Are you ready to create your happy, boring dream life?
Episode Summary:
Are you ready to create your happy, boring dream life? You may have heard me use this phrase over the last few months, and I've really noticed that my clients and my audience, and the Heart Centered Entrepreneur community as a whole have been resonating with this phrase. I've had a lot of seasons in my life – things have been chaotic and stressful, and up until these past couple years, I felt like I was in survival mode. I’ve come to think that it takes a lot of courage to be able to say that what you are desiring most is peace. So on today’s episode I’m sharing the exercise that helped me craft my happy, boring dream life so that you can inch closer to yours!
PS: Have you filled out the community engagement survey? Do it today to be entered to win some goodies! Your responses will help me decide on where I want to put my focus in 2024 to better serve my community
Topics Discussed:
How your happy, boring dream life can look different in comparison to anyone else’s
Why Anna believes financial stability is one of the most important things every woman can have
Solving for a future problem by taking a look at your current desires
The exercise that Anna uses to help craft her happy, boring dream life
Giving yourself permission to spend money on the things that will help you feel safe and secure
Using movement to process emotions through your body
How routine can help you move closer to your desired life
The importance of finding a community of girlfriends that you can really lean on along with your loved ones
Episode Resources:
Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Google | Stitcher
-
Anna Rapp (00:14):
Are you ready to create your happy, boring dream life? You may have heard me use this phrase over the last few months, and I've really noticed that my clients and my audience, my hearts center entrepreneur community, you beauties, have been resonating with this phrase. I'm the middle of doing a survey and poll for my audience, which by the way, if you haven't filled it out yet, make sure to enter there's some amazing prizes at stake. But I really wanna know what drives you, what are you most wanting so that I can cater it around that. And in the initial responses I've been getting back this phrase, happy, boring, dream life is what I'm hearing that you guys want more than anything. I think some women want a life that's filled with like adrenaline and super mountaintop experiences, right? And like, sure, like I love to travel too.
Anna Rapp (01:01):
I got to go to Mexico City with one of my best friends a few weeks ago. But like at the end of the day, for me personally, what constitutes success and happiness for me is being able to live a life that there isn't a lot of chaos. Like I've had a lot of seasons of my life and a lot of you might be able to resonate where my life was chaotic, my life was stressful, my life was in survival mode. And so I really think it takes a lot of courage to be able to say, actually what I want is peace <laugh>. I wanna be able to to to live again, like a happy, boring dream life. So I wanna define that for you, what that means for me, what this phrase looks like. And I really wanna challenge you to unpack what your happy, boring dream life looks like.
Anna Rapp (01:46):
Maybe there's parts of it that are already existing, but I wanna challenge you just because your dream may not be to like jet set around the globe with like a martini in your hand. It doesn't mean that you don't deserve to go after what means success for you. And I think there's this myth that like living a happy, boring dream life doesn't take mu take money. It actually does take a lot of financial stability to create a happy, boring dream life. One of our amazing community members, Megan sent me this thing that was saying like, the reason it's so important to have financial stability is because when you have financial stability, then you can always make decisions in alignment with your values. And that's why I'm so passionate about helping women make abundant, abundant income in a freedom-based way. Because I do feel like it is the way that you're able to never make a decision.
Anna Rapp (02:37):
You're, you can always make decisions based on your values and never on money, never on survival, right? Okay, so I broke happy, boring dream life. You know, I love a good acronym. So it's happy H B D L, happy, boring dream life. And I broke it down into H B D L four categories just to explain to you what my happy born dream life looks like for you. Because I want you to think about each of these four categories for yourself, right? For what do you need more of and permission to desire and dream more for yourself. Okay? So I drip broke it into home body daily routine and loved ones. And I feel like a lot of you might be settling because maybe you're like me, where I'm like an optimist and I see everything half full and I can turn like any bad situation into a good one, which in some ways is great.
Anna Rapp (03:37):
In other ways. It really has made me settle a lot in life because I feel bad about wanting more when I already have something good. For example, when I was working my therapy job and thinking about quitting my business to start coaching, I didn't hate my job. Like I enjoyed my job. And so in order to go from something good to something better, or in order to go from wealth to more wealth or happiness to more happiness, it takes inertia, right? And I find a lot of my clients that are already making six figures that are working to go to beyond, if they don't desire or dream for what's ahead, they'll start to sabotage what they have. And so I think doing this exercise isn't like a nice to have, it's a need to have so that you know, otherwise your brain, your brain wants to solve a problem.
