me, it’s laying in bed at night and reflecting on my day and correcting that course so that when I wake up, I know what I did wrong, what I did right, what I’m not going to do again, what I’m going to do to move my life forward. Life’s in session. This isn’t a dress rehearsal. Is something I, like I mentioned earlier, I constantly say to myself, because at the end of the day, I can Always work to serve others. But if I haven’t served myself first, my goodness, I’m going to be living on that wheel of fear forever, and I’m never going to face anything. And do you truly want to make a difference? Ask yourself that. I do want to make a difference. And, and then I categorize. Where do I want to make a difference? Where do I want to start making a difference? Who are the people in my world that deserve the best of me first? And then the rest don’t get leftovers, but they get me at my hundred percent because I’ve dealt with this other thing. Maybe it’s family.

[01:03:19 – 01:03:19]
That’s right.

[01:03:19 – 01:04:08]
Maybe my core value, my core values, my three main core values are faith, family, and work. Well, I give. When I go to church or I’m praying, I give 100% to faith. Right when I’m with my family, I give them 100% of Dwight. I’m not giving them partial this. I’m at a family event. I’m thinking about work. I’m thinking about all these things. I have worked hard and I still have to work hard to stay in the moment, to be in that moment, to create the memories, to add to my legacy. You need to get to a point where you’re not always. You’re with people, but you’re not present mentally and emotionally. You’re disconnected because you’re worrying about work. That work worry is still going to be there. Worry is a waste. Right. You suffer twice. We won’t even get into that. What I think about worry and. But you know, we could have. You and I could have a weekly talk show together, like a podcast together.

[01:04:09 – 01:04:10]
And help people worry less.

[01:04:10 – 01:05:55]
Well, how to impact people differently, because we’re both unique individuals. We both have unique talents and experiences that the world honestly needs to hear. That’s why I have the Give a Heck podcast to bring people to share. I don’t think I know it all. I want to learn till the day I breathe. I hope I’m still doing podcasts a week before I die just because I want to impact people. And you know, another thing I will add, you got four books, I’ve got one book. I’ve got my podcast. At the end of the day, our living legacy, even when we pass away, are, you know, whether they’re stepchildren or not, you still raise them, their generations, the generations below. If they have kids or if they already have kids, you could be dead a hundred years and somebody says, I want you to understand your great, great, great grandma Ron here’s her book. That’s what made her tick. Look at all these interviews. Look at all the things she’s done. Your grandpa, your papa, your great papa Dwight. Read his. Here’s his book. Here’s what he stood for. This, this is what his challenges were. He did not let that stop anything. So if you’re a person that wants to, to be able to have that legacy, I’m not saying go write a book, start a podcast. I’m just create memories so that they can be shared over generation to generation. Well, you know, this is why our family does this, because great, great, great, great, great grandpa Dwight or great, great, great grand Rhonda did this and she changed our lives forever. You can be that little drop of water and like drop part of me into a pond and the ripple effects go out. They may minimize at the outer edges, but you still had an effect, right?

[01:05:55 – 01:05:59]
That’s right. That’s right. So knowing that to be true.

[01:05:59 – 01:06:50]
Oh, yeah. I wanted to talk to you about this, this great conversation about 10, 15 minutes here. Rhonda, you say that complainers are fear driven. I was reading that and everywhere. And I agree. I find they deflect. They complain. They’re the worst keyboard warriors, especially with all the research I’ve done on keyboard warriors, I find they are deflecting. They dislike or even hate their own lives. They hate everybody else’s lives. The biggest thing though, that I teach, though, is that, you know those people that are criticizing you and doing that, they really do hate their lives. They, they’re deflecting and being a keyboard warrior because inciting, anger, sadness, some form of emotion they can feed off makes it so they don’t have to think about their hamster wheel, their brokenness.

[01:06:50 – 01:06:52]
Well, they want everybody else to feel like they do.

[01:06:52 – 01:07:13]
Yeah, their, their life of quiet desperation and they get off on it. You can only though people listening watch. You can only feed your life for a short period of time with making people fearful and angry. Living on that kind of an emotion. Well, you’ll have health issues. You’ll deteriorate, destroy yourself. You’ll just, you’ll literally destroy yourself.

[01:07:13 – 01:07:14]
You’ll hate yourself.

