Finding Purpose and Grace with Betsy Clark

Are you giving yourself grace in fulfilling your purpose? In today's episode, Betsy Clark joins us to share how you can use your values and strengths to work towards your purpose! Plus, she's sharing the importance of grace and giving yourself grace—which she share through grace cards.

Review full show notes and transcript at susancrewsco.com/podcast

Connect with Betsy:

coach2strengths.com

Get a Grace Card: coach2strengths.com/grace-card

Transcript

Susan  

Listeners, today’s guest is a very special person and one that when you are in her presence, you will feel her light and her love. I met Betsy at an E Women’s Platinum Summit in California earlier this year. And I am so thankful our paths have crossed and I am looking forward to getting to know Betsy even a little better through our conversations today and in times when we meet. When we were introduced, someone asked me, did I have one of Betsy’s grace cards. And I am sure this puzzle lock came over my face. I did not. You will hear a little more about that maybe towards the end or how you can snatch one of these wonderful cards so you will always know when you need to offer yourself grace. I knew right then that Betsy and I had the same mission to spread love and light and empower women to eliminate or magnify their inner light so they could live their life on purpose. And that is one of the reasons I have Betsy with us here today. Betsy, I’m so glad you’re here today. 

Betsy

Susan, thank you. I have really been looking forward to this. This is going to be fun.

Susan 

Yes, I definitely believe we are going to have some fun. And listeners, just to give you a little bit of background. Betsy has been an entrepreneur for over 40 years. And she was an interior designer. I did not know that. But I can understand that. And she created beauty with paint. Whereas now she uses words. And as I said she just shares her light to illuminate the world around her and the people around her. Her mission is to help women know there is more. We all can find more. And the struggle that you’re identifying with or thinking about is there to help you access your brilliance. She gets it. She’s been there. She’s done it, and she’s learned how to reframe. Oh, Betsy, it is so good. It is all so good. But I have a question before we dig into some of the meat of today. I love getting to know people and to hear about their childhood or their teenage years or their college years, these formative years that really do impact our lives as we become adults and in aging adults or middle agers whatever we are. Can you share with us one of your childhood memories?

Betsy

Oh my word. I mean, I’ve had a gazillion of them. Okay, so my top value is beauty. Okay, I was raised by a mother who was an artist. And so there were four of us. And we were stairstep. My mother had four kids in six years. And so we would be driving, and I was raised outside of Boston, and she would stop the station wagon. That was when we had station wagons, and she’d make all four of us kids get out of the car, and we would lean against the car, we watch the sunset, and she would make us get out of the car and be present to the beauty all around us. And I gotta tell you, Susan, that shaped me. It shaped me. And that’s, I think that’s why my top value is beauty. 

Susan  

I am so in love with that and I hear my granddaughter. So we live in the home that my husband was raised in, we remodeled it. And it’s on a farm. Before we moved here, we lived in an area, a space that was very private, which suited my husband and I perfectly, where his home is situated on our farm, or our home now is very open and very public. We are on a corner the house, it’s kind of back, but people can see all around because of the farm. The one reason that I, the main reason I agreed to move here was for sunsets. And my granddaughter’s have learned how to sit on that deck and watch sunsets. So, I love that Betsy, just nature and beauty and being present.

Betsy

Bingo, being present.

Susan  

I hear that your mom taught you how to be present, and pay attention to the beauty of the earth and the world around you. What a beautiful story. I get it, I can see how that has shaped you through the years. So I mentioned you’ve been an entrepreneur for over 40 years. So what is one of the biggest lessons you’ve learned about yourself as an entrepreneur?

Betsy

So I think I was maybe in my 30s, when I read this quote, and I know your listeners have heard this quote over and over and over again. And it’s the signature for my email, and it’s from Oscar Wilde. And he said, “Be yourself. Everybody else is taken.” And so I was raised. I mentioned, I had siblings, and we were all stair step. And we really influenced each other. And we were, I come from a very strong family where the women are really strong. And I realized I wasn’t my sisters and I didn’t follow their path. I was the youngest of four, and I was watching where they succeeded and where they didn’t succeed. And I’m going, oh, I’m going to make my own path. And I realized they were going in a more traditional route. And I was way too much of a free spirit. And I would never make it. If I wasn’t an entrepreneur, I think I’m actually at about 45 years as an entrepreneur. So I make a terrible employee, I am a terrible employee, but boy, have I ever got entrepreneurial stuff down because I’ve made enough mistakes. And instead of being undone by those, I see those as learnings not a lesson. You’re gonna learn your lesson. It’s more of a learning. And so for me, it’s a reframe, and energy changes around that, where grace is extended to myself and to others in that particular learning.