Anna Rapp (04:20):
So it's better to solve for that future goal, that future desire and have that clear than to not have a goal. To not have a desire. And what happens when you're happy and when you have some money is a lot of times you're like, Hmm, it's good enough, right? It's okay for you to dream for what's next. Okay? Here's the four categories. I'll dive in for me. And if you'd like, feel free to grab a piece of paper and dump what it is for you below. Maybe you even wanna fold your paper into four corners and in each of the corners, right? Home body, daily routine, loved ones. Okay? So happy born dream life for me, let's start with my house, my practical house. It meant buying a house. It is the best thing that I've done post creating my freedom fund to create stability for myself, right?
Anna Rapp (05:04):
I talk about this all the time. Maybe it wasn't the best time quote in the market to buy, but for me personally, since I bought the house, like when I bought it, I was like 80% sure I wanted it. But also was like, is this a bad decision? This is a big risk. Like I'm buying it on my own. I have not regretted it for a single moment. Having my own home and knowing that my monthly mortgage payment is going to this investment at the end of the day, I'll have like a million dollar property that I own is such a blessing. Oh my goodness. And to have a house where I could paint the walls, I can do like, it's my territory. My, there's just something for my brain that's unlocked having my own house. So if you're someone that you don't have a house or if you you maybe have a house, but it's not your dream house. Maybe it's like in a neighborhood where you don't feel safe in a city you don't like
Speaker 2 (05:56):
In the category of home, I included living in the city. You want to living in the neighborhood, you want to living in the type of house you want to. And when you have that house renovating it to make it just like you'd like, right? Because for me, my dream is not to travel the world. My dream, I spent a lot of time in my house and a lot of my clients that are moms is the same way, right? Like, I work from home, we live from home, like we spend time in our house. So for me, living in the house of my dreams is worth every penny. And you guys know, I've hired my friend Devon to help design the rooms, right? The, my living room, my bedroom. And it honestly took me a little inertia. I was like, because for me, like I'm not naturally creative.
Speaker 2 (06:40):
So to have Devin come in and suggest to me different furniture pieces, different layouts, of course, like once I lay it out the way she says, I'm like, oh my gosh, this looks like magic. I feel like I'm in a hotel, right? But until she does, like, I'm just kind of fumbling around just so this is not my zone. So I really think if it's not your zone, like hiring a designer, someone like Devon, you know, I highly recommend her. She's amazing. She's one of my best friends. And really investing. And the other thing hiring Devon helped me with is it helped me justify dropping three K on my bedroom, right? Otherwise it's because I'm like, oh, well I'm hiring her. I might as well like do it. Right? Right. Otherwise, I feel like it would take me a lot of courage to be like, oh, it's just my bedroom.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Like does it really? Do I really need to spend that money there, right? Yes, you do. And the I feel like we're so quick to invest in so many things in our life and business, but I do feel like our house, our living environment is something huge to be, especially like if you're past six figures and you're working on upleveling your life, I just feel like it's such a huge uplevel. And so really allow yourself in that box to dream up what you need to make your H home feel like your version of dream and luxury and abundance and peace and beauty. I can't remember if I told you guys this, but I was doing E M D R with my therapist for some past stuff and she encouraged me to think about a safe space in my head. You might've heard of this exercise before.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
So that like when you're triggered you can like calm yourself down by thinking of a safe space. And usually it's a fantasy space, right? Like a beach somewhere or a cabin. But you know what came to mind? My living room, my house, my current house, my house is such a safe space for me, such a space of peace that literally the first thing that came to mind of any fake place in the world was my own living room. Oh my God. Like I got tears when that came up for me. And she was like, okay, is that like that's the safest place in the world for you? I'm like, yeah, it's my own living room now, albeit in my fantasy, I have a giant white couch that doesn't have any children's fingerprints on it, but that's neither here nor there, right? I feel like all of that I've done in this last five years to like leave a marriage that was not serving me and my kids, right?
Speaker 2 (08:52):
To move 13 hours across the country to buy a house, right? Like I think all of that came to like, it was a lot of bad hard decisions. And I think we are sold this thing that in order to like, you know, build our dream business, have our dream house, have our dream, whatever it takes, no pain or sacrifice or risk could not be further from the truth. So if you're in the middle of building your business or going after a big dream and it's taking sacrifice and resilience, I just wanna say you're normal. Like of course like any hard thing, right? Any, I feel like for me personally, everything in my life has taken aligned risk, aligned action, aligned faith sticking in there. And I just think like, I wanna say that to you so you're not making yourself crazy if you're seeing some challenge along the way of your up level, right?
