Sandy Kovach [00:00:02]:
Sometimes life forces us down a path we never saw coming, and we're forced to take a detour. In this episode, we get into insights, strategies, and our own personal experiences that will hopefully help you embrace change and conquer the unexpected with how to deal with life's detours. Welcome to Imagine Yourself podcast, where we help you imagine the next chapter of life with grace, gratitude, courage, and faith.
Lanée Blaise [00:00:28]:
Hello, everybody out there listening. Just want to say thank you for always supporting us here at Imagine Yourself podcast. I'm Lanée here with Sandy, and we want to talk today about some of the ways that life can weave in and out and switch lanes on you. And sometimes you just have to straight up do things differently than you've ever done before. It kind of builds upon our last episode, which was on Reinventing Yourself, and we had a wonderful guest who happens to be related to me. Her name is Tami Garcia. And it's so funny, because even as I'm saying this right know, sandy and I had all these plans for what that episode was going to be all about, and I really wanted it to focus on how she's my cousin Tami Garcia decided to move from the United States to Mexico, and we were going to really get in deep about that. But that episode ended up being even more vibrant and interesting and it just kind of went different ways than I had expected. And getting into that aspect of when life does things differently or when you find yourself needing to do things differently, I just thought we'd kind of talk about stuff like that today and kind of let people listening think about that and then reflect upon that in their own lives, too.
Sandy Kovach [00:01:50]:
Yeah, listening to the past episode and if you haven't listened back to reinventing yourself at any age, which is what Linnae was alluding to, I mean, we're going to kind of focus on making big changes like Tami did, but that was certainly part of it. Making big changes can be reinventing yourself, but we talked about life going in different directions based on circumstances, and as I sat there and thought about if I was to reinvent myself, what would I do? And I was dumbfounded because right now I'm going through too much stuff to reinvent myself. I have some issues I need to take care of. But I thought back to when I was just graduated from college, and obviously you're in a much different position in life when you're young and just starting out. But I was able to get a job over the phone when I was living in Virginia to a dude in Arizona, and it was in radio, and my parents had retired out there, so I was like, I want to go live in Arizona because my parents are out there, and I've always wanted to see the Southwest. And I drove myself all the way across the country and I stopped in New Orleans and I would never do this now, but I went know on Bourbon Street by myself. Like, okay, this is crazy, totally different world back then, for one thing. And then I think of myself now and of course I would never do that, but that's not age appropriate for me now. So that's kind of what I came out with. It's like a desire to do something really different and out of the box. After I get out of the situation I'm in, I'm getting ready to have some surgeries and stuff, but then obviously knowing it's not going to be driving across the country by myself. So you see where I'm going there.
Lanée Blaise [00:03:33]:
I see where you're going. All you're really saying is that part of there, remember it's reinventing yourself at any age is what we were talking about. And different ages and stages require different things. And I'm just grateful to hear the optimism that you have after these surgeries and that you're already kind of thinking about what kind of fun, open minded things you want to do. And that's kind of the whole purpose of that whole episode anyway, before trying to do some things to shake life up in a good way.
Sandy Kovach [00:04:03]:
Yeah, I was so down because I didn't really know where things were going with my medical diagnosis. But I feel like I see some light at the end of the tunnel. It's going to be some not easy times ahead of me, but I'm already looking forward to the resolution and honestly, of course, different things could happen, but I'm not going to go that way in my mind. I am going to think about the best because what good would it do to worry me? I've been worrying and being depressed for all this time. I want to switch it up.
