Finding what fulfills you

Welcome back to How To Twenty Something, today I am going to help you uncover your path towards living a fulfilled life and the different ways it can show up in your life

Most of the time, when people talk about wanting to feel fulfilled, they curate it towards their career choice

And for some, that is the case 

Which makes sense since your career is the most time consuming part of your life right now

I know my passion is carried out through my career, I know my mom absolutely loves what she does, and I have met a very small handful of twenty-somethings who have a corporate styled job and love what they do too

I’m here to tell you, this really isn’t that common, especially at our age, and it’s not to say that you won’t get to that place eventually, but right now we are all babies in the adult world and are still figuring a lot of shit out

And some of that shit comes with understanding who you are and what you want out of your life – whether it’s coming from your career or elsewhere

And hopefully this episode starts to get your mind thinking about how you can find what fulfills you in different aspects of your life

Because here’s what I know, if you don’t find the thing that lights you up and makes your heart feel all warm, you’re going to resort to unhealthy coping mechanisms, you’re going to feel like you’re stuck in groundhog day and living the same day over and over again, you’re going to think maybe you should move cities or countries to improve your quality of life, and you’re not going to feel like your existence matters

It’s dark, I know, and I’ve been there, believe me

But when you become passionate about something, life becomes a lot more fun and you have more to look forward to than your next day off or next vacation planned

You’re no longer trying to escape your life on the weekends, but actually working to build something for yourself that makes you feel good and important

Every now and then I ask people if they are using their weekends to build the life they want, or to escape the life they have

And if you’re part of the ladder, which I know a majority of twenty-somethings are, then it’s time for you to take a step back and learn about your interests and how you want to play a role in the world today

It’s not to say you have to be some speaker or influencer – not in the tiktok social media way, but in the Tony Robbins kind of way; however it is to say that you need to look within and figure out how you can create joy and find your reason for existing without the dependence of other people to create that meaning for you

Before I stumbled upon my passion I would always say something along the lines of if I die, it wouldn’t matter anyways because I’m just another cog in the machine

I was 22 with that mentality – I thought it was mainly because I wasn’t important to my place of employment and barely knew anyone in the city I was living in so if I disappeared nothing would really change for anyone, other than my family being sad

Now, I have something that I’m working towards, I want to make my mark on this world, I want to help people and change their perspectives and the way they think so they don’t have the thoughts that 22 year old me had

I’m creating this for myself, because it gives me pure joy – it’s not dependent on someone else showing up for me, although the emotional support is always welcomed

But if there were zero listeners to this podcast, I would still show up in the exact same way as I am right now

I was recently talking with some friends and we were reminiscing on moments from our childhood and we joked and said 10 years from now we’ll be reminiscing on this moment in our lives

To which one of them said, man I can’t even think 10 years into the future right now and I said I can and I’m excited for what I have in store as I have big dreams that I’m chasing

It’s to say I have a precise 10 year plan, but I do know that I will be doing something within this line of work

The version of me today has an entirely different thought process than the fresh out of college girl who felt stuck in her 9-5 and didn’t really understand why

Now I can reflect back and tell my younger self that what I experiencing was a completely normal adulting moment that no one talks about and it was that you need to find what makes you feel good about your life and add it to your schedule on a regular basis

Whether that’s daily, weekly, or monthly – regardless of how often you’re making room for it; it needs to be consistently included in your life

I believe we all have a thing that lights us up, but you’re so caught up in wondering what others would think, or not even giving it a thought as to why your existence matters because you’re constantly operating on autopilot and one day you’ll wake up and realize more than half your life has passed you by and you’ve done nothing with it

And that’s why so many older adults have a midlife crisis

I want to help you feel proud of the life you’re creating for yourself, whether that means it’s from the job you show up to, the community service you take part in, or even becoming a mom or dad 

But whatever it is, you can’t even begin to get there without bringing awareness and structure to your life

That’s why those are the first two pillars in my Own Your Life Signature system

Without those two pillars you will remain a cog in the never ending system created by Rockefeller

8 hours of work, 8 hours of sleep, 8 hours of play – and we all know that’s not even the case anymore as it’s more like 6-7 hours of sleep; 9-10 hours of work including your commute if you’re back in office, 1-2 hours of working out, 1-2 hours of cooking and cleaning and the remaining time for laying on the couch because you’re so exhausted 

And while those are all important it can feel mundane and you lose yourself along the way

College is the most unrealistic sense of freedom that we got introduced to once we became an adult

It gave us a lot of time flexibility, close proximity to friends, and tons of events to do, and then you enter the real world and you quickly realize how dull and gray the world becomes

Which is why you need to find the color in your life, the light that shines through your soul so you have something to look forward to on a regular basis

And don’t worry, I’m going to help you get started with finding your light, but mind you this is generalized and if you want to work on this towards your unique life then I invite you to come work with me as purpose is pillar 4

