The Art of Living Big | Subconscious | NLP | Mindset

In this episode of The Art of Living Big, Betsy shares some profound insights on grief. She explains that it’s not linear and how we can grow bigger than it. How relationships with those we have lost can change form rather than end, and why hope is a brave decision. This one will move you. Oh, and who doesn’t want a bed jet?

Transcript:

 Welcome to The Art of Living Big, where we explore how to live intentionally and with more joy. I’m Betsy Pake, your host, master, coach, and creator of the Navigate Method. Here to help you listen in to your true desires, elevate your standards, and live life to the fullest. Now, let’s go live big.

Hello. Hi everyone. Welcome to the Art of Living Big. I’m excited to do this episode today, which when we, as I say that, when we get to the topic, you’re gonna be like, wow, you’re excited about talking about this really heavy thing, but I, promise there’s hope in it, and I think that’s the really important part in all this.

So last week I did an episode where it was really just me breaking the seal of coming back. So thank you for to so many of you for listening. I am so just so grateful that you accept me back into your ears while you go about your daily tasks. And,, and let me talk with you. I. Wanna tell you a couple other things, and again, if you’re new here, you’re gonna be like, why is she telling me this?

I, I don’t know if you’ve been here a while, you’ve kind followed along the journey whether you wanted to or not. And so I’m gonna give you a couple quick updates. My teeth are complete. That is one of my updates. If you remember last year I had dental work that had to be done. I had, , cap and I had a couple weird teeth things.

I don’t even remember now what it was, but it was a lot of stuff and it was stuff that I had kind of put off for a couple years. Anyway, once I had that done, I got Invisalign because I had a lot of strange gaps in my teeth that I didn’t have most of my adult life. It, just started happening as I really started clenching my teeth these past few years, and so I.

Got my Invisalign. The Invisalign is over, and then I got two new front teeth, I guess I got bonded so that the little space between my teeth was. , Filled in, I guess you could say. I don’t know, I think, I don’t think anybody that meets me that doesn’t know me would notice to me. It looks like I have a couple of chiclets in my front, two front teeth, but I’m getting used to it and it does feel really good to have like a even smile, you know?

And I see my teeth so much because of how I record on Instagram. So anyway. My teeth are complete. And it just feels really good to have that journey done. I mean, it’s been like a two year journey to get my, to get them teeth straight. And now I have this really incredible mouth guard that I can wear at night that is, I don’t know, it’s just space, age and amazing.

And , I’m happy about that. So that’s keeping my teeth from ever moving again, and it feels really good. So, if you’ve been here for a while, you know that I am. A big fan of sleep, like I really like my bed and I like to sleep, so I wanna tell you about something that I bought. It is not sponsored. I tried to get them to sponsor me for a year.

I was messaging and filling out forms on their website. Never, did they reach out to me, which I was like, I am the perfect person to talk about this because I’m obsessed with sleep for one thing, and I. Have a whole audience of women who are right where I am, where you likely need this thing. Now I’m gonna tell you what the thing is, and I’m gonna tell you my honest to God truth about it.

But first I just wanna talk about sleep and how much I love it. Okay? So, if you’ve been here, you know, cozy Earth is one of our sponsors. You can get 20% off anything on the website. , You use the code live big Betsy, and you can get 20% off, but. Yeah, that’s neither here nor there for this episode.

What I really wanna tell you is that if you followed, you know that I’m obsessed with their house coat. Okay? So this is like my routine. Are you ready? Because if you really want some insane, , cozy sleep, I’m about to give you all the things. I have an aura ring and that gives me my sleep score, right? So if you’re familiar with that, I routinely get 94, 96 sleep scores.

I don’t know what happens when you get a hundred. I have a feeling I’d there would be a parade outside for me if I got to a hundred. But my point is I get really high sleep scores now. It. Is it one thing or another? I don’t know. But I’m gonna tell you all the things because there may be a piece of one of these things that helps you.

Okay. Enough of the lead up, let me tell you. So there is this, and again, none of this is sponsored except for Cozy Earth isn’t really sponsored. They give us a, they sponsor this show, not this particular episode, but I love them. So what I do is I have this. Bath salts. That’s a magnesium bath salt, and it’s called flu, F-L-E-U-D fluid.

I have a subscription, I don’t know, it’s 20 bucks a month and I get three of them. So I do a fleud about once a week, and it is like a high concentration of magnesium, but different from Epsom salts. It makes me feel so chilled out. , There’s other stuff in it, but it is amazing. I put it in my tub and I set a timer so that I stay in there at least 20 minutes and those nights,, and I typically notice this will last four or five nights, and then I notice I need to do another one, or that it makes my sleep better if I do another one.

So what I’m about to tell you, the rest of the, this is why I could never have a partner ’cause of all, the things I’m about to tell you. So I take my fleud bath, I put on my cozy earth. House coat, that’s what it’s called on the website. It is basically a comforter that they cut into the shape of a house coat.

I put it in the dryer. Okay. I put it in the dryer so it gets warm, and then I put it on when I’ve just gotten outta the shower or gotten outta the bathtub. Okay? Now I walk into my bedroom and I turn on. Turbo. Turbo mode of my bed jet. Okay, so the bed jet is the thing I was saying. I was trying to get them to sponsor me and they didn’t.

I’m gonna tell you, the bed jet is like a machine that goes underneath your bed and there’s a hose, like a vacuum cleaner hose that goes into a sheet, a special bed jet sheet. Okay. This sheet lives above your top sheet and under your comforter. Okay? And it’s got these channels that go all the way up through the sheet.

And on the bottom part of that sheet, it’s like a, it’s like a envelope. Do you know what I mean? It has two sides. The bottom side is porous, and so the air comes out. From the bottom onto you, and the comforter that you have on top keeps that air contained inside the bed. Okay? So they have turbo mode and it’s 10 minutes of hot air and high fan, and it heats your little bed up to the coziest thing.

So now I have on the cozy earth housecoat, I am deliciously relaxed because I’ve had a fluid bath. I’m cozy. I turn on turbo mode, it gets everything all set up. I get in and it’s warm. It’s not too hot, it’s warm. It’s really great. Now. Now the next thing I do. Is I have a special pillow for between my knees, so my knees don’t go knocking together.

’cause I sleep on my side. I, have, I didn’t realize how ridiculous this was until I started really telling you I have a purple bed, which is a specific kind of bed and that I love. I’m obsessed with it. I have a friend that told me to buy one. She bought one for everybody and her family, they’re amazing.

Again, no sponsorship. I should have one purple bed. The pillow that keeps my knees from knocking together. I have a NOD pod, which I’m a huge fan of the Nod Pod. A couple years ago I spent $3,000 at Christmas time on Nod Pods for people I love. So the Nod Pod is a weighted eye pillow that goes over your eyes and helps your parasympathetic nervous system and helps you relax into a deeper state of relaxation.

So here I am. I’m in the cozy bed. The fan is off now ’cause it’s been 10 minutes so Turbo Mode is done. I’m in the purple bed. I have the Nod pod. I also have a Nod Pod body. I will tell you, I bought the no brand one on Amazon, but it’s, , a weighted blanket that’s just the size of your torso. Okay, so now I got this weight.

I got my mouth guard in. Now I hit the dry button. On my bed Jet, it has cool mode, but it also has dry, which just rotates the air around so it’s not too hot, it’s not too cold. And then when I get really hot, , as one does at one o’clock in the morning, I press the cool button. The, remote control is huge and lit up, and , the words are big.

So I don’t need my glasses and I can hit cool in it. Sends like shot a shot of cool air around the inside of my bed and it is heaven. So I know that’s a lot of things. What did I say? Food bath. The. Housecoat heated housecoat turbo mode on the bed jet, the purple bed, the nod pod, the nod pod body, and the custom mouth guard.

But I’m telling you what like it is. It is really good. It is really good. I sleep really good. Okay, so what was that like 10 minutes of telling you all my crazy, sleep schedule. But we do what we have to do. I do believe that sleep may be like one of the most important things. To keep ourselves healthy and to keep ourselves going, , and to have the energy to be able to do all the things we need to do every day.

So anyway, that is my crazy sleep story. But you can get your cozy Earth stuff. Make sure to use the coupon code ’cause it’s 20% off, which I think is great.. I’m a big fan of the Cozy Socks too. Anyway, this episode is not sponsored by them, but I’m obsessed, so I feel like I, they’re like, which episodes do you want us to sponsor?

I’m like, it don’t matter. I’ll just be talking about it all the time. ’cause I really like it. I’ll tell you, I get sponsorship opportunities now all the time, and I never take ’em very, very, very rarely. The ones I want are like Veg Jet. Nobody calls me, but. Because I only want stuff I really, really love. I don’t wanna tell you to buy a bunch of stuff you don’t need.

Okay. All that stuff you need, come over to my house, spend the night, I’ll get you set up. Okay, so now, for kind of this other part of the show that I really wanna have this discussion with you. Okay, so this past week I woke up and I, it was a Wednesday on St. Patrick’s Day and. I felt so weird, like heavy.

I just felt heavy grief in a way that I hadn’t felt in a long time. It was real weird and I got up and I,, did my thing and got the shower started. And then I was like, what is this? And then it dawned on me that it was the anniversary of my mom dying and I actually had to ask Sury. So I had to, ask her what is 2026 minus 1988, and when she said it’s 37, I just, cried in a way that I can’t explain 37 years since my mom died. 37 years. And it’s funny, , that book, the body keeps the score. I think, your body keeps the score.

