Listen to Discovering Your Desires: Empowering Steps Towards Confidence

Hey there, and welcome. Are you a woman who is unapologetically ambitious, but you're also deeply focused on honoring God, loving your family well, and pursuing meaningful work? Well, you've come to the right place. My name is Dana Byers, and you and I are going to be fast friends. Let's get started.

Welcome. Before we get started today, I wanna take just one minute and share with you a recent quote that a client named Amanda sent me. Now, a little bit of background. I am certified to administer something called the Energy Leadership Index Assessment. This is an assessment that was founded by the Institute for Professional Excellence and Coaching, and my client, Amanda, purchased that assessment. And then after she went through it, she sent me this message. She said, this assessment and video teaching were fabulous. I've spent all day pouring over it. This is the understanding I was looking for of where I am and why I am so stressed lately. I believe this is the foundation I need for getting unstuck and lowering stress in so many areas of my life. Thank you so much, Amanda, for just taking a moment to share that with me so I could share it with everyone here on the podcast. If you're interested in learning more about the Energy Leadership Index assessment, go to Dana by coaching.com and click on Energy Leadership Index.

We'll have Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of Been There, learned that I'm Dana Byers, your hostess for today. And I think we're gonna talk about something very fun. I wanna share a perspective with you that I hope really unlocks your understanding for discovering your desires, the things that you really want in your life, and how to take empowering steps towards confidence. I personally believe that our confidence grows, we develop our confidence muscle when we really kind of steep ourselves in understanding, becoming aware of, and really even just kind of discovering the desires that we have. So we're gonna be talking about some confidence building for Christian women today, our self-awareness and our empowerment, really discovering your desires and the things that motivate you, and some insights that I've learned from my practice of coaching Christian working women over the years. I really want this to be something that as you listen to, you find that it's empowering your goals, that you can take biblical actions for pursuing your desires without any sort of shame at all.

So I'm loving the idea of this kind of targeted conversation to help you and me take steps towards godly confidence today. So, as I said, I've had the pleasure of coaching many women over really countless hours over the past couple decades in various jobs that I've had. And something that's interesting to me is that I've noticed that one of the hardest questions for women to answer is this, what do you want? So if a woman can get past that question, what do you want? She'll often then get stumped up by the follow up question, which is this, why do you want that? And the reason I think, is that it's hard for us to know what we want. You know, there are various reasons we struggle with knowing what we want, because sometimes we're just so busy caring for other people, our kids, our spouses, loved ones, maybe parents or coworkers, your direct reports at work.

And we're just failing to consider what we might actually want in a scenario. And then if you're asked, if you're able, you know, to comfortably say, here's what I want, then if you're asked, why do you want that? Many of us feel a little bit uncomfortable saying why it reveals our motivations. It might make us seem less, you know, spiritual than all of our other friends or our coworkers at work, or the other moms that we know. But saying why? And really coming to terms with that is something that can help us build confidence to understand ourselves better. And instead of judging ourselves, really recognize the way that God has wired us. And in fact, you know, I think some of us have walked through seasons of life where we have provided such intense care for others that we've actually become numb to our own desires.

I certainly have done that. You might be able to relate to that, and that might seem like an extremely benevolent behavior, you know, to focus so much on other people that we don't know what we want. But in my opinion, it's really just a dark hole. We spiral down into a lives existence that doesn't really have a lot of confidence exuding from it, because we don't know what we want. We don't know ourselves. Well, we might know God, but we haven't really taken time to ask him to help us understand the way he created us and what he created us for. So walking that path towards numbing your awareness of what you truly want in life is, is actually shutting down the dreams and the desires that God has given you that could very easily happen. And if you play out that behavior of putting others' needs and desires ahead of your own all the time, you will see what I mean.

You know, over time, we become women who kind of rest our identities on our job titles or our salaries or our kids' behavior, or whether or not, you know, we're married or we're single, or maybe even the success or the lack thereof of maybe our family overall as compared to other people. And I just wanna say lovingly to you that this is not God's best for you. If anything that I just described in that scenario is something you're experiencing, I want to invite you to consider approaching life differently. But what it takes, instead of thinking more about other people and doing more for other people, which is often what we as women tend to do, it's gonna require you to become self-aware, to recognize and admit to God and to yourself, and maybe to some trusted people, what you truly want. You know, that could be maybe a promotion, whatever that looks like.

I want you to start thinking about identifying what you want and why you want that. So here are some thoughts. I've heard women say what they want while I've been coaching them. A woman has said to me, I would like to earn more money to help my kids pay for college. Another client said, I'd really love to lose 15 pounds because I want to have the energy to keep up with my grandkids. And a third client said, I would like to start my own business so I'm not tied to someone else's calendar. She really wants to have a sense of control and freedom with her time. And so, as I share those three once with you, that women have shared with me, I'm sure you see the logic in all of those, right? However, if those were your thoughts, the tables might turn. And here's why.

