Be Your Future

The doors to The School of Self Image are officially open. In fact, we start on October 1^st. This is the first membership ever of its kind where we combine personal development, style, and surroundings to up-level a woman’s self-image. Because, after all, how you see yourself is creating your entire life. And at The School of Self-Image, we refuse to see ourselves as anything less than extraordinary. You can go to schoolofselfimage.com, check out all of the details, and I look forward to seeing you inside.

Bonjour, and welcome to The French Kiss Life Podcast, where personal development meets style. I’m Tonya Leigh, certified master life coach and the hostess of this party, where we explore how to live artfully and well. Each week, I’ll be sharing inspiring stories, practical tips, and timeless wisdom on how to elevate the quality of your everyday and celebrate along the way. Let’s dive into today’s episode.

My friends, can you believe this is the 200^th episode of The French Kiss Life Podcast? I remember the first day that I picked up a microphone to record episode number one. And if you go back and listen to it, you can probably see that I’m a lot more comfortable doing podcasts than when I started.

In fact, back in those days, I would actually just read my blog posts. But now, I seriously just pick up a mic and I talk with you, as if you were sitting in the living room with me. But I just want to say a huge thank you to all of you who tune in week after week and listen to these episodes.

It means so much to me when I get a message on Instagram or Facebook or you email me, just to tell me how, by just listening to the podcast, that your life has changed. And that’s why I do what I do. Some of you may never join one of my programs. I may never get to meet you in person.

But just knowing that the time that I spend every single week recording this is having an impact on your life means the world to me. I am truly grateful and so appreciative for each of you that listen to this podcast.

So, today’s episode is very fitting for the 200^th episode. I’m calling this Being Your Future. So, when I recorded the very first episode of this podcast, I remember thinking about how it would feel to have over a million downloads. I felt the experience ahead of time. And that feeling state is what inspired me, week after week, to show up to record it.

Now, keep in mind, at the time, I don’t know, I was having maybe a few thousand downloads every week. Now, we have way more than that and we’ve had well over a million downloads. But I started to embody the future of a woman who had over a million downloads on her podcast the day I started.

I know many of you, when you start out to reach an extraordinary goal, you focus on how far you have to go. You focus on things like you should have started earlier, or it’s going to take too long, or it’s going to be too hard. And these kinds of thoughts create states of being that don’t align with your future; the future you that has created what it is that you want.

When I think back over my life and how I’ve ended up where I am right now, which is sitting in a penthouse overlooking downtown Denver, it is because I envisioned it and I became the woman living this way before it showed up in my life.

There is a term called pre-cognition and it is the ability to predict our own futures, our own future experiences. And if you think about it, when we’re small children, we do this all of the time. We use our imagination to think about what is possible. We dream of being ballerinas or firefighters or doctors or, for me, I wanted to be an architect.

And I would sit around and draw houses and imagine what it would be to have a firm one day, an architectural firm. And today, I help designing lives, so it’s just as fun, if not more so. I’m still designing. Just a different form.

But as children, we do this all of the time. And then something happens when we become adults. We get so caught up in the day to day. We stop dreaming. We just try to survive and we’re not thriving. The majority of adults are not thriving.

And the reason being is that you’re not using that precognition to predict your future. You’re not creating those future experiences that you want in the life you have today.

And then, an interesting thing happens. We start to become very past-focused. In fact, many of you think that who you are right now is real. Many of you are telling yourself a story about who you are that is being defined by the past.

But when you are being your future, you are also being defined by your future and your future-desired experiences. Whenever I set a goal for myself, my process is to get really clear on the woman who has achieved that. It’s like I do a case study on her.

And I get into her mind and I think of what she’s thinking and what she had to think to get to where she is. I want to tap into her feeling state. What does she feel on a daily basis the majority of the time?

Now, she’s still human. So, she’s still going to have all the human emotions. And here’s the thing. I know that my future self is going to have other big goals. So, she’s probably feeling doubt, anxiety, all of the things that I’m feeling right now because I just set a huge extraordinary goal for myself.