[01:07:15 – 01:07:34]
Absolutely. So, you know, I find, I find that so many people that are complainers, that are fear driven or keyboard warriors, what would you suggest we do when we can’t get away from them, from the people like at work or even a family reunion or a family get together. What would you. Your suggestions that help people ground themselves and not get even worse?

[01:07:35 – 01:11:19]
Yeah, I’m going to say two Things one is, you know, there are people that are complaining that are just attempting to get their emotions out of them. Okay? So I want to differentiate between complaining and venting. So complainers don’t want to find a solution. They just want to complain. They’re not interested in solution. They just want to talk about how horrible life is. Right. In whatever way that they see it. Venting is. I’ve got a lot of emotions right now, and I need to get them out of me. So you could do that in a journal, right? You could vent on a piece of paper. But many of us want the connection while we’re going through feelings. So I teach my students and my coaches to do something called venting, which, again, I know we’ve all heard, but I want to clarify what it actually means because I know many of us aren’t doing it correctly. Venting is. I am taking full responsibility that I have a lot of emotions that I need to process, and I need a partner in order to process. So I call up a friend. I said, hey, do you have five minutes? I need to vent, right? And that person, because you’ve trained them, say, yes, of course. And so you let it go for five minutes. You do what I say, whatever you have to say. The other person does not do anything that they do not ask questions. And they do not go, oh, no, they don’t do any. No response. Just. You’re just listening. And then when the person. When you’re done venting, you go, okay, that feels good. I’m complete. And usually I actually ask people to set a time, like, I need five minutes to vent or I need ten minutes to bend. So while you’re listening to that venting, you’re not responding. You’re not buying into the story. You’re just knowing that they’re processing. When they are complete, you change the subject, you move on, right? So venting people want to find a solution. Complainers do not. So let’s say you’ve got that great aunt at your family gathering and she’s telling you the same same story. A couple ways to deal with it. One is, you could say, you know, I’ve heard this story a couple times. I’ve heard you mention this a couple times. Are you looking for a solution or do you just want to vent about it? How can I support you? What do you. What you need from me? So one of the cool things to do is go hearing you tell me the story. But what is it you want from me? Do you want me to agree with it? Do you Want me to join you? Do you want to just vent it out? Do you want me to help you find a solution? What do you need? So you’re putting the responsibility of their. Of their complaining in your relationship on them? What? Why are they telling you they’re complaining? It is. People will be like, what? Because the first time you do it, they’ll be like, what do you. What do you mean? Just want you to. I just want you to listen to me. Okay, so you just need to vent. Okay, great. Go for it. I’ll give you two minutes. Right, well, what. What? So are not threatened by their complaining. You’re not disgusted by their complaining because again, you know it’s fear. You know it’s fear. So you’re going to again, put responsibility on them. Are you. Are you seeking. Are you. You want to stay, Just stay in the problem, or do you want to seek a solution? What do you. What do you want? So again, you ask them a question. Trust me, when you start asking those types of questions of them, they’re going to quit complaining to you because you’re not joining the party. You’re not in Complaintsville. Right? And they’re like, well, they’re not going to get in it with me, then forget about it. So just simply say with no emotion, not any disgust, any irritation. You know, Sally, I’m going to stop you right here because I’m a little confused. What do you need from me right now? How do you want me to listen? You know, that’s another great way to say it. So put it on them and they are going to quickly leave, right? Not satisfying. They’re not getting fed. You’re not fueling the fire. You’re not putting a log on. Right. And you’re also.

[01:11:20 – 01:11:23]
Enough times, they also leave the situation permanently.

[01:11:23 – 01:11:26]
Oh, many times they leave the situation because it’s not any fun anymore, Right?

[01:11:26 – 01:11:33]
Yeah, but I mean, permanently, they don’t ever bring it up again. Oh, they might not communicate with you again, depending on the circumstance.

[01:11:33 – 01:12:24]
100%. 100%. So it’s about recognizing that their complaint has nothing to do with you, even though they might be complaining about you to you, which, by the way, you never vent to the person you’re venting about. So if. If my partner is the one that’s upsetting me at the moment, I’m not going to vent to him or her. I’m going to go vent to a friend or. Or my therapist or my minister or my priest. So you never vent to the person you’re upset with because you Are you are venting in order to get clear, in order to cleanse yourself, to get a new palette. Right. To, to be able to think clearly. That’s the purpose of venting. So you don’t do it with the person. So that’s one of the reasons couples and, you know, relationships get in the muck and meer is because they’re venting to each other instead of getting clear themselves and then coming back to join forces to figure out a solution now.