Speaker 2 (09:42):
So again, I really encourage you to think through what do you need to do to make your house more of a home? Do you need to move cities? Do you need to buy a new home? Do you need to move? Do you need to rent a new place? Do you need to? What do you need to do? Do you need to renovate? Do you need to buy new pillows? Like what do you need to do? Because it's worth it. That's the, for me, in my happy, boring dream life, it is worth it to invest in my home space even more than some other things that people might consider luxury, right? I do wanna update my car. My car is <laugh> needs to be updated. But for me, I still haven't prioritized that yet. Again, just because this is so important to me, you deserve say this out loud, affirm it out loud right now.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
I deserve a home that makes me feel like a queen. That feels like bliss, that feels like I would rather be here than in a, a, a five star hotel, right? It's worth it for you. And I feel like people are willing to like drop two K on a vacation, but they're not willing to drop two k renovating their bedroom. And your bedroom is something that's gonna fricking be with you 365 days a year, right? Be willing to drop money on your sanctuary for your happy, boring dream life. Okay? Number two, body, body. How are you taking care and spending time on your body? I'm someone that, I'm an Enneagram seven, so that's like in the head center. So I'm someone that's like more of a thinker. I'm less in my body, but I in the last two years have like massively dropped into my body mostly through dancing and through fitness.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Those are like two of the biggest ways that I call them. Like almost like active meditation. I do have a meditation corner that I've added to my room in the last few months that I love and has really helped me be present. And honestly like having my dream house has also helped me be present. 'cause Like I enjoy being here. I enjoy doing my own laundry, which I know sounds crazy, but like it feels like peaceful to do like some of these little routines. But I would say that dance and fitness are a huge way that I get outta my head. Like as business owners we're so in our head all the time solving problems that it's so nice to be in a fitness class where I'm like not thinking about anything. Literally my brain is blank except for like survival, surviving the fitness class <laugh> and I'm moving my body and I was reading an article that was saying how much women process our emotions through our body and sure, it's great to talk things out too, but I also just think movement is so helpful.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
And why I am so grateful to have found bachata dance that I do probably at least eight hours a week fitness that I do at least seven hours a week, right? And really I move my body a lot and that for me creates a happy, boring dream life because it helps my mood, right? The more you move your body. Research has shown us too that moving our body competes with a lot of medication when it comes to a lot of mental health issues that really our body and movement is such medicine. Movement is medicine. And again, for me, I wouldn't do it unless I had accountability. So that's why it helps to like be at a gym that I like, sign up for dance classes where there's like an actual time to go do it, right? Don't rely on your own inertia. Okay, next is daily routine.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
So again, I'm someone that like butts bucks against routine <laugh>. I think most entrepreneurs do. Like we want freedom, we want flexibility. But it is so nice in the last two years, I feel like I really built in a routine that I can come back to. It doesn't mean I always nail my routine perfectly, but it means that like I always flow back into it. Some routine things that I've added is, you know, my daily mindset work, my daily mindset check-in and journaling, brain dump that I do. Reading to my kids out of a big book that we're reading, little Women <laugh>, we read like a few pages a night. Like some of the on Sundays I usually do like meal prep and prep my vitamins for the week. I've been doing a laundry load every day to just kind of stay up on laundry, right?
Speaker 2 (13:27):
Like really thinking through like what are the eating, sleeping, home routines that feel delicious? That to me is happy, boring dream life. And honestly, when I went to Mexico City with my girlfriend a few weeks ago, we reflected in, the reason we liked that trip so much is because we integrated a lot of our routine into that trip. We were still active. We went to yoga even though we were on vacation, we got to dance, right? We got to meet up. There was a girl that we met at yoga that we hit it off with and we invited her to breakfast with us. So we had time just to like hang out as friends and she'll over food. We ate food that, you know, fueled our bodies. It was pretty like clean. It wasn't super greasy, right? Like, so I do think that like routine for me gives me my happy, boring dream life.
Speaker 2 (14:14):
And again, if you're a mama, like here's a caveat to this. For example, my routine has completely been thrown out the last two weeks because my kids had the stomach flu and it was like a whole situation around here, right? And I give myself grace, obviously I cannot go to the gym when my kids are throwing her up. Obviously I didn't do my mindset work every day because when my head hits the pillow, I'm getting some sleep, right? So again, if you're in a season like permission to not always do the routine, but I think what holds us, but I think we need to have the routine and then we need permission to not always do it. But I think have it to always fall back on is something that's so supportive and magical and relaxing. Especially as an entrepreneur. So much of our life in business is unpredictable and up in the air.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
Like exactly how much money we're gonna make every month. Exactly how many clients we're gonna land if social media platforms are gonna change, right? If clients are having a good month or a bad, like literally in business, everything is up in the air. So I find that like having these routines is so grounding for me as, especially as a coach, I'm able to show up with a more consistent energy for my team, for my clients. When I have some of these things that I can fall back on that like my yoga class is always gonna be the same. My mindset check-in is always gonna be the same. We're always gonna sit and read our book whether it was a horrible day or a good day, right? Like those routines I feel like are so supportive. And so asking yourself what you need in this chapter, okay?