My body knew, I feel like every day, I have no idea what the date is. I should probably know, but I’m like, I don’t know what date it is. I just know it’s like Wednesday or Thursday or whatever and sometimes I don’t even know that. And so I wasn’t really paying attention. I knew it was coming because , of course, ’cause it’s St.

Patrick’s Day, so everyone’s talking about St. Patrick’s Day, but. It really hit me in a different way than it has before. And I started thinking about grief and how I don’t think it’s, , I know for sure it’s not linear, and I know that because it’s been 37 years, and if it was linear, I wouldn’t have had the reaction that I had

when my computer said 37. I was like,. I made a sound, , like a painful sound. I almost heard myself and thought, what is that? And it was just the shock of 37 years. It’s been a whole lifetime and it’s not even like a, it’s almost her entire lifetime. For one thing. I hadn’t thought of that till just now.

She died at 41, so it’s almost her whole lifetime, but it is. A lifetime. , By the time someone’s 37, they’ve given life. Like it’s, just so long. And I thought it’s been that long since I’ve seen her or asked her a question or smelled her or heard her voice. , It’s not like now where we have video.

Like when I go, my kid’s gonna have video. He’ll be able to listen to me any moment, , for decades. We don’t have that from 1988. I never, ever texted with her. I never know what that was like. I wonder what she would even think about all the technology now. I wonder what she would think about what I’m doing now.

And , if you’ve been here a while, you’ve heard me talk about this, but my mom died one day when I was in high school. I went to school and she went on a trip with my sister. There was a guy from our hometown who was a hockey player, and he was playing at the university on his final game before he went into the NHL Felt special, and my mom was spontaneous and she liked to celebrate things and to make things special, and so she and my sister decided they would get in the car and drive to his last game.

How cool that would be to be there and to be able to cheer him on. And he went to the college where my sister went and my dad worked. And so off they went that morning. They left early before I even woke up. And when they were driving, they got to New York. I lived in Vermont at the time. That’s where I grew up.

And the game was in Ohio. So they were in New York. Right around Watertown if you’re in that area. And long story short, my mom got off at a wrong exit. They stopped at a little store and said, how do you get back on? , Sometimes you get off on the highway and then you’re like, I can’t get back on.

, There’s no entrance, there’s just an exit. And he said, oh, this happens all the time. You have to take this little access road. And when you get to the end of the access road. Then , you’ll see the entrance ramp to the highway. And he said, just be careful ’cause it’s a twisty road. And my mom said, it’s okay, we’re from Vermont.

And they got in the car and , it was March and it was cold and it was icy. And as my mom was turning around a bend, the car skidded off the road and kind of down and in little embankment. And , as. Cars do. When you kind of pick up momentum, you know, faster, you go down a little embankment, you pick up some momentum, and there was one tree in the middle of this field, a whole field.

And of course, she hit the tree, hit the tree. My sister climbed, got outta the car. She had, broken her jaw and they both had their seat belts on, but. She climbed up the embankment and someone was driving by and they stopped and looked at her and just said, I’ll call the ambulance. And my sister said, thank you.

And the ambulance came and they took the jaws of life and they helicoptered my mom to the closest hospital where she had surgery and died about 12 hours later. , I think about that tree a lot, and historically I have, because it was just like a one tree in the middle of a field. There was a lot of places you could go.

It was like a parking lot with one tree. But you know, she went where she was looking. , That’s what you do when you’re driving, but that is what you do in life. You go where you’re looking, you go where you are mulling things over. You go where you’re worrying, you go where you’re putting your attention.

And I have often felt over the years that my mom and I were creating my business together, that perhaps before I was born, before she was born, we had a pact that I would be her daughter. And she would have some dramatic exit where I would be devastated to the place where I had to find meaning in it in order to move forward.

And that meaning would create a lot of good. And so that is how I think I got to where I am , and even became a coach, , back in 2012 and started doing this work. . Here’s the thing that I think when I look back, and someone asked me recently about what is a belief that you have about life?

And I knew it ex immediately. I was like, oh, I know. Which is a funny thing that I would know, but I was like, oh, I believe things can change in an instant. Like things can change in an instant, and I know that to be true because of my mom. But the weird thing. Is, I never took that to mean things could go bad in an instant.

It’s always been a thing that brought me hope. It’s always been when things are going sideways where I’m like, man, this won’t last. ’cause things can change in an instant. My brain did the opposite. For some reason, it, rewired. To this can turn around any second and it doesn’t even need an explanation.

And I really think that’s my superpower. When one of my friends was asking me this, it was actually a client, a friend, client, an old client now a friend. And I was like, I think that’s what it is. , I think that’s like the whole basis of how I operate in life. So, , there is specific moments.

In my life where that belief has saved me when hope felt irrational, but I held onto it anyway and I didn’t pay any attention to what was happening. And you’ve probably heard me say this on the show over the years, , I don’t care what’s happening. It’s not real. It’s my old vibration showing up, and now I’m thinking about something else.

, Every. Every day. And I did the, I do, , , I did a podcast episode on this back in January, I think, where every day I write as if it’s a day in the future. And typically what I do is I pick a day at the end of the quarter. ’cause that’s how I do my goals, is like quarterly goals. And I pick a date and then that’s the date that I write about.

So like every day. A day every day. This year I have written, it’s now March 31st and I am, and then I write all the great things that are happening. And the really interesting thing, and in that process as we’re getting close now to March 31st, is I wrote some crazy stuff and it’s almost all come true.

It’s almost all come true. And I noticed when I would be taking chances, like risks, but they were calculated risks or I was. Trying to shift to do something different or bring in something different into my business or whatever it was. And I know it’s because my brain was like, well, to get to that we have to do this thing.

Like we’ve got to add in this thing. We’ve got to take this risk. We’ve got to pay somebody to find this person for us, or whatever it was. And I just think those two things together. So that when I was writing every day, it, could change. . Things can change in an instant, and turnarounds don’t require any reason.

There’s no reason, just like this bad thing didn’t really require a reason. Symmetric, sym symmetry of chaos, I guess you could say, ? It just all came together, and I think things can all come together all the time. I posted on Instagram that day about grief and about how, I don’t think it’s linear.

I think it’s access. I think it’s as you’re going through bigger things, you have more access to grief. As you learn and grow and get to know yourself better, you have more access to grief. The amount of access I had at 16. To understanding grief and, working through it or even experiencing it was different than my experience.

Now at 54, almost 55, I’m having different things happen in my life and that door to grief is wide open and that’s why it hit me so hard that morning My. Child has, I say child 24 has a cat that they have had since they were 10, and tonight we’re going to put that cat down. He’s been in the hospital. It is just time.

And so we have access to handle grief in different ways. When we’re older, we have access to make different decisions about grief as we get older. And I think that there’s something really nice about never losing access to it. , I know that sounds kind of weird ’cause who wants to have grief? Like that feels, I’m gonna use the air I’m using.

Air quotes bad. Like it feels bad, right? But I have a lot of hope. I know it sounds weird ’cause I don’t have hope the cat’s gonna live. We’ve made the decision and we’re going over there tonight, but I have a lot of hope that there’s healing in it, that there’s evolution in it, that there’s purpose in all of it.

And that choice probably made unconsciously at age 16, , is still running in the background. Things can change in an instant. I know the situation with Sammy, the kitty isn’t changing, but I know the way we feel about it, Ken and I know things can shift. So here’s the thing when I posted this on Instagram is I got so many messages from people.

I mean, hundreds of messages and everybody can relate to grief. , It’s just such a human thing. I think the part that is harder is when you’re 16 or 10, 22 and you’re trying to relate to grief because you haven’t had enough life experience to be able to access it where you can really process it.

And so I have some thoughts of what I would tell someone who is. Loving someone who is losing a parent as a kid. Oh, y’all know I’m gonna cry. I’m not gonna cry. It’s gonna be fine, but I have some real thoughts.

So I have some thoughts. Maybe they’ll be helpful. Maybe they’ll be helpful down the road. I think the first thing is to recognize. That your access to the grief when you’re younger is going to change as you get older. And that’s not a bad thing. It doesn’t mean, oh my God, this is never going away because , that’s just a part of life.

It’s not whether it’s your cat, your dog, you know your parent. You don’t ever get over it. But what happens, and I think especially when we go through something when we’re young. We’re expanded and the threshold of our emotion is pushed in A way that doesn’t always happen in adolescence is that you get the opportunity to get bigger than it a lot earlier.

The grief doesn’t really get smaller, but that’s not a bad thing because you start to really expand around it. And I actually think in a way we don’t want it to go away because, I’m not gonna cry because it I is a reminder and it really helps us access the love as well. , There’s that idea of the light and the dark and the good and the bad, and you can’t put one into perspective in the same way if you don’t have the other.

So you don’t ever get over it, but you get bigger than it. And if it happens to you when you’re younger, you have an opportunity. I’m coming from my perspective. . If you had never lost a parent and you’re like, wait, what? But you have an opportunity to experience way more joy than other people.

