Get Naked:: Helping Women Strip Away Limiting Beliefs

By Debra Payne PhD and Lynda Brown PhD

In Get Naked, we will teach you tools and skills to help you become aware of the influence of limiting beliefs and how to keep them from dominating your life. You will discover how to:

Adopt the mindset that you are enough.
Release overwhelming fear, worry, and guilt.
Free yourself from needing approval.
Stop being driven by negativity.
Relinquish habits of muscling for control.
Surrender pessimistic thoughts.
Quit being held hostage by your emotions.
Kiss the practice of prizing victimhood goodbye.

Getting Naked begins with loving yourself. When you love yourself, you allow yourself to be imperfect. Some things will be left undone. You may not get approval from everyone. But, Dear Reader, In order for life to change, you are going to have to think, feel and do some things differently. After all, if you keep doing the same things, you will keep getting the same results. Ah, but there are rewards on the other side! Once you dare to Get Naked, life changes.

Come visit us at sedonasoulutions.com and https://www.facebook.com/sedonasoulutions.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Balboa Press
• Release date: Sep 6, 2016
• ISBN: 9781504364416

Debra Payne PhD

Instant, authentic joy and laughter – that’s what you get when you interact with two ladies who’ve lived with their hearts open, made a colossal number of mistakes along the way, then gathered up their insights to help people connect to their inner abundance. Join Debra and Lynda as they discuss how to overcome limiting beliefs that prevent you from feeling joyous, motivated, and open to new possibilities. Lynda has a doctorate from Duquesne University, specializing in interpersonal and public communication. Her career path includes being a business owner, academic administrator, university professor, and subject matter expert in public relations and interpersonal communication. She inspires her students to pay attention to how they talk to others and she teaches them to be especially vigilant about how they talk to themselves. Her belief is that words are powerful whether they are said to ourselves or to others. Words can inspire or they can tear down. Debra has worked as a mentor and coach for many years. Her career experience involves coaching in education and corporate settings. She loves to work with individuals seeking to better their lives either on a personal or a professional level. Debra holds a PhD in Higher Education from the University of Minnesota. She is also an Associate Certified Coach (ACC) through the International Coaching Federation (ICF). Lynda and Debra have both journeyed through life-changing experiences and have come out the other side to be able to help women move forward when they feel stuck.

Book preview

Copyright © 2016 Lynda Brown, Ph.D. & Debra Payne, Ph.D.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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The author of this book does not dispense medical advice or prescribe the use of any technique as a form of treatment for physical, emotional, or medical problems without the advice of a physician, either directly or indirectly. The intent of the author is only to offer information of a general nature to help you in your quest for emotional and spiritual well-being. In the event you use any of the information in this book for yourself, which is your constitutional right, the author and the publisher assume no responsibility for your actions.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

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ISBN: 978-1-5043-6440-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5043-6439-3 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-5043-6441-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016913114

Balboa Press rev. date: 09/22/2016

Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1 Limiting Belief #1- Fears Run Amuck AKA There’s nothing I can do about them!

Chapter 2 Limiting Belief #2- Approval Seeking AKA I NEED approval.

Chapter 3 Limiting Belief #3- Trapped by Labels AKA That is the way women should be!

Chapter 4 Limiting Belief #4- Wallowing in Lack AKA I’m not enough.

Chapter 5 Limiting Belief #5- Rigid Expectations AKA I have to have things a certain way.

Chapter 6 Limiting Belief #6- Muscling for Control AKA I have to make things happen no matter what.

Chapter 7 Limiting Belief #7- Trapped by Pessimism AKA Don’t get your hopes up.

Chapter 8 Limiting Belief #8- Imprisoned by Emotions AKA But I can’t help it!

Chapter 9 Limiting Belief #9- Lusting for Perfection AKA It must be perfect!

Chapter 10 Limiting Belief #10- Prizing Victimhood AKA Why does this always happen to me?

Chapter 11 Trapped in a Syndrome Du Jour But this is the way I am!

Chapter 12 Princess Syndrome I deserve it!

Chapter 13 Beauty Queen Syndrome Beauty is everything!

Chapter 14 Queen Bee Syndrome I AM the star!

Chapter 15 Fly Syndrome If I ignore it, it will go away.

Chapter 16 Superwoman Syndrome I Have to do it All!

Chapter 17 Window Shopping Syndrome My life is dull so I live through others’ lives!

Chapter 18 Dating.com Syndrome I am nothing without a man!

Chapter 19 Paralysis by Analysis Syndrome If I keep analyzing it, I will figure it out!

Chapter 20 Get Naked and Reconnect

Chapter 21 Developing a Positive Mindset

Chapter 22 Staying Flexible

Chapter 23 Taming the Ego (Tantrum Child)

Chapter 24 Striving for Healthy Detachments

Chapter 25 Loving and Forgiving Yourself

Chapter 26 Trusting Yourself

Chapter 27 Strengthening Your Bounce-Back Muscles

Chapter 28 Conclusion

About the Authors

Dedication

I, Lynda, dedicate this book to my family. I, especially, would like to acknowledge my husband, Richard, and my sons, Peter and Michael for all their encouragement.