I think a few episodes back i said alignment was pillar 4 and I messed that up as that’s pillar 5 so oops that’s my bad

But yes, finding your purpose is part of the journey I take my clients through

So you don’t feel like you’re aimlessly walking around from one thing to the next, but operating with intent and that comes from finding what fulfills you

What makes your heart feel warm like someone’s giving it a big hug whenever you are growing that part of your life

And it’s what I’m here to help you with

To start, think back to when you were between the ages of 8 and 10 and ask yourself what did you enjoy doing

For me I was deep into competitive gymnastics by this point in my life and in my free time I loved playing with dolls or my sister and I would set up kingdoms in her bedroom and we had all of these plastic animals where the lions were in charge; you know, normal kid stuff

But my biggest interest was gymnastics and it honestly shaped the person I am today, which is what I’m getting at with this little question

Last year, my coach hosted a summit on zoom where she brought in a lady, I don’t remember who this was, but I do remember her saying that what you liked doing from ages 8 to 10 largely translates to what you like as an adult

This is not the same for everyone, but it 100% applied to me

When I was doing gymnastics, I was in incredible shape and always active even when I wasn’t in the gym, I was very disciplined, I was learning time management since I would go to school and then have a 3 hour practice every night and still had to keep my school work in check; and I had to be mentally strong and in tune with my body

Yes, my mom instilled the time management, school priorities, and commitment to seeing something through to the end even when it’s hard in me, but the discipline, overcoming fear, trying new things, sucking at first but improving along the way, and having a team all came with the sport

Gymnastics was my life at that time and it created the foundation for me to know how my body moves, take care of myself, be fit, and have a basic understanding of what muscles were and where

And now I’m a personal trainer and life and nutrition coach

The personal training and nutrition coaching definitely relate back to my formative years and life coaching came about through hardships I encountered later in life, but it is cool to see the full circle I unintentionally made

But was meant to complete 

So, if you are one the many twenty-somethings out there trying to adult and are struggling to even think about what you like to do in your spare time, ask yourself or ask your parents, what you liked doing as a kid; what were your hobbies or interests

And start to implement some version of your interests into your adulting life, you might be surprised with the outcomes

Now this could very well be a piece of enjoyment rather than fulfillment, and if that’s the case keep listening, I mean you should keep listening regardless

And while fulfillment does bring enjoyment, it doesn’t necessarily work the other way around

When something is fulfilling you, you feel this incredible power within you that you have meaning, that you’re achieving something and that brings about happiness and enjoyment

When something brings enjoyment and not fulfillment, you are taking pleasure in something, which yes, is also important, but is not the focus of this episode

Now, a year ago I hosted my first workshop called Find Your Fulfillment, because I see so many young professionals dragging their feet Monday through Friday, so if you were one of my first workshop attendees, some of this might sound a bit familiar

But a question I like to ask people who are struggling to conceptualize how to find their own fulfillment is if there was an extra hour in the day, how would you spend it

And your answer is not allowed to be sleeping, watching tv, or drinking alcohol

Let’s say if tv and internet and social media and alcohol didn’t exist, what would you choose to do with your 25th hour of the day

How can you use that extra hour to nourish your mind, body, and soul? Essentially, what would you do to fill that time?

I know this is a podcast, so feel free to hit pause and seriously ask yourself this question

Start to let your mind think about how you’re showing up in your life right now versus how you want to be showing up

I know this exercise might be a little difficult for you, as I’ve talked to so many young professionals who don’t even know who they are or what they like

And remember, this is to help you get started in thinking about your approach to life a little differently; not necessarily to give you the answers you need about your unique life and what allows you to feel fulfilled

I wasn’t always fulfilled in my life, as I stated early with my it wouldn’t matter if I died thought process, but my personal journey lead me down a very unexpected path when I broke my foot senior year of college and then when I lost my job in 2020

You see, I wanted to get my personal training certification right after I graduated college because I had just gone through months of weight lifting as part of my rehab from breaking four bones in my ankle and I wanted to learn more

I was always extremely active; in part because my mom didn’t want to have couch potato kids, another part was my severe body dysmorphia, and the final part was a kid living in Florida so being outside all year long was the standard

I wanted to expand my knowledge about weight lifting outside of the squats, deadlifts, and single leg deadlifts that I had to do for physical therapy

My boyfriend at the time told me it would take too long and isn’t worth the cost of the certification, to which I believed him so I didn’t go after it; until I lost my job a year later and was like well I have nothing but time now, so what do I have to lose

But it wasn’t until I took the initiative, and reached out to a personal training opportunity when I had just started my certification, that showed me the fulfillment I didn’t even know I was missing

And maybe that’s you as well – you’re someone who doesn’t realize what this sense of fulfillment feels like and how absolutely magical and amazing it feels when you are living out the true version of yourself; the you that was put on this planet to be

Rather than what society has told us we should be

And so you don’t know what you don’t know, but what you do probably know is there are people operating in line with their passions, which means you can too