If you can access the grief, you can access the joy in equal parts, and I think that is a superpower. I think that makes your whole life. Like I, I believe we came here as like spiritual beings to experience the ups and downs, not just to experience ups. Like we came here for all of it. And so this gives you access to all of it, and I think that’s a really special thing.

The other thing that I wanna say is the relationship doesn’t end it. Is our belief that when they are no longer in the physical form, that they’re gone. I’m using air quotes again that they’re gone, but I don’t believe that. I believe it changes form. I believe that the access, it’s like when my mom was in the kitchen and I was like in our TV room, and I would yell to her and she would answer.

I wouldn’t see her, but I would get the answer to my question. And I talk to my mom now all the time, even more so over the past few years than I ever have before. The other day I said to her, I want a miracle today. It was on her anniversary of her death. I said, have something happen today that is so crazy that I would never, ever believe it if it didn’t happen today.

Like something that right now, if you told me it was gonna happen, I’d be like, that’ll never happen, and I got that. I’ll do a show on it, but it’s not gonna be today. But I got the craziest thing happened, the craziest thing. And so I decided that was my sign and that there’s signs all over. And if that could happen, why not ask for something every day?

And you might feel like we don’t get to have miracles every day, but I think we do. What if we do? What if you’re wrong? What if we do? What if the relationship doesn’t end? It just changes form, and I’m still in a relationship with her and she can actually help me in such a different way now, and that when I don’t communicate with her, or I don’t ask her for what I need or I don’t show up, then I’m limiting myself and I’m cutting myself off from her.

It’s not her doing it to me, it would be me doing it to her and. There will be a moment. There is a moment, I think for me that happened years after my mom died, where I realized how much she shaped the way that I think, and not just in her being here, but in her not being here and.

There was so many lessons that shaped my life, which I really like my life. I really like my life, especially right now. I really, really like it, and it, her loss shaped it just as much as her being, and that’s legacy. That’s not loss, that’s legacy. And so I allow the lessons from her loss. To be attributed to her and to influence the way that I operate and the way that I enjoy my life, my sleep, I’m allowed.

We’re allowed to dive into the things that make us happy. It can be silly and whimsical and fun, and we can know how important it is because we can know how shitty it is when it’s gone and that it could be taken at any moment. My mom didn’t wanna go. I’m sure she would have changed her mind if she had an option.

All right. The next thing that I would tell someone that is witnessing someone losing a parent right now is to let them say the wrong thing. After my mom died, I was so devastated as one would be, and my dad was not. Super present in my life. I’m gonna say it. My parents were married, but my mom was the homemaker and my dad worked and he was also really active in our community and he volunteered for lots of things and he was busy and the way he interacted with us when my mom was alive was a lot different.

It’s not that he’s a bad man at all. He’s lovely and I. And now as an adult have formed a really, especially over the past year, he has been just a super rock star for me. So when my mom died, she’d only been dead a few weeks and I said something terrible to him about that. And so he let me, he, let me just say that shitty thing.

He never asked me to explain it. He never told me how it hurt his feelings, which I’m sure it did. He just forgave me really fast. And looking back, I think he was likely just aware that I was afraid, that I was afraid of him dying too. And that was my process, and he let me have it. So if you’re watching someone lose a parent, or they just lost a parent, let them say the wrong thing.

Let it go. And also you are allowed to be angry. You’re allowed to be fine. You are allowed to feel both of those things on any given day. And if you are losing a parent, you’re allowed to be angry, you’re allowed to be fine. And you’re allowed to feel both of those things on any given day. It’s just life.

It’s life and life is happening. And I think the more that we. Allow ourselves to define the box instead of live in a box, the easier it will be for us to be able to move forward and to get perspective on it, and to grow around it, and to grow bigger than the grief. And so here’s my thoughts on. All of this and on hope , as a bigger lesson, , hope as a practice.

I say lots of times to women in the navigate method that hope, I think is one of the scariest things. ’cause you have to trust almost something outside yourself. And I think most people treat hope like it’s something that happens to them when the conditions are good, like when it’s safe to hope. But I think one of the bravest things you can do is hope.

Hope for better, hope for clarity, hope for realizations, for peace, even when the conditions aren’t right, even when it doesn’t seem likely. And you know what my mom’s death accidentally told, accidentally taught me is that hope is a stance. , It’s a decision. It is a rewire. We can say, this awful thing happened and this shitty thing I went through and, that things can change in an instant.

It’s neutral, right? You choose to make a reason to keep going no matter what your situation, whether you lost a parent at 50 or you lost ’em at 10, or you never have at all. We all have. Things that we grieve. We grieve relationships and jobs and friendships. People don’t have to die in order for us to be grieving and for all these lessons to still be important.

And that choice, I think to, decide that you are going to focus where you wanna go. I feel really lucky that has quietly been chugging along in the background of my brain. And I don’t know if that’s just how I was wired long before my mom was born. And I have a lot of other flaws. Like, let me celebrate the one thing.

I do this really well and I make a really good, soft boiled egg. Okay, so let me have this. So, but I think that when we can do that. We can recognize what unconscious choices are you actually listening to and which ones would you choose, , in inside group. That’s one of my favorite things to do with people is to really dig down and find out what is it unconsciously that you’re thinking?

What’s the pattern that’s running, and do you need to rewire it? Do, does that pattern need to change? It’s okay that you thought that thing for a long time. It probably served you and kept you safe, but now what do you want to be thinking? What would you choose? How do you want to live this wild and precious life?

Because things can change in an instant and you don’t have to lose someone to learn this. But if you have, , I want you to know that the very thing that breaks us open can actually be the thing that keeps us going. And that, I think is how you live a big life. Just a reminder, we have our fireside chat this coming month in April on the fifth.

Yeah, it’s Easter. I know it’s Easter Sunday. The scheduling sometime chooses us. We don’t choose the scheduling. It’s all right, so it, you can’t make it. We’re gonna do it again early May. If you can make it, maybe you’ve spent the day doing Easter stuff. Maybe you won’t do any Easter stuff and you’ll just wanna come hang out with me.

It might be a smaller group, which will be really fun. We’re just gonna talk about. Some of these big decisions. There’s no real script for these. We don’t record them. They’re a place to be honest, and to share and to have a little community, when we feel so alone in some of our big decisions, especially around marriages, and that’s the work that I do.

It can be isolating and there can be a lot of shame in there. And so this just brings you to a place where everybody gets it and you don’t have to explain yourself. So come join. Come join me over there, fireside Chat. You can find the link in the menu on my website, betsy p.com, or just message me on Instagram Fire.

If you just shoot me a message, it just says Fire. It’ll automatically reply. The world of bots is amazing, but it’ll help me get it to you quicker. Also, if you haven’t followed along on Instagram, come find me there. It’s just Betsy and I’ve got something new that I’m working on. I’m really so freaking excited about these videos that I’m making.

None of them are live. I’m trying to figure out if I need to hire a videographer, but I have stories to tell and I wanna tell it in a new way. So I’ll still be doing the same content that I’ve been doing, but I have some other things just to share with you about what it’s like. To start over in your fifties.

There’s so many little funny stories every week that I have, and I thought, let’s, share these in a new way. So be sure to be looking for those. I really wanna get those out soon. So it, it is on my short list, and then next month please go to my YouTube because we are. Again, we’ve really done a lot of work.

I say we, it’s me and my cat. Enjoy my, operations bestie. , We’ve done a lot of work to create systems so that I can get some really good YouTube videos out for you. Longer form where I’m gonna be recording y’all. I bought gear. I got, a set up now. , You know you gotta come, you gotta come and visit me over there.

. I’ll let you know when it’s live, but be on the lookout. You can also just text me on Instagram or dm me on Instagram, YouTube, and it will send you the link so that you can follow along and get alerted when they’re live. Okay? All that chatter, just to say, I’m so happy that you’re here. Thank you for being with me on this journey, and I love you so much.

I’ll see you next time. Bye-bye. Thanks for joining me on The Art of Living Big. I hope today’s episode sparked something within you, maybe pushed you to dream a little bit bigger and live a little larger. Don’t forget to subscribe. Leave us a review and share this podcast with someone you know who might need a little inspiration today.

You can find me over on Instagram at betsy pa and on my YouTube channel. Remember, the world is vast. Your potential is endless, and your life, it’s yours to shape. Until next time, keep reaching, keep exploring, and keep living big.

In the words of Phil from The Hangover…We’re back baby, we are baaackkk! It’s been a hot minute so Betsy gives us a little update in this newest episode of The Art of Living Big. Betsy talks about her trip to Marrakesh and the spontaneous way it came to fruition as well as the quote she came across that made her reflect back on 2019 and then imagine 2033. Enjoy this short and sweet recap, then get ready for more big living ahead.

Transcript:

 Welcome to The Art of Living Big, where we explore how to live intentionally and with more joy. I’m Betsy Pake, your host, master, coach, and creator of the Navigate Method. Here to help you listen in to your true desires, elevate your standards, and live life to the fullest. Now, let’s go live big.

Hi everyone. Welcome to the show today. So I’m doing this show if you have been here. If you’ve been here for a long time, like a year, couple years, maybe even for the long haul, I, feel like I need to do a quick life update mostly to get myself back in the pattern of doing these shows. It got really hectic here at the Navigate Method over the last couple months, and I kept thinking, I’m gonna get to it, I’m gonna get to it.