Susan 

Wow. You know, there’s so much to unpack right there. First off, I hear loud and clear, you know, be yourself. That quote is so important, “be yourself because everyone else is taken.” But gosh, in this society, in this day and time, how hard is it to be yourself when you’re constantly especially women. You know, we’re constantly flooded with social media, with “the perfect moments” and I have that in air quotes, listeners, “the perfect moments of people’s lives.” And oftentimes you don’t see the dirt or you don’t, you’re never told or or you’re never told what it took for someone to get to where they are right. So you want to be them but you don’t want to go through the work or the challenges or the lessons to get to that point right. When we fail, it’s not failure. It’s a lesson. There’s something great to come out of that to grow. 

Betsy

You know, could we reframe that to a learning?

Susan  

Yes, absolutely. A learning. I love that even better. Yeah, it is. And I can tell you, throughout my years as an entrepreneur, and I’ve had five different businesses, I tell people all the time, you know, we haven’t gotten it exactly right. The first go, we’ve always had to step back and evaluate. And I think that’s very important as an entrepreneur, and I think you would be willing to say that if you hadn’t looked at these learnings and what you get the knowledge or you gained from them, you wouldn’t have survived this long as an entrepreneur.

Betsy

It’s life. Right? It’s life. There are good times and hard times. And it’s just it. Here’s the thing is, the learnings don’t always have to be personal. Right? I think as women, we personalize so many of these learnings of like, oh, what’s wrong with me? You know, how come we didn’t see that? We can’t see, we’re blind to our blind spots. And that’s where I think collaboration and learning is huge. We, especially as entrepreneurs, we need each other.

Susan  

That is another wonderful point, we need each other enough. I’ve talked about this on several episodes, because a lot of the women I bring onto the show are coaches. And I’ll never forget, when I went to hire my first coach in the early 90s, my husband and my father both looked at me, like what you’re gonna hire a coach. A coach for what? You know, because it was before coaching was really that thing. And I’m like, well, I’m gonna hire this coach, because I feel like, there’s something she can share with me, that’s gonna make my business soar. And they looked at me like I was nuts. But I got support, which I wasn’t looking for that. I was just telling them, this is what I’m gonna do. But I find that coaches have helped me see my blind spots, and that you’re 100% correct. You can see stuff in me that I can’t see in me. And that is why we need, as you said, coaches, collaboration, people, as entrepreneurs, people, other women who are entrepreneurs, who understand what we’re going through, and especially when we’re doing a lot of it from home or by ourselves, right, we need that all the time. 

So, Betsy, you know, you’ve worked, I know, you and your husband do some really cool things where you guys live now. And I know that having a I want to say balance, but I don’t really enjoy the word balance, because I often feel like it’s not totally achievable. Or if you do find balance, you’re kind of standing at that top of that fence, wondering where do I go next? So I love the word harmony and thinking about it as a symphony as playing. What are the things that you have done to achieve work life harmony throughout your years as an entrepreneur?

Betsy

That’s a great question. So, when I look at harmony being a singer, what’s the bass note? That’s where harmony that comes, you got to have one true bass note for everybody to play off of, right? You got to have a conductor for the orchestra to play off. He’s the one that leads it right. And you got to have a starting point. And so for me, I think there are a couple of things. And this is my bias, because I’m a gallup strengths coach, I really believe you need to know what your strengths are, instead of supposing well, what is my superpower? You know, what is my superpower? I mean, like, opportunities pass us by we’re still pondering. So you need to know what your strengths are. You really need to know what your values are. And so when you take your strengths and your values and you blend those things together, and then you put them on wheels, like a skateboard and you get into action, you accomplish your purpose. And the truth of the matter is if you don’t know what your strengths are or your values, it is hard to be on purpose. And if you’re not on purpose, it’s hard to make progress. So progress is the very thing progress towards your purpose, not your goals. But your purpose is the bigger thing so sometimes we get into these new endeavors, it might be our second, third, fourth, or fifth iteration of a business. And if it doesn’t align with our purpose, reason for being, we’re gonna flounder. And we’re not going to have balance because there’s always so much to do. Does that make sense to you? And because to me, it’s like so clear that we need to know what our values are, because that’s how we make decisions that keep us in alignment. So we don’t get into comparison. And I see comparison is number one thing that gets in the way and causes women particularly to play a smaller game, because to talk about what you mentioned earlier, we’re always looking at someone else’s highlight reels and comparing them to our behind the scene, and we never match measure up, it is a setup. And I go around the country talking about comparison, because once we get out of that comparison, it is that total inflammation of not being enough. We can’t fulfill our purpose. And I find that so many women, especially when it’s their second or third iteration of a business, trying to quote unquote, reinvent themselves, which I just want to pause and tell your listeners, you’re marvelous the way you are. Don’t reinvent reinvest, in yourself.

