Loading summary
Transcript1 lines
- [00:01]
A
Welcome to the Joy Broadcast with me, Ali Mortimer. I was once upon a time an IT consultant, recoding systems in the retail industry to function better. And now I'm turned a life consultant and joy coach where I like to think I reprogram and recode hearts, minds, souls and lives to feel better. This podcast, the Joy Broadcast, is a way to bring joy to your life, whatever the weather, whatever you're doing. So. So you feel a pocket of positivity in every single day. If, like me, you've once upon a time found yourself wondering whether you will ever be happy again or if you're just staring at the kitchen sink wondering how you'll get through the next 10 minutes, this podcast is for you. Get you a glimmer of hope, a dose of happiness, or an infusion of joy right here, right now. Welcome to the Joy Broadcast. Hello everybody, and welcome back to the Joy Broadcast. Well, I don't know where to start this week, really. Last week definitely felt like I was swimming through a lot of treacle. Jet lag is a thing, isn't it? I just couldn't lift myself out and I found it really hard. But this week I feel like I've been back on form, firing on all cylinders, you know, nailing life, nailing my to do list, and getting everything done. One of the fun things that I have been doing this week has been to speak to everybody in, in my Joy Rebellion in the membership. As part of my birthday celebrations, I offered up some joy sessions to everybody who had said yes to being part of the Joy rebellion in 2026. And I did this partly because I love having conversations, I love coaching, I love understanding what's going on in the field and what's going on with the women I'm attracting in my world so that I, I can actually support and help and guide. And I know that that might sound really selfish, but it fuels my joy and I'm a generator. So I don't know why I feel guilty or bad for doing that, but it's just, oh, I love my work and that feels so good. And I've loved having all of the conversations. And do you know what? I had five or six conversations, those joy sessions in one day. And I thought, gosh, that's going to be a tough day. But I ended up feeling so energized that I then went on and did a 45 minute peloton on my bike. I was like, that's unheard of. So I love it and I love doing them and I love hearing what's going on in everybody's world. And I love celebrating with them, but I also love, you know, working through some of their challenges. One of the challenges that one of the ladies brought to me was she just said, do you know what? Everything is great in my life. Everything is good. I've got everything into a really calm position, and yet I feel that there's this little niggling voice that says, I was meant to do more, to have more, to do something different than I already am, but I'm afraid to rock the boat. And I riffed back to her and I said, do you know what? That's so interesting, because I know what that feels like, having had my whole life turned upside down and to find myself at rock bottom underneath the ocean, not even in a boat, but sunk at the bottom of the ocean. I remember writing that it's like when you've actually managed to get back into the boat and stabilized it and got it calm, you almost fear rocking the boat again for falling out and going right the way back down to the bottom, because you feel like you've got so much to lose, but yet there's also part of you that your soul is there saying, but there's so much more to life than this. There's so much more to life than just bobbing around on a boat. There's so many places to go, people to see, mountains to climb. So when life is really, really good, why rock the boat? I totally get it. But if you do have that little voice in you, like, I knew I had it in mine. It was knowing that I was here to experience more, to have more, to do more, to love more, to adventure more. It was like, gosh, it's time to rock that damn boat. We've got to get moving. And I think therein lies the answer. Movement. If you've ever watched any of Arthur Brooks, the king of happiness, any of his Instagram posts, one of the things that he said, the key to happiness is to always be moving. And I totally agree. So many times my clients come to me and they just say, I'm stuck or I feel trapped and I can't move. And that is when they don't feel happy, they don't feel joy. So joy, happiness comes from this sense of movement, of progression, of evolving, of growing, of expanding. So if we take this back to the analogy of the boat, when you start to rock that boat, you're starting to make waves, and it's those waves that lead you to movement. Those waves are going to need you to get a Bigger boat. You're going to have to create a bigger boat. And the more you rock the boat and create bigger boats and the waves start to rock, then those waves that you're creating by rocking the boat are going to lift you higher, get you moving. And do you know what the fun thing is? Well, I think it's fun. I think about rocking the boat. When my sister and I, when we were really young, we always used to holiday in the south of France. My uncle built a house down there and we used to go and stay in his house. And it was near the Lac du Bourget, near Annecy, and the house was on a river. And my dad bought us a blow up canoe. And we would literally spend every waking hour on this blow up a canoe, going up and down the river to the Lac de Bourget and back, jumping off the rocks. But one of our favorite things to do was actually just to rock the boat to try and get each other out. It was so much fun splashing and falling in and letting the boat topple over. And just those memories just bring me such a smile to my face because we were constantly moving, experiencing life