But now. I have some shows and show ideas that I’m ready to come to you with, but I thought, you know what? I’m gonna make sure I get a show to you this week. And so I’m just gonna do like a little catch up and, , if you’re brand new here, you might be like, I, don’t know why I need to catch up of her life.

Just get to the shows and I hear you. This one may be one for you to skip and to go to the others, , to all the episodes that are in the backlog, but. For those of you that have been here for a while, I wanted to give you a quick update on a couple things, and then it gets me in the pattern of showing up and then next week it’s not quite so scary to come back.

Isn’t that silly? You know, when you haven’t called a friend in a while. Anyway, we’ve been down this road a couple times over the past few years, so let me just dive right into it. Alright. I went to Morocco last month. I wanna tell you quickly about that. Years ago I went to Iceland and I was gone to Iceland for a month.

So I know that was a little different. , But I did three episodes about all the things I learned and , , all the wonderful things about Iceland. But this is really what I wanna tell you about Morocco. I got this idea that I wanted to go to Marrakesh, and back in November I went for a walk.

When I was at one of my coaching events, so with my coach and somebody new was in the group and she and I went for a walk. And as we were walking I mentioned that I really wanted to go to Marrakesh and she was like, let’s go. And we opened our phones. I had points for days, so we opened our phones and booked our trip for just a few months later.

And I remember thinking like. I really hope I, end up liking this woman, but it turns out she was lovely. We talk all the time and we had such a good trip. We went on a Tuesday and came back on a Sunday. It wasn’t a long trip. It’s hard sometimes to get away for a long time, but it was so great to experience a different culture and to immerse ourselves in something so different and really.

So unique and really wonderful. I really loved Marrakesh It, it was extraordinary on multiple levels, but one of the things that I think is really cool, and maybe the lesson in this is that sometimes it’s hard to fit in things that we want to do. Hence me just doing this podcast today. Sometimes it’s hard to find the time right to fit it in and to create the space for the things we really wanna experience in our lives.

And sometimes just being spontaneous and not having it be perfect and figuring it out as you go. We were literally on the airplane going, okay, what are the things that we wanna be doing? And , anytime. You decide like I’m going to Marrakesh, or I’m going to Australia, or wherever you’re going, all of a sudden you’re gonna start to see people that you know that have just come back or are planning a trip and everybody goes, oh, you need to check this out.

You need to check. So we had a little list. We planned it on the plane and it couldn’t have gone any better. Honestly, it was the greatest trip we fit so much in. We walked all over. We took private food tours, we got private motorcycle rides around Marrakesh, so we could see all kinds of things that we wouldn’t have seen if we just stayed inside , the area where we were staying in our Riyadh and.

I mean, it was just really incredible. I got to see a friend of mine, Jane Green. If you are a fan of her books, you might know her. And she lives in Marrakesh and just was really a really fantastic trip. So, highly recommend Marrakesh, but also I highly recommend being spontaneous and not having to figure it all out, and not having to make it be perfect before you just do it, ?

I read a book called Stranger by Bell Burden. I’m gonna tell you that when my friend Molly told me to get this book and I downloaded it to my Kindle, and , probably like you, you get a new book and you’re like, I’ll read a couple pages and just see how it goes. I looked down and I did not look up until the book was over.

It was about four hours. I just read and read, and read. I was on the airplane, so it worked out. There was no place else to go or nothing else to do, but this book was so good and it, she is a socialite and she is in New York City and has a home that they bought on the vineyard and. Tells the story about her husband deciding to leave her and how she walks you through it.

It feels like you’re really with her on the moment if that kind of content is a little triggering to you. Just a warning, but it was so well written and such a great book, , so if you were looking for a new book to read, I just wanna highly suggest that one to you. I have been talking about really relaunching the YouTube channel now for months, and I think we’ve got it figured out.

It just took a whole lot of gear and planning, but in April. Please check out the YouTube channel because we’re gonna be launching videos every single week that on Tuesdays, so this show will come out on Thursdays and the YouTube channel will come out on Tuesdays. So if. Please check that out.

, You can find a link for that YouTube channel anywhere, , Instagram, on my website, wherever you wanna go. And if you email us, we can give that to you as well. So I think it’s gonna be great. I’m excited to do it in this new way, and I hope that you come and join along , on that little journey.

All right, so before I head out for today, and like I said, it’s a quick update, but I saw this quote this morning and it said, gosh, the version of me from March, 2019 would be so proud of the version of me today. And I thought. I wonder what the version of me in 2019 was doing. And so because I keep an online journal, I went right back to 2019 and read so many of my posts and.

, I was in the thick of it at that time, wanting to leave, being really miserable in my marriage. And looking back here like we was too, and just feeling really stuck. Like I had no options. And , I do think the version of me from 2019 would be pleased to see where things are today.

A lot of. The things I used to dream about are here in my life right now, but it also made me think about the version of me in 2033, that same amount of time, and what is it that she would be pleased to see? What is it where she would go, oh wow. What a difference. How do I wanna live my life? How do I wanna?

Show up more authentically. The things that I was thinking about was like, what are the things I really wanna cultivate? Where do I wanna spend my time? Who do I wanna spend my time with, and what do I want that to look like? , Sometimes jumping ahead five years or 10 years to make goals feels really overwhelming to me, but for some reason, becoming the version of me.

Seven years from now and looking back gave me a different perspective and didn’t feel quite so overwhelming, and it made me shift more from things I was doing or goals I had to accomplish to an appreciation and the way I was experiencing my life. As opposed to the goals that I had, and that’s been a big shift for me over the past, even like three or four months I think, of just like really honing in, I think, and enjoying the things that are happening.

And so I wanted to share that with you in case that perspective shifted some things for you too. So thanks for being here with me today on this. Very short episode, but the one that brings me back, the one that breaks the seal on me not being here. I appreciate you so much , and thanks for all your messages on Instagram and asking when the new show is coming out next week, it will be way more planned out, and I have some really good topics that you guys have asked me about and that I’ll be able to come in and talk about.

, All right, I hope that you have a great week and I’ll see you next time. Thanks for joining me on The Art of Living Big. I hope today’s episode sparked something within you, maybe pushed you to dream a little bit bigger and live a little larger. Don’t forget to subscribe. Leave us a review and share this podcast with someone you know who might need a little inspiration today.

You can find me over on Instagram at betsy pake and on my YouTube channel. Remember, the world is vast. Your potential is endless. And your life. It’s yours to shape. Until next time, keep reaching, keep exploring, and keep living big.

In this episode of The Art of Living Big, Betsy discusses the concept of relationship deflation, where connections gradually lose emotional engagement without any overt conflict or drama. Do you feel expanded or deflated after your relationship interactions? Betsy also touches on how to handle the end of relationships gracefully while staying true to one’s own path and growth. Last but not least – Betsy has collected your questions so stay tuned for an upcoming Q & A and continue to ask more on the socials.

Transcript

 Welcome to The Art of Living Big, where we explore how to live intentionally and with more joy. I’m Betsy Pake, your host, master, coach, and creator of the Navigate Method. Here to help you listen in to your true desires, elevate your standards, and live life to the fullest. Now, let’s go live big.

Hi everyone. Welcome to the Art of Living Big. If you’re new here, welcome. I haven’t posted in the last couple weeks. It’s been really, really busy here, and , I had to prioritize self-care, I think in all of this. You know right now if you live in the United States, you might be feeling what I’m feeling, which is just a lot of heaviness and I think confusion and grief and overwhelm, and , it feels like, how could this be real?

What’s happening? Ugh. It’s really heavy. And so if that’s where you are, that’s where I’ve been to. And so I decided certain things were just gonna. Go on hold. And I think that’s okay as we get our bearings. And I needed to put the things that were most important. You know, our clients put them first and have space and energy for them, and I think I’ve been really successful in doing that, but it made me not overhear on the podcast.

So I’m excited to be back today and to have some space to be able to talk with you. , Over on Instagram, I’ve been getting just so many messages about the videos that we’ve been doing over there, and I think that sometimes it can be really helpful to have words to understand. What we are feeling in our body.

, I don’t think I’m saying anything over there that people haven’t felt, but they just didn’t know how to dissect it or how to translate it maybe into language. And so , I’m pleased that I’m able to do that over there. And so today I wanted to talk about something and I think it’s something that happens inside relationships.

, Typically when they’re ending, and this doesn’t just have to mean a romantic relationship, I think it can mean a lot of relationships. , I’m noticing it right now in several of my relationships, and it’s not a bad thing. It just is a thing. And I think that if we are feeling it, likely the other person is feeling it, to some , extent too.

So it’s not like when you’re fighting, I’m thinking about the relationships I have that are ., I call it like closing the loop. It’s just, there’s no big disagreement or marker that says like, this is no longer working. It’s just sort of deflation. That’s how it feels to me. I was thinking the other day, I had an interaction with somebody and I was like, you know what?, I’m done showing up when the other person isn’t showing up. . It’s like they reach out ’cause they want connection, but , they’re not actually available to show up and do the work of being in relationship. You know, whether it’s a friendship or a romantic relationship or anything.

