Are You Living by Default or Design? - episode 314
Living by Default or Design.
Which is it?
We follow the rules, meet expectations, check the boxes, and somewhere along the way, we forget to ask ourselves what we actually want.
My guest, Heidi Frye, calls this living by default instead of by design.
After years as a successful corporate executive, Heidi discovered that fulfillment wasn't waiting at the top of the ladder. It was waiting in the choices she hadn't yet given herself permission to make.
Today, she's traded chasing success for creating impact.
Because you don't have to keep living a life you never consciously chose.
Heidi is our guest this week. We are in the series Now What, God? Discovering Your Next Assignment.
This is Unabashed You. Let's talk.
You can find Heidi at Heidi Frye Coaching.
Curious. Adventure. Compassionate.
— Heidi Frye
Not There - Yet
Thoughts from Are You Living Default or Design?
Are you living by default or design? Am I living by default or design? It’s something to ponder. I think we tend towards default because it feels easier. In the present we avoid pain, seek pleasure, and conserve energy. That is the ‘emotional triad’ as outlined by Dr. Douglas J. Lisle and Dr. Alan Goldhamer.
The challenge here is it’s all too comfortable to stay stuck, to stay where you are, no real forward motion. That is default mode. What about design mode? This mode is where personal growth, risk and reward, doing things scared reside. It all depends on what you want. And you get to want what you want.
I think it’s clear to anyone who listens, reads or knows me in IRL that I am all -in for doing my best in design mode. The last half a dozen years of my ‘third act’ have been doing things that scare me, partaking in things I know little to nothing about.
Like coach training. I could not even describe myself as a coach a year ago. I was dipping my toe in learning more about it. I read, I listened, I challenged myself to know more. After 9 months of coach training, I can say it now with no reservation. I am a coach. I am a podcaster. I am a writer (blogs, book). It feels good.
Now the flip side. I went to an all-day workshop for business coaches. In the room were a variety of people with more experience than me, less experience than me and everything in between. Some with enviable success (that’s a thought) and some not making money - yet. At the end of the day Jody (the coach of coaches) asked us if we had any takeaways. I raised my hand because I had had an epiphany halfway through the day.
I felt God impress on me, You are a baby at coaching. Babies don’t know how to tie their shoes, babies don’t ride a bike, drive a car or even go to school. They are not there - yet. They need time to gain experience, time for trial and error, time to learn, time to grow. Why are you expecting to be so far along, so quickly, when you haven’t developed the skills and experience to be there - yet.
And there it was. A gift. The gift of time. The gift of trusting the process. I could not be where someone else was. I am where I am and isn’t that the best thing possible? It’s about the journey, not the destination. I will choose acceptance and gratitude for the new beginning and enjoy the passage of time. Plus, I think I am a toddler now. Haha.
The only impossible journey is the one you never begin.
— Tony Robbins
