Ep #157: Alternate Universe Belief

You’re listening to episode 157 of The Confident Coaches Podcast, the one where we wake up in the alternate reality of our fricking dreams. Alright, let’s go.

Welcome to the Confident Coaches Podcast, a place for creating the self-confidence you need to do your best work as a life coach. If you want to bring more boldness, more resilience, and more joy to your work, this is the place for you. I’m. Amy Latta, let’s dive in.

Hi my friend. How are you doing today? I’m fabulous as always. You are amazing, I sure hope so. I have a fun episode for you!

I think this could even be described as a little silly, and I think that’s the deceptiveness of today’s topic. It can seem kind of silly. It can seem kind of fun, and yet it is a powerful Jedi mind trick.

It works only all of the time when you use it, so I’m going to describe it to you, help you figure out what it looks like for you and how to use it yourself. It’s a super fun belief tactic that I use every once in a while with my clients. I actually just used it recently in a one-on-one session that some of my mastermind members get, it’s called alternate reality belief.

An alternate reality belief is basically exactly as it sounds. It’s like, what would you believe if you lived in an alternate reality? And this is really most effective when what you’re currently believing just feels so true that you can’t imagine not believing those things. Like, this is where you’ve already run all of the coaching Models where you can like, “yes, I can see that these things that I’m believing don’t serve me. They don’t help me. They are getting in my way.”

And also, this is another tactic that you can use in this place where you’re like, “yeah, I see it. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do about it, Amy. This is just how I think. This is just how I was raised. This is just everything that’s been modeled for me. I don’t know how to act a different way. I don’t know how to be a different way than this.” And I’m like, “Great. Let me introduce to you to alternate realities. Let’s just have a little fun, because why not? Because where you are now, where you keep butting up against the same place and you keep believing the same thing and you know it kind of sucks, and also nothing you’re doing is changing it. That’s not fun. That’s not an enjoyable place to be, so why not try something a little fun?

Why not try something a little silly? And the silliness is just because we’re going to go and we’re going to bring in some movie concepts here and we’re going to be a little silly with it, but don’t underestimate the power that it will have inside your brain.

So as of, for instance, this did recently come up with a client who wants to show up differently in her business than she ever has before. She wants to be somebody who doesn’t filter everything that she says. She wants to be somebody who tells it like it is. She wants to be somebody who’s more fun and more playful from the outstretch, and not just keep those things behind closed doors until after you are working with her.

But she has beliefs that she has to be a certain way that professional women have to look a certain way. They have to sound a certain way. You know, this idea that we as women in the business world need to present ourselves in a certain way. And not only does she have to present herself in these certain ways, she also has to model those certain ways for others that she is somebody to look up to.

She is modeling for others, and some of the things that get in her way are these ideas that she can be seen, but she shouldn’t be heard. It’s not okay to be too loud. It’s not okay to be too much. I’m sure some of you have seen and heard those things. What other things might be coming up for you when you think about the rules that you were following, the things that you learned growing up, what you hear reiterated what you really worry about, and these things are so attached to her identity and that’s what happens so much.

That these rules that we live by can be so attached to our identity that it seems just entirely foreign to even try to change it. Like we can see that it sucks. And also, I don’t know what else I’m supposed to be, if I’m not this, then who am I? And that we kind of know the answer to that question, and it scares the crap out of us.

Like to the point when we were coaching, I even asked her, I even asked her to clarify, do you really even want to believe anything else because this seems so attached to your identity? I don’t know if you want to change that, and I think that is really, really important before we dive in, how to use alternate reality belief to help you start unlocking some of these things is understanding that you don’t have to change how you think and how you feel.

You can be the person who succeeds in spite of. It’s really funny … this was actually something that came up in our coaching. I totally didn’t put this in my notes, but I’m suddenly remembering that she really remembers this phrase “well-behaved women seldom make history.”

And she’s like, “so I want to not be well behaved, but maybe I could actually be one of those seldom people.?” Her brain’s convincing her that it’s easier to be one of the behaved women that actually do make history. The seldom part of that statement is to just be who she wants to be and redefine what “well-behaved” even means.

So that’s what keeps coming up for her. And I did ask her, “do you want to?” and we went off on a whole tangent that, you know, maybe it would be easier or she’s trying, you know, of possibly convincing herself that it was easier to be that rare unicorn who does filter what she says, who doesn’t say everything that she really wants to say, who doesn’t stick out for the crowd and still becomes massively successful.

And I’m like, “sure, that possibility is absolutely there, and you don’t have to. You can try to be that person that holds all of that in and remains buried and covered under all of those rules, and does not let your real personality shine, and go become successful. That is totally an option on the table.” I’m just like, “Why?” That sounds miserable. That doesn’t sound fun at all. That sounds awful, right?

This is what happens, I think, to so many people. We’ve seen all these true Hollywood stories and everything. People being something that they aren’t in order to become the success, and then they get there and they find that the success doesn’t make them feel any more themselves.

They don’t suddenly, after the success feel like then they can finally be who they are because then they worry about being rejected even more so, because even more people know them. But it is an option on the table, and I think it’s important to reiterate that you don’t have to do this. But why not try?