Speaker 2 (15:37):
Finally, the biggest part of my happy born dream life is my loved ones l remember the in the acronym for happy born Dream life is H B D L, right? H B D L. And I put homebody daily routine loved ones. So for me, like for me, my number one priority in life is to be a patient and present mom. At least right now. While my littles are little, that is the biggest thing that drives me is how can I be a more engaged mom, a more present mom. It's a hundred percent why I work part-time hours in my business the best I can. And people are everything at the end of the day. Like life isn't guaranteed. I feel like I'm just realizing like how short life is. And at the end of the day, yes, it's about making money and making an impact, but it's also about like selfishly being with the people we love and spending as much time as we can with them and prioritizing the people in our life over anything.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Period. Right? And how beautiful. Like that's what financial stability helps you do, right? People say like, we talked about this earlier, money doesn't buy happiness. Yes it does because money buys choice. Money buys the ability to always take action and alignment with your values, which for me is prioritizing the people I love. So if I need to let a client go, I need to do something so that I can prioritize something with my kids. Like I can do that, right? Even think about the last two weeks I've been able to like move things around so I can like really show up for my kids when they're sick and give them snuggles and stuff like that, right? So for me it first goes down to my kids, they're my everything. And then my friends like I am so grateful I have the best girl gang.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
I've talked about this before, but I spend time building that girl gang, right? Like I allow myself to spend time investing into my friendships. And I think for some of you that don't have the type of friendships that you want, I would encourage you to do friend dating and really spend time trying out some different friends, going on some coffee dates. If it doesn't go anywhere, fine. If it does, go somewhere, try something again. See if you guys wanna like go to the spot together, whatever, right? But I'm so grateful that I have so many friends. I have a lot of business owner friends, I have a lot of mama friends, I have a lot of like friends from high school, right? Like permission to invest your time into friendships. 'cause I feel, feel like as a female, it's like our secret weapon having our girls.
Speaker 2 (17:53):
Because here's the thing, life is always gonna have challenges, but it's easier when there's people with you in them. Like that's, I think what I've discovered is like there's always gonna be life challenges, but when we have people by our side, that's where it gets easier and more palatable and more doable, right? So really asking yourself what is it that you wanna put in that loved ones box? Is it that you wanna put, you wanna, you know, start your business so you have more time for your loved ones? Is it that you have a business but you wanna put better boundaries on your schedule? You guys know for me, I really condense my business to mostly Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday in the middle of the week and then about three weeks outta the month. So I have a fourth week in the month that's lighter. So maybe you need to do more boundaries.
Speaker 2 (18:38):
Maybe you need to like get slack off your phone, email off your phone. Maybe you wanna prioritize having more kids. Maybe you wanna prioritize finding a partner. Maybe you like what is it in the loved one category because I feel like of your my happy boring dream life, that's the part that's most important. Okay? I hope this was helpful for you and just gives you some inspiration to be able to kind of dream up what would bring your happy, boring dream life to the next level. And I want you to tell me, I want you to tell me and maybe even like circle the category that you most wanna focus on. But I do feel like this is what makes me such a happy human and makes me be able to like continue to grow and scale my business with such ease is again, really crafting that life that for me equals success.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
Okay? Let me know if this was helpful for you. I would love to hear share me a picture of your paper and I cannot wait to dive in again, if you have not done that survey yet, I'm doing a survey giving away a hundred dollars gift card for my community because I really wanna hear from you as my team and I are planning for this next year. I wanna make sure we're creating the content and the things that resonate for you. So it's just a survey that tells me a little bit more about you. How many years have you been in business? What type of trainings are you most looking for? That way we're making sure at Heart center entrepreneur, we're crafting the things that we best for you. 'cause I dunno if you've heard, but I'm on the cusp of crossing the million dollar mark in my business in lifetime revenue.
Speaker 2 (20:04):
I cannot believe it. You guys, I'm so grateful. But as we're getting for it, ready for this next level, like my team and I are putting our heads together and like we're ready to like continue to grow and get bigger and bigger. But we wanna do in a way where we're supporting what you need in listening to you. 'cause Obviously you are what's most important to me. You are why I'm here. So please fill out that survey if you are able, just grateful for you times 10, okay? Loves, have a beautiful rest of your day.
PS: In the midst of this challenging time I’ve been asking myself what I can do to help? One of the #1 ways I support my clients is by helping them simplify their business so that they can increase the flow of money without creating extra work. In this season simplified visibility and sales is needed more than ever.
So if you’re craving personal support as you reposition your free and paid work, I’d love to help you simplify your sales process so that you can produce income in your business even during a challenging time. If you want support you can check out my services and book a free discovery call here, or you can send me a DM on Instagram.