and having so much fun. So if you're feeling like you don't want to rock the boat, but you've also got this deeper sense, this inner knowing, or this whisper wherever it's coming from you, deep within you, in your little earworm that says, come on, there's more to life than this bobbing about, playing it safe, playing it small. It's time to rock the damn boat. Jump around, jump out, rock it, do something different, grow, expand. And only you will know what that might look like. But rock it. And you don't have to completely capsize it initially. You can just start to do some gentle rocking. Go and get curious about what might happen if you started investigating what that might look like. If you moved this way, grew that way, made some waves, it's okay, you don't have to launch yourself straight out. So go rock the damn boat if that's you've got that little whisper. I also want to talk about the flip side as well, because there's also a time, and I remember when it's not a good idea to rock the boat. So let's talk about that just for a moment. If you're going through a really traumatic experience or you have just recently experienced trauma, if your boat has been rocked unexpectedly, it's probably not a good time for you launching yourself out of the boat or rocking your own boat yourself. I'm just Thinking that through in my own mind, and I'll relate it to my own story. But I rocked my own boat, or we chose to rock our family boat. When I decided to walk away from my. My corporate career in IT consultancy and in IT. I did that in 2015 because the boat that we were in was not a healthy one for us. It wasn't healthy for me, and it wasn't healthy for my family. So we intentionally decided to rock the boat and we jumped. Well, I jumped out of it and built a new boat around us. You know, that was a good decision to rock that boat. But however, 18 months later, the boat that I'd created again or around us at that point was rocked when my mum died. When this podcast comes out on February 2nd, that will be the last time I sat with my mum alive. That was when my boat was rocked unexpectedly and I wasn't ready for her to go. And so it was almost like I fell out of the boat and started to drown. It was overwhelming. People talk about grief like waves, and this is true for grief. Those waves that come over you that can make you feel like you're sinking, that you can't catch your breath initially. That's how it feels like. It feels like you're drowning. You can't breathe. It's just so overwhelming, you're not sure what's going to happen. But eventually you start to learn how to float, to rise to the surface, and you can catch your breath. And every now and again, another big, overwhelming grief wave will come and hit you and you submerge again. But it's about how do you climb back into the boat every single time that you feel like you're being submerged by one of those big grief waves? But holding onto that boat while everything around you is a rough sea, a turbulent sea, it's like, hold onto it, anchor down. This is when I first learned how to use joy, how to close my eyes and go into myself and stabilize myself when the grief was rocking my world. It was how I went into my inner world to find that stabilization by using joy. And that's really where the acronym first came from, just on you. It was joy to cultivating that feeling of joy within me for me so that I could survive a storm. And again later that year in 2016, when I found that my marriage wasn't exactly what I thought it was, and where infidelity and betrayal were revealed to me. Other people had been putting holes in my boat so that the boat started to sink. And no amount of rocking would keep me Afloat. So I think what I'm trying to say through this whole podcast in terms of this joy code of know when it's time to rock the boat and know when it's time not to rock the boat and hold on to the boat. And either way, whatever's happening to your boat. Are you with me still on this one? It's saying that rock the boat. If you want more joy in your life, if you've got to a point where you know, like, this is good, but I know that I'm meant for more. I want more joy. I want more love, I want more experiences, I want more adventure, then rock the boat and rock the boat with joy. Do it with fun, do it with play. Use joy and understanding and in the name of joy, to go in and understand that rocking the boat will bring you more joy. Alternatively, if you are in a boat that is rocking not of your own making, then you stabilize the boat with joy. This is when you go back into you. This is when you do the daily dose. You go right back to the beginning of this podcast and you go and dig out those daily doses of joy. You download the Daily Dose of Joy guide that I will put in the show notes. You write your joy list. You understand what is going to bring you joy. You flood your body with those hormones, dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, endorphin, by just doing one thing that brings you joy every single day. That's you stabilizing into you. That's you holding on. Use joy in both situations. If you want to rock the boat because you want more joy, do it in the name of joy. And if you want to stabilize the boat, stabilize it with joy. That's basically what I'm saying. Whatever's happening to your boat, whatever's happening to your boat, use joy. It's always a strategy. Either way, it will work for you. So I've got a few questions to help you understand which scenario you are in and how to use joy. Am I avoiding rocking a boat and the boat that I'm in because I'm afraid or because I'm healing? Now, if you're feeling afraid, it could be possible that it's absolutely time to rock the boat. If you're afraid of losing something, rock the boat. Interestingly, I've just