What if it’s just a hell of a lot more fun? And I’m going to give you another reason why you might want to do it anyway. it’s coming up. It’s a really, really good one that stopped me in our tracks when we were coaching together.

So, yes, these things: “be seen, not be heard … it’s not okay to be too loud … it’s not okay to be too much.” This was so attached to her identity, and it just felt and sounded so real. But when I asked her point blank, “is this who you want to be for the rest of your life?” She was like, “no.” She knew it.

Okay. At least we have that. At least we can start from there. And that’s where it all comes up. “But I don’t know how, I don’t know how, when I’ve been one way my whole life to flip a switch and be another way.” And I was like, “Great. Let’s have a little bit of fun.” Okay, let’s pull out the alternate reality.”

I use lots of movie references. The entire last podcast episode was all about The Matrix. I’ve used the idea of like the Harry Potter reference before. You know that reference, where you know there’s seven books. You don’t have to have finish book seven in order to help somebody in book one, chapter one. I think I just quoted Star Wars this past week where I said, “Never tell me the odds.”

I’m going to use movie lines, movie quotes. All of and movie concepts, movie themes, movie plot lines, all of the time, just because it’s so comfortable for me.

So, I want you to imagine that you were in like one of these movies where like you have lived, you’re living in one universe, and something happens.

A comet streaks through the sky. There’s an electrical surge. You’re like Tom Hanks in big, where you go, and you make a wish with the little machine. (I cannot believe I am totally blanking) Zoltar, yes! You go, and you make a wish on the Zoltar machine, you know this is like 13, going on 30, like father, like son.

There’s a million of these movie plot lines, and this is what I want you to imagine that you have lived. You are in a movie, and you have lived one way your entire life and the rules that you lived by in that life. So, we’re in this movie and we’re watching this person living this life where you know they’re living by, here’s what you’ve been told and here’s what you’ve believed was important. Here are the things that you believe you can do. Here are the things that you believe you can’t do. Here are the ways that you’ve been told define success and define professionalism, and all the way down the line, like I want you to imagine like you’re visualizing yourself. I don’t care if you want to pick an actress that’s playing you.

Imagine them living your life defined by these set of rules, and you can see all of the scenarios that they engaged in, all the scenes that they interact with other people, and all of the rules just become super, super obvious, right? There’s my client being seen, being heard, not raising her hand. In the meeting, there’s my client, making sure she’s not too loud and abrasive.

There’s my client who’s kind of holding herself back because she doesn’t want to be seen as too much, right? We can all visualize it and kind of play it out in our brain right now.

And then the meteor hits, or you go, and you make the wish on this Zoltar machine, or you know, the electrical surge hits and you zap back, and then you pass out, and then you wake up. You wake up in an alternate universe, and you’re looking around.

Now in the movies, this always plays out a little fun, right? But you get to write this script, you get to decide what the rest of this movie plays out like. You know, alternate universe belief is essentially everything that you have known to be true is no longer true.

You know, and in the movies, hijinks ensue in some way, because you’re fighting against this alternate reality. It doesn’t make sense to you. You’re still trying to be who you were before the lightning struck in this new alternate reality. And of course, it never works out, you know? And maybe you’ll learn a little bit along the way.

By the end of the movie when the universe is realigned, and you show up in your old universe with your new alternate universe thoughts and feelings in what you learned. But in this science fiction movie, it’s called Your Actual Life.

So, I want you to imagine that all of these rules and all of these definitions and all of these have to’s and all of these must be’s and all of these, you definitely cannot be … that you’re going to go to bed tonight and you’re going to wake up in this alternate universe, and what would that alternate universe look like? You can literally define it however you want to define it.

Now, sometimes when we say that you can be whatever you want to be, this alternate universe, you can do whatever you want to do, there that can be, and I want to acknowledge that can be a little overwhelming.

It feels a little too fantastical and it actually can trigger some trauma and some anxiety, and I ultimately want to coach every single one of you because y’all going to join Free to Paid Coach and then you’re all going to graduate from that and move into path to a 100k, right? Obviously.

I want to encourage you to live fantastical and to live unreasonable, and to live unrealistic as much as possible.

And also, I’m not going to lie, it can kind of freak your shit out a little bit when you first get started. So, here’s how you are going to define your alternate universe without completely freaking out that’s a little too much. It’s a little too fantastical.

You’re going to take that list of all of the ways that you currently define your universe, how you’ve lived the whole time with following these rules that you followed. I listed out so many of them already.

And in the alternate universe, the opposite is true. It’s like the upside down. You’re living in the upside down, kind of like Stranger Things, except the things that you’re afraid of won’t actually kill you in this alternate universe. Like, it’s like literally the opposite is true.

So, for my client, it’s expected that not only should she be seen and heard, she should be heard often, that loudness being loud, being outspoken, is honored and revered. That being too much, too muchness is celebrated and championed. People are looking for that. People are looking for that in their women professional leaders, they want the too muchness. They want the loudness. They want the outspoken words.

These are virtues worth modeling for those who look up to you in this alternate universe. And what was super fun is as we were talking about this alternate universe, she added, she would live with no regrets. She would make decisions in her business with no regrets.