[01:12:24 – 01:12:42]
To have a level conversation. Yeah, yeah. It’s. There’s so much great things for those people watching or listening. We’re definitely going to have to have Rhonda on again, maybe more than once. I wasn’t kidding. We, I think we’d have a great weekly show together. It would be great.

[01:12:42 – 01:12:46]
There you go. We’ll call it Worriesville or Worry less.

[01:12:46 – 01:13:27]
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. One of the things I want to talk about, just the last couple of questions. You authored quite a few books, some of them best selling. We’ll go through them for the listeners and viewers, including your seminal work, Fearless Living. 150,000 copies sold and translated into 16 languages, which completely blows my mind. That’s just amazing. Congratulations, Fearless Loving. Change your life in 30 days. You’re welcome. And do I look fat in this? I myself wrote a book and found it very cathartic and helped me realize things about myself. Both a pat on my back and a kick in the ass. Right. What was it like writing yearbooks? And did writing them help you continue to move forward in your life?

[01:13:27 – 01:14:47]
Oh, 100, absolutely. Writing, writing a book. And by the way, like 82% of Americans, and I would include Canadians there, want to write a book. They have a desire to write a book. And to give yourself the gift of writing your story down is, is a treasure you are going to be in. You’re going to start seeing yourself so differently. You’re going to start seeing your courage, you’re going to start seeing your fortitude, you’re going to start seeing your power. So it’s very healthy and enlightening and awe inspiring and yes, humbling. So yeah, my books, each book was its own journey. And right now I just finished the first draft of my fifth book and it’s my book about my dark night. So I went through a dark night of the soul. More than one, but I’m talking about one in particular in this book. And writing that has been more than cathartic. It’s just been revelation after revelation after revelation. You know, even though I think I, oh I know myself so well. I’ve been changing lives for 30 years. I’ve been teaching people about fear for 30 years. We all have hidden parts of ourselves. We all have parts of ourselves that we discover only through the act of revelation. Excuse me, reflection, writing it down, speaking it out, etc. Telling our stories. So, yeah, I just finished the first draft. 336 pages.

[01:14:47 – 01:14:47]
Wow.

[01:14:47 – 01:15:16]
And now I’m. It took me two and a half years to get that all in. Like the. And when I say first draft, I mean every chapter is probably been worked at 10 times. So it’s, you know, it’s a finished product per se. And now I’ve had a couple people read it and now I’ve got some edits to do. But yeah, writing your book, telling your stories, journaling longhand with a pen, with a paper, with pencil, not on the computer is one way that you will discover how brilliantly amazing you are.

[01:15:17 – 01:15:41]
And those, those revelations that we have. And you know, I don’t know about yourself, but I, you know, I’ll be sitting and just writing something. I’ll be typing something, working on an article or working on something for a client and have a. And look through the lenses of them after I. Reflecting on their conversation and thinking to myself, wow, I used to be like that.

[01:15:41 – 01:15:42]
Yeah, that’s right.

[01:15:42 – 01:15:44]
I. I changed. I changed.

[01:15:44 – 01:15:47]
Yes, yes. And I love her. That. I love that girl.

[01:15:47 – 01:15:51]
Yeah. Or, or wow, I thought I had dealt with that.

[01:15:51 – 01:15:52]
Yeah. Yeah.

[01:15:52 – 01:16:04]
And it’s just like an aha moment and it’s like, it’s like what I thought I dealt with that. I compartmentalized it and shoved it down for however many days, decades. Right.

[01:16:04 – 01:16:05]
That’s right. That’s right.

[01:16:06 – 01:16:24]
I, I know I was, I went through every gamut of emotion writing my book, setting it to the editor coming back and them not liking a specific thing. I was talking about saying, I don’t care. You’re. You’re here to edit and make sure it looks like that I’m talking to.

[01:16:24 – 01:16:26]
That reads well. That reads well. Well, yeah.

[01:16:26 – 01:16:38]
And. And that’s written in an 8th grade format so that people can get it. Big letters. You know what I mean? People with the small little paperbacks and a fine print are never going to read my book if it was like that. Right.

[01:16:38 – 01:16:38]
Yeah.

[01:16:38 – 01:17:04]
And it’s not to say that we want to dumb down things, we want to make things approachable for people, but oh my goodness, the things I experienced, the crying, the laughter, the like, aha moments and even. And then that. What’s that the words I’m looking for, even releasing the book was. It was, you know, like I was petrified. Why am I doing this? Why would people want to read about me? Why am I, you know, Are you kidding me?

