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Kinder Mind
Kinder Mind
Exploring Living Authentically
What does it take to truly live an authentic life? In this episode, we're joined by life coach Rebecca Fink, who shares her profound insights on cultivating self-awareness and aligning our daily habits and decisions with our true selves. Rebecca demystifies the concept of authenticity, contrasting it with being genuine, and explains how societal pressures and the desire for positive feedback can create barriers to authentic living. By tuning in, you'll gain a deeper understanding of how to navigate these challenges and make choices that bring sustainable peace and self-alignment.
We also dive into practical strategies for maintaining authenticity, especially within the complex dynamics of family and work relationships. Rebecca highlights the importance of mindfulness, setting boundaries, and making intentional decisions, even in mundane activities like cooking dinner or carpooling. Plus, we have thrilling news to share as Rebecca joins the Kinder Mind Coaching team, ready to guide clients towards personal growth and authenticity. Don't miss this heartfelt and enlightening conversation that encourages you to embrace your true self and live with greater intention.
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Right, okay, let me make my notes bigger. Thanks so much for joining us for another episode of the Kinder Mind podcast. Today we're exploring, living authentically. We're here with guest speaker Rebecca Fink, life coach. Thank you so much for joining us today, rebecca.
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:Thank you, I'm excited to get into it.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:Absolutely so. Thinking about this topic of living authentically, what do you define as living authentically?
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:Really what living authentically is? A pattern. It's a pattern of habits and decisions that come from a really deeper than normal review, and more so than just reviewing, but an acknowledgement of what comes up for you as you live your day-to-day life, as you make decisions, as you're confronted with interactions and go through everything you would normally go through. In other words, it's being able to engage with people in the world in a way that brings you very sustainable peace.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:Thanks so much for sharing that. So, thinking about peace and kind of the way of the world today, what does it mean for someone to be true to themselves and, you know, live their lives in authenticity?
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:That's going to look different for everybody. You know I'm sure you've heard the phrase everyone you meet has their own story and all of that, but it is, it's so true. Really, what I think being true to yourself is is doing what you need to do to allow yourself to feel comfortable, accepting the reactions and emotions that come up for you again just during the course of day-to-day life, and then understanding how those reactions and emotions guide your next steps. How do they impact the decisions that you make?
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:So then, thinking about differences, I know we hear, like you said, being true to yourself and authenticity and being genuine. Are there any differences between authenticity and just simply being genuine?
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:Yeah, yeah. So a lot of times they're used interchangeably and honestly, it's not a huge deal that they are. But if you really want to get into it, being genuine is more how you relate to others, while being authentic is a very inward reflection. It's how being authentic is how you express your inner self to the outer world, and in order to do that, you really have to do the inner work. So genuine is more outer self. Being authentic is more inner self.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:Thank you so much for distinguishing that full transparency. I did not know that difference before today, so that's super helpful. To think of it from a lens of like authenticity and living authentically is really you focused You're the driver in the seat for that, whereas being genuine is more for others and those types of connections and what that looks like. So thank you for that. Sure, what are some common barriers that people may face when they're trying to live authentically?
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:Oh my gosh, there are so many. Because it's hard, it's really difficult to accomplish authentic living and it's always a process there is no. You know, I've done this for seven years and now I live authentically every day. No, it's a living, breathing process that goes throughout your whole life. But I think one of the most common barriers is just the desire for positive input. I mean this can be even from your own internal messaging, for instance. I know a lot of people will take on more right. More work went super well. Everybody's talking about it for years.
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:Or maybe your friend feels just so much better, so much more unburdened after you talk, and that gives you a sense of accomplishment and sense of joy. Or you were really successful in that project at work. You got a huge promotion, you got a raise, wonderful things happen to you and that project at work, you got a huge promotion, you got a raise, wonderful things happen to you and that's wonderful and it can be life changing. But it's possible that at the same time you didn't really want to do those things. And that's where a big barrier to living authentically comes in, because you're getting all of these positive messages, these positive messages, you're getting all of these wonderful rewards, but you didn't really want to do those things in the first place, so they made you feel a little uncomfortable, or they made you feel a little bit anxious about the amount that you were taking on to your own plate. So I think that that desire for positive input while it's a great thing usually, actually in this case can be one of the most common barriers.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:That definitely leads me to my next question. So it's about barriers and expectations and pressures. How does societal expectations and external pressures impact our ability to be authentic?