I, Debra, dedicate this book to my son, Brett, for his continued support, encouragement, and inspiration. I’d also like to thank my partner, Eric, my nieces, Crystal, Miya, Savannah, Alexis, and Dierdre, all of my very old Central and OHS friends, my Women Who Wine buddies, and everyone at Satya, especially Ali.

Introduction

Argue for your limitations, and sure enough they’re yours.

– Richard Bach

Why do limiting beliefs deserve our attention? The basic answer is that limiting beliefs can hold you back or keep you stuck. Limiting beliefs are those beliefs that pigeonhole you into thinking that there’s only one answer. Limiting beliefs are those beliefs that stop you from doing and thinking that you have potential beyond your wildest dreams. They keep you stuck in a place where people or situations can control you.

We all have limiting beliefs. These limiting beliefs can be unhealthy or harmful if they are not managed. If you kept them in perspective, then even though you may have to deal with the tendency to fall back occasionally, you are more apt to find your hidden potential. Deb and I are passionate about giving you tools and skills to help you become aware of the influence of limiting beliefs and ideas about how to keep limiting beliefs from dominating your life.

When you allow too many limiting beliefs to go unexamined, they can join together and develop into syndromes. What we call syndromes can lead you down paths that you may not even be aware of. We use the term run amuck quite a lot in this book to reference what can happen to our beliefs. The word amuck means to go berserk, behave uncontrollably, go on a rampage, or our personal favorite – to rush about in a murderous frenzy. When beliefs and syndromes run amuck, it may just be time to pause and examine what’s going on in your head.

We’re writing this book to help you recover from years of acting from limiting beliefs and syndromes that could influence your way of looking at the world. Our goal is to help you recognize and move past those limiting beliefs and syndromes that hold you back. If you are trapped inside your limiting beliefs to the point where you cannot even identify what those beliefs are, you do not see alternatives to the way you are thinking, feeling and acting. You keep repeating the same thoughts and behaviors. You may feel miserable as a result and you don’t know why. You may dismiss opportunities because you immediately disqualify yourself. You may feel stuck when all it would take is a few minor shifts in order to redirect your life in a new, more dynamic way.

Examples of how limiting beliefs limit possibility:

• I have a great idea for a book, but I believe I do not yet qualify to put words to paper.

• I believe I have to have a perfect life before I have the right to help others.

• I believe that the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, and because I’m not wealthy right now, I don’t act on the great business idea I have. Instead, I just remain bitter.

• I have failed in relationships, and because of this failure, I’ve let the limiting belief I will never have love in my life rule my interactions. I find myself sabotaging relationships before they even really begin just to prove myself right.

Get Naked: Helping Women Strip Away Limiting Beliefs is about discovering our authentic selves through stripping away limiting beliefs that we were taught early in life. If you can answer yes to any of these questions, then we invite you to get naked!

• Do you want to transform your life?

• Do you want to feel vibrant and vital?

• Do you want to have enough energy to make desired changes?

• Do you want to learn?

• Do you want to grow?

• Do you want to see a new future?

• Do you want to see love in your life?

• Do you want to discover joy?

What Do I Really Want Exercise

This introduction exercise is about identifying what you desire. Take a few minutes to really think about this question from the perspective of how you want your life to be. For example, you may think that you desire a shiny sports car but what you really may be looking for is having the thrill of adventure and the feeling of freedom. Rather than focusing on material things, identify what you desire to achieve by getting those things.

Start with your 10th most desired and work your way to your top desire.

Top ten list: (10, 9, 8 ….)

This is the second book in the Sedona SOULutions book series. Our main goal is to inspire women to inspire women to shift their focus to a more positive, uplifting perspective that will enable them to bring better things into their lives. It’s about helping women to recognize their limiting beliefs and change the way they think about things and hence the way they react to situations.

In order to achieve this goal, we have taken our life lessons and examined them in light of what we see happening around us. Even though the names and characters in our book are fictitious, the stories are real and the lessons are true. In our conversations, we have targeted specific limiting beliefs that we can see ourselves and other women around us either consciously or unconsciously accepting as truths. These learned truths can govern or limit our lives.

So, dear reader, some or all of these may apply, but we encourage you to notice how people, mainly women, react around you and to use those ideas that you feel will help you become more self-reliant, confident, motivated, and joyful.

Our first book, Sedona SOULutions: Five Steps to Feel Better after Loss, serves as a guide for people in any type of life transition. This book explains how to let go of old stories of I’m not good enough; I don’t have enough; Nothing good will happen to me; I won’t make it; I’m unhappy; I hurt; I don’t see anything good happening to me…. (We could go on and on with these wails of woe). And after letting go our life-done-me-wrong song, we talk about how to get back on the right track and create new and better stories to carry people forward.

