Brenda Winkle 00:00:01 Welcome to your yes filled life. I'm Brenda Winkle, energetic leadership guide, psychic, medium and somatic coach for ambitious leaders who know their gifts are real and who want to stand fully in them. Here you'll learn how to trust your intuition, embody your vision, and step into the freedom you've been creating, all without chasing more certifications or carrying stuff that does not belong to you. Every week, I'll share powerful practices and conversations with thought leaders and changemakers that help you transform your vision into embodied confidence. Claim your gifts without apology and lead with both clarity and freedom. Because your gifts aren't cute. They are powerful. They're real, and they're needed. Start today by downloading my free energy audit at Brenda Winkle for audit. It's the exact tool I use to track what's fueling me and what's draining me? It will help you discern between that hit of achievement and true joy, so that you can lead with more clarity and impact. This is your space to stop proving, start embodying and live fully in your gifts.
Brenda Winkle 00:01:16 Welcome to your yes filled life. Hello and welcome to your yes filled life. I'm your host, Brenda Winkel. Today on the podcast, we're going to be talking about the intersection of nervous system safety and identity. Because here's the thing. There is a version of you that feels very real, very familiar. Absolutely true. It's probably how you describe yourself. It's probably how other people know you. It might be how you make decisions. And one of the things that I have come to realize, both in my personal life and in working with hundreds of clients is that there is also this other version of you, the one that you are trying to step into, and the current identity is part of the reason that you can't see what you want. Notice what I didn't say. I didn't say you couldn't get what you want. I didn't say you couldn't be what you want. It's that you can't see. So I know that you are self-aware. You are doing the inner work. You are reflective.
Brenda Winkle 00:02:31 You have grown. You are taking time to make sure that you honor your self. You're doing self-care activities. You're really doing the work. And still there are things that might feel just out of reach for you or unclear and somehow not you. And here's where there might be evidence of that. When you are involved in any group or community. If you find yourself feeling frustrated or irritated by certain topics like let's say, for example, in my membership, the Empowered Empath Collective, we had started with a very business forward focus, and we've now shifted into primarily emotional regulation, nervous system regulation, intuitive development. And if you came into that membership because you wanted to be around me in my coaching spaces and that kind of thing, and you didn't have a business, it might be difficult for you to fully realize the change, to fully realize that business is not the focus of this membership. It is. It is not what we talk about even 10% of the time. But if there's a part of you that feels like you don't belong for whatever reason, maybe it's that you don't have a business.
Brenda Winkle 00:04:05 In that case, that story. But I'm not. This might actually be keeping you blind to the ways that you do fit in. And I experience this in my own life. When I started the podcast, I talked about this on the last episode where I started the podcast. And then if people would call me a podcaster, I would be like, well, no, I host a podcast. I'm not a podcaster because there was an identity mismatch. Another place where this showed up for me was when I was transitioning from full time educator in public schools into full time entrepreneur. It took a long time for me to even be able to say the word entrepreneur without choking. Because I didn't identify as an entrepreneur. I had a different picture in my mind of what that looked like, of what that person was, and it didn't fit the way that I saw myself. I had thought of entrepreneurs as like, you know, Elon Musk or something. I had not realized that an entrepreneur is simply somebody who comes up with ideas and tries to monetize their gifts, skills and talents in a way that earns money.
Brenda Winkle 00:05:18 That's the definition of an entrepreneur. But in my mind, I didn't see myself as, you know, a multi-millionaire, multi-billionaire type of person. And so there was a mismatch. And so I had a really difficult time calling myself an entrepreneur and making decisions like a business owner, because I was still making decisions like a teacher who was in a side hustle. So my own identity in that case, was really preventing me from stepping into the fullness of who I could be, because the difference between working in an organization and being the head of the organization are. That's very different. It's a really different mindset and it's a really different skill set. And the things that I was doing as a leader in education are still solid. They're they're sound decisions. But they were not the decisions that somebody who runs a business needed to be making, because there's a different lens required. And if I didn't allow my identity to shift, I would not still have a business. I can promise you that because my identity as a teacher was so overriding my identity as somebody who could help people outside of an established system, that there was a lot of self-sabotage that happened in those first two years.