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:Oh my gosh, I mean in every way, in every single way you can think of. I typically hearken back when I'm thinking about this to one of the very first things that I learned as a professional, and that is that we all grow up in some kind of community. And as we're growing up, one of the things that, if you're familiar with Maslow, maslow's hierarchy of needs, so we all grow up in some kind of community and one of the most basic needs that we have, from the time that we're a teeny little kid, is to feel a sense of belonging, to know who is responsible to us, who is going to address us when we're crying or we feel bad or we need to eat, who's going to get their needs met. And we adjust our behaviors. We end up adjusting our views and our language, almost everything that we have to get those needs met and to please the people who are meeting those needs for us, because that's how we get them met right.
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:If we're in good standing with these providers, then they will bring us the things that we know we need and after a while, these just become habits. These just become habits. Your views, your behavior, your language, your responses, your decisions all of this just become your habits and sometimes who we are or who we want to be really can get lost in these habits. And I mean we can circle back from here to the question that you asked me about barriers. Some of these habits may result in positive feedback, and everybody loves to feel that. Everybody loves to feel that. So the expectations that society puts on us that really develop into these behaviors and views and language, and the pressures that society puts on us to meet their expectations really do impact our ability to be authentic.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:That makes a lot of sense. Like you mentioned, getting our needs met and how we adjust our core belief system and the way we view and approach the world. That fear of judgment or rejection Always. I know tons of folks out there are fellow people pleasers and really overcoming that behavior can be a lifelong battle if that's a behavior that you've developed out of needing to seek approval and things like that developed out of needing to seek approval and things like that. So what are some of the key benefits of living authentically from a mental and emotional well-being standpoint?
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:You know I think less burnout, less personal burnout. I know we talk about that a lot with work, but less personal burnout, I personally think, is number one In its most basic form. Living authentically is just living in a way that gives yourself the same leeway and grace that you probably give other people every single day. We're constantly surrounded by answers. We're constantly surrounded by this is the right thing to do, and that's exhausting. It is exhausting to try to meet those expectations that you don't hold anybody else to, and I think that once you do start giving yourself grace and once you do start understanding why you're making decisions and that you don't have to make those same decisions, it'll increase self-confidence, self-regulation, self-acceptance, all of these things that burnout slowly kind of takes away from you. Just in short, it has the potential to bring this deep sense of peace within yourself and within the way you shape your life, for as long as you practice it.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:So now for the hidden secrets that I know that you're sitting on because you're a life coach and this is what you do, and you help people to live more authentically. What practical steps can we take to start living more authentically and really be more true to ourselves?
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:I think the best first step is mindfulness and I know it's easier said than done, but really, at its most basic form, all mindfulness is is taking note. Right as you go through your life, just start to take note of the things that you're doing and how you're feeling, making the decisions or doing different tasks within your life. I think that if you give yourself that moment of mindfulness, that moment of taking note, you'll find that perhaps you don't really want to cook this for dinner. It's a little too complicated. You'll find surprising answers. You don't really want to do carpool on Wednesday or that extra couple hours that you are going to do at work. That really aren't a problem. It's not what you truly want. It's giving you a little bit of pause. Your shoulders are squeezing in towards each other. You're schlumping a little bit more than you usually do. You know any slew of physical manifestation that could be clues for you. Just take note of them all and see what you come up with.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:I really love that recommendation no-transcript, really checking in with yourself, your environment, your surroundings, taking time to smell the roses. I think this is a great use of that analogy not letting things just kind of pass you by, like it's not allowing life to become so routine that you just become expected to do the things that you do and so thinking about expectations and these barriers and things that are placed on you. How could someone maintain authenticity while navigating complex relationships like with family or work? You mentioned, like maybe not staying late, or maybe I don't want to do carpool on Wednesdays, so like, how do you navigate that? How do you now navigate it in a way to where you can live more authentically?