In fact, I’m going to be sharing it in The School of Self-Image, which is my latest membership program. And I’m sharing about the process that I’m going through and achieving it. But when I set these goals for myself, it is my job to become a match for them, to be that woman now, to be my future now.

A lot of you are wanting to create the thing first before you become the thing that created it. And that’s why it’s so hard for you. Just for example, with weight loss with me, I thought, “Well when I finally lose the weight, then I can be a slim woman.”

But I had to become a slim woman in my mind first in order to lose the weight in a way that was healthy and was sustainable and something that I could maintain for life. Because let me tell you, I could lose weight with the best of them, but I would always gain it back.

Why? Because I wasn’t being a woman who didn’t have a weight problem. I had the self-image of a woman who struggled with her weight. And so, I was really good at proving that true over and over again.

But when I started to practice being a naturally slim woman with the thoughts that I think, with how I feel, with how I showed up at a table, how I ate, over time, that is who I became and the experience that I created for myself. But can you see, I had to become her first?

The same goes for money. I had to become a wealthy woman first before I could attract wealth into my life. I had to start thinking abundantly. I had to start feeling abundantly. Because, if you think about it, it’s really the energy that matters.

And because our thoughts do create our feelings, our energetic state, it does start in the mind. But I had to start thinking and feeling like a wealthy woman, even when my bank account was trying to tell me otherwise.

And so, I get that struggle, you all. You want to feel this way, but then you look around at what is and you begin to match that energetically. And so, you really have to do the work of rising above what is and using your imagination to dream up new experiences that you want to have, and then living in the energy of them already being done, of already having been experienced.

My COO just left. In fact, she left about 30 minutes ago. We were together for a week working and planning things out and getting everything ready for the new members of The School of Self-Image and it’s so good. I’m so excited for you all to see inside. And if you don’t know what that is, just head over to schoolofselfimage.com and you can read all about it.

But when we first started working together – I think it was over two years ago, it’s been a whole – she had me write out my perfect day, which is one of my favorite exercises to do. And it’s one that I do often, or I do it once a year, which is pretty often.

But she wanted me to do a fresh one with her. And she told me that she read my perfect day that I wrote over two years ago recently. And everything that I wrote down I am living today. I described my closet in detail in that perfect day, what it felt like to get dressed. I described my workday, who I’m talking with, my team, what I’m working on, how it feels.

What else did I put in there? I did put in there, I have a video crew, like a creative team that is amazing and that I love working with. Well, my video crew just left. They drove across country in an RV to record the orientation videos for The School of Self-Image and they are brilliant and so much fun to work with.

I also wrote in there how I was feeling, my overall energetic state. I wrote things like the kinds of people I hung out with, the kind of community I have. I mean, it’s incredible what I wrote and how I’m living all of it right now. It’s so crazy.

And you have to understand, when I wrote that, I was living in a little cabin up in the woods and my community was not that big and had I allowed myself to dwell on what I didn’t have or what I thought was missing, I would not have been a match for where I am now.

I really did bloom where I was planted. I made the best of it and have wonderful memories from that time in my life. And I wouldn’t change it for anything. And I really believe it as because even though what I wrote down in the external world wasn’t a match for where I was, I lived as if. I took what I had and made the best of it.

Every day, I would wake up and be like, “Oh my god, the sun came up today and I didn’t even have to make it happen. Oh, my goodness, look how beautiful it is outside.” I am so grateful for my community and my clients and this work that I get to do. I’m grateful that I’m alive. I am so excited about my future and I’m so grateful for where I am.

I would do this every single day because, if I didn’t manage my mind, my mind would have said things like, “Look at you. Where’s your community?” Even though I have always had community, they weren’t close by. I had a few good friends where I lived, but most of my community has been in New York or LA or just scattered across the country.