Brenda Winkle 00:06:39 I was full time for sure. Now let's talk about what identity is and what it isn't. Your identity is not just who you are or what you do. It's what you believe is available to you. It's who you believe you are. What feels safe? What? It feels like you can actually ask for what it feels like. You can hold people accountable for including yourself. And it also has a little bit to do with what feels realistic. So if your identity is, let's say I'm the one who holds everything together in my family, or I'm the empath who feels everything deeply, or I'm someone who has to think through things really carefully. Then there are some possibilities that will literally feel invisible. You won't be able to see them, or they'll feel unrealistic, or you'll just think like, not me. So the ways that this shows up is you might if if something doesn't mesh with your current identity, you might find yourself dismissing ideas really quickly. And. One of the biggest shifts that I had to make when I was moving from being a full time teacher into doing what I did now, was realize that I was not going to be able to listen for advice from people who had not been where I was going.
Brenda Winkle 00:08:15 So my identity shift was personal. It was absolutely about my own identity, but it was also shifting around who I was seeking counsel from, who I was seeking coaching from, because the educators in my life, while they are absolutely brilliant at educating, at finding great ways to teach things, at teaching retention or finding ways for people to retain new information, they were not necessarily business owners. And so a lot of the advice that I took my first two years full time was resisting the actual advice I was getting from coaches I was paying, and instead taking advice from people who had not been or I was trying to go. And when my identity finally shifted into, oh wait, I am no longer a full time educator. I am a business owner, I am a coach, a healer, a psychic. When that identity shifted, then I began to be able to take advice and listen and see things with a new lens. So the other thing that happens when you might have an identity mismatch between where you currently are and where you want to go, is you might find yourself talking yourself out of things that excite you.
Brenda Winkle 00:09:39 So maybe you get an idea that you want to go travel the world and you want to travel full time, and you want to find a way to do it on a really cool budget so you can spend time on excursions. If you're not matching that identity is somebody who has the freedom, flexibility and budget to travel. You might not see solutions and ideas out there, like, for example, those house swapping sites or the pet sitting sites. And it does take looking out of the box. A lot of times when we're thinking about identity shifts because your identity has been formed by your life experiences, but it's also been solidified and affirmed by everybody in your life. So one of the things that still comes up for me is when I'm in conversations with my mom, she will often say things like, you're just such a good teacher, which I am. I am a good teacher, but there's a part of me that pushes back against it because I no longer identify as a public school teacher. And so there's a little bit of like internal jostling that has to happen or it doesn't any more in the same way than it used to.
Brenda Winkle 00:10:57 And now when she says, you're such a good teacher, I'm like, yeah, I am. I'm helping. Literally thousands, tens of thousands of women and and men, mostly women. I'm helping them by teaching the things that I know about energy, empathy, intuition, nervous system and emotional regulation. And so there's not that pushback of, you're trying to put me in a box as a music teacher, but I had to work through that. And then another thing that might be interesting for you to think about is, are there ways that you're feeling drawn to something, someplace, someone, a hobby, and then you immediately talk yourself out of it and come up with all the reasons why it's not a good idea, why this is not the right time, why there's not enough money for that thing. If that's happening to you on a regular basis, whether you're dismissing ideas quickly, talking yourself out of things that interest you or entice you or excite you, or you feel drawn to something and then immediately talk yourself out of it.
Brenda Winkle 00:11:58 I want to tell you, this isn't a wrong thing, but it is evidence that your current identity is blocking the future identity. So let me give you a really tangible way to think about this while I put on some lotion. so. Oh, that was a little squirt. if you identify as somebody who is always tired and you say things like, I am always tired, at the end of the day, then it's going to be very difficult for you to see other ways of being, and it will be very difficult for you to even conceptualize that. You might be able to get more support on board. You might be able to say no to some things. You might even just need some more rest. It'll be difficult for you to see that because your identity is saying, I'm tired. And so we want to be really careful about the ways in which we say I am. Make sure when you're saying I am that it is something you really want to be, do, or have. And one of the things I love to teach is I am becoming someone who and then fill in the blank of what it is that you want.
Brenda Winkle 00:13:14 I am becoming someone who allows herself to rest when she's tired. I am becoming someone who prioritizes her energy. I am becoming someone who can do this thing I've always wanted to do. And when you say that I am becoming someone who we are working with your current identity and we're also working with your subconscious. If you were to do an affirmation that's like, I am a blah blah, blah blah blah, your subconscious will immediately say, no, you're not, you liar. And that that's why affirmations do not work. There is a boatload of evidence that affirmations in their current form don't work because they don't account for your subconscious beliefs. They don't account for your nervous system safety, and they don't account for your identity and the stories you're telling yourself. So if you put an I am becoming someone who and then put the affirmation in, you're going to have a whole different result. Now let's talk about the nervous system layering that goes into all of this. Because if we're ignoring what's happening on the nervous system level in the subconscious, when we're working with identity, we're missing the boat.