She would quit regretting the decision that she’s making or wishing that she would make a different decision, but she didn’t because she was too afraid of all of those rules. She would take a lot more risks. She would take all of the risks, things she’d never dare do in her current reality. But hey, in an alternate universe where you can be anything and you can do anything, and that is celebrated, why not live with no regret?

Why not take those risks? That’s right. Because in my alternate universe that’s celebrated, because really, this alternate universe is a universe where we weren’t all conditioned and socialized to conform.

Right now, your alternate universe might look a little bit different than mine and a little bit different than this one client that I coach that I just coached this concept to. But ultimately, that’s the similarity for all of our alternate universes. There is no mass conditioning and socialization to conform and be a certain way.

Now some people have managed to live in this alternate universe already, and for that I say amazing. Whenever I meet somebody who just is not bothered by all of those rules, I’m always like, “That is amazing.” They are also the rare breed and probably not listening to this podcast.

For most of us, we are imagining where we weren’t told by others all of the time messages reinforced in so many places. What is and what is not acceptable all of the time.

Here’s another little secret about this alternate universe concept: there’s a good chance you’re already living a little bit of it in your life already. Like there are already areas in your life where you do show up more as your alternate universal as than your current reality self. Maybe in some parts in your life or maybe just certain days. For my client, it shows up for her that once people are her client, once people hire her, they actually see more of this alternate universe version.

She shows up more as herself, not as worried about being too loud, too much or whatever. And for the most part, they are delighted. And this is what so often happens is we try to conform. Our desired reality that alternate reality sneaks out anyway because you’re too fabulous to contain. This alternate universe is always the better version of ourselves or the more realized version of ourselves is probably the better way to say that.

But we want to wait until we know we are accepted and we know we’re going to be safe. But in an alternate reality, that’s not a worry. There was a really big reason why alternate reality living is really what we want to be living, and particularly in our businesses, in any relationship, honestly.

I mean, take business out of this and we’re talking like this could be applied to dating, this could be applied to marriage. This could be applied to applying for a job. This could be like trying to meet new friends. It’s all the same because really what we’re saying to people, when we show up in this kind of reality universe that we’ve been living in trying to contain our alternate universe persona, what we’re really saying to people is, “if you want to see who I really am, you’re going to have to hire me first.”

And ooh, that’s just kind of messed up. That little gem came from my client. This idea was the words are coming out of our mouth. We both stopped in our tracks because it was like, “Whoa, if you want to see who I really am, you’re going to have to hire me first.” And that’s a really big ask of your client. Like that’s a big ask of your employer, of your spouse, of a new friendship, of anything. If you want to see who I really am, you have to be all-in on me already, and then you get to see who I am. Ugh, that’s a burden on you and it’s a big burden on them.

I invite you, a client that I coached, invites you, to peel back the curtain. What kind of person do you really want to be? How do you want to show up?

Start with the rules you think you have to follow and how you would show up if those rules were not there. And then define that alternate universe belief. Be there. See it in your mind. And as you work through your week, you can even ask, “What would alternate universe me do?

I mean, this is kind of like a future me, but sometimes in future me, we are still operating in this universe, so we have a hard time answering the question.

Sometimes future me really works. Sometimes you can be like, “Okay, future me, who’s already achieved this what does she think and feel?” Sometimes that works. I love that idea, but sometimes it doesn’t work and that’s where we want to go to alternate universe. Alternate universe where everything, all the rules I live by now are flipped upside down where how everything I have lived by up into this point is the exact opposite.

How would she show up here? What would she say here? How would she engage with this person? How would she write this email? What would she say on this consult call right now? Where I can tell that this person is interested and they’re just really, really scared to say yes, and I know I can help them, and I know that they’re in, and that they’re just terrified.

What does alternate universe me say here? Who’s not afraid to be heard? Who’s not afraid to be seen? Who’s not afraid of her muchness, her loudness, her fabulousness.

Oh, see, now we’re talking. Now people are getting to know the real you before they have to pay you. And that’s way more fun. That’s so much more fun. It’s more engaging.

And here’s a super, super bonus: it builds more trust with yourself, and it builds more trust with them, because alternate reality universe, this alternate reality, alternate universe belief is really about building trust that this is who you really are, and you trust yourself, and you trust this version of you to have your own back and there’s no bait and switch on your client’s part. Who they see showing up online is who they’re going to get all of the time.

It builds trust with you. It builds trust with them, and it’s just a hell of a lot more fun. And when you practice more of this alternate reality belief and you go to this kind of alternate universe, and you can see yourself there, I invite you to visualize yourself operating in that way because visualization is a Jedi mind trick that works only all of the time because your brain does not know the difference between the reality that you are living and the reality you create in your brain, because it’s all in your head.

So, you might as well visualize the reality where you get to be exactly who you want to be.

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Share it to your stories, share the one thing you heard today that you needed to hear in your stories. And if you tag me, I can reshare you and I can promote you as well. I can share your coaching with my people. I’m so excited to see what you create in the world.

And I’ll talk to you next week.

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