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Hi , welcome to the podcast

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between hard and brave . I'm Sarah

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, and I'm here to be with you in

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your personal growth and self-improvement

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journey , and I'm here to share

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my own life experiences

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with you . I'm a yoga teacher

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, a business intelligence manager

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with a master's degree in IT

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, and Nobel Queen International 2023

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with health and wellness advocacy

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. I'm so excited to start

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this journey with you , to uplift

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you with positivity , the power

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of mindfulness and yoga and

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the freedom of conscious living . So

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let's start together and

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take a moment for yourself . Take

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a moment for yourself . Hello , hello , sarah's here . Welcome back to my podcast If this is not

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your first time listening , or welcome to the podcast if it's your first time

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listening to my episodes . I'm so

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happy to have you here and I sincerely

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hope that you find this episode useful

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after listening to

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it . I try to share with

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you the things that really helped me with my

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personal development , with my

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personal life , my

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professional life , and

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I'm more than glad to share it with people

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, those who are interested and would learn

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something from it . Even one person

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who can use this information

1:23

to their benefit can give

1:25

me a feeling of fulfillment

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. So please do let me know if you

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are able to use

1:32

these tips to your benefit

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and what's your experience ? All

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right . So today

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I want to talk about the idea of perfectionism

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, and I believe I'm a good person to

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talk about this because I have been

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, and still am , sort

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of a perfectionist . But

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my point today , or my topic here , is to not allow perfectionism to stop us from living

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life , and that can happen a lot of time

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. So let's talk about what is perfectionism

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. Perfectionism is that

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when is the

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time when an individual only

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aims for what they see as

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perfect and

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if it's not perfect , they don't want it ? So

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it's like a black and white

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kind of mindset . When

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you hear this , you probably think that these people do have everything

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really awesome and they put in a lot of work for

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everything to work great or look great or

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sound great . And that's true they do . But

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what are the

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cons of being a perfectionist

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? When

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you want everything perfect

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, it's given that you will

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be disappointed , because

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that's not how the world works . Am

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I correct ? I believe

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I am Not . Everything is perfect

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. I'm not perfect , you're

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not perfect . Our parents are not perfect

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. Our children are not perfect . Our neighbors

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, our teachers , our colleagues , our bosses

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, our employees you know everyone

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does have something about

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them that can be considered as a flaw

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or is a flaw . So expecting

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things to be perfect is not very much realistic

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, and we might lose

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a lot of opportunities and

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people if we always aim

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for the best

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of everything and

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imagine yourself

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starting a project

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, something that you really

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like to do . For example , for me

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it would be this podcast . Let's use this podcast

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as an example . I knew that

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I had to prepare for it , so I did my research

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. I knew what I wanted to talk about

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. I took my time thinking

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about it and actually I took a very long

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time thinking about it . That

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could be my perfectionism . When I say

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long time , I'm telling you like two years

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. Yeah , that's a long time . So

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then I started

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researching what are the tools that I

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need to have and how I need

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to prepare myself , testing

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Sometimes . I recorded

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some episodes , I deleted a lot of

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them and at

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some point , suddenly I realized that

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it's been months

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that I've recorded

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my first episode and

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I'm not satisfied

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or ready to publish

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any . At that

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exact moment , I realize it's my

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perfectionism that's holding me back

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. Yes , true , it's true

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that , being a perfectionist

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, you would like to make things

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work great . However , what's

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great to me cannot be great to other

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people or between two people

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. They can have you know something

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, they can look at something and

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describe it as nearly

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perfect , and the other person would absolutely

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dislike it . So it's hard

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to really aim for something that's

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perfect , especially if it's

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in the eyes of other people and

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if it's only about you , how you see

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it . Perfect . Look at yourself

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. You're only a human . You're not

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a robot . You're not built perfectly

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. You do have flaws . It's human to have

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flaws . It's human to get tired . It's human

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to feel burnt out . It's human

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to learn through experience

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. So you have to start and

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you have to take that first step

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so that eventually , through experience

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, you get closer and closer to perfect

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if not perfect at

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some point , or you might get perfect at some point , but

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basically your first step is not going

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to be perfect . So if you only

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aim for what is perfect

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, you might just be holding yourself back

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from creating , from

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new opportunities , from

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feeling achieved or fulfilled

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. So it's a good thing

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to reflect on and find

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for yourself what are

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the things that you've

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been wanting to do , or

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give it a chance , and you haven't because

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you are being very picky

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about it . That

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can apply to our friendships

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, our relationships as well with

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boyfriend , girlfriend

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, with husband or wife

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that's my Persian accent

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, but anyway , wife

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. So you cannot accept

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your partner to be perfect , because

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they're also human like you . So

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when you set a standard

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and they are not able

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to achieve it , you feel disappointed

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. They do feel disappointed and

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it brings a lot of negative

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feelings in your relationship

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. So what we can focus

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on , instead of being a perfectionist