Brenda Winkle 00:14:28 Because this work is not just about mindset. Mindset matters. But if we're not tending to the body, the nervous system, we're ignoring the subconscious. And the subconscious is in charge of around 90% of your programming. Most research indicates that you have around 10% of your thoughts that are conscious. Everything else is happening under the surface. It's in hidden beliefs, it's in nervous system patterning. And a lot of times it's in survival patterning. We have been taught ways to stay safe, ways to avoid sticking out. And I want to I want you to think about something right now. Like if you're able and you're not driving, I want you to think about your relationship, to being able to expand your arms all the way up and over your head. Now, if you've done a lot of yoga, that may be pretty easy for you, but how easy is it for you to extend your arms? Can you can you try that with me right now? How easy can you extend your arms? Can you stretch them up over your head? Can you take your up more space? People who have been conditioned through their nervous system or subconscious beliefs that taking up space is dangerous, scary, or not allowed.
Brenda Winkle 00:15:47 Will find that it is very difficult to keep your arms outstretched and expanded for any length of time outside of, let's say, a yoga pose. So invitation to play around with this this week and just see your relationship to expanding your body. Like can you widen your stance? Think about even if you sit down, do you automatically compress yourself by crossing your legs and bringing your elbows and arms into your body? Or do you allow yourself to expand to spread out? Okay, so it's not quote unquote ladylike to do that. But you know what? We are in a freaking patriarchy. So maybe being ladylike is not all it's cracked up to be. Because if being ladylike means that you contract, is that really something you want to do? I don't know. Not me, that's for sure. Your nervous system, your subconscious, is wired to protect you. It's wired to protect your current identity. And the way that this works is your brain is scanning for familiarity. Familiarity, according to your brain, equals safety, even if the thing that's familiar isn't what you want.
Brenda Winkle 00:17:03 And when we insert a change, whether it's a change in activity, experience, or even thought processes, as far as the ways we're talking to ourselves about our identity or even taking actions, when we insert a change, our brain goes into a little bit of an alert and the alert is where the brain is scanning for safety. Am I safe to do this thing? And if the brain is on board with the action, what you're saying, the identity, then you'll continue to move through that with relative ease. But if the brain decides. And by the way, this is all happening under the subconscious. If the brain decides that what you're doing or thinking about or wanting is too big of a change, it registers that change as a threat. And what the brain will do is it will activate a stress response, and it will activate survival patterns that keep you doing exactly the same things you've been doing. And so when it comes to something new, like let's say you want more visibility, if you are trying to grow a speaking career or you're trying to expand your medical practice, or you're trying to have a life with more ease or more travel, or you're trying to allow yourself to accept more support, like maybe a cleaning service, or maybe hiring additional help, or you're trying to expand, which is my current reality right now.
Brenda Winkle 00:18:51 I'm trying to expand into this new identity. Your brain, if it if it sees things as too much of a change, it's too far out of the familiar. It will register as this is not safe. And that means your brain is going to send a message to the body, to the nervous system that says, ooh, danger! Let's get into a survival pattern because we need to survive. Literally. That's the goal of the nervous system. And the brain is to keep you alive and to survive. So if we are doing something even intentionally that the brain perceives to be a threat, it's not going to let us do it. And so when we get into a nervous system response, which is what a survival pattern is, then we end up doing things that look like self-sabotage, or they look like executive dysfunction, where we just can't even get off the couch to even start the thing, or they look like procrastination. This is all happening on the nervous system level. This is why if you've been working through something, you probably consume and consume and consume you.
Brenda Winkle 00:20:00 Register for more summits. You listen to all the podcasts. You read all the books. That's a nervous system pattern. Or why you continue to ask other people to make decisions for you or ask for their advice. That is a nervous system pattern. That's the fond response. Or maybe you just get busier and busier and busier and you agree to more things, and you put more things on your calendar, and you just keep going as fast as you can go until you feel like you can't breathe. That is the fight response. Or maybe you are deciding that today is the day you have to clean the stove, even though the cleaners are coming tomorrow. Instead of doing the thing that you actually know will move the needle, that is the flight response. So you don't just have an identity. It's not just something you have. You are filtering your entire life through what you're perceiving to be your current identity. So you're not just choosing based on what you want or what you hope, or even necessarily what you like.