Lanée Blaise [00:04:31]:
Switch it up, switch it up. And I love that best aspect. I always pray for God's, best for situations, and we don't always know ourselves what's best, but we try to just keep that hope and keep moving in that direction. What you said to me also kind of triggered: my daughter is off to California for a, you know, also as far as out of college, and she wants to see what it would be like to live in California and see if that's the place she'd want to live. I'm like you would leave me. Like know, but she's going to live there for a month with a friend of hers, and they're going to discover know, and not that you can't do that at any like, you know my cousin Tami, she completely took all of her things, sold them and kept the essentials and moved to a different country, moved to Mexico. So spoiler alert from the last episode. But I kind of was looking at all the different things in my life and I had to kind of do a smaller step approach because Sandy you and I both admitted we don't necessarily want to uproot everything like Tami did. That was something very specific that she felt the nudge to do. But mine has been actually, my biggest takeaway has been to embrace change. Like, when you're going through life and you're going through your goals and ambitions and you think that you're headed in one particular direction, and then boom, something unexpected changes, and you find yourself on a completely different course. And that's kind of like what you're alluding to. Also, you did not anticipate these health things going to come at you, but you're trying to make your way with it. It's like I decided to take it a step further, Sandy. I decided that because I'd said in the other episode to Tami, I don't like change, period. But now I'm learning to actually implement change myself. Good change. And so I just wanted to tell everybody it's almost like a plug for Imagine Yourself Podcast, but it's not meant to be.
Sandy Kovach [00:06:45]:
Oh, why not? We can ingratiate ourselves here to everyone.
Lanée Blaise [00:06:49]:
Well, then I'll just go full out, because it's a situation where I have been changing the ways that I eat and exercise, the way that I schedule my time, my appointments, my activities, the way I think about my career, the way I do my faith walk and listen for God's guidance. It's all based on all these different guests that we've had on a match yourself. And it's like we have guests on some of them we know, some of them we don't know until we record. But they're all wonderful people and they're all willing to help. Some of these folks, I'm just going to list some of them. They have just been instrumental in my life, the nutrition and wellness aspect of my life. I've been talking to we had a guest, Carrie Lappy. We had Aaron Tennant. We had Elizabeth Sherman. They were all talking about some of the different know, it starts in your mind with Know nutrition journey. I've been grocery shopping differently. I go to bar class now, which nobody would have who knows me, would have ever thought that were you sweating?
Sandy Kovach [00:08:02]:
Because I know you don't like to sweat.
Lanée Blaise [00:08:03]:
I don't like to sweat. And I do know because the bar class is these tiny little movements, so I don't have to sweat my hair out because that is important to me, too. I'm not changing that.
Sandy Kovach [00:08:14]:
No, but you made it work for your no sweat self.
Lanée Blaise [00:08:17]:
I made it work for Know. You tweak things till you get it right career wise. I'm a writer, and there's a writer strikes, and now there's an actor strike, too, in Hollywood. And so Heather Wolfson, she's a career coach. She was one of our guests. She's been helping me kind of map out the different things so that I can be ready for when these strikes come to when some agreements come to an end and just taking my career in some different avenues that I hadn't expected. It's not just about me writing. It's also about me helping other people to create some of the projects that they're interested in doing. That's something I had never thought about before. Tariqa Wheeler is another one. We had her on the show and I'm not really in contact with her now, but looking at her posts on LinkedIn and on Instagram have been so inspirational to me. We had another person on Christine Meyer. Her book "Keep It Simple, Smarty Pants" has just been so helpful to me because I don't want to get out ahead of myself too much, know, take myself too. So, you know, I've been kind of getting in that flow. And the other person who I really love, she was on Angela Scott, has just been so beautiful as far as the faith journey that I walk. She is just an example of someone who runs to God for everything, and I'm just really liking that aspect. I have a question. Do I go this direction or that direction? Run to God, even wait on God if I need to. I'm trying to do that thing which people talk about where only positive social media is flowing into my account to take a look at when I scroll through and unfollow those who give posts who might be trying to be informative but sometimes can make me depressed or sad or take me off guard. It's just kind of really getting into a good flow. So I don't know. All that talk with Tami has really just made me reflect upon the fact that I'm making these small changes in different little areas and it's making my life better. She said to take a self audit.
Sandy Kovach [00:10:32]:
Yeah, I love that. And I thought about that. Maybe I'll have a little downtime while I'm doing my surgeries and I can start thinking like, okay, is this fitting? I believe one of her quotes that really hit me was, is this fitting who God wants me to be? Am I happy? Not that every moment of your life is going to be happy, but you should have a sense of peace and joy in general, I would think. Yeah. All the things. I love the assessment part of it, and I love the faith part of it. And especially you mentioned Angela and what was the name of Angela's episode? Because that was like a couple of episodes back.