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:I mean, that is really the crux of everybody's goal when I meet with them. So it's a great question, and there can be aspects of living authentically that are going to impact other people in ways that they don't really like or they panic about and that can come back to you as a really negative interaction. Boundaries are a positive thing, whether that be the boundaries that you're realizing you really do need to keep when you have this authentic view of yourselves, especially for complex and work dynamics and working through those boundaries, really holding them there. Now, keep in mind, living authentically doesn't mean do whatever you want whenever you want, and here are the tools to kind of rationalize those.
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:You can still do the things that you're not super excited about. You can still stay two or three hours overtime at work, but you can still volunteer to throw that party for a friend. The difference is that you're making a very self-aware, intentional decision. So, while the goal of living authentically is to create this inner peace, it is a big ask to tell somebody hey, now that you have this tool, you should always feel inner peace. It's a practice. It's a practice that you can keep coming back to and maybe the authentic decision is I really need to stay for an extra hour or I really do need to step away and take this call, but you're doing it in a very self-aware, intentional way.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:I love that you talk about like intentionality and even giving yourself, you know, permission to make these choices. That might not exactly be what you want to do and how it's really a journey. It's not something that you can just use as an excuse to stop doing all of the things. I know we've talked about the people pleasing thing, and that's definitely something that I've become more aware of, I think, as I'm getting older. You know being way more protective with my time, when typically, I want to help as many people as I can, I want to do as much as I can, so then I would habitually stack my plate with this mountain of stuff that there's no way I could humanly possibly accomplish and then, I really had to take a pause and look around me and see who is this negatively impacting?
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:Well, it's impacting me. I have no time for self-care, impacting my family. I have a reduced amount of time that I can interact and spend with my family and then. So now I still definitely get those feelings, though after I have to really enforce the boundaries and turn something down because, oh, that's one person I wasn't able to help or I know they were disappointed. And so to short story, like I recently had that happen in a situation where I wasn't going to be able to provide an hour meeting per week for someone who needed that hour because my schedule was just maxed out. And when I communicated that to the person in their liaison, the liaison was like it's just an hour, you can't accommodate an hour. And when I, like, opened my calendar and saw all the colors and all of the things going on, like no, I could not find an hour because then I would be further kind of dipping into my reserve that I have for me that I need to exist so that I can really show up for my family and those around me.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:So I think you know continuing to take those pauses every single day and weigh out what are my goals, like, what are the things that I want to accomplish? What do I find to be the most fulfilling for me? How can I incorporate those more into my life? So then, if I do have to stay those extra hours at work, well, what am I doing that for? Am I doing that because that's going to free up a couple extra hours for me and I can leave early on Friday? Or is that just because I'm placing this kind of expectation on myself to be a doer and a go-getter? So yeah, I love that. You really kind of like differentiate that and explain that it's a journey, it's not a sprint.
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:Like every day is going to be kind of continuing to think about living authentically and for a lot of people, it creates even more anxiety or more feelings of panic when they can't do these things. I can see that If you're being authentic to yourself and you're thinking OK, these are feelings that I want to work on. Maybe the answer is to stay those extra hours, even if you don't get off early on Friday. It's just it's so different person to person. Thank you for sharing that. I love to. I loved hearing about that absolutely, and while kind of.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:While we're on the topic of like navigating relationships, I'm gonna throw you a curveball. Um, the thing that comes to my mind is if you are in a current relationship or you've ever been in a relationship with, uh, someone who has narcissistic personality disorder, you may, or may not have been programmed to think that anything that you want makes you selfish.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:Any boundary or preference that you have makes you selfish. So do you have any guidance or thoughts on how someone can really overcome that kind of pre-programming from their previous narcissistic relationship, or maybe even a current one, to start with that kind of authenticity?
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:Great, great question about someone who is in a relationship with a narcissistic partner, because that programming is really strong and I won't get fully into that. But I think what I would say to them is this is going to be a process, just like it was a process for you to learn all of your partner's behaviors and needs and just like you were probably predicting what they were going to do and their responses. It's going to take you a while to get back to yourself, and that's okay. And while you're learning to be authentic to yourself, what that means for you is going to change. Right now, it may feel more authentic to not be around a whole bunch of people. In three years it may feel more authentic to surround yourself with very specific people and be choosy about who you surround yourself with, but it's going to be a lifelong process because what you're doing is unlearning and then very slowly learning all of the different aspects of life, like self-worth, self-confidence, grace that a lot of people coming into this work may already be familiar with. So it's going to take you a while to get back to all of that and all of it is going to be practice, and with practice comes permanence right. So the more you practice it, the more second nature it's going to feel.