I don’t think it matters. But I noticed this the other day and I was like, you know what? No hard feelings. I’m not mad., I just don’t feel anything. It feels like a deflated balloon. And in some aspects I think this can be a. , Relieving feeling. , It’s this feeling of like, why am I even here? , , why am I putting any energy into this at all?

What’s the point of the interaction? And so I wanna talk about that moment a little bit today because it is information, , and as we move forward and make decisions about our life and what’s right for us and what’s not right for us. Every piece of interaction or feeling or acknowledgement is information, and that helps us to have discernment so that we know how we want to move forward.

A couple years ago. I was at an Abraham Hicks event, a live event, if you are familiar with Abraham Hicks. If you’re not, you can go just search through my podcasts. And I did a couple episodes describing what this is, but I went and saw Abraham Hicks. I think this is where I heard this it, or it was right around that time that I heard this on one of the many recordings of Abraham Hicks that you can find on YouTube.

And what they said was, when you’re in a relationship. You are not, and of course Abraham Hicks said this much more eloquently than I’m going to. But it’s not just a relationship with the two of you. Like you think you’re in a room with the person you’re in a relationship with, and it’s you and them, but really it’s about you and your higher self, your inner knower.

, That’s who you have to have the relationship with. You have to be so clear on who you are and what you want and what you stand for and all of those things. And they do too. And when you do that, it becomes clear if there is a relationship here at all. Otherwise you just become disinterested.

And I remember that component of it is like, it’s not that you’re mad or sad or glad or whatever. There’s like a disinterested. The other night when I experienced this, I was like, this is what this is. It’s a deflation. It is. I’m so aligned with my inner knower that , being even in the room with the other, , it’s like you don’t want anything bad for them.

You just are done putting any energy there at all. And I think that many times when we are frustrated. With somebody and we’re in a relationship. And when I say relationship, I’m gonna keep saying this. It could be friendship. So it could be friendship, it could be, , romantic relationship, right?

But when there is frustration, right? When you’re like, oh my God, will you just listen to me? Or why don’t they see it the way I see it? All of that, when you’re frustrated, frustration, I think still has hope, like frustration carries an element. Of activation, right? Where you’re explaining or hoping or trying to be understood.

, Frustration says , maybe if I say this differently or if I try one more time, or if I show up a little bit differently, like they’ll finally get it. They’ll finally get my perspective. And honestly, I may be wrong, but I know for myself, I don’t need somebody to agree with me. I really don’t, but I need them to step forward to try to understand my perspective.

And if I don’t get, that’s where the disconnect is. It’s not when they’re just trying to convince me that I’m wrong. There’s frustration in that for me because there is still hope that they will step forward , and meet me where I’m at. Deflation I think is totally different. , I think happens when our nervous system just says, you know what, there is nothing left here to work with.

, There’s nothing, there’s no charge. There’s no activation, there’s no fighting. There’s just a, like a disinterest. Going back to what Abraham Hicks says, you’ll just be like, I’m just not interested. , I just don’t care. And that is when your body says, oh, like this is totally empty. And I think that deflation happens a lot in relationships where there isn’t a lot of harm.

And I’m gonna explain what I mean. I think that deflation can’t happen when there’s a lot of activation, when there’s a lot of harm, when there’s a lot of feeling of , I need you to see me and you’re not seeing me. I don’t think deflation can happen in that environment. I don’t think it happens when there’s yelling or, , obvious emotional abuse or anything like that.

I think it is really subtle, and this is how come, I think sometimes we see this a lot in friendships because they’re less charged. So like when things just kind of fizzle out.

And so I think , the shift here is when one person is speaking from something that is, I’m gonna say like important or meaningful to them, like it has meaning and the other person responds with. Really surfacey or a subject change or logistics, , it’s nothing hostile. , It’s not that person like shaming or blaming or fighting.

None of it is loud, but nothing actually meets what was said and over time. This takes a lot of time, I think, but over time our nervous system starts to track this pattern. Like I speak, I, share something, right? Which that is relationship I share and I am met. So I share something and it’s just , goes nowhere, right?

Like it just gets overstepped or bypassed or whatever, and eventually your nervous system stops. Reaching, it stops reaching for connection with that person because what you’re getting, your nervous system registers is not okay or not really holding any kind of attention. I think that is when deflation happens and when that happens, I think it can be really confusing.

And again, I see this a lot with friendships because there’s not the same. I’m gonna say it this way. , There is an opportunity for that there to not have the same emotional charge. Sometimes there is, especially if you’ve had a friend for a long, long time. But most people have been taught that relationships end because of a conflict, like somebody did something wrong or there was a line that was crossed or something really dramatic happened.

But I think deflation happens. When your nervous system is just so tired of not being met, that it just disengages and loses interest, and then the person starts thinking like, why am I even here? It’s not anger or contempt or any of those things. I think it’s a level of clarity. It’s really a realization, right, that this person is seeking.

Connection without meeting me in a relationship. So the good news about all of , this is really a moment, I think, where boundaries become possible. And it doesn’t have to be some dramatic boundary. It doesn’t even have to be verbalized if you don’t want. It’s not a big confrontation. It is just a line in the sand that says, I’m done explaining.

I’m done stepping up to meet you in a fault. Pretense of relationship and bonding. I am gonna make a decision to stop responding. It’s not that I want anything bad for you, it is just a level of alignment. And , I talked about discernment, it being a level of discernment, but going back to what?

Abraham Hicks was saying, I think this really applies. It is this moment where you’re so aligned with who you are and what you want and what you stand for, and how you wanna be treated. That when someone can’t meet you there, you’re not mad. You just don’t care anymore. So this is the part that I want you to hear.

If you feel like you’re getting to that place with somebody, it doesn’t mean that you’re cruel. You decide to disengage if you leave, because you no longer want to have to disappear to some extent in order to stay connected to that person. That is your nervous system taking really good care of you. Is your nervous system noticing when there’s a misalignment, and that is your nervous system actually becoming regulated around.

Being without that presence.

And so, , in my Instagram videos, I always do a north star, like something to ask yourself. So here’s a North Star in this. Or , just some thoughts to mull over it is if you’re thinking about somebody that you’re like, am I at that place? And honestly, if you’re thinking, am I at that place?

You probably are. But when, here’s the question is, when was the last time. You felt deflated instead of frustrated. And I hear this all the time from women too, where they’re like, I’m in this marriage and , I just am at the place where I just don’t care. Like I don’t even wanna fight. I’ve just checked out.

Very similar. I think true deflation comes when your nervous system’s totally regulated by being alone, , without that in your system. And then. That comes injected back into your system and you go, oh, this feels really unaligned. I think you’re right on the cusp of being like, what? I’m categorizing as deflated when you’re still in relationship, like deep in relationship.

, Okay, here’s another question is after you interact with this person, do you feel expanded? , Do you feel seen and happy and engaged, or do you feel like, why does something feel off or empty? And here’s the tricky one. If you still feel hope that they’re going to meet you, you’re likely not in deflation yet.

If they do not meet you and you’re not surprised at all, and you just feel like, eh, I didn’t even really expect it there, there’s your signal in deflation. So there’s no right answer in this, and I think. Relationships. When we think about, , from the womb to the tomb of relationships, you can be in any place, in any type of relationship.

And when you get towards the end of that place where you feel like you’ve truly moved on, I think that’s when you feel the deflation. I think that’s when you’re like, you know what? I hope the best for you. I really do. And. My attention and energy is gonna go somewhere else. So I don’t think of deflation as failure.

, I should do a whole show on this ’cause people comment sometimes on my posts on Instagram and ask about your vows. Don’t you care about your vows? And I have so many thoughts about this because. If you decide to leave a marriage because you’re being ignored, for example, your vows were broken long ago, like nobody signed up, nobody took vows to stay even while being completely ignored and, you know, avoided for weeks like the vows were broken.

So I could do a whole show on that. But I think when we look about, think about this. It is sometimes the closure of relationships. , I will say all the time, this is how I feel. You can determine how you feel. The closure of relationships isn’t failure, it’s a completion. I think we come in contact with people for really short periods of time or long periods of time to help us get to the next level, to help us each grow in different ways and.

Part of that growth continues on as the relationship ends or disintegrates or deflates. I think it is a marker, but I also think you know that anytime you’re in a relationship, there’s more than one of you. And so sometimes having things come to a close for you is the beginning of someone else’s journey of reflection and really.

Moving through things, and if we can stop trying to be responsible for other people’s reactions and instead stay really true and honest to our path and what’s most aligned for us, then we can show up or choose to withdraw our attention and energy in the places where it’s really right and likely right for both parties.

And sometimes I think the most self-respecting thing you can do is to just quietly stop participating in something that no longer meets you where you are. You know, we are all growing and changing in different ways, and I know sometimes we think, well, our partner hasn’t grown at all. And it may not seem like you’re growing in the same way, but they’re likely evolving in some ways, evolving away from you, perhaps, , instead of evolving towards you, which is what we all want when we have healthy, good relationships.

So when you’re ready. The relationship will slowly deflate, whether it’s a friendship or a romantic partnership or anything in between. And when that happens, it is likely your nervous system acclimating to you. And when you no longer feel the pull to be heard or to be understood, it can actually be a huge relief.

And that is how you, I think you live a really big life. Thanks so much for being here this week. I will see you next week if you have suggestions for podcasts. I know a lot of times people will leave me messages over on Instagram asking me questions. , I have such a hard time, it’s really difficult to answer.