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, is progress . Progress

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is , or

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could be , slow , but it's still

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a progress . For example , you

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wake up today you do something different compared

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to yesterday that's already progress . You

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get a project done

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that you've

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been working on for some time

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or has been in the backlog for some time that's

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a progress . Or you

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are practicing a better way of

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communicating with

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your family also

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progress . Or you started boxing

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for the first time that's

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you tried a new pose

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in yoga . You're not able to do it , but

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at least now you know what are the steps to

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get into that pose , even if you're

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not doing it completely and perfectly

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. That's progress . So let's have

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this mindset , because this is actually

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the mindset that keeps

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us motivated to

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reach success . It's

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the want

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for perfectionism , but being

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logical enough to

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know that it's not achievable

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overnight or ever . However

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, you can take baby

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steps and focus on the progress

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, and that's how you

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can achieve it someday , maybe even

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sooner than later

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. One more thing

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about perfectionism

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, which is unfortunately

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something that a lot of people

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can relate to , is burnout

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. So I

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myself , I

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put a high standard on

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myself and I believe

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that's why I can say

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that I have quite good achievements

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in life . However

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, what I've learned recently , especially

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during the past year , is

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that my standards should

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not always be so high

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. Or they

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can be if they're not bothering

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me , or they can be if

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they're not bothering me . However

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, if it's affecting the quality of my life or my well-being physically

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, emotionally or mentally then it's

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not worth it . I'm

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not saying that you should always baby yourself

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. There are times that you really

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have to suck it up and get

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up and get the work done , even if

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that's not what you want , and

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try to do better or step up , and

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that's what you have to do . But

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for me , there was a time that

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for a few months , I was feeling

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absolutely burnt

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out . I could not enjoy

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my personal life because of the amount

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of time I've put into my

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work willingly

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. I wanted everything

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to run smoothly and

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I wanted every

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requester , stakeholder

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to be happy , which is not

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possible , humanly

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, not possible , and

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that pressure , that standard , really

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did make me feel burnout

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On the side . I was

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aiming for other things

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as well . I was aiming

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for deepening my skills in my

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yoga career . I

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was aiming for building a community . I was aiming for getting my paintings

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done and much

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more and much more , and much more . So

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that was a lot of pressure . So

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I just took some time , by

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December 2023 . So

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I just took some time by December 2023 . I took

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the last 10

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days of the year to

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just sit down

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and think . I

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didn't do much . I didn't

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rush myself , I

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just sat there and started thinking and I concluded

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that , for now at least

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, I should only focus on one thing

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a day . I

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wanted to finish or

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accomplish multiple tasks in a day

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and I was able to . For some

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time and a lot of days I

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wasn't able to , which made me feel like

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, oh , I wasn't able to succeed

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today , and that's not a good feeling . So

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I told myself that I'm

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gonna do only one thing a day Two

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. If I'm not able to do it , I'm

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not gonna beat myself up , it's okay

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. If I'm tired , then I will rest

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. Doesn't matter if I've already

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slept nine hours and I need

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one more . I'm going to

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rest until I feel rested , and I did

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so , and it did feel really

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, really good . So sometimes

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it's important to look at

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what our perfectionism is doing

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to us . It might make

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us successful . It might

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make us feel accomplished

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. You

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can achieve goals in a shorter timeline . However , are

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you losing something

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on the way and

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if yes , how

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impactful

12:44

that thing is on

12:46

the quality of your life ? Are

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you sacrificing a lot ? Do you

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have the option not to sacrifice

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that much ? If yes , if you do have

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that option , then take it slow

12:58

. Enjoy life Sometimes

13:01

, enjoy being still , enjoy

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pausing and

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simply existing . That's

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also one thing I use sometimes

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in my yoga classes . Enjoy

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the simple feeling

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of being alive and

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the gift of existence . All

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right , I guess I'm going to wrap it up here

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. I hope that

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you found this useful and it

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gives you ideas to think

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about it . Are you a perfectionist

13:35

? Do you have to tone it down or

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do you actually need to

13:40

raise your standards a little bit higher

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? It's up to you . Let me know what

13:44

you think . Thank you , dear

13:46

listeners , for joining me on

13:48

this empowering journey today as

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we conclude this episode , remember

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that your potential is boundless

13:55

and your journey to a more fulfilling

13:58

life has only just begun

14:00

. I'm here to support you every step

14:02

of the way , so keep coming back

14:05

for more insights and inspiration

14:07

. And remember this

14:09

podcast is proudly independent

14:11

, created with a passion for making

14:14

a positive impact . Your support

14:16

means the world to me , so

14:18

please consider subscribing and

14:20

sharing it with the people you know . Together

14:23

, we can inspire more individuals

14:25

on their journey to empowerment

14:28

and a better life . See you

14:30

soon for more life-changing discussions

14:32

. Until we meet again , stay

14:34

empowered .