And I could have very easily slipped into everything that I thought was missing. But the whole time, I really did the work on focusing on what I had and getting into the energetic state of my future, being my future. Even on those days where no one would see me except my dogs, I would get up and I would get dressed as if I were walking down a Manhattan street going to the office.

Every morning, I would journal. And I would oftentimes journal from my future. And I would put on music and I would create the surroundings that felt good, that allowed me to flourish. I would have meetings with my team and we would talk about the future and where we were going.

And by doing that day after day, now I’ve created a completely new reality; one that I would not have created had I not been a match for it. And the way I was a match for it is I was being my future two years ago, the future that I’m living today.

And that’s the thing. You have to transcend who you are right now. Because who you are right now is based on thoughts and feelings from the past. And a lot of you are looking at where you are right now and you’re telling yourselves the same things and feeling the same ways. And therefore, you’re not a match for the future that you want.

You know, one of my favorite people that I’ve studied around this is Dr. Joe Dispenza. He wrote the book Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself, The Placebo Effect, and a couple of other really incredible books. I can’t remember the names of them right now.

But he said, according to research on mental rehearsal, “Once we immerse ourselves in that scene, changes begin to take place in our brain. Therefore, each time we do this, we’re laying down new neurological tracks in the present moment that literally change our brain to look like the brain of our future.” In other words, the brain starts to look like the future we want to create has already happened.

I tell my clients all of the time, I’m like, “Listen, everything is created twice. First in your head, and then in reality.” But some of you, if it doesn’t happen fast enough in reality, you just slip back into being who you’ve been versus living in that space of being your future and holding it long enough that the outside world can rearrange itself to be a match for it.

Now, here’s the thing. In order to be your future, you have to know what you want your future to be. You have to know what experiences you want to have. You want to know what your goals are.

Because if you’re sitting around saying, “I don’t know what I want,” how can you be a match for anything other than where you are? That’s why, in The School of Self-Image, for example, the very first thing that I have you do is to pick an extraordinary goal, a goal that is going to change how you see yourself.

And then, the work is to become a match for that goal by being the woman who has achieved it before you’ve ever achieved it. You know, the work I’m doing right now is I want to make this the best school of its kind in the world, that focuses on a woman’s self-image.

And so, I’ve been doing a lot of work of feeling what it would be like to be a woman that creates that. What am I telling myself? What am I thinking? What am I proud of? Who’s around me? What do my days look like? How am I showing up? How am I dressing? How am I presenting myself? What do my surroundings look like?

And every day, I’m waking up and I am practicing being my future right now. And I know that if I continue to do this, over time, I’m going to create the best school in the world that focuses on a woman’s self-image. It’s just the way it works.

But the other things that begins to happen is that when you’re being your future, number one, you are energetically being her, meaning you’re going to have to shift your energetic state to be a match for whatever her energetic state is. But then the other thing is that when you know what it is that you want to create and you are thinking from your future, you start making different decisions.

A lot of y’all are wanting your life to change, but you’re not making the decisions that’s needed to change your life. One of the things that kills our dreams more than anything is indecision, just sitting around hoping for clarity, hoping for the right answer. And all you need to do is to think from your future and just make the best decision that you can right now in your present.

Decisions get the momentum going in your life. And I love to think there’s no right or wrong decision. There’s just a decision that you learn from. There’s just a decision that’s either going to teach you something or move you forward. That’s it.

But when I think about my future self, she’s very decisive. And so, I can bring that back into my life today and ask myself, what decisions do I need to make today that will lead me closer to my future? A great example is when I think about creating the best school of its kind in the world for a woman’s self-image. I know I’m going to need more help.

Now, my brain wants to come in and tell me, “You probably shouldn’t do that right now. You probably can’t afford it. That’s a big risk.” But I know my future self is like, “Sister, you need help with this.”

And so, I’ve been interviewing people in certain positions to help me support clients in an incredible way, to support me in an incredible way. And I’m going to be hiring, because that is what my future self would do. So, I need to do that now.