Brenda Winkle 00:21:10 You're choosing based on who your brain and your body and your nervous system believe you are allowed to be. Now, we don't want to blow up an identity. Like it just doesn't happen that way. It's not like you flip a switch and there's a magic formula of identity work. It doesn't work that way in my realm. And I would really be highly questioning anybody who tells you that it does. Because just like anything, it takes time. There's not a magic formula. There are things that do work. We know they work. There are things that you can do on a daily basis that will absolutely move the needle on this, but we still are not going to have an instant shift from one identity to the next. But what we can do is we can begin to create that nervous system safety in the body through somatic practices, which is exactly what I offer both in my private coaching and in the membership, the Empowered Empath Collective. And that's also a big part of the reason why I offer somatic practices at all of my retreats, because what we're working with is creating safety in the body, and what that means is we're telling the body that it's safe to communicate to the brain that even though this thing is new, it's not actually life threatening.
Brenda Winkle 00:22:35 So the brain can begin to dial back some of our survival patterns. So invitation to ask yourself some expansive questions that might give you some insight into the identity that's trying to come through. I've got three of them for you. Invitation to write them down or open up a note on your on your phone. Because if you spend some time reflecting on these, you're going to get some little aha's. Okay. So number one what if this was available to me. The thing that you want. What if it was available to me right now. Alternative would be. Wouldn't it be fun if this was available to me right now? So that's number one. What if this was available to me? Or alternative? Wouldn't it be fun if this was available to me? Number two, what version of me would say yes to this? Number two is what version of me would say yes to this? And number three, where am I defaulting to? Who I've been instead of who I'm becoming. Number three again.
Brenda Winkle 00:23:53 Where am I defaulting to? Who I've been instead of who I'm becoming now? This is not going to be an overnight thing. It's not about learning a bunch of new things because you already learned enough. You know a lot. You don't need information on this. What you do need is implementation and daily somatic and nervous system practices to support your new identity expansion. And so what we want to do is to create some awareness around where your current identity might be quietly limiting you. And I'm asking myself these questions too, because I am coming up against the same thing over and over and over and over again. And so I know that there is something there in my own beliefs and in my own nervous system, and I'm not quite ready to talk about it yet. But I just want you to know I'm working with it, too. And then the next thing is invitation to allow yourself a little bit more space while you work through this. If you fill every nook and cranny of your time, energy, bandwidth, day and home with things, it doesn't give the new identity any room to breathe or really take root.
Brenda Winkle 00:25:14 So you might need some more spaciousness through this time. So this is the kind of work we practice inside the membership, the Empowered Empath Collective. It's not just about understanding the patterns from a logical standpoint, although we do talk about that, but it's more about noticing them in real time and choosing something different, consistently supporting ourselves. Like for example, I work with so many people who identify as high achievers, whether they're currently working or not. That high achiever ness seems to be a very common denominator of people that I tend to attract. And there's this idea that when I ask for weekly wins, that it has to be something that is like an accolade, something you actually won, like, oh, I did this, I completed this lunch, I did this thing. And so I invited my members to get really reflective on where they were resisting, celebrating something that had nothing to do with an achievement. Maybe it was about their home or their relationships, or the ways they were taking care of themselves.
Brenda Winkle 00:26:26 And one of my members shared that she had taken a nap and she never allows herself to take a nap. And she said that her brain was telling her the whole time that this was a terrible idea. And then her exact words were. But thankfully, I was unconscious soon and I feel so much better now. And so there's a softness that comes from doing this work inside the membership. And for some of you, you're at a point where these patterns are more subtle and your identity is more established. And what you need isn't necessarily more awareness. You are looking more for support so that you can expand into the version of you you know you want to be that version who is resourced and rested and fully trusts her intuition. And if that's you, I do have a very limited number of spots for private coaching clients, and you can learn more about that. I'll put the links for all these things in the bio or in the bio in the show notes there in my bio too. If you're on social media, but I do have an application process to work with me privately because I want to make sure it's a good fit for you and for me, and it's just a really quick application for questions.