Susan  

I love that word shift. 

Betsy

It is one ladder. It’s one ladder.

Susan  

Ah, it is!

Betsy

Reinvent versus reinvest. And reinvest in your magnificence. You don’t need to be fixed. The only thing that needs to be fixed are stray cats and dogs. That’s it. 

Susan 

Exactly. I love that. Gosh, I really love exactly what you said there. We don’t need to be fixed. You don’t need to reinvent. You just reinvest. Because religion taught me you know that I was broken. You know, you need to be fixed. Right? Or you need to be molded back together. Well, no, I’m not broken. I don’t need to be fixed. I need to remember I’m enough. Right? 

Betsy

Well so let’s  entertain that. Okay, so if you’re broken and you put that vase or that vessel back together, how does the light get out? It gets out through the cracks. It’s our, it’s a leveler. It’s welcome to humanity, we all have our stuff. It isn’t about our stuff. It’s about the impact. And only you determine the impact. And the way you determine that is through your mindset. So your mind set matters. If you don’t have clarity, you don’t have the words and you don’t have the mindset. You’re gonna be tossed to and fro in the sea of doubt, you’re always going to doubt yourself. I get pretty passionate.

 Susan 

I do love that. And you already touched on it, you know, I was gonna mention that you are a gallup certified strengths coach. You know, in in, you’ve touched on it that strengths and mindset are your sweet spots. And that is for some one, like you can come in and help another person, see where they need to invest in themselves, and how they can transform.

Betsy

Bingo. Because if we go back to that, you know, be yourself everyone else is taken. Here’s what I see. As we especially in terms of leadership, I do this whole thing about being a leader worth following. But we think so much when I started out in the 70s all the books were written by men for men and I love men. I married one and I birthed one. I’ve got a grandson. So I mean, like I love man. And in addition, we do leadership differently. We do business differently. And I think that’s where harmony and balance comes in. It’s necessary. But when we start shoulding all over ourselves like I should be like, you know in E Women, which is where we met, right should be more like Sandra Yancey .I love Sandra. She’s a friend. But we only need one Sandra Yancey. We only need one Susan Crews and we only need one Betsy Clark. God knows I know that one. And we come in to gather and we come in with our strengths, we come in and we start doing this thing where we move cogs on a wheel as opposed to being like grasping our hands and sucking the life out of everything because we’re trying to be well rounded. It doesn’t work. So I want your listeners to hear, relax. Give yourself a grace card. Give yourself a grace that we all On the grace now, let me be very clear that does not say excuse card. Big difference.

When you stay on purpose, and you have incremental progress, we’re not asking it to be bodacious, jump off tall buildings in a single bound. I’m not asking that but incremental, consistent, sustainable progress, you will stay on purpose and be fulfilled.

Susan  

Absolutely. I love that. In talking about that, you know, I have found, especially as I entered into my late 40s, and then all through my 50s, that there were certain things that I needed to do every day or as close to every day that I could for myself, to really have my soul shining or to be illuminated, right? What are some of the things that you do every day to make your radiant soul shine?

Betsy 

Okay, that is such a great question. And I’m not sure when people were going to be listening to this session together, but I just want to pitch out something that what you’ve just asked is huge, especially during holidays, and when we visit our families. Because oftentimes, when we get in the midst of our familial family, and our extended family, it becomes a goat rodeo. Because we get triggered, old things come up, and all that sort of stuff. If you don’t hear anything on this segment, I want you to hear this. If you want to travel and be with family, you have got to hold on to your morning routine. Think about this. When we go to the holidays, and we go when we travel when we stay with family, everything gets turned upside down. And so you know what, we’re gonna go shopping at nine o’clock. Well, you wake up at eight o’clock, and you don’t have time to do your rituals. I’m going to tell you, get up half an hour earlier so you stay true to what works for you. 

