How you share your stories matters.
Arminda Lindsay is a force. She's a force of integrity, love, and inner strength. That's because she knows who she is, what drives her, and that she does Arminda better than anyone else could.
She wasn't always this way. Her life isn't all roses and sunshine; it took her a long time to come to the point of trusting herself and her instincts enough to bring her whole self to every environment. This is a large part of what makes her such a good coach.
In this podcast, Arminda shares a couple of stories that will resonate with listeners; one is an example of when she not only realized her boundaries for what she would accept from others, she set them definitively by walking away from a job after an abusive event.
When we share stories like this, they're not only reminders, or evidence that we are resilient; these stories help others to know they're not alone, and that they can make decisions that are right for them. We learn from these stories that we CAN and MUST choose ourselves and our well-being, and that we define our own value. If we don't define our value for ourselves, we leave that critical aspect of our lives to those around us. And very few people will value us any more than we value ourselves.
The first step must be define our core values, and to be introspective enough to recognize what drives us. As Arminda said in the podcast, if we want to find satisfaction in life, we must stick to our integrity, our knowledge of our own needs. Because if that's out of alignment, nothing feels right, and we lose our sense of self.
Bonus: In the podcast, Arminda shared something about herself that I didn't know, though now that I do, I'm not at all surprised. Here's a little something to make you smile:
Arminda loves coaching extraordinary women to see the beauty of who they truly are by accessing the power they possess when they step into ownership of their full expression. In addition to working with women, she has also worked with C-Suite executives, leadership teams, business owners, and entrepreneurs for over a decade, and is a trusted advisor who coaches leaders to elevate their strategic thinking and performance to expand their vision and its impact on their organizations and leadership teams.
When Choose Your Own Adventure books hit the scene my enthusiasm could not be sated. I devoured these books, always reading them from start to stop as many times as I could choose a different direction to guide the fate of the main character through one seemingly critical decision after another, never tiring of the delightful discovery of how one choice could lead to such different consequences and possible outcomes. When I came to the conclusion of a series of choices, I happily turned back to page one and started over again, always choosing differently than my previous read through the same plot.
I’ve come to understand that my life is no different than the storybooks I’ve always loved to read. And up until a few years ago, I was so invested in believing my own story to be true that I was no more writing my story as much as I was allowing it to be written by everything and everyone around me. I was a character in my own story, but one who existed at the mercy of the plot unfolding around me.