[01:17:05 – 01:17:59]
My assistant, My assistant came in with Fearless Living, my first book. My assistant came in with an envelope, right? Like, and she’s like, I think it’s your book. And I went, well, open it. She goes, I’m not opening your book. I go, open it. She goes, no, I’m not doing it. So she gives it to me and I’m like, oh, my God. Oh my God, I gotta go. So I open the packaging, I see my hardcover, Fearless Living. I throw it to the ground, start crying and going, what have I done? What have I done? And my first print run was 20,000, which was, you know, amazing. And I started brainstorming how I could buy all 20,000 copies because what have I done? I’ve told everybody will know everything about me. And oh my God, this is horrible. And I had a complete, you know, cathartic meltdown in that moment, realizing that I am now exposed forever. You know, all my, all my stories of my humiliating moments in my life are shared, right?

[01:17:59 – 01:18:00]
No more putting the shield up.

[01:18:00 – 01:18:13]
No. Well, yeah. And you know what? But that’s also freeing because now that my shield isn’t up, I don’t have to fake my way and pretend it is and pretend I’m any different than I am because I’ve written it down and you can read all about it now.

[01:18:13 – 01:19:04]
That’s. Yeah, I. Everybody I’ve talked to, I. That has a book. Not everybody on my podcast has written a book. I asked that question to. About the book and what it did for them because it is such a freeing thing. I remember getting. I remember getting my book in a bubble packed envelope he sent me. The publisher sent me the first cop, like it hadn’t been released. He said that we. Here it is, read it, go through it. And I’m. And I was like scared. I open it up and I read it and I’m starting to go through it and I’m highlighting and marking things still that I should change because he said he’d give me one edit. And yeah, I was so hard on myself. I was reading it, it was just like. And I had read it how many times? Some chapters I rewrote 8, 10 times. It was just crazy.

[01:19:04 – 01:19:57]
I actually have writing classes that I do for, for, for, for people. I teach writing classes and I’m helping people write their first draft and I explain to them that when you’re writing your book, there are going to be days that you’re like, this is the best book ever written in the entire world. I’m a genius. And then a week later you’re going to be like, this is the worst book I’ve ever. This is a horrible. What was I thinking? And so I explained that you’re on this roller coaster of loving and hating your book. And as like my. My niece is. Has left being a lawyer and is now a songwriter. And I’ve explained this to her because she like, she writes a song and she loves it. She’s like, oh my God, this makes great song. And then she works on a different song and then she looks at her old. The song before and she’s like, I hate it. It’s so horrible. And I’m like, yes, that’s your. Like, no, I hate it. That’s normal. Just come back.

[01:19:57 – 01:20:02]
It’s the climb. It’s the climb or it’s the valley despair or somewhere in between mean you’re camped.

[01:20:02 – 01:20:04]
All right, it just. Right.

[01:20:06 – 01:20:17]
We. Self criticism of yourself can be healthy if dealt with in a correct fashion. So many people don’t. They just beat themselves up and then they escape into their addictions. Right? Doesn’t have to.

[01:20:17 – 01:20:23]
Let’s just clarify language. Self. Self feedback is good. Self criticism is not exactly.

[01:20:23 – 01:20:50]
Yes. Correction. Thank you. I love, I love the. I love the correct correction of the word because I, I pride myself in being a wordsmith. So thank you for that correction. But yeah, it’s. You know, when somebody reads your book, whichever book it is, did you have an intent for the end result of what they were reading? Which every book. Did you know that right from starting to write it or did it. Did it unfold as you wrote the book?

