How to Discover Your One Essential Word for a Successful Future

[00:00:00] Bettina M Brown: Hello, hello and welcome to In the Rising Podcast. My name is Bettina, and this is the platform I've chosen to talk about living a life that's really in alignment with your hopes and your dreams and your goals, and leaving behind that shame, blame game that really does nothing for you. Or for anyone around you.

So, I like to start off by saying that I am not a licensed counselor, psychologist, psychiatrist, but I am a healthcare professional and a certified life coach. And I like to approach things from the perspective of questions. Questions of how we can get to the point where we felt fulfilled. And basically have fewer regrets.

Regrets are going to be there, but fewer and fewer would be ideal. So today I wanted to talk about something that kind of just fell in my lap, and that was about having control over your own life and having control over your view of what that should be under all and any circumstances. And I came across this poem, Invictus, which is actually written by William Ernest Henley, and just by the name yourself.

Like we know this is an older, this is an older poem that someone wrote this at least 150 some odd years ago. But what is really cool, in my opinion, is this last little verse. It matters not how straight the gate. How charged with punishments the scroll? I am the master of my fate. I am the captain of my soul.

But what does this really mean? What does it mean to be the captain of your soul? And basically, it's no matter what the circumstances are, that I am in charge of my life, that I am directing my path and how I allow life and all the outside stuff to limit my desire and dreams is also within my control.

Right? So when you have a vision or goal, it is so important not to be distracted by opinions of others, of actions of others. Really to be captivated by your purpose and your reason for being, your reason for waking up, or whenever you listen to anything, it's like, what is your why? What is your why?

What is your why? Figure that out and stay with things that. Keep you in your why because there are many things that other people will say to you because they don't have what it takes or they don't have what you have. They don't have certain gifts that you have to make changes, and other people have some kind of power, but then they change the goalposts.

And you've probably had people like that in your life. Sometimes it's family, sometimes it's work where this is what you have to do to get to the next level. And then when you get to that, oh no, but this is really what you need to do to get to the next level. And then you get to that point and it's, oh, no, no.

And these goalposts, I mean it's if, if this is really what the game of football would be like, it would not have as many fans. Like there has to be an end point and people will always move those goalposts. For their own benefit, not for yours, but what is your goalpost like? Is someone else moving them or are you?

So, it is important that we kind of think of this crab story and where if you have an entire bucket full of crabs, you really don't have to have a lid on it. And that's because every time one crab gets up to the top, all of his little friends or her friends will pull it back down. That's kind of human nature as well.

The more you get to the top, the more alone you're going to be. If you want to have a big support group at all times, then don't follow your dreams. Follow other people's. So if you want to live and honor your vision, you do have to set out by yourself to some extent. It does not mean that you're not in a fleet of ships with other people going the same direction, but you are in charge of one vessel, and that is you.

So what is actually interesting about this poem, what I found interesting is that this author had a huge amount of hardships in his life. He actually developed tuberculosis of the bone around the age of 12, and in his early twenties, had to have his leg amputated. And TB lives in your body and sometimes it flares up, rears it ugly head and then it goes away.

But on one of these times, he became so ill, he almost had to have the other leg amputated as well. But his courage and his perseverance and his view as he went through this really made an impression on his friend Robert Lewis Stevenson. Again, older sounding name, and he is the author of the book, treasure Island, and one of his characters that he modeled after his friend who showed so much courage.

It's actually Long John Silver in some parts of the country. We also know of the little fast food restaurant, but the wonderful hush puppies, also Long John Silver. But what really hit me was his courage. The author of Invictus, his courage in following his dream and saying, I will, no matter what, move forward, I will still write my poetry.

I will still show this, made an impression on other people and, and that's how we live on. It's not just directly us to someone, but what people see in your behavior. How people see and perceive you with all the obstacles that you have in your own way. And so what I did as I went through more research is I found out this is actually a title of a movie as well, and Morgan Freeman plays Nelson Mandela.

And Mandela said that this is one of the poems that helped them through all of those years of imprisonment, how not to grow better, how not to grow more angry. But to develop himself, to put his effort into himself and to do something crazy, like exceed his own expectations. And he did. I mean, if that's not a story, I don't know what is, but having these words from someone else's difficulties helped Nelson Mandela.

And it's the same way that that poem stuck out of the, I am the captain of my own soul stuck out to me. Are we or are we not? So Invictus actually means unconquerable and Latin unconquerable, that your spirit cannot be conquered by anyone under any circumstance. Sometimes those are very big circumstances, but your soul is always that one thing they can't take.

Right? It's, you can take my money, you can take my house, but you can never take my soul. Cause I don't, I don't have to give that to you. And the more we feel like we are the captains, That our fate relies on the decisions of, of what we make and not on others. That determination and perseverance in ourselves makes us our own captain.

That means those stars and that compass belongs to you alone. But what exactly does it mean to be the captain? Because you know, there's captains we respect and we hear that, you know, the one that leads his crew to safety and does everything and he's the last to escape. Or sometimes you'll hear the captain goes down with his own ship, but what does that really mean?

It means that this person shows valor in the face of fear, even when those circumstances are dire, to still do the right thing to still care for other people. To still show humanity and faith and in so many ways, love other people regardless. And that storm that that captain is in can be small. And sometimes that storm just seems to last for years and years.

It can be health scares, it can be family drama, it can be work drama. It can be your own interpersonal drama. It can be a storm of anything, but it is still you driving and steering, basically that ship. And if we are to remain unconquerable, it means that we are choosing. To restart, recharge. Begin again.

Keep fighting, keep going. Saying yes. Under all the circumstances we choose that over. Going just below deck and blaming the world that our ship has, you know, changed direction. Has no purpose, no guidance, no value, no life. It is really in that adventure of a lifetime. We end up being that captain and it is usually one lifetime.

That's all we get. So, the question I posed today in, in this podcast is really looking in that mirror and asking yourself, are you leading your own ship? Are you leading your own ship in the direction of your chosen destination? Or are you continuously looking at all the storms that have passed? They're passed in your history books, and you're reviewing everything what could have or should have and this and that, but you are not moving forward right now.

You're still looking back at all of the waves that you've gone through instead of the waves. Or sometimes smooth sailing ahead. You know? In fact, what I like about this captain kind of parody analogy is that you are that captain and there can only be one, right? You don't have multiple, multiple captains.

There is only one. And in that, yes, yes, we are alone, but we are alone together. Meaning that there's a good chance that you know someone, you've heard of, someone who's overcome or going through something very dark, they're in their dark days. Freedom of problems is not a given. We are all going through something or we have gone through something or guess what?

Something's ahead of us and we don't yet know about it, but we are not always alone as we're going through that. But we still have to make that decision of what will we do in that path right here, right now. Because you never know when you will be unconquerable or Invictus until you really are making sure that you are remaining unconquerable in your soul.

And from that point on, Everything else you have the ability to conquer. So thanks for listening to me today. I really enjoyed learning about this topic and, and doing some research and realizing how many pieces actually came together for that story to fit together. So if you feel that someone would benefit from this, go ahead and share this podcast.

And if not, If you have not yet subscribed, I would encourage you to do it and leave a review. It does so much wonder for my podcast or anyone else that you're listening to. It does so much for that person who puts that work together to really bring some light out into the world. And until next time, let's keep building one another up.