Brenda Winkle 00:27:45 I will get back to you. No matter what. If I think that it's a good fit. What I'll do after you apply is I'll reach out to you, and we'll schedule a time to talk, and then we'll talk about it and make sure it's a good fit for both of us. So you can learn more about that at Brenda Winkle. And sometimes you don't just need to see it. You want like to be immersed in it. You want to step away from your normal environment. You want to step away from the day to day so you can really collapse time and get massive results, massive transformation in a very quick number of time or amount of time. So you can really hear what's true for you without the noise of who you've been. And if that's you, I want you to go get on the waitlist for the Ignite Retreat at Brenda winkle.com for Ignite Retreat. The doors are going to be opening soon. I planned for one in March of 2027, but I've gotten a couple requests for September of 2026, and if there's enough interest in a September or maybe, perhaps October, depending on how things work out of 2026, I would absolutely host one.
Brenda Winkle 00:28:59 So if that's you get on the waitlist, let me know and you'll affect that planning. So where in your life are you saying, oh, this just isn't me. And invitation to get curious on. Are you right that maybe you're in the wrong place or the wrong group? Or is it just possible you haven't allowed yourself to identify fully in the new identity that you want? And what if it's possible that you actually are in the right place at the right time and you're ready to step into this new version? So if this resonated, invitation to go binge the podcast. I listen to my own podcast because I want to make sure it's good. Like, if I didn't want to listen to it, why would I expect you to? That would be nuts. And I was just listening to an episode that I recorded in 2024 with Tiffany Carter. And it's important to note this because so many times we tell ourselves we just can't do it. We're just not doing good work. And I honestly haven't listened to that episode since it went live.
Brenda Winkle 00:30:17 And the reason is that I recorded that episode with Tiffany three days after my dad died. I was raw with grief, and I felt completely dysfunctional, and I felt like I wasn't doing a good job. But I also knew that I had made a promise to myself that I was going to show up for me, and the way I was showing up for me was I was going to continue to produce the podcast. I was going to continue to show up on social media, and I have done that. I just got a notification from Instagram that I have 120 consecutive weeks of producing content on Instagram, and then I went back and listened to that episode with Tiffany Carter, and it is great. It's a great episode. Now, was I as engaging as an interviewer that day? No, honestly, I wasn't. But it meant so much to me that Tiffany came on my show because Tiffany is a top five, not 5% top five podcast in the world, and I've been working with her in two of her, well, three of her programs, and I respect her so much.
Brenda Winkle 00:31:32 And she was really helping me by being a guest on my podcast. And so I wanted to honor that time. And so I decided I was going to show up for it no matter what. And I'm so glad I did. And the reason I'm telling you that is I'm going through that again. you know, I mentioned in the last episode that my own dog is having some unmanaged pain that's really hard. And then we lost my daughter's dog, who used to be our family dog, last week. And so here I am again, like raw with grief. Does it compare to losing my dad? No, honestly. But is it easy? Also, no. And here I am. How am I doing it? Well, I'm doing it because my identity supports this. My identity says I am a podcaster. I am a coach. I am a psychic. I am showing up for my people. That's my identity. And it makes me feel good. And the other way I'm doing that is through a ton of nervous system and emotional regulation.
Brenda Winkle 00:32:31 So I'm doing the breathwork, I'm doing tapping, I'm checking in with myself. I'm back to my my basics. I'm doing my daily checklist, which if you want my daily checklist. I would love to share it with you. Ask me on Instagram. DM me there or send me an email and I will share my daily checklist. And the daily checklist is not about doing all the things every day perfectly. It's about remembering that there are some things that you can do that make a huge difference there. The small hinges that swing a big door. So if you're going through a time right now invitation to keep showing up because you're still creating really, really important work and you're still contributing in really meaningful ways. And I'm just so grateful for you for listening. Thank you. If this resonated with you, would you please consider sharing it with somebody you care about and then going to leave the podcast? Your rating and review would mean so much. It takes just a second and it means a ton. It really helps the podcast grow and it helps the podcast get into other listeners ears.
Brenda Winkle 00:33:43 Thank you for being here. All right, so in the next episode, we are going to turn the tables and you're going to hear an interview with me where Marlene Foster was interviewing me for her summit. And so you'll get to hear some of the ways that I respond to things. And I'm going to tell you all about the energy audit, which if you have not downloaded the energy audit, what are you even doing? Go grab that energy audit. And if you already have downloaded it, this is your invitation to go back to it and start doing it again. Because when we get into these places, like I am currently, where my nervous system is a little bit more activated because I'm more emotional, because I'm going through things, we have to come back to basics and tending to our energy. That's as basic as it gets. All right. Thank you so much for being here. Bye for now. Until next time.