Susan  

And I love that that what you said there, what works for you. Jimmy teases me, he says, I get up to sit. I do and guess what, Betsy, I get up to sit.

Betsy

It works for you.

Susan 

It works for me. I get up, I fix a cup of tea, I have quiet time and meditation, a Bible study and journaling, whatever. But it’s how I get grounded. Or how I get prepared for my day. I mean, I may some days, just sit there and hold the cup of tea and enjoy the warmth in my hands. And I don’t get up from that and say, oh my gosh, you didn’t read 20 minutes. You didn’t journal today, you didn’t do this. But that morning, that’s what I needed. I do know, I always start with stillness. So what’s something you do?

Betsy

So I have a litany of things that I love to do. I love to do heart math. So I do heart centered breathing. And so there’s a little device that goes to my ear. So it’s sort of like a biofeedback. I am part of a wisdom challenge where we go through proverbs every single day, and we text each other. Where’s the wisdom in this. Because, for me, wisdom is a value in I can’t just talk it, I’ve got to do it. So I saturate myself in wisdom. And for me, the Old Testament is choked with wisdom. So I do that and I text out what – it’s important for me to read it and write it and then hold myself accountable to a handful of women. Okay, so having had multiple concussions, I do New York Times Spelling Bee every day to keep my mind and Wordle and the little mini crossword just to get my brain going. I pray, and then I’m off for the day. 

But you’ve said something really important that I want to just point out if people didn’t hear it the first time. Is self trust is such a huge thing. And we don’t talk about it’s like, well, I can’t trust myself. Well, you know what, you can’t trust yourself because you keep telling yourself you’re not trustworthy. What if we reframe that? So for example, if you say I’m getting up at six o’clock this morning, “I’m gonna get up at six o’clock every morning because that’s what I should be doing.” And you go to bed at two o’clock and you realize four hours of sleep is not enough for me, I’m asking you to move your clock to let you sleep till eight, or nine. Because life is, it’s just it’s not linear. And so if you, to get back to your point, if you felt like you should journal and pray and do a bible study and drink your tea and feel the warmth and all that stuff ritualistically mindlessly. You are going to start at a deficit and you’re going to break self trust. Who wants to start at a deficit? So what if, when you go to bed, you check in and say, Okay, it’s now one o’clock, I need at least five hours, six hours of sleep, I’m gonna get up at seven. You change the dial on your alarm clock, so that when you wake up, you’re already ahead of the game, because you trusted yourself, you listened to yourself, and you checked in. Because I think self coaching is huge.

Susan 

And, Betsy, I’ll let you in on a secret. Secret not really secret. I don’t get up to an alarm clock. Or rarely do I get up to an alarm clock. Now, I mean, when I had children, of course I had to. And when I first started my real transformation process in my mid to late 40s, I did have that mindset, I’ve got to get up at 5:30. And I am going to do this. And I’m going to do this. And I’m going to do this and I’m going to do this. And I’m going to do this to start my day off, right. And I found exactly what you’re saying that I felt defeated. On the days, I couldn’t do that or whatever, right? So that’s how I have learned to be okay, with some days, I just sit and hold the cup. And it’s a beautiful moment. I also have found, you’re a person of faith so for us it’s God. For others, it might not be God. But for us it is. And you know, many nights when I get in the bed, I will just say “Holy Spirit, I’m in bed later tonight than I’d like to be. I know you will wake me when I need to get up in the morning. And I trust that that’s when I am going to rise and shine.” And so last Friday, actually my daughter called me. My daughter and her daughters called me when they were on the way to school. It was 7:20am. And I had not gotten up yet. And she said “Mom, are you still asleep?” And I said, “well, I’ve only been up a few minutes, but I haven’t gotten out of bed yet.” And she’s like, “what’s up with that?” And I’m like, “evidently, I needed sleep.” You know? And she’s like, “wow, you really do, do that.” And I’m like, “yeah,” because they know I usually am up between 5:30 and 6. But it’s just that clock, you know that that way, but I love that I also love the way you you brought that to self trust and being trustworthy. You know, trust is a huge thing. My children know that I had trust issues came from some childhood stuff. But learning to trust yourself is where you have to start to deal with any other trust issues. And so, one of my I am affirmations that, you know, I’ll tell myself at times I am trustworthy. You know, when thinking about a business decision or something else, I am trustworthy. Oh, man, Betsy, you and I could go on for a long, get into deep conversations. I have one more question for you. But for Okay, when we get to that, I would like to do two things. Number one, can you tell our listeners how they can get in touch with you? And if you have anything special you would like for them to have, how can they grab that?