As you could imagine, , dozens of questions every day that are complex and nuanced, and so if you do have a podcast suggestion or a question that you want me to answer in a q and a, I am gonna try and do one of those too. We have. I think hundreds of questions right now that I have screenshotted so that we can anonymously answer those things, so hopefully we can find , a flow that works to be able to help everybody in the best way.

All right, have a great week. We’ll see you next time. Thanks for joining me on The Art of Living Big. I hope today’s episode sparked something within you, maybe pushed you to dream a little bit bigger and live a little larger. Don’t forget to subscribe. Leave us a review and share this podcast with someone you know who might need a little inspiration today.

You can find me over on Instagram at betsy pake and on my YouTube channel. Remember, the world is vast. Your potential is endless and your life. It’s yours to shape. Until next time, keep reaching, keep exploring and keep living big.

In this first podcast of the new year, Betsy discusses her strategy of scripting in journals to envision a hopeful and expansive future. She details how this practice helps condition the unconscious mind to focus on desired outcomes. Betsy reminds us to start the day with positive actions while minimizing distractions so we can plan for a successful day. Be sure to follow The Art of Living Big on YouTube as well as your favorite podcast app. Let’s go LIVE BIG in 2026!

Transcript

 Hello. Welcome to The Art of Living Big. All right, so I’ve tried this before in the past, but I am really making an effort 2026. I am not only audio recording this, but I’m video recording this too. So if you’re here and you’re on YouTube, hello. If you’re listening and you wanna see it live so you can see what I’m talking about, that’s great too.

And you can just go to my YouTube channel. If you can find it on Instagram or on my website, or just search for me, Betsy PA on YouTube. All right, so let’s dive in here. You know, I have been thinking about so many things that I wanna share this year, and I’ve gotten a lot of questions on Instagram recently.

And, you know, I did a podcast. Gosh, it was like fall, maybe October, September of last year where I talked about a couple years ago when I had a post go really viral. It got eight or 9 million views. And at the time, that’s how a lot of people found me, which was great. And what I was saying in that video was that I really decided that I wanted to go deeper.

I wanted to change how I was doing those videos, and I really wanted to talk. I wanted to. Talk and share . And so that’s what I started doing. But what I didn’t expect was that it would, it would resonate with so many people in a, in a way bigger way than it had the first time. And that actually using my voice on those videos changed a lot of things for me.

I mean, it’s opened up a lot of opportunities. But it’s also given me a different sense of confidence, which I find really interesting because I’ve had the podcast for years, but I have had the podcast behind the veil of video. You didn’t have to see me. And you know, I have talked historically on the show about how I didn’t record.

Video because so many times when I do these podcasts, they just come from my heart, and so I close my eyes when I talk and I thought, this is gonna be the weirdest video because I’m gonna be just sitting there, but I’m gonna be, have my eyes shut and I, you know, I won’t. It’ll, I’ll just look like a weirdo.

And what I decided was that I actually can do it. I can do video with my eyes open and I can think with my eyes open, I can walk and chew gum and think at the same time. So this week I wanted to talk with you about something that I have been working on that is, a practice I would say that I have had for years and years off and on for probably 15 years.

And about two years ago I started doing it really religiously, and this year I even got sort of a special way to do it. So historically, how I have always done it is in these little mole skin notebooks. I have a whole bunch of ’em that I get, you know, when I go to events or go to a conference and they give you the notebook and I always write in my iPad.

During those conferences, I bring those home and I have all these mole skin notebooks. And what I have used them for is to do something called scripting. Now I’m gonna talk about how I do it specifically, ’cause I think it is a little bit unique, but I have used them for scripting. And the great thing about it to me was that I could script, I could do what I’m gonna explain and then I could just toss these out.

Like I didn’t need to keep them. Sometimes I would keep them for a year. Just recently I did a huge. Huge clean out, and I tossed some from 2017, so some really old ones, and it felt good to just purge and get rid of stuff. But the work that was done in them and the momentum that was created by using them.

Still exists in the EERs, even if I don’t have the evidence that it was completed. And so I wanted to talk with you about scripting and about my practice for scripting and what that looks like. So. Let’s dive in here. This year, what I have done is I started using my Paper Republic Journal. This is a journal I’ve had for, I don’t know, maybe almost a year.

It’s just a leather journal. I love it because it has all these pockets and I could put things in it and,, it lets you, it’s a traveler’s journal, so it has these elastic bands and it kind of lets you add in certain components, different notebooks. I buy. These notebooks on. Etsy, and you can see I have one of ’em here.

It’s blue, but they’re just thin little notebooks. And so I can use them for a whole bunch of things. And I have different colors just ’cause it’s fun and I buy a whole section of them. I’ll put it in the show notes in YouTube, but I buy like a 10 of them, a 10 pack at a time. So they have different ones.

Some of them have graphs inside, some of them have dots, some of them have lines. So whatever it is that I need. I use those for different things. So the practice that I really wanted to show you was scripting, but while I’ve got my journal out, let me just show you the other. So the other thing that I have here that I use these little notebooks for is my visioning.

And this is really in the morning. I really like that first hour when I wake up to not even look at my phone. Like definitely not my email. I don’t wanna look at my text messages. I don’t want anybody to need me. For at least an hour now when my daughter was younger and now I have a cat. So sometimes my time isn’t always my own.

But you know, I understand we have things that happen in our life, but right now I am in a really exceptional time in my life where I get to choose. I get to choose everything and it’s glorious. And one of the things I get to choose is what I do in this first hour when I wake up. So when I first wake up, that hour is really sacred to me.

I don’t wanna be responding to my team. Sometimes they’ll leave me messages in the evening. I don’t want to be checking email. I don’t want to be responding to clients. I want to be able to fortify myself first and what that means for me. Coffee. What that means for me is coffee first. So I usually will make my coffee.

I have an espresso machine and sometimes I make a Americano. Sometimes I make a latte. And then I come in here to my office and I have this little thinking chair and a little, you know, thing here with all my books. I have a little setup with my lamp and all of my pens and all kinds of stuff, right?

So I’ve got all these little things to be able to use this hour really successfully. So one of the most important things that I do is inside my Paper Republic Journal. And so how I start off typically is I’ll go to my vision boarding, my visioning,

I have a book that I bought. I just got this on Amazon. It’s. A vision board book. It’s got a thousand images and quotes. They have all different ones. There’s just different photos in here now. When I put together my visioning pages, it’s really a book for me to open up and to use my imagination.

So these pictures don’t have to be exactly the thing that I want to do. It has to be something that makes me feel something. So sometimes there are photos in here, like there’s one of multicolored yarn. It’s really pretty yarn. Let me just show you so it’s yarn in a pile because I want to be reminded of how good creativity feels to me.

I have pictures of women with friends, right? They’re by a pool. Um, it’s all good, just a little quote. And I also have little things that I have thought while I have been looking at these, and I jot those down, like feeling the sun on my body, feeling cool, water on my feet, knowing that I created the life that I want.

And so what I do in the morning is I just go through my book, I peruse my book, and. You know, there’s things about my home that I’m gonna buy at the end of this year. There’s things about money and investing. There’s things about friendships, there’s things about, partnership and the people I wanna surround myself with.

And so many good things that just make me feel. Really hopeful and alive and appreciative really for what I have. So I usually will go through my visioning book and get in a really good feeling. And then what I do is I open up my planner. Now I have been using, and this year I started last year. I started at towards the end of the year, half of the year.

But this year I got the daily planner from Paper Republic. And I love it because it’s just dots on every page. So it’s just these big blank pages. It’s not like a regular agenda. And I use an online calendar anyway, but what I do every day is I open this up and I just start writing as if it’s a day in the future.

Now, for my work, typically I run on 90 day sprints, so I have goals. Like I love a good goal, right? But I, an annual goal to me gets totally lost. What’s gonna happen December 31st? I won’t even think about it till the end of September and then, then I’ll be like cramming to try to finish. And so what works really well for me is 90 day sprints.

So instead I have an annual goal, but I’ve broken it down into. Into quarters basically. And so right now I’m working this first quarter, which ends on March 31st. And so when I go into to write in my planner, I write is now March 31st, 2026. And I am so excited because when I woke up today, I looked in my email and I found the most incredible invitation to go to.

You know, I come up with some crazy stuff, like anything that feels fun in the moment. And that’s the idea, is that I want to be expanding. You know, the other day I wrote about how I got invited to serve Richard Branson’s Island. Like is that gonna happen by March 31st? Uh, well, even as I say that, I’m like, maybe, I don’t know.

I don’t know maybe, but. It’s fun to think about it, and it’s outside the box of my normal life. It gives me a, a new way of thinking and something to focus on. You know, our unconscious minds wants a trellis, right? It wants us to plant a stake in the ground and to go, this is the thing you need to climb up.

And if you are constantly planting stakes in the ground that are worry and nerves and hopelessness, that just means you’re human. But it also means that you need to really consciously add in moments to create something different, right? You’ve got to. Create time in the morning. I mean, this takes me 15 minutes probably to do this whole thing, to look through the vision pages, to feel really good and to start writing.

And the writing probably takes me, I don’t know, seven minutes. It’s not long, but it is enough to start my brain going in a different direction because when I am working with my brain, when I am consciously creating changes in my brain. What I am doing is setting up a track, like a railroad track for where it’s going to go.