Lanée Blaise [00:11:09]:
Yeah, angela's episode was on Comparison detox and trying to make sure that we find our God given gifts. And that is another aspect and element of making those changes, to make sure that we're doing things that respect God and the fact that he's given us these gifts and talents that he wants us to share with the world. Whether it's in our actual career or profession or whether it's something that we do outside of that, it's super important. And Sandy, you just hit a big button too, with like there's an element of even when things are happening that we are completely not wanting to happen and not happy with. For example, your upcoming surgery. You were saying that that could give you the downtime to do some of the self audit and inner work because when you're laid up, you don't have a whole lot of time to go frolicking around. I just want to say, like, to that point, this wasn't exactly a self audit, but I don't think I ever told you this, Sandy, but I had to have foot surgery. One on each foot. And it kind of had, like, a six to ten week recovery period each time. And a lot of it was literally being laid up with your feet up and elevated and iced. And I did everything the doctor said, but while I was in that state, I did a few things. First of all, I took time to savor my family members who had to take care of me, really appreciated them, took time with guys and myself. But I also wrote a dang sitcom during that time because at first I had to write it out longhand because I couldn't even figure out how to balance the laptop on my lap with my foot up. But all I'm saying is that even in some of these bad situations, some good can come from it. And it's really hard when a person's feeling depressed or sad for them to look on the bright side and think of the positive and think of the blessings. But sometimes when you're already in a decent mood, it can be a good opportunity to really show that gratitude to God. Think of your blessings. Think of the things that came from you can even look back in the past and think of some of the good things that came from those bad times. Because I know I broke down in tears when I found out I had to have surgery on each foot and be able to drive and all that stuff for all this time. But now it's all behind me and now I can look back and think about some of the good parts that came from it in the midst of all the not fun parts.
Sandy Kovach [00:13:47]:
Yeah, well, okay, so you know that famous verse in the Bible everybody quotes? Jeremiah 20 911. For I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord. The plans are for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope, which is a great scripture. But the one verse right before that is, you will be in Babylon for 70 years.
Lanée Blaise [00:14:12]:
And it's going to suck.
Sandy Kovach [00:14:14]:
Yeah, we don't quote that part of it, but sometimes you just got to go through the desert but doesn't mean God's not going to bring you out on the other side. And trusting God's timing isn't easy. And like you said, especially if you're in the midst of it, you're kind of depressed or you just lack of energy. It's just all overwhelming and you don't know how anything is going to change. But if you can keep that in mind anyway, and even if you can't hold that scripture and have meaning to you now, even memorizing scriptures like that or whatever ones are in the Bible, hide it in your heart as the Word does. Say and say that to yourself. Or encouraging quotes or gratitude lists or different things you can come out of the other side, whether it's being laid up for all that time with foot surgery and if you write a sitcom like Lanee did, awesome. But if you just lay know and take the rest you need, that may.
Lanée Blaise [00:15:11]:
Be what you need to it's, because it's about timing. It's about remembering that these things are temporary. I guess as much as I say that I don't like change, maybe I am grateful for the fact that we do need to all realize all things will change. And the whole purpose of us doing this podcast is to help us all focus on self reflection and Godly gratitude and trying to give hope in a world that will absolutely tempt you with bad stuff all the time. You're constantly tempted to focus on. And there are plenty of bad things to focus on. And it's not that we ignore it, it's not that we stick our head in the sand, but it's that there has to be a balance where we push forth a narrative that God is good and we are good and life is a blessing.
