lisa fabrega
What “life lessons” have you learned in the past ten years?
For me there are a few that stick out (and that consequently I teach in Capacity Work™). But there was one life lesson I kept thinking about all week which I’ve personally learned the hard way:
Don’t fight harder for someone than they want to fight for themselves.
You might’ve learned as a child that you had to fight for everything you have. Or maybe you had to fight to get a parent’s love. Were you a child in a large family and had to fight for people to notice you? Perhaps you still “fight” for your family to see you for who you are, even though they never will.
Whatever the situation, many of us have learned that if we “just fight hard enough” maybe others will want to fight for themselves, see us, meet us halfway or grow, too.
The problem with this is YOU become a casualty.
You spend so much time trying to wake someone up. Ever tried to wake someone who doesn’t want to? They’ll be irritated, yell, be mean, throw things or even smack you. Or they’ll just roll over and ignore you. Now you’re drained and exhausted from trying to wake them up. And they’re still sleeping.
What happens when you do that constantly with different people in your life? Do you see what a time and energy waster that can be? What’s the cost of that for you personally?
Who in your life who is WILLING to do the work with you is being ignored while you focus on the person happily sleeping? How many hours of wasted time could go towards growing your wealth or spending time with people who WANT to grow and are EASY to get along with?
This is why in Capacity Shift, we work on Emotional Capacity. Because that impulse to fight for someone harder than they want to fight for themselves? That’s what we call an addiction to hidden emotional labor.
Emotional labor is one of the hidden energy and joy drainers. Often when clients come to me saying they’re burned out or that they can’t imagine growing more because they already have enough on their plate, the culprit is emotional labor. It blocks you from expanding your capacity to receive, hold and handle the next level of what you want.
Here are some ways you do hidden emotional labor that pulls you away from your most important work:
That client who just doesn’t do their homework, or doesn’t show up for calls, yet always complains they aren’t making progress? Or that client who, as soon as they hit the real issue they need to work on, bolts instead of staying?
Don’t waste time or energy trying to show them why they’re self sabotaging or why they need to stay. Just let them go. If they truly wanted and were ready to deal with it, they wouldn’t have bolted right when you got to the good stuff. I promise you that two, new, willing people ready to do the work will show up to replace them. Always happens this way, I promise.
That person on social media whom you spent time explaining they can’t have experienced racism because they’re white (because racism is a systemic issue that benefits anyone with light/white skin), yet they continue to argue they’ve experienced racism. (They’ve experienced prejudice, not racism.)
It’s clear they haven’t fully educated themselves on the many, many scholarly articles written on this topic. If they had, they wouldn’t be arguing with you. They aren’t listening and don’t want to. So stop arguing with them and focus on the people who are waking up and do want to learn. Karma will take care of the other person.
The people who keep passing you up for the speaking opportunity you want, even though you’ve got something to offer that no one else does? Move on and focus on people who do want to book you to speak. There will come a time they’ll be begging you to speak at their event and you won’t have the time for them anymore cause you’re all booked up.
We spend so much time trying to get people to notice us, who simply won’t. Often, when I work with my clients I find their whole marketing message has been crafted to convince the people who’ll never sign up to work with them, instead of the ones ready and don’t need much more than an invitation to say YES.
When we work on their capacity and their message switches to focus on those who are ready, making money becomes SO much easier. There are so many people who are ready to grow with you. So why do you waste so much of your time, money and energy on the ones who aren’t?
This is a Capacity issue.
These days, no one who wants me to spend my energy and time “convincing” them gets a sliver of my time. They wanna self sabotage or stay stuck in their ways and beliefs? That’s for them to deal with. Good luck on that journey.
I’ve got so many people who are ready to do the work and are kicking ass because of it. Friends who are excited to grow with me. They’re truly dedicated. It’s a joy and easeful to work with those kinds of clients and have those kinds of friends.. Why would I waste any time trying to convince people who aren’t ready?
Expanding your emotional capacity means dropping the habit of emotional labor and doing self care by only putting your energy into things that are RESPONSIVE and OPEN to you.
Read that last sentence again. Let that sink in.
I’ve got two spots open in my usually-sold-out Capacity Shift™ group coaching program this month. This program starts at only $375 a month. And includes group coaching calls, modules and an amazing, diverse community of amazing, kind and ambitious women who are all in on growing together. In this program we work on all six capacities, and you get a series of assessments to help you discover WHY you’re feeling blocked in your capacity and exactly which capacities you need to start working on.
If you’re interested in talking more, just go here to fill out this short form and we can have a chat where I can tell you more about the program. And don’t worry, I just said I don’t do any convincing, so you can expect our conversation to have ZERO pressure.