And if I’m focused on the things I don’t want, then that’s where it’s gonna go. And my unconscious mind is trained. It’s built, it’s designed to show you more of what you’re focused. And if you are focused on all the things that can go wrong and all the ways that life is trash and all the ways that people have hurt you or.

Controlled you or you know, used guilt and manipulation to make you do things you didn’t wanna do. Like that means you’re human. And it means that if you’re spending time focusing on that, that’s what your brain’s gonna show you. More of your unconscious mind operates on repetition and emotion. And if those things, and worry so often is emotional, if those two things are not where you wanna go, you’re actually working against yourself.

One of the things that I always say to my ladies when we talk about something like this, or any idea really, and when I say my ladies, I mean my ladies in my program, people that work with me, I always say, I don’t care if it’s, if what you’re saying is real, like I believe you, that it’s real, but I don’t care because a lot of things could be real.

There could be a whole bunch of real going on right now that you just don’t notice because your brain is deleting it. Our brains naturally delete and distort things. That’s what they do in order to make sense of the world. I remember several years ago. There was a GIF shortage, Jiffy Peanut Butter, and every time I went to the grocery store, they’d have like a little thing that said we’re sorry, we’re out on of gif.

There’s a shortage. I don’t remember what happened, but they didn’t have it at my grocery store. And GIF is the brand that I like. And so every time I went I was like, oh my God. No, no, Jeff. And then, I mean, it was a while. It was like, you know, six weeks, probably every week when I went. No peanut butter. And there was one week where my daughter went with me, she was maybe 15, and I said, they don’t have GF, and I looked, they didn’t have it.

I, once again, they don’t have it. And she got this really weird look on her face and she’s like, it’s right there. It was almost face level. You know how the shelves go. It was almost face level, but I was so sure that it wasn’t there, that my brain deleted it. It. I’m not making that up. That’s actually what our brains do.

It wants to create the environment that you think is true. So reality was that the peanut butter was there. My daughter could see it, but my reality, my reality was very different. Who knows how long I had been depriving myself of Jeff Peanut butter, just for the sake of being right, because that’s what I expected.

So the whole idea with my scripting in the morning is to create a different expectation. Now, will Sir Richard Branson reach out to me? I don’t know, even as I wanna say, no, my body feels like maybe because I have trained myself so much to be open to a possibility of something that I never expected for a possibility of something like so thrilling and fun.

So I wanted to offer this to you because perhaps. This strategy and this anchoring really in the morning in something expansive could work for you, you know, so many times. And somebody reached out to me this morning ’cause I shared this on Instagram and someone reached out and said like, I’m in the process of, of getting divorced.

I don’t understand how I would use this. And I said, well, think about a time in the future, like maybe it’s three months. When will your divorce be final? Six months. So right now it’s January, let’s say it’s June 30th, and I’m so grateful that we parted in such a way. This is what you would write. I’m so grateful that we parted in such a way that this feels aligned.

It’s for the good of everybody involved. My kids are so healthy and acclimated to it. I can see an amazing vision for my future. I’m excited about what’s coming. I feel respected and I feel like I can respect him in this new way forward. Like it doesn’t matter. And this is where I’m saying your reality doesn’t matter.

’cause if you’re like, he’s a manipulative narcissist, I believe you. I believe you. And does it make sense to spend your time focused there? It’s protective. It probably feels protective. But for this, this is about dreaming. This is about expanding what could be possible because you have no idea what could happen.

Anything could happen, and so to keep that alive, to keep that open in your brain, because your brain, again, is scanning for the places and it doesn’t have to feel. I don’t want you to be like, oh my God, I’m just writing a whole bunch of lies. You’re not writing lies. You’re writing what you want. You’re writing what you want.

It doesn’t have to feel real, it just has to be feel real that this is what I would love. It’s an intention. And when the intention is laid, when the railroad tracks are laid, then your brain knows where to go. So. Try, try this. Just grab a piece of paper, write in your iPad, grab an old notebook, whatever you have, and begin this practice of scripting every morning to a place in the future where things are going the way that you want.

Because I think when you can do that, that is how you live a big life. Thanks so much for being here with me. Thanks for being here for the first like real video of this , I’m excited this will get better and better, so I’m grateful that you’re here. Have an amazing week. I’ll see you next week. I love you so much.

I’ll see you then.

In this episode of ‘The Art of Living Big,’ Betsy helps us focus on the present moments in our lives. She reminds us to emphasize the cozy, reflective moments amidst holiday preparations, to fully “wear our lives” by making conscious choices for ourselves. Betsy clues us into the powerful messages in our dreams; metaphors produced by our unconscious mind that we can learn from. She concludes with a message of hope for the new year and an invitation to embrace our true potential.

Transcript:

 Welcome to The Art of Living Big, where we explore how to live intentionally and with more joy. I’m Betsy Pake, your host, master, coach, and creator of the Navigate Method. Here to help you listen in to your true desires, elevate your standards, and live life to the fullest. Now, let’s go live big.

Hi, everybody. Welcome. Welcome to the show today. It’s our last show before the holiday, so I hope everybody’s ready. I hope you’re getting some time to decompress. I know the last couple weeks it’s been cold here in Atlanta, like super cold, and I have had. Twinkly lights. I feel like I’ve got my decorations just right.

, I haven’t turned on an overhead light in weeks. It feels so nice and cozy. I actually have really been enjoying it, being really chilly out. I don’t know, just I’m in the top floor of my apartment, which I like to call the penthouse and. I can really hear the wind because I’m right , on the corner, but I really love it.

The other day , it was like a, it was Saturday, I think. Saturday or Sunday. It was so windy here, so, so, so windy. You could just hear the wind whipping outside. And I was like, this is a perfect conditions for a nap. And yeah, so I just took a nap and I could hear the wind and it was just kind of magical.

I grew up in Vermont, you know, I live in Atlanta, but I grew up in Vermont. So anyway, I attribute my love of the cozy to that experience, I guess. . So I’m excited to be here with you today. , Just a reminder, next month we have a fireside chat. It’s January 11th. I’m really gonna try and do these every month, and it’s just a free time for everybody to come together on Zoom, you can sign up by going to my Instagram.

The link is gonna be in my bio, but you can also just message me, fire and it will automatically send you the link to get signed up. , We did this in November and it was really so nice to have everybody come together and it was nice to see some of my old clients and favorite people. And we just talked about midlife and some of the challenges.

I’ve got some thoughts for this time. Last time was very unscripted, which this time will be two. I mean, I wanna just go with the flow of what everybody needs, but. Wanted to invite you to join us. I know last week, I don’t know, every week probably, I’m talking about that quilted house coat from Cozy Earth and Cozy Earth’s one of our sponsors here on the podcast, but I’m obsessed with my quilted house coat and they’ve sold out.

, I’m so sorry if anybody didn’t get theirs, still get it in January. The code live big Betsy. That’ll still get you 20% off like any time of the year. But those are just so great. I’m not surprised it sold out. One of my very best friends was waiting to get one and she was gonna have that be her Christmas gift.

And when she went to go buy it, they were completely sold out. I actually looked last night, the night before and they just had extra, extra large. , And if you look at the size and guide, I think they’re pretty. Pretty true to size. So , I was like, get the extra, extra large and then just return it so you get the super discount.

But it’s, so good. But I wanna remind you also that they have those cozy lounge socks. Those are great stocking stuffers, so don’t sleep on those. ’cause , I think when I looked at the other night, it was like 30% off on the website and then the live Big Betsy code gets you an additional 20%. So it’s a huge difference.

And those stocks are lovely. So. Just wanted to shout out Cozy Earth and remind you guys, I know I’m gonna wear , my bathrobe , to the fireside chat. I have no shame. I love that thing, so I will show up in that. , But I’m really excited to see everybody, so hopefully you’ll be able to make it.

All right. So today, okay, so this is kind of a vulnerable thing, but , I, I wanted to share something because I. I talk a lot on the show about unconscious change and how we show up in the world and , a little bit of magic. I think. I love a little bit of magic in the universe and , one of the things that I have done for years is I use a journal on my iPad called Day One.

You’ve probably heard me talk about this before, but it is a online journal. It’s an app on my phone and on my iPad. I use it on my iPad. I’ve used it for, I don’t know, probably 12 years, maybe more. And I love this thing because it’s easy. I like, , we continue to do things that are simple, right, and easy.

And it gives me a chance in the morning to just sort of like. Data dump, like everything that’s on my mind and whenever I have a dream that was really vivid, I like to write it out with all the detail that I can remember. And I find this really helpful because it helps me remember the dream and I can think about it later and figure out what this means.

But also one of the cool things about this journal is it’ll tell me like, this is what you said last year, this is what you said three years ago, 10 years ago. And , sometimes we forget. How much we’ve grown or how much we’ve changed unless it’s right in front of us, , unless it’s like something that we can actually see to compare.

And I think we all have this habit, I’m gonna say like a really bad habit where we’re looking forward, right? These are the things I wanna experience. This is what I wanna have in my life. These are the things not working. And so when we’re comparing it to the future, it appears as. Lack, it appears as absence because we’re not where we wanna be, but when we have a chance to reflect and to say, look at where I was and now look where I am.