And I’ll tell you this; I have never regretted investing in myself or my business. In fact, those are the investments that have paid off more than any other investment I’ve ever made. But even knowing that, my brain loves to keep me where I am. But I want to be constantly evolving my self-image, how I see myself. Because you may have heard me say this in the last podcast. You can only create to the edge of your self-image.

And so, by practicing being my future, what I’m really doing I I’m evolving my self-image to be big enough to hold that future. Because that’s the only way I can create it. If I don’t evolve who I am, then I don’t have the space for anything other than where I am right now.

So, being your future is about thinking as your future self, making decisions like your future self, feeling like your future self, having that energy. If you’re someone who wants to maybe make more money, how much money do you want to make and what would it feel like to have that amount of money coming in? Like, feel it now.

If you’re someone that wants to meet the love of your life, imagine the love of your life is sitting right beside you in your living room. What would that feel like? Begin to practice that feeling now. She’s not sitting around, afraid that the person is not going to show up. She’s not focused on the absence of the love of her life. She’s not telling herself there’s no good men out there, because he’s sitting right beside her.

You have to be her now. Be that future now in order to attract him into your life. And then the other thing that you have to do is you have to start bringing in things into your surroundings that match your future. What does that version of you, what kind of books is she reading? What is she listening to? Who is she hanging out with? Does she have fresh flowers in her home? Go get some fresh flowers. How does she dress up every single day?

You know what it’s like? It’s like you being handed a script. One that you’ve never really read before, but you like the script. You want to be that character. And so, you start to read it. You’re really clunky. You’re forgetting your lines. It feels awkward. You definitely don’t feel like the character yet.

But over time, if you practice that script long enough, guess what, that is who you become. You become that character. And you no longer need the script. You know it. You know it well.

And a lot of you are trying to avoid that awkward in between. And I’ve talked about that on a previous podcast. But that is what’s required to become your future self. You’re practicing becoming her. So, you’re going to forget your lines. You’re going to feel silly sometimes.

But if you stay committed to her, eventually you’ll look in the mirror and you’ll be like, “Oh my goodness, hello. There you are. Hi. I’ve been missing you. I’m so glad you arrived.” That’s truly how I feel sometimes. I look in the mirror and I’m like, “Oh, there you are. I’ve been waiting for you.”

What I want to challenge you all to consider is that the best years are ahead of you. I want you to be making your futures way bigger than your past. I want you to expand the limits of your own self-image so that you can hold that future for yourself. And to do that, you’re going to have to clean up your mind. That’s like step number one, so that you can clean up your energy, so that you can be a match for it.

You’re going to have to start showing up on purpose. You need to get out of the yoga pants every once in a while, even though I do love me some yoga pants. Unless that’s how you see your future self. If she’s wearing yoga pants all day every day and it’s intentional, I will be your biggest fan.

But a lot of us, especially right now during COVID, we’re sitting around feeling terrible and we’re dressing in ways that make us feel terrible. Like, put on something beautiful. Put on something that says, “Here I am, world.” And it may just be you and you in the house. But you matter. Dress to impress yourself. Dress to feel better. Because when you feel better, you look better. And then when you look better, you feel better. And it’s just a gift that keeps on giving, my friends.

But showing up on purpose is about getting up and getting dressed, thinking about how that future version of you is showing up and then begin to practicing showing up as her in the life you have now.

But showing up isn’t just about our clothes. It’s like, how we carry ourselves. Some of you are walking around contracted, being small. I want you to hold your head up high and walk into a room and own it. Because I feel like every version of our future selves, when she walks into a room, she’s like, “Hey, here I am. Where are all my new friends?”

And showing up is also, like, how you communicate with other people. How do you think your future self is communicating with others? Begin to practice that now. And then finally, you’re going to have to switch up your surroundings. You need to go out there and create new experiences for yourself.

