Audacious Updates

Steven Furtick said, “The difference between a vision and a daydream is the audacity to act.” In this episode, I am revisiting my word of the year, which is “audacious” and giving you some audacious updates. So, let’s dive in.

Welcome to the School of Self-Image, where personal development meets style. Here’s your hostess, master life coach Tonya Leigh.

Hello, my beautiful friends. I am so thrilled to be recording today’s episode because it’s all about my audacious updates. So, if you’ve been listening to the podcast for a while, you probably know that I choose a word of the year every single year. And this year, for 2021, my word of the year is audacious.

And since we are over halfway through the year, which is crazy to think about, I thought I would give you an update on my audaciousness; the audacious moves I have been making this year.

And I also wanted to do this podcast just to give you a little nudge to assess your word of the year. If you choose one, this is a beautiful time to go in and see how you’re doing. Are you embodying your word of the year? Do you feel like you’re living into it? And if not, do the necessary adjustments to get back into your intention.

Because we still have, what, five months left. We can do a lot in five months, my friends. So, let me share with you my audacious updates for these last six months.

I chose the word audacious for this year because I feel like my work right now is playing to the edge of life, which requires that I am an adventurer, that I take bold risk, that I dare, as Brené Brown would say, dare greatly.

And all of this requires that I am constantly stepping into discomfort. I like to think of audacity and courage as going hand in hand. And I feel like this is such a good word for so many of us because everything that we want is going to require that we are bold, that we take those bold risks.

And so, I hope that my audacious updates will inspire you to really think about your life and where are you being called to be more audacious. Because you could be audacious in many ways. Audacity can be wearing that sexy feminine dress to a very conservative event, or it can be starting a business after being a stay-at-home mom for 15, 20 years. It’s you stepping into the boldest, craziest, wildest version of yourself.

That’s how I see it. Because it will seem crazy to the rest of the world. You have to know that. So many people will say to me sometimes, “I can’t believe you’re doing this. It’s crazy.” And I’m like, “Yes.”

I think for me, I discovered a long time ago, I don’t want to live a dull, expected life. I want to live a life that is unexpected, even to myself. I want to surprise myself all of the time. Not only do I want to surprise myself, but I also want to delight myself. I want to make myself proud, which is going to require that I am audacious.

So, here are my audacious updates for this year. The biggest one, which I think I announced last week on the podcast, is I made an audacious decision to move to Puerto Rico. And yes, many people think I’m crazy, and that’s okay. I am a little crazy sometimes.

But many things factored into this decision, but one of them was, you know, my daughter is 23 now. And I’m at a place in my life where I can really go anywhere. And as an entrepreneur, Puerto Rico just makes sense for me as a US citizen.

And so, I will be making this move within the next few days. The next time I record a podcast, I will be in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Which is crazy. At the beginning of the year, I had no idea that I would be moving.

And the crazy thing is, I’m moving from a place I absolutely love. I’ve enjoyed Denver so much. I live in this beautiful penthouse that overlooks downtown. I have the most gorgeous view ever. I completely bought all new furniture. Everything’s brand new in this apartment.

I’ve had the most amazing year, over a year here. And I’m being called to do the next audacious thing, which is move. And so, that was a really big one for me because my brain has wanted to talk me out of it. My brain has wanted to tell me that I should stay here. It tells me all of the reasons why Puerto Rico is a terrible idea, such as I don’t speak Spanish, it’s a territory that’s run very differently than the US.

There’s all these cons that my brain wants to give me. But there’s also so many beautiful and wonderful pros. And so, when I just sit with all of it, I’m like, “Okay, what if all of this is true?” Part of it’s going to be amazing. Part of it’s going to be difficult. What do I choose to do? And I still say, I choose to go to Puerto Rico.

And the other thing that I just want to throw out there for you all is that a lot of times, I see you all, my clients, not want to make decisions because you’re afraid of making the wrong decisions. I’m willing to make a bad decision. I’m willing to make a decision that doesn’t end especially well.

And the crazy thing is, the more I do that, the better my life gets. Audacity is the willingness to make bold decisions. So, when it comes to Puerto Rico, I’ve already told myself, if I go and I hate it, I can make a new decision. But right now, my decision is I’m moving to Puerto Rico. I know, just hearing myself say that sounds so crazy. But that’s the kind of life I want to live, to be honest.

I want to be constantly pushing the edges, exploring, seeing what’s possible. It’s hard to do that when you’re standing in place. And so, I’m heading to Puerto Rico. And for those of you within the School of Self-Image, don’t you worry, there’s going to be, I’m sure, a lot of behind-the-scenes of my life there. So, stay tuned for that.

Okay, the next audacious update that I’m so excited for is I have decreased my people pleasing to probably about 15%. You all, I don’t know that you realize how huge this is when I think about how much of my life was spent people pleasing. It’s still there, but I can tell you I’m way more intentional and my people pleasing that I’m doing now feels better. I usually, most of the time, want to please these people that I’m pleasing.