As women, we tend to kind of numb down, numb our own desires or hesitate to share them for fear of judgment. I'm so proud of those clients of mine who bravely told me what they want. And I understand and appreciate that it can be difficult to say that we have to say it to say people, but I want you to imagine a great big scale, okay? You know, a scale that weighs things. And on one end of that scale is the thought I want what I want, and I'm gonna stop at nothing to get it. Okay? That's one dramatic end of the scale. Well, the other end of this great big, massive scale says, I should never have what I want in life, and I'm gonna focus only on other people's needs and desires. Okay, well, that's two very far ends of the scale, right?

Far ends of the spectrum. They're both very dramatic. But I'm using those dramatic examples to show you that many of us, myself included, we I think tend to lean too far to that side of the scale, which says, I should never have what I want in life, and I'm only gonna focus on other people's needs and desires. We lean too far in that direction because we just want to make sure that we are nowhere near, you know, we don't wanna be anywhere close to believing ourselves or to being perceived as women who say what's at the far other end of the scale, which again, is, I want what I want and I'm going to stop it. Nothing to get it. We don't wanna be on that end of things. And so I think we overcorrect sometimes we don't allow ourselves to be a little bit more neutral, to come to maybe the middle of those scales, to better understand what it is that we we want in life.

So I'm going to use a pretty neutral example to share with you one way this played out in my life, but I use something that is not specifically, you know, related super personally to any of our lives, so that you can get a broader picture of how this might be able to work when you discover something that you want. Okay? So when I was in college, I took an art class. I actually met my husband basically in that art class. I had encountered him before, but we got to know each other better, working on a project in that class. And during that semester and that class with my husband, I discovered one of my favorite artists. He is a painter, he is a sculptor. And so over the next years, even into my late twenties, I had the opportunity to visit some of his works with my family when we lived in Europe.

And I, I loved this artist so much that even friends and loved ones when they're traveling, if they see pieces of his works of art, they'll just text me pictures of it. It's just something that I quite enjoy. And I've always thought, as long as I can remember, wow, wouldn't it be so special to own just a small little piece of his work? But I always left that desire at simply wanting that to happen, even if it, you know, were never really possible. In fact, it felt so far out of reach that I would just enjoy the thought of his art. I would look at pictures I had taken of his art, a coffee table, you know, a coffee table book that I have of his art. And that was enough for me. But I still had that desire thinking, man, wouldn't it be nice if, well then incredibly, one day, I think it was back in 2018, maybe, no, actually maybe 20 19, 1 day I discovered on a random day and extremely affordable way to purchase a small sculpture of this artist, I had access to the funds at that time to be able to purchase it.

I had a place that I wanted it in my home. And I, it feels so silly, but I don't really have the words to express to you how it felt to me to unpack that little sculpture when it arrived in my home, to give it a place of honor where I, I see it every day. I can see it from where I sit on the couch when I have my quiet time. I can see it when I'm watching TV in the evening with my family. It is really special to me, and I love this little sculpture. But here's what I think that the catch, here's where the catch comes for those of us who are Christian women who want to be good stewards of our money, who want to use our money and our time to give our kids experiences. We wanna build a life around the things that it seems we should have or want.

And it's a catch for those of us, because we want to cater our needs frequently to the needs of others and not our own. And while I wouldn't say ever that I needed that little sculpture, I would say it is so delightful to me. And I am fairly confident that most of you listening right now probably aren't judging me for finding the time and the place and the money to purchase this artwork. That means so much to me. But I am also confident that some of you listening to this would actually judge yourselves for spending money on something that might feel a little bit silly to you, but would actually bring you great delight. So the catch here is with the how, right? How do we bring about the things that we want in our lives? Do we push our way for it? Do we do illegal things?

Do we spend more money than we have? Do we find unfair ways to get an advantage? You know, the, the how is what is so important when we have a desire? And I think that's why we so easily kill our, our desires because we think, oh, that's not possible. But I'm telling you, my delight was multiplied after years of wanting something and then suddenly discovering it was somehow possible. So the how matters when we choose not to kill our desires, right? But there's an even bigger element of play here that I wanna communicate as clearly as I can to you. And it's this, make sure that you don't kill your desires. Don't sacrifice them on the hill of practicality and logic. You know, you do want what you want, maybe you won't get it will, will it come to pass? Maybe not. But it's a special confident feeling to get to a point where you are 100% okay with what you want never happening, but you still allow yourself to desire it instead of shutting down those thoughts and the things that would have meaning to you.