It might be where you are physically, it might be where you live. It might be goals you’ve reached. It might just be, I am shifting and changing and I’m moving forward. And there were years where I would look back at a year ago, two years ago, and I would say to myself, oh my God, , I’m talking about the same exact things.

Like I feel like I haven’t changed or grown at all. Like when am I gonna get. Unstuck. But the truth now that I can see when there’s been a little bit more space, and I can look back, I can see that this is actually like turtle, right? Like a turtle. Like little tiny shifts moving me in the direction that I want.

And that’s really, really important. So what I wanna do is I wanna talk about a dream that I had last year. So it was right around this time last year and I was on that day that I was taking that little nap. It was so windy, windy out, and I opened my journal and I wrote it in my journal, and then I was like, I’m gonna take a little nap.

But in my journal, I looked back and then sometimes I’ll look back at the year before or two years before, but then I’ll look at days surrounding it, you know? I’m like, what was going on? Just so I can remember. And. I had a dream last year and I wanna tell you about this dream. And it’s not because I think dreams are, , mystical or predictive in some like woo woo way, but it’s because I have learned both personally and professionally that when something inside you knows the truth before you are ready to face it.

It often speaks to us through our unconscious, and our unconscious speaks to us in metaphor. And so this dream actually happened in one of the final months that I was still living in the same house as my now former husband. And the timing of that really matters because emotionally, , the relationship was over.

We were trying to sell the house. It took quite a while, and so we were living in close proximity, but. The relationship was over. My nervous system knew it , just that my body was still there. And when you live like that for too long, right? When your inner world and your outer life are out of sync, something starts trying to get your attention.

And so in this dream, I was at the airport. Now I wanna share this dream because, and I’m gonna relate it back , to you and why this. Could be helpful. Okay, so I’m at the airport. It’s not a normal airport though. It’s , packed, like wall to wall to wall people. So as far as you could see, like a sea of people.

And , you’re in a crowd, so there’s just, you’re not really walking regular. You’re like shuffling. You know that feeling. So I get this feeling that everyone’s moving really fast. Like everybody is going someplace. They know where they’re going and they’re all. Moving and bumping into me. So I’m like, goochie, goochie, goochie.

And they’re bumping into me and I feel like I am not able to actually take a step forward. And , airports are in between places, right? You’re not where you were and you’re not yet where you’re going. You’re in this like in-between place. And that is exactly where I was in my life at that time. So.

In this dream. I was traveling with him, but I wasn’t walking beside him. I was following him. So he was like way ahead of me, completely unaware that I was even there just doing his thing, right? He just kept moving forward and I was getting pushed around, like losing my footing, trying to keep up, and in my dream he never turned around and that’s the image that I remember.

I remember feeling like I was. Almost a kid getting lost in the shuffle, ? And I, think that experience of my life at that time is reflected in that dream, because that’s where their relationship was , at that time. I, felt like. I was orienting around him, like tracking him or adjusting to him.

And when you live that way long enough, , you lose your own internal compass. And at some point in the dream, I realized that I had a backpack that was gone. So I wasn’t carrying the backpack on my shoulders. I had been holding it like by the top straps. You know how sometimes backpacks have that little handle?

So I was holding it by that, so it was like an accessory. So at the moment that I realized I was missing the backpack is the same moment that I realized I actually had been carrying a backpack, if that makes sense. And then I looked down and realized it was just gone. It was like I noticed my hand first.

I don’t remember setting it down. I don’t remember like choosing to let it go. I just looked down and it was missing, and I think that’s how this actually happens. Like we don’t wake up one day and decide to abandon ourselves. We adapt and we accommodate and we make it work. Until one day we look around and we think, like, where did I go?

And I tried to backtrack through the crowd in my dream, and eventually I found a backpack that I thought looked like mine. It was like the same pattern, like the same kind of backpack, but it was empty and it wasn’t quite the right size. And I remember thinking in the dream, and I wrote this in my journal that I don’t even know if this is mine anymore.

I think this is like such an important moment because from the outside my life looked the same. Like the same house I was, looked like the same woman. It looked like the same marriage. Right. But inside it was empty. It was empty backpack. And , I don’t think, when I look back I’m like, that wasn’t unhappiness.

That was dissociation. Right. Dissociated from what was happening and in my dream, I went to the gate attendant and I told them that the only picture that I had of my mother who died when I was 16, was in that bag. It wasn’t true. I even wrote that in my journal. Like I told her a lie that the only picture I had of my mom was in that backpack because I needed her to understand how serious this felt and that I needed help and I needed somebody to see me.

And so they tried and they were confused. And then eventually , the,. Gate attendant, just admitted that she couldn’t do anything. And so I just turned around and just walked away. I just decided to move on, and that is when I realized that my phone was gone too. My voice, like my connection, my ability to call for help, everything was gone.

And here’s what I want you to hear in this. This dream wasn’t about my marriage. It, and I wanna say that again. He’s had a, he has his own experience of that. Like it is not about him. It’s not about my marriage. It was about my identity erosion. It was about what happens when you stay in a life that no longer fits for way too long.

And I think when we talk about metaphor and , our unconscious minds speaking to us through our dreams. , That backpack was my identity. It was my needs, , my internal resources, and I wasn’t wearing it. I was carrying it by that little handle so lightly so that I could maneuver around other people.

And that is what I think self abandonment actually looks like. It’s not like some big dramatic event. It’s not obvious. It’s reasonable. Subtle, and I see this all the time in my work, women who tell me that they can’t quite put their finger on it, like they feel kind of numb or lost or disconnected. And so they think , , that they’re broken, but they’re not.

They’re just, I would say like disembodied. Right? And so. I wanted to share that dream because I think it’s was such a good metaphor for where so many of us are and where so many of us are, whether we’re feeling lost or dissociated from a relationship or a job, or after your kids leave to , go off to college and you’re alone for the first time.

Like so many things. And so I think that when we think about. A big life, and I’m using air quotes, right? ’cause I talk about a big life. A big life isn’t some fancy living on a yacht. , That’s not what I mean by a big life. I mean, choosing yourself, right? It’s not about blowing everything up. It’s not about dramatic things.

It’s , it’s not about certainty even. It’s about embodiment. Embodiment, right? It’s about. Wearing your life, that backpack, instead of carrying it so loosely that anybody could knock it out of your hand. Wearing your life means , that your values live inside your body, not just inside your head. Right?

It means that when you speak and something feels off, instead of talking yourself out of it. It means you listen to it, right? It means you, you know what your yes and your no are, and that those come from inside your body, not from managing someone else’s comfort. Most people, and , I’m including myself in this, we don’t lose ourselves because of one big thing.

It’s not one big event that happened. We lose ourselves because we are so great at adapting. At, making ourselves smaller to keep things calm or low maintenance or understanding. And then one day you wake up and you realize that you’ve been holding yourselves by the little tiny strap. And so. , If you’ve been struggling in your relationship or in your job or anything where you’re like, should I stay or should I go?

Here’s the question that I wanna leave you with, is instead of that, I want you to ask yourself like, where am I managing my life? Instead of inhabiting it, , where am I carrying myself instead of standing in myself? , I think we can abandon ourselves in a million different ways. And, , I’ll say it again, it, had less to do with my ex-husband.

It had to do with me. I was the one doing that. I was the one choosing that. And yes, there’s were circumstances around it, but in the end it was when I decided to. Fully embody myself when I decided that I was gonna put myself first, when I decided that being kind wasn’t the end all, be all that what if being kind and people saw me as being so kind.

It’s not that I don’t wanna be kind to people. That’s not what I’m saying, but perhaps that was an indicator that. Yeah, I was putting everyone else first and that I didn’t always need to do that. There are times where I put my daughter first and that feels right. That is the right thing to do, and I want to do that, and there are times when I don’t.

So having the discernment of that, I think is really important so that we don’t lose ourselves. Because when you can start wearing your life again, that’s when clarity comes back to you. And , this year for me, I don’t know if you saw on Instagram, but every year I give myself an award. So I order these crystal awards from Crown Awards.

And this year my award was, , the Chrysalis Award This year has been. So transformative for me, not because I did some big thing or not because I, , had some big, huge success. Like it wasn’t that. It was that I started feeling really solid, that I started really leaning into my body as an oracle, that I started really trusting myself in a totally different way and hearing myself.

And I stopped getting lost in that big crowd getting bumped around. So it’s not, , the art of living big isn’t about becoming louder. It is about becoming solid, right? It’s about putting your backpack back on your shoulders, fully, like strapped in with the little strap around the front. You know that clicks in that.

That is how you live a big life. I hope you all have a really, really happy holiday. However you celebrate. I hope you have a hopeful New Year, and that 2026 becomes everything that you want it to be, and you get to decide. You get to decide how that goes. All right. I love you so much. I’ll see you after the new year.

Thanks for joining me on The Art of Living Big. I hope today’s episode sparked something within you, maybe pushed you to dream a little bit bigger and live a little larger. Don’t forget to subscribe. Leave us a review and share this podcast with someone you know who might need a little inspiration today.

You can find me over on Instagram at Betsy Pake and on my YouTube channel. Remember, the world is vast. Your potential is endless, and your life, it’s yours to shape. Until next time, keep reaching, keep exploring, and keep living big.