For those of you who are people pleasers, I’m going to have to just do a whole podcast on this because what I can tell you is it slows you down tremendously. And you can’t be audacious if you’re trying to please everyone, if you’re trying to keep from rocking the boat. It just doesn’t fit together. Audacity is being bold. It’s taking risk.

And sometimes, the risk is being honest enough to tell the truth at the potential expense of people being upset with you. It’s just the way it is. And I’ve had some people be upset with me this year. And that’s okay because at least I’m not upset with me as much as I used to be because I’m being truthful and honest with myself. So, that’s a huge audacious update. And for you all that are people pleasers, you know how big that is.

Other audacious updates are me getting into shape. I’ve been hitting the gym at least five times a week. I have put on muscle. I have taken off fat. I’m feeling stronger. I’m feeling more clear-headed. I’m feeling better.

And people say I actually look better now too. I’ve actually put on weight, which for those of you who struggle with your weight, let me tell you, it’s not about what the scale says. It’s about how you feel inside your body.

So, even though I’ve gained weight, a large part of that is muscle, and I’ve also lost some fat. But the scale shows I’m probably about 10 pounds heavier. I don’t care. I really don’t care. I really don’t.

I have the audacity to not worship the scale like I used to. I don’t know if it’s because all of the work that I’ve done on my mindset around this or if it’s me getting older, but I don’t care what the scale says anymore. I really don’t.

What I care about is how I feel. And by showing up this year and working out and making a commitment to my fitness and my health, I feel so much stronger and so much better in my body. So, that’s that update.

And then, the last audacious update that I will give you is around my business, which probably isn’t a surprise to you all because my business is such a part of me and a part of my life. But last year, I completely revamped my whole business model.

I let go of many of my old programs and I decided to focus on one thing, which is the School of Self-Image membership, which I love. Oh my god, I love this membership so much. And I’ve made two big decisions. One I can’t share with you right now. But it’s going to be so fun. I can’t wait.

The other one, I can give you a little hint. I’m going to be hosting my first live event ever in 2022. And I have hired some of the best event planners in the industry. And right now, we are securing and finalizing the venue, which I cannot wait to share with all of you.

If you’re within the School of Self-Image membership, you will be the first to know and seats will be limited. So, if you want to know about this event that’s going to be audacious, I promise, you’re going to want to come join us within the membership.

But this has been big for me because I’ve been doing this for 10 years – over 10 years actually – and I’ve run many retreats. I’ve done a lot of small in-person gatherings. But I’ve never done a large event. And I’m not going to lie. Part of me is like, “Why in the world are you doing this? Things are going smooth. You’ve never done this before.”

Which by the way, can I just tell you all, it’s the worst thing to say to yourself, that you’ve never done something before. It’s such a useless thought because of course you’ve never done it before. Until you do it, you will continue to have that as evidence that you shouldn’t do it. Which is why we have to go out there and do it, so we can say, “Hey, I have done this before and I’ve learned and it just keeps getting better and better.

But back to my event. It’s been an audacious decision to decide to do this. Because I’ve had people tell me that I shouldn’t, especially with the climate and shutdowns and everything that’s happened over the last year, I’ve had people advise, “Maybe you should wait a little while.” And then I’ve had people say, “It’s just not worth your time or your effort.”

I completely disagree because any time I can gather in-person with people in my community, it’s worth my time. I think it was probably four or five years ago. For those of you who went, you can tell me. I did a tour. And basically it was for free.

We gathered in beautiful hotels around the country and in Europe and the community came together. There was no charge. It was like a cocktail party. And then, for the women who wanted to join me for dinner, there was a charge for that.

But while maybe it wasn’t financially lucrative, it was spiritually lucrative. Like, how I felt leaving those events, and just being able to connect with you all and the community, and then to see you connect and build friendships, to me it’s one of the reasons why I do what I do.

And so, I’m really excited about this event. And while I can’t give you all of the details just yet, what I can tell you, again, if you want to be the first to know, get into the membership. And second, I want this to be an audacious event. And I keep thinking about that, like, what would an audacious event look like? What would it feel like? And what kind of positive impact will it have on women’s lives?

I’m so excited about this. And by then, I’m sure I will have more audacious updates for you all. But to wrap this episode up, I want you to think about two things. I want you to ask yourself where you can be more audacious in your life. Where do you need to make those bold risky decisions that could potentially have such a huge payoff for you?

And then the second thing is to revisit your word of the year. Check in. How are you doing? What’s working well? What’ not working well? What can you course-correct? Because I want us to end this year with a bang. I want us to be so proud of ourselves. So, now is the time to start doing that work. Don’t wait until the last week of December, even though it’s never too late.

But why not start setting yourself up to make 2021 an audacious, unforgettable year? Okay, my friends, I will see you next week, from Puerto Rico.

Hey, have you grabbed your free copy of the School of Self-Image Manifesto? If not, what in the world? Head over to schoolofselfimage.com/manifesto and get a copy that teaches you how to think and show up in the areas of mindset, style, and surroundings so that you can transform your self-image.