If you choose to strip away limiting beliefs, you are going to have to do a little housecleaning. In Five Steps to Feel Better after Loss, we used the metaphor of decluttering your house as akin to decluttering your mind to make room for more positive, uplifting, inspiring thoughts. We talked about how changing your focus is necessary in order to feel better and to see new, exciting opportunities. What you focus on seeds your thoughts, which in turn guide your emotions and steers your actions. In other words, what you focus on is extremely important.

Five Steps to Feel Better after Loss centers on the idea that the way we think, feel, and act has to do with our judgment of what’s going on. If we judge something to be bad, then we feel bad and tend to avoid it or deny it. Changing your focus and letting go of the negative judgment of yourself and others becomes vitally important.

Finally, the five steps help you recognize that after you let go of your old stories, it’s possible to create a new, better life by crafting a new life story that inspires you and allows you to feel joy. You shift your focus to view what is going right in your life and you create from there.

All of our Sedona SOULutions books, workshops and teachings are about discovering your connection with your higher soul or that wiser, calmer, nonjudgmental part of you. It doesn’t matter what you name this connection. You can choose to call this your higher or intuitive self, soul, or any other term from a religious belief that may guide your life. What matters is that you begin with the sense that there is a presence that is beyond each one of us, and it is possible to access this source. Sedona SOULutions serves as a catalyst to bring out the strength and the knowledge that is already inside you.

The overarching theme for this book is the power of authenticity which connects to all of the ideas in this book. Getting Naked is about finding and daring to be your authentic self. Your authentic self is the essence of who you are—the untamed little person who has not yet had time to chain herself to beliefs. Think back as far as you can go to the little person who had no qualms about splashing in the mud. This person—this little you—is naturally joyful and inquisitive, and eager to greet the world with open arms. Without fears and resentment, without a past that chains her to stories of regret, this person greets every day joyfully.

We are set up for inauthenticity from the first years of our life. As women, we are taught by our parents, family, community and society that it is important to please others. For most of us, we were raised to be relationship minders. What others say and think about us guides how we act, think and feel. If we think, act and feel differently than what society tells us then we risk being an outcast or labelled.

Getting naked means daring to connect with that part of you that believes the universe has your back. Getting naked happens after you strip away limiting beliefs that sound like the following: I can’t do it, The problem or situation is larger than me, I don’t have what it takes, and Bad things always happen to me. Uncovering your true naked self means you can develop the conviction that:

• Everything will be all right.

• There’s a lesson in this situation that will move me forward.

• When I connect to love and trust, other people and situations will come to me that will make it all right (and most likely much better).

The process of getting naked is about moving away from your fears and recognizing your strengths. It is about putting worry on the back burner through trusting yourself and the universe (or higher power). We encourage you to move away from self-inflicted guilt to the belief that guilt only helps you if you can right a wrong and move forward. We also talk about leaving behind shame and recognizing that shame is a judgment that does not serve you.

Getting naked is about adopting a mindset that you are enough, that you do enough, that you have enough, and that right in this moment, all is well and right with the world. When you get naked, you take the idea of scarcity out of your life and replace it with the orientation of abundance and gratitude.

Throughout the book, we use dialogue to make our teachings more concrete. We use our own life experiences to give examples of how limiting beliefs and syndromes can affect you. Life is a school and a great teacher if you pay attention to the lessons along the way. We hope that you can relate to some of our stories, which can be either comical or tragic.

The first half of this book identifies common limiting beliefs. You will hear about being clogged with fear, worry, guilt and/or shame, being hooked on needing approval, feeling trapped by stereotypical labels, and being congested with negative self-stereotyping. We also talk about feeling blocked because of rigid expectations, habitually muscling your way for control, feeling trapped through pessimism, being held hostage by your emotions, feeling driven to achieve perfection, and prizing victimhood.

In the second half of the book, we talk about how limiting beliefs can turn into syndromes. A syndrome is a group of symptoms that consistently occur together. The way we position syndromes is not just a once-in-a-while reaction or action but those actions that are more habitual ways of dealing with a situation. In this book we name a number of syndromes:

• Caretaker Syndrome

• Paralysis by Analysis Syndrome

• Queen Bee Syndrome

• Princess Syndrome

• Fly Syndrome

• Superwoman Syndrome

• Norman Rockwell Syndrome

You may or may not relate to all of these syndromes but most likely you will know someone who does.

In the final Get Naked section, we give ideas about how to strip away your fears and replace them with prosperity thinking. We suggest that when you change your beliefs to expect things to come your way, they often do. Yes, you still have to do the work, but when you change the way you have acted or reacted in the past, you form new, more empowering beliefs. When these empowering beliefs start getting stronger, you become more motivated. This work isn’t a chore. It’s a joy.

Introduction Practice

Changing Clothes

This practice is about using your imagination. You ready?

Start by going to your clothes closet in your mind.

Section One:

Pick out an outfit.

How do you feel in this outfit?

Are you feeling sassy or serious?

Are you feeling sexy or dumpy?

Are you feeling adventurous or comfy?

Section Two:

Pick out an outfit that makes you feel the opposite of your first outfit.

What does this change of clothes tell you about your feelings?

You know you have the ability to change how you feel by changing what you’re wearing. You can do the same