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:Just keep coming back to the work. Allow yourself to mess up If you need to. People, please for a while, it's okay. That's what's authentic to you, that's what's going to bring you the most inner peace. That's not to say let's not look at breaking those habits. But your journey is going to look much different than other people's journeys. It's going to be in much smaller steps and the successes are going to be much more celebratory, because you're coming back to yourself. You're owning yourself again. You are not living for somebody else anymore.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:I love that you mentioned the small steps, because I think that's another kind of toxic behavior that we as a society have. When we are, you know, working on ourselves or we're really working on anything, whether it's our house or you name it we look at the steps, we look at our progress and then we do the awful thing of making a comparison, and as humans, we are psychologically wired to make comparisons. There's no way to stop making comparisons. That's how we learn about the world around us. That's how we again develop our core belief system of how do you behave at school, how do you behave at work, how do you behave at home.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:Comparisons are always going to happen. It's what you do with that comparison that really changes your kind of life trajectory and what you value, and you know how you go through your day to day. Are you going to use that comparison to feel bad about yourself or to shame yourself? Or, oh, look at all of those nice things that they have. They're so much better than what I have. Or are you going to use that comparison as a motivator to go out, set those goals and accomplish those goals, like being more authentic, and you know, really going on that journey? So, while you may compare yourself to other folks who are practicing mindfulness and they're doing yoga, resist the urge to see the work that they're doing and think that that negates anything about you and your progress.
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:That's exactly right, and I just, Instagram speeds things up, TikTok speeds things up a hundred times faster than they really should be done. So you know, you have people who are talking about their own mental health journeys or their own authenticity journeys on those platforms and I think what people really forget is that they didn't wake up one day and just decide to be like that and if they have, they haven't done the work.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:No, absolutely. I could not agree more. So then, thinking about authenticity and kind of the broader picture, how can living authentic this word I knew it was eventually going to how can living authentically contribute to broader social change or influence societal norms?
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:You know, I know that there are two different schools of thought, or at least I've heard that there are two different schools of thought when I speak to my colleagues about this but I don't think that that is something that living authentically can really provide, because it's not an external exercise, it's not. The point of living authentically isn't to impact people around you. It really is this internal, self-focused practice that you just have to keep coming back to. So it's true that you may end up being an example for other people. People may look to you as an example of how to hold boundaries or as an example of how to live a pleasurable life, how to get the most out of life, and that's great because that part is going to impact society.
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:I know that there's a movement right now in corporate America where millennial I'm sorry, where Gen Z is coming into the workforce, and between millennials and Gen Z there is a push to not stay over, not work more. There is a push not to be bullied or give into a toxic work environment, and a lot of that, I think, has to do with living authentically. A lot of that has to do with looking at how work culture was impacting people internally and people's mental health and there was a desire for it to stop so in those ways it absolutely can. But when you're starting to practice living authentically and when you're continuing with that in your life, I don't think that there is an end goal to change society or be a catalyst for that change. But, like I said, the outcomes of living authentically may do that.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:That makes a lot of sense. It really does. So you do this. This is what you do. You help people to live more authentically. I'm so excited to share that Rebecca is actually joining us on our new adventure with Kinder Mind Coaching actually joining us on our new adventure with Kinder Mind Coaching. So she will be coming to Kinder Mind Coaching and offering her services with us. Look for that to launch within the next month. We will definitely update everyone once it does and I hope you all will check it out and get started on working on yourself and becoming more authentic. Rebecca, are there any kind of parting words you'd like for our listeners to hear?
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:I am super excited to start with kinder mind and I'm super excited to start working with you and the clients and people who are, who are ready to jump into this. Yeah.
Dr. Elizabeth Barlow:Wonderful Well, it was so nice having you on the podcast today. I thank you so much for your time and all your wonderful insight.
Rebecca Fink, Life Coach:You too Be well.