Betsy

Okay, I really appreciate that. So they can go to coacht2strengths, and it’s coach and it’s the number two. And then be careful how you spell strengths because a lot of people get the last three letters a little backwards. So it’s s t r e n GTH s, because you have multiple strengths. And so I have an accountability journal, that is marvelous. Hold yourself to account and also, you know, we talked about the grace card, and I have multiple grace cards. So, if you feel courageous, and want some grace cards and are willing to send me your mailing address, what a concept to get something in the mail that’s not a bill or just an ad, I will send you some of these Grace cards as a gift. Because here’s what it says on the back of the grace card that says this is your personal grace card, give yourself a break. This card gives you permission to love, accept, and forgive yourself right now. And so when I put that together, Richard Rohr’s definition of forgiveness came to the top for me. And he says “forgiveness is letting go of the past you wished you had.” Because some of us had challenging pasts And how come? It’s unfair, why? And this gets back to what Susan and I talked at the very beginning. It is enough, this is a lesson you need to learn. This is an opportunity to learn to expand and to grow and to get back to that word I mentioned earlier, progress. We’re talking about progress, not perfection. So grace abounds. We just need to have the eyes to see it. And to grab hold of it, extend it, and also be a conduit, because grace is given freely.

Susan  

Absolutely. And I will tell you, listeners, I have my grace card in a very special place where I see it every day. I read grace, and then I turn it over, grace card and then I turn it over and I read it. And it is a real treasure because offering grace to yourself is not easy but it is so important. It’s just important. We could elaborate on that. But it really is. So, listeners I can tell you: be bold, be courageous. Send Betsy, your mailing address, and you will get something other than a bill or junk mail, political stuff, whatever in the mail, which will make your heart sing. I promise you that. 

So I love that. And all of your information will be listed in the show notes. So listeners, you can pick it up there, you don’t have to remember it. You can pick it up there. But if this episode has you thinking about how to put yourself first while living a life on purpose, then you will want to be sure and connect with me at my socials @SusanCrewsCo. If you would like to have a time to talk, where we might can unpack something for you. Be sure to go to my website, SusanCrewsCo.com and check it out where you can schedule a time for us to get together. 

Betsy, it is always a pleasure to be in your presence. And I have learned so much from you today. Before we go looking back and thinking about the things we’ve already talked about. There’s got to be one more tip or suggestion or piece of advice you could leave our listeners with today. What would that be?

Betsy

Okay, this comes from my daughter who I still, at 41 I still call my baby treasure. She said “when in doubt,” because we’ve gone through some difficult times this last year. She said “when in doubt, just add water.” And I said wait, what? And she said “just as water.” And so she started going through this litany of what that means. Have a drink of water. Make yourself a cup of tea, take a shower, take a bath, have a glass of wine, go walk by a body of water, go walk by a stream. If you can’t do that, because you’re incapacitated or something like that. Turn on your phone and listen to waves crashing. Listen to the rain. And you know what tears are water. Maybe you just need to add water. Feel free to cry. And so if you are not feeling true to yourself, you’re feeling a little wonky or undone. Follow my nurse daughter who has had a lot of experience in trauma and recovery just because of the nature of her work. Just add water.

Susan  

Wow, what a brilliant thing to say. Just add water and I get goosebumps. And I think of flowing water, living life living water. Oh, very wise. Thank you for sharing those words from your daughter and tell her that I said thank you and I hope that our listeners will offer gratitude as they hear that. I love that Betsy, thank you so much. We hope that you have enjoyed our time together and I know that I certainly have enjoyed my time with Betsy Clark. If you have enjoyed this episode, be sure and tune in next time as I shine the light on another radiant soul sister. Till then I’m Susan Crews, your host. And be sure to go to SusanCrewsCo.com where you can find all episodes of the podcast, resources, and our community.