Staying Present in Difficult Moments

When Kelly Chase finished filming Love Is Blind, she felt that she had an opportunity to leverage her new public profile to become an entrepreneur. In addition to her full-time corporate job, she began building a business as both an influencer and a coach: working on brand partnerships as well as helping private clients. Eventually, it all became too much. Kelly noticed her nervous system becoming increasingly dysregulated. She began having anxiety attacks and would wake up out of breath, heart and mind racing. 

Recognizing that trying to be all things to all people was unsustainable, Kelly left her corporate job to pursue her own business. As she watched her bank account fluctuate dramatically month after month, she did some self-discovery and realized that what she was really craving above all else was stability. Becoming an entrepreneur had seemed sexy and fun, but she had put herself on the backburner in the process. 

Now, Kelly works a corporate job that she loves and focuses just on the parts of her business that light her up. She has put in the work to discover what she needs to show up as the best version of herself and makes sure to protect that above all else. If you too have considered branching out on your own, Kelly shared some suggestions on the podcast that may be helpful in your decision making process. 

Try it yourself: 

• Listen to your body and tell people what you need. In the thick of her struggle with anxiety (when she was working all of her jobs simultaneously), Kelly had to reschedule with one particular coaching client several times. She felt the guilt and shame take hold within her body but she continued pressing through it. Looking back, Kelly reflects that she wishes she would have been up front with this individual, admitting that she wasn’t showing up as the best version of herself and offer to refund her or pause the sessions for a longer period of time. Listen to the feelings that arise in your daily life. If something is causing you shame, anxiety, resentment, anger, or any other negative emotion, take note of it and try to listen to what it is trying to tell you.

• Understand your balance. One of the exercises Kelly called out as being useful during her training process to become a health coach was a pie chart exercise that highlighted different areas of life (relationships, creativity, finances, physical health, etc). She and her fellow participants were asked to put a dot in each of the slices to indicate the level of balance they felt in that category. For instance, placing the dot close to the edge of the relationships slice would mean a lack of balance. Putting one near the tip of the finances slice would relate to a high level of balance. Doing this simple exercise allows you to have a visual representation of how you are showing up across the various elements of your life and make adjustments for any that are out of whack. 

Reverse engineer your dream life. Kelly recommends painting a mental picture of how you would like your life to look in an ideal scenario. Then work backward. What would it take to get there? How can you define concrete, manageable steps so you’re not burning the candle at both ends to achieve that dream? Write it all down and create a roadmap for yourself. There is no point in having your ideal life if you’re too exhausted by the time you get there to enjoy it.