You need to try different ways to work. You need to listen to different things, watch different things, get off of the news for heaven’s sakes. Stop scrolling through social media all day wondering why you feel so bad, and go create new, exciting experiences in the life you have right now today. Instead of waiting for one day when hoping and wishing you had those experiences, how can you bring those experiences into the life you have right now?

And you may start small. Let’s say, for example, an experience that you want to have is, like, traveling the world. And right now, not many of us can do that, especially here in the US. But how can you get the essence of that in your life today? And it may be going to a museum. It may be watching the travel channel.

But how can you bring the essence of that experience into the life you have right now? Because here’s what’s going to happen, you all. You’re going to start upgrading your surroundings and it’s going to start sparking new thoughts about yourself, about the world, about what’s possible. And that changes you. It up-levels your self-image.

And all this requires that you be your future now. No more waiting. No more waiting until you’ve lost the weight. No more waiting until mister right comes along. No more waiting for your business to grow. No more waiting for more money to come falling into your bank account. No more waiting for all of those things that you think are going to make your life so much better. You have to make your life better today so that you can be a match and attract those things into your life.

One of the things that I know is that if you want to improve your life, the best way to do that is to enjoy your life. And I think we can all agree, when we think about our future selves, she’s enjoying her life. So, how can you bring that experience into your life today? How can you enjoy your life more? And this is going to require that you transcend who you’re being today.

You’ve heard me say this often and I’ll say it many times more. To create something you’ve never had, you’re going to have to become someone you’ve never been. And if you want support around this, I would love to support you in The School of Self-Image because this is what we’re going to be doing.

We are going to be up-leveling how we see ourselves so that we can have more joy and more confidence and more excitement in our futures and create the results that we want to create. And we do this through those three areas that I just mentioned; our mindset, our style, how we’re showing up, and our surroundings.

And I do believe that by the time you listen to this, it will be the last day to join for the October 2020 class. It is a monthly membership, meaning you can join for a month. And if you don’t like it, you can leave. But I think you’re going to love it and want to stick around for a while.

There will be weekly classes and Q&A, coaching. I’m bringing in some of my favorite experts that have really supported me in my journey in the fields of personal development and health and wellness and beauty and style and home and organization. I am so excited.

And I don’t know if I mentioned this. I don’t think I did. But when you join, there is an option to upgrade to an annual membership. And when you do that, you get access to the Wealthy Woman, which is a course that I taught not too long ago to some of my clients. And some of you have been asking me how you can get access to it.

Well, this is how. Come join us for a year within The School of Self-Image and you get not only two months for free, but you get the Wealthy Woman course, which if I were to sell it to the public, it would be a $1000 course, minimum. I’ve had women who have been through it already and telling me it’s just totally transformed their relationship with money.

One of them told me that she’s already made an extra $2000 because of what she’s learned. Another woman has told me that she’s got a solid plan to pay off her debt and she has no doubt it’s going to happen. I even had a CPA in the course that told me that all CPAs should be required to take this course.

And it’s all about evolving your self-image. So, we talk about the energetics of money, but we also talk about the practicalities and what it really takes to be a wealthy woman. I am so excited, you all. I am determined. I am going to make this the best school in the world of its kind. And if you want to join us, head over to schoolofselfimage.com.

Now, let’s do a really quick recap. I want you to practice being your future now. And that’s going to require that you decide what you want. What do you want your future to look like? What is your extraordinary goal that will change how you see yourself? And then go to the place of already having achieved it. And who is that version of you?

How is she thinking differently than you’re thinking today? How is she feeling different? What decisions is she making that maybe you’re not making? Who is she surrounding herself with and what is she surrounding herself with? How is she showing up?

Write out that script for yourself and practice it every single day until one day, you look in the mirror and you’re like, “There you are. I’ve been waiting for you.”

If you enjoyed this episode and you want to dive even deeper into the French Kiss Lifestyle, let’s start with a makeover; a mindset makeover. You can download my free training, The Three Mindset Makeovers Every Woman Needs, by visiting frenchkisslife.com/mindset. Because, after all, mindset is the new black.