come off a wonderful call with another lady who's in my joy rebellion, and she said, my mantra this year is to not be afraid. And I pulled her up on that one. I said, actually do it afraid, because doing something afraid means you're brave means you're courageous. Walking with fear is bravery is courage. If you're doing something without fear, that doesn't make you brave at all, you know. And another thing she was working on was confidence. And I said, if you want to work on your confidence, then do more things afraid because that's going to build the strength muscle in with you. It's going to build that resilience muscle with you. Walk hand in hand with your fear and say, come on, we're doing this anyway. Wonderful book. Feel the fear and do it anyway. Susan Jeffers Walk with fear makes you brave. Don't do things afraid. I think if you think you're going to have to do things afraid, you'll never do them. So do them afraid and be brave. So if you're afraid, it's time to rock the boat. If you feel like you're healing, then it's probably the time to honour some stillness. Go within yourself. Honour yourself. You just on you. Okay, my next question. Is the status quo aligned with my joy definition or is it just safe? So in my previous podcast or in my blog this week, I've talked very much around the definition of joy. Actually, it was a blog post this week. So my definition of joy, when I first wrote that down many years ago when I was in this dark place where my boat was being rocked and I said to myself, I just want to be happy again. This is when I determined my own definition of what happiness felt. I asked myself, okay, if I want to be happy, then I've got to know and understand what happiness and joy actually means and feels like to me. If I know what it is and how it feels, I know how to create it. And I wrote in my journal at the time, okay, let me just imagine that feeling of happiness. Because I could take myself to a memory of what happiness and joy felt like. And I asked myself, okay, how does that feel? And in my body, I just wrote down on my page, I said, it feels like this real deep, centered, grounded contentment. A piece of I'm so grateful for where I am. And I said, is there more? I was like, yes. There's also this tingle of excitement around me of I'm so excited for what's to come. I'm filled with an anticipation that makes me feel all giddy with excitement. I don't actually know what's coming, but I'm excited for whatever it is. The best is yet to come feeling type. So for me, it was understanding that my definition of joy, my definition of success, was Contentment and gratitude, plus excitement and anticipation. So go and determine what your definition of joy and happiness is. And then you can ask yourself, is where I am aligned to what that definition is? And if so, stay the course on whatever your boat is doing right now. If you're feeling like you're just playing it safe, better not rock the boat, better keep safe, then it's probably time to rock it, right? It's probably time to get moving. If you're playing it safe, how can you know where you're going to go? You're almost like, safe to me is like hiding. It's staying small. It's staying where you are. And happiness to me is always the sense of movement, of something better that's coming, something just round the corner. So maybe it's time to start to rock that boat just a little bit. Third question you can think about, am I the one who needs to rock the boat, or am I responding to someone else's rocking my boat? If you feel you need to, then it's going to be done with an intentional action. Why do I want to rock the boat? What is my intention in rocking the boat? Where do I want to go if I rock the boat? Is it just to have a little bit of fun? Is it to see what's shaken up? Is it to see how big I can make the waves? Is it to see if I can move the boat to take me where I want to go? Do I want to go on an adventure? If somebody else is rocking your boat, find out what their intention is and then intentionally center yourself and decide where you want to take your boat. That's what I would say. That's what I would say. So if you've decided that you want to rock the boat, you know, how do you rock the boat and feel like you're doing it in a way that makes you feel good rather than absolutely terrified or completely messes up with your nervous system, you know, just get very, very clear on what that little inner voice is trying to say to you. Get yourself very clear on what is that more? If that little voice is saying you're meant for more, what is the more that you're meant for? I remember thinking that little voice was saying to me, you want more. And I was petrified of wanting more. I held myself back because I thought that, you know, wanting more was greedy, that I shouldn't be allowed to have more. But then I realized, actually, why can't I have more? You know, my mum dying 10 years ago gave me that first real initial gumption to go and say, do you know what? I want to live and love my life because it's going to end in 2023. The same thing. Something similar happened. I lost a very dear friend of mine and I was like, do you know what? Let's absolutely go for more, because we've got the opportunity to. And my dear friend Juliet didn't. So let's go for more. But what is that more? And I remember thinking, I want more fun, more love, more adventure, more romance, more play, more money, more wealth, more experiences, more travel, more of absolutely everything that I've got already. That doesn't mean that I'm ungrateful for what I have. It's just saying, actually, let's go for a bit more. And why not? Is your more of the same or is it more of something different, something you haven't tried? What does your bigger boat look like? Does the bigger