Something that I want to help you find within yourself

If you’re one of the many twenty-somethings out there thinking “I don’t even know what my interests are” then start with the work you do right now and find all of the things you like about your job

Is it the team building aspect; the making clients happy; the behind the scenes part of helping someone else shine; the community of coworkers you have; the people you come in contact with; the use of your creative brain

It could be anything, but start to pull out the parts you like, the reason you haven’t quit this industry yet; money aside

Because money is important, you need money to operate in society, but it isn’t everything so there has to be at least one other reason as to why you like showing up to your job right now

And from there, look at your environment or potential environment and find where that one thing also fits

For example, if you like to be behind the scenes of operations so someone else can flourish, then finding that same concept outside of work would look something like volunteering at a children’s theater group or dance studio

I’ll go back to my personal example, if you love fitness and health and want others to love it as much as you then become a trainer, train one client a week or host a group class on the weekends if you’re too tired during the week

When I found my love for personal training, but my mom told me to go get a real job again, I made sure I was still incorporating personal training into my schedule as regularly as I could

Sometimes that meant subbing a class once a month, sometimes it was 4 times in one week

Regardless, I knew I needed to prioritize including it into my life otherwise I was going to be extremely sad operating day in and day out in my 9-5

Another exercise you can do is write out your ideal day, let’s say you never had to work another day in your life, what would your day look like?

Where would you be located? What would you do to fill your time? But seriously write down an entire day start to finish and then reflect back over it and pull your favorite moment of your imaginary day

As that is your starting point to living a life that is on purpose and good for you, your favorite moment is the key to what you like and now you can begin to trace it back to your current reality and schedule it to be in your life more regularly

Finding what fulfills you is not easy, it can be for some, it can be so obvious and natural for some of you, but for the majority, it’s tough

You have to look within you and uncover the part of you that’s missing and it’s hard to see what isn’t there yet

But when you do; man when you find your thing that lights you up, life becomes more enjoyable, it becomes brighter; YOU become brighter

And everyone around you sees it

When I found the career of coaching, and my heart grew 10 sizes, my mom and sister saw my passion

They knew nothing was going to stand in my way of me pursuing this self-employed path because I would be glowing every time I talked about my future or my reason for wanting to take this risk on myself

Sometimes what you become passionate about is due to you going through some life altering obstacle and you want to make sure no one else has to suffer in the way that you did

And that’s what happened with me

2019-2020 I was struggling to find my place in this world, I was struggling with my own identity, and I was in a really dark place where it seemed like not a single other person could relate to what I was experiencing and there wasn’t a resource that could help me figure it out

And by resource I mean someone who specifically helps people in their twenties

So part of my mission, as I’ve said several times now, is to make sure none of you have to feel alone in your journey and to know I am the person you can turn to when you need help figuring your own life out

And trust me, it’s a much quicker process when you do it with a professional, than trying to do it on your own

It makes me want to cry, in a happy way, when I talk about finding your reason for existing on this floating rock through space, because it is so important when it comes to living a life you want to live and are proud to wake up to almost everyday

And I want to reiterate that your passion does not need to make you money, it doesn’t need to come from your career, it can be things that make you happy like coaching a grade school sports team, or volunteering at a humane society, or starting a social club and being the leader of connecting other people, or becoming a mom or a dad, or rescuing animals from kill shelters, or creating a hiking group, or becoming a yoga instructor, or starting a bakery

Your options are endless, you just have to look inside of you, ask yourself the questions from this episode over and over again and then actually do something about it!!!

I gave you three different ways you can pull out pieces of your identity, the parts of you and your life that bring you joy so you can build on them

It’s time to wake up to the life you’re living in this present moment, find out what you’re not loving about it, and then go on a hunt to find your thing that makes you happy

It’s not a straight path that is easy to follow, but it is possible and it’s exactly what I help my clients with; after we work to get their shit together

Because you do need consistency in your routine to explore what else you can add to your life as routine allows spontaneity without disaster

But if this is something you want help with, please reach out to me as this is why I became a coach for young professionals

You know my email is always in the show notes, as well as my website, and a direct link to my calendar to book a road to success call

Let me be the person to guide you through your journey towards fulfillment

And if this episode gave you your own aha moment of what lights you up in your life, then please tell me!! I love hearing from you guys when an episode resonated with you or how right on time it was for your life

It helps me to know that my mom’s not my only listener – although i do love that she listens to every episode

But hopefully, everything I just said opens your mind up a little bit and gives you the nudge you need to find what fulfills you

And if you liked what you heard go ahead and share this episode with a friend or on your social media, give it a rating, a follow, and subscribe, but do something that helps me expand my outreach to all the young professionals that exist in this world so we can all operate out of a place of fulfillment together

And with that I’ll be in your headphones again next week with a brand new episode of how to twenty something; until then, enjoy the rest of your week and start to dig into what you want out of your beautiful life