[01:20:50 – 01:23:42]
Well, every book that I write has all been about self. You know, my wholeness, remember self acceptance. And my essential nature is authenticity. So everything I do is to support people in having the awareness that there is a path to accept themselves fully and that they have permission to be authentic. So when I wrote Fearless Living, what I’m hoping. Do I want people to discover their real fear and change their like dramatically? Sure. But what I really want is for that their heart to open their eye to eyes, to open their perception of the world to change. If I can shift your perception, if I can point out or by reading the book, inspire you or move you so that you’ll. You see something in a new way that you hadn’t seen before. That little movement that you did. Just seeing something a little bit different is the way you escape. You’re, you know, it’s like the door opened. If the door opens, you can get out. So in my Fearless Living read, Fearless Living, the door opens. Are you going to get out or are you going to stay in? Fearless Loving. I open the door, I’m going to get in or, you know, get out or stay in. So everything I do this podcast is we’re opening a door right now. The door is open. We’ve talked a lot about fear and lots of other lovely good things. And the door, if you’re willing, have an, if you have any. Aha. Or if you’ve been inspired or if you have any movement or you’re, you know, you, you’ve enjoyed it, that means the door is open and you are the one that has to decide to take the first step and move outside and get out. Get out the door while you can, while you’re inspired, while you’re, while you’re open hearted, while you’re in the glow of our conversation, while you’re in the glow of reading a book. That glow gives you a certain period of time for you to escape. So take it and do it. So that’s what I’m always giving people permission to live the life their soul intended is my entire reason for being. My mother never got to live hers. Remember, she died. Yeah, of course, just by when she finally was leaving my father. My mother died. My mother never got to live her purpose. My mother never got to live the life her soul intended. She never did it. So now if you want to psychoanalyze me, My whole life has been about fulfilling my mother’s unfulfilled dream, right? To help people not become my mother, you know, not maybe literally be murdered, of course, but to, to kill themselves in the act of self denial or you know, self betrayal, self abandonment instead to live the life your soul intended. I, I am here and I am a safe place and I will kick your butt and love you at the same time. And you can move forward. You can move forward and the door is open. Run.

[01:23:46 – 01:23:59]
So Rhonda, I have one last question to ask you. If you had to give our. If you had to give our listeners one last closing message, Rhonda, what would you tell them in regards regards to giving a heck and never giving up?

[01:24:00 – 01:24:26]
There is nothing wrong with you. It’s just fear. There is nothing wrong with you. It is just fear. There is nothing, nothing wrong with you. It’s just fear. There’s nothing wrong with you, it’s just fear. There’s nothing wrong with you. It is just fear. And you have a choice whether to listen or not. There’s nothing wrong with you. It’s just here.

[01:24:26 – 01:26:26]
Oh, I love it. That’s great closing message and one of the things we talked about, I think it was in pre before we hit record is here’s something I’m going to give the listeners and viewers. I use a little mantra which is very, very simplistic, doesn’t work all the time. I’ve practiced it for years, probably close to 30 years. Just always tell yourself when you feel fearful, listeners or viewers face everything in rise. Fear is an acronym for me. I face everything in rise. So if you have a fearful moment, think to yourself, can I face it? Can I rise above it? Who can help me? Maybe I need to call Rhonda and vent or maybe I need to call Rhonda and have some good advice. But I’m not going to be fearful of it. I’m going to let allow others to grow around me so that I can continue to climb in life, not be camped. Understanding though, when you go through the valley, despair and then you’re up on the climb or your camp somewhere in the middle, that’s okay too. Just don’t get stuck in that place. Know you have a Rhonda call Ron or Dwight to call or whatever. But just tell yourself in that moment, fear is not going to encapsulate my life anymore. I’m going to rise above it and I’m going to win the game of life because and people say, well, living life isn’t about winning or losing. Sure it is. I win every day that I, that I feel good and I don’t go to bed in quiet desperation. Where I’m grateful for my life, where I’m grateful for my family, my friends, my co workers. I’m grateful for the fact tonight I guarantee I’ll be laying in bed and I’ll be thanking for me, thanking God, being grateful for having this amazing conversation and a prayer appreciating the fact that anywhere in the universe you could live. And you chose to send me a message asking to be on the show and me being bright enough, thank goodness to have you on because this has been a true treat. I really appreciate you and your wisdom.

[01:26:27 – 01:26:28]
Thank you.

[01:26:29 – 01:26:58]
So what we already know, we’re not even going to ask this question. What’s the best way to reach you? We already touched on that. Go to giveaheck.com people you’re going to have all her social media Media links. The link to go and and have her see the three videos. The three 15 minute videos. Do yourself a favor. Step off the curb. Quit standing and being a spectator of the life going by. Step off the curb. It’s enter life. Any last final words before I wrap up the show?

[01:26:58 – 01:27:04]
Be fearless. You’ve got everything you need. You just need to. The door is open. Now just walk through.

[01:27:04 – 01:27:19]
Right on. Fantastic. So I appreciate you again. Thanks so much for being on Give a Heck. Rhonda. I appreciate your time and sharing some of your experiences so that others too can learn. It is never too late to give a Heck.