boat look like a bigger house or is it a bigger promotion? Does it feel like leaving a corporate company that feels safe, or does it mean that you want to grow your current business bigger? What does it look like? You know, be really honest about whether it's this boat that you want to rock or actually whether you want to jump completely out of it, whether it's out of a career, out of a relationship, even out of your own body. What do you want to do? What is it that you want more of? More health, more wealth, more love? What is it? Is the boat you're in going to get you there? The next thing you can start to think about is just where do you want to start? You know, how do you want to do it? Start with the small rocks. Start with the small. Easy and gently. You don't have to capsize the boat on day one. As I said before, you can test the waters a little bit. What happens if you speak up about that idea? What if you put meat on the bones of your idea for a business? What if you decided to look after your health? What does that look like? It doesn't mean to say you have to completely rehaul and overhaul your whole diet or exercise regime, but it could be just like, what is the one thing that I can do for myself today? What happens when you set a boundary? What happens when you define your values and walk by them? You know, what happens when you say, actually, this is no longer working for me anymore and I want to change it. Just watch and see what happens to how that boat that you're standing in responds to some of those small movements. Think about the fun I think that's step three. You know, remember the journey that I just took you on in my south of France memory. Have some fun, and if you've got people in the boat with you, get them to rock it with you. You know, when James and I decided to rock our boat in 2023 and take that sabbatical, it was like, right, okay, we're going to do this together. This is not the way that we want to go, and this is not the boat we want to go in the direction of. So let's start building a new boat while we're still in this one, but let's build a new one. Let's start rocking it. Let's start moving it. Where's the fun? How can we do with this? With fun and with play? Let's go on an adventure. You know, can we get excited? But we're in this together. Let's go, you know, find the fun. Find your people. I was lucky I had James in my boat. But, you know, even if you don't have a partner or friends, there are so many wonderful people around. You know, in my business, I'm always making waves and making changes, and I have the most wonderful coach. Maybe it's time for you to find a coach to help you who can help you stabilize and have fun while you're doing it. Next thing is about trusting the waves. As I said very early on in this, it's the rocking of the boat that creates the waves. It's those waves that create the lift, create the momentum, and it's actually those waves that deliver the bigger boat. You can't get to the next level without waves in whatever you want to do, wherever you want to go, whether that's in health, whether it's in wealth, whether it's in life, whether it's in love, whether it's rock the boat, if you want to move, and then link it all the way back to joy. Will rocking this boat move me towards my definition of success? Listen to the last podcast. Will this boat move me towards my definition of joy and happiness? And if so, rock away. And if not, then maybe it's not your boat to rock. Or maybe you need to go and have a look at your definitions of joy and of success. So really, what I want to wrap up with this joy code 101 is, if you've been playing it safe, this is your permission to rock the dam boat. And if you're healing, this is your permission not to rock the boat. This is permission to just hold on, hold steady, hold steady. With joy until you're ready. And if you're somewhere in someone else's storm, this is your permission, really, just to be the anchor point and the steady point while absolute chaos whirls. And you know what? How are you that anchor? You focus just on you. You know, the common thread in all of these is just to come back to you, just on you. Your joy, your definitions, your truth, your knowing, your little V voice, and your boat. So I would love to hear from you. How did this all land for you? Are you going to rock the boat? Are you stabilizing the boat? What are your worries? What are your fears about everything that I've just said today? And if there's anything you have to say to me or you want to join the conversation, please do. I'm going to put links in the bottom we talk about these sorts of things all the time in my membership, the Joy Rebellion. I drop the JOY codes in every single week and they spark the conversation for women to discussions of what that might look like, what that might feel like. We hear from many women who've done it and how it was for them otherwise. Come and find me in my emails. I'm pretty good at replying to my emails, so do come in and let me know if you love this podcast and if you feel like there's someone in your life who needs to hear this message too, and they need to rock their damn boat, send them this. I would love for you to do that. Thank you for being here. Thank you for helping me spread the Joy today. My mission is to spread love, joy, peace and abundance to as much of the world as I possibly can so that every person knows that they don't have to walk alone in their darkness. So if you've enjoyed today's podcast and this episode, I would be so honored and happy if you would support my mission and share this with your network, your friends and your family. Please feel free to leave me an honest review on Apple or sponsors Spotify. And until next time, remember, the ripple of joy starts with you.