Sandy Kovach [00:16:15]:
Yeah. And to your point earlier of giving some shout outs to some of our previous guests, it was partially of course, it's because we do want to say, hey, go back and listen to some episodes. Depending on whether you need help in your career and your health or whatever, we try to make a little bit of a variety. We've got several faith episodes and relationship and love episodes and all the things that help make life better. But it's not just to shout out Imagine Yourself podcast. It's to say thank you to our guests and thank you to everybody who contributes so we can be part of this movement to encourage people. And no, life's not always going to be good and you're not always going to want to work on self improvement, but there will be times. And we want to kind of be honest with you. This isn't just like we're going to give you a bunch of motivational quotes. Not that anything's wrong with posting quotes, we do that too. But we want to be all real. We want to be authentic. And I think women I mean, I know this is true for me when I hear people's stories, whether they be from guests like with Tami and all the things that she went through prior to her moving and is continuing to go through you realize that we're really all in this together. Nobody's trying to be better than anybody else, and we're just trying to all make it.
Lanée Blaise [00:17:32]:
Yeah. And that we will make it. True. We need to hear that, too, sometimes. We will make it. You will make it. You have people rooting for you, praying for you. We pray for our listeners, we pray for our guests, pray for each know, like Tammy said too, none of us has it all together perfectly by any way, shape or form, but we're trying. We're striving for good things and all God's best. And also I wasn't going to say this, Sandy, but there's a couple of books we don't ever really do this, but there are two books that I keep by my bedside, one I've kept on my nightstand since, like, 1987.
Sandy Kovach [00:18:16]:
Wow. 1987?
Lanée Blaise [00:18:17]:
It's a really old book. It's called?
Sandy Kovach [00:18:18]:
Is it Ralph Macchio's autobiography?
Lanée Blaise [00:18:21]:
Honey, that was the poster that I had on my wall back in 1987 with Ralph Machio. Honey. My Karate Kid. Man yeah, but my husband had me move that.
Sandy Kovach [00:18:34]:
So you had it right up until you got married?
Lanée Blaise [00:18:36]:
Yeah. This is a book called "God Calling". Now, a lot of people have heard of the book Jesus Calling, but God Calling is my absolute favorite devotional book. It's been around for decades and decades and decades, but it's called God Calling by A. J. Russell. And I just highly recommend the other book I just purchased on Amazon. I maybe read about half of it, but I really wanted to recommend it also. It's called "Unraveled: A love letter to those finding their way." And it's by Deanna Loria. And she's just someone that I followed her Instagram account, and she just gives the most encouraging, beautiful, god filled words and advice. It just always feels that it's spot on. Like she's looking in my brain and saying, oh, you're having trouble with this? Let me give you a little help. And it's always God based, so I recommend that, too, only because we're talking about trying to focus on the things that are hopeful and loving and joyful, and I just wanted to share.
Sandy Kovach [00:19:54]:
That very cool. I love that. And here's one. I haven't ordered the book yet, but I just recently discovered Kate Bowler. She's got other books and a podcast. She's been through a lot in her life. I believe she is recovering from cancer or has previously gone through that. And she kind of writes from the perspective of, hey, stuff happens to people that's really not so nice. So let's not just paint a rosy picture, but let's get our blessings from God, even through the bad days and the ordinary days. So her latest book is called "The Lives We Actually Have". And like I said, I just discovered her. I've been following her on social media and really like what she puts out and definitely look forward to reading the book. So there you go.
Lanée Blaise [00:20:42]:
We are not just plugging ourselves.
Sandy Kovach [00:20:45]:
The books: one old and one new and a podcast.
Lanée Blaise [00:20:49]:
So there you go. Because it's all about whatever we can do to be a blessing, to please God, to help others, to have fun.
Sandy Kovach [00:21:00]:
Yeah, got to put the fun in there too.
Lanée Blaise [00:21:03]:
Overall, we just want to say imagine yourself in a space where you are able to be open to all of the good things that are flowing your way. We never know what's right around the corner. We want to anticipate the good and be drawn towards it and just have some life changing things happen that maybe we didn't even expect, but that turn out to be more wonderful than we ever imagined.
Sandy Kovach [00:21:32]:
Thanks for listening. Hope the podcast was encouraging for you. We'd love your feedback. Leave us a review and a rating or get in touch with us via social media or at. Imagine yourselfpodcast.com and whether your next detour is tomorrow, next week, a year or ten years. Here's to it being a blessing for you.