You allow yourself to experience the feelings and the thoughts that are reflection of how you are created, that are reflection of your values and the things that have meaning to you, the things that are special to you. So you can allow yourself to hold space for the thought of, but wouldn't it be nice if, and that keeps us in a space where we aren't demanding, we aren't forcing our way for the thing that we want to happen, but we also allow our once and desires to come to the surface. We don't, you know, pull them out at the root. We give our dreams and desires, a safe space to thrive and to be nurtured without an attachment to them actually having to happen. This is kind of a unique space to live in, but I wanna invite you to that because I believe that listening to your desires, giving them a space to breathe, this is going to help you know yourself better.

It's going to help you understand the way God created you without having judgment for yourself. And it can build a sense of confidence over time as you know what you want, but you're not demanding it. And you will stand ready to act if a window does come open for you, but you are not hustling to make it happen. So I have a little assignment for you today, and that is this, take the time to think about something you want. Name it. Now, it's possible that right now maybe you want some ice cream or maybe a vacation, but I want you to think of something that you long for that you maybe don't mention much, if at all. You might be longing for something like a friend who truly holds you accountable so you can grow, you might be longing for a job or where you have a 401k that you can invest money into every paycheck.

I have a friend who said recently she would love to have a garden that she could tend to, to support her mental and physical health. I know someone who would love to have a companion pet. Maybe you want to own your own business, to utilize your strengths to serve other people and to pay the bills. You might have a deeply seated desire to be part of a church community whose theology aligns with yours. You might just want the chance to try out a business idea or to partner with someone else with an idea that you have a deep desire in. You might be to have a job where your value is acknowledged, or maybe you would really love to have a consistent sleep schedule that is not impacted by stress and anxiety every night. I want you to think about, as I said, something that you want that maybe you don't talk about a lot, but it's really there.

It's kind of knocking at the door of your brain and you feel yourself either pulling it out at the root, you feel yourself killing that desire, or you feel yourself using logic or things to kind of shut down the fact, you know, this is not possible. You might be telling yourself this can't happen. So you kill that desire. And so don't just stop naming at just one thing that you want. I think what happens when I work on this with clients is once we start identifying and talking about the things that we want, the list grows. And I encourage you to go so far as to create a list of those things that you want. Again, you're not gonna put yourself in a mindset of hustling to force them to happen. You're really, I believe, putting out there the desires of your heart. You are letting God actually, you're agreeing with God.

He already knows you want these things. You're saying, God, I do care about these things. I want these things to come about. Would you take a look at my motivations? Would you help me get to a more neutral place where I don't feel selfish, but I also don't kill my desire? And what happens is, the more you write out, the more you will get to the heart of what you truly long for. And once you identify some of those key things that you would like to experience, or that you are longing to bring about in your life, then you can ask yourself, why do I want this? And again, as we're talking about confidence building, remember, no answer is incorrect here. When you answer what you want, you want the relationship or the status or the sculpture or whatever it is, maybe you want an experience.

You want that because there's a belief within you that either you need it to face whatever's happening today or whatever's next in your life, or maybe you believe that it would just bring a special element of desire and maybe even a sense of worship to who God is and what He's done in your life. So a little bit of a word of caution here. Once you know what you want, you might start seeking it out in unhealthy ways. A nagging desire to make it happen could immediately creep in and contrary to popular secular theology, you and I are not God. We cannot simply say something will happen and then make it appear. You know, I never got to a point where I thought, man, wouldn't it be great to have one of these pieces of art? And then I just stared at the wall and suddenly it appeared there, right?

Like, we are not God. But there are biblical actions that can help move us in the direction of the things that we admit that we want, that we know we have pure motives and desires for. And here's what you can do. You can pray and ask God to provide those things to you or to remove those desires if they're not from him. You could tell some trusted people that you are on the lookout for these things. Remember, I shared with you, I told my friends and my loved ones, oh, I love this artist. And just to add joy to my life, they would text me pictures whenever they saw his art around the world. You can align your thoughts and behaviors with the possibility that God could answer these prayers. You could keep a hopeful watch for his provision without being attached to the outcome. And finally, you can ready yourself to experience and live out the why behind what it is that you are seeking. Confident women know what they want and why they want it, and they partner with God to pursue what he leads them to do in their lives. Ladies, I've so enjoyed having this chat with you today. Thanks for joining me for another episode. If you would like to learn more about working with me, go to danabyers coaching.com/get coached.

Could you become a strong, empowered woman? Absolutely. I think it's important for all of us to learn how to become empowered women, and that's why I've created a special 30 page free download to accompany all the things you're learning on my podcast. You'll get to take true purposeful action towards learning how to feel empowered as a woman after God's own heart. To get your free download, go to DanaByersCoaching.com/free.