Navigating Through Storms: The Power of Relationships and Choosing Your Circle Wisely

Hey there, it's Jo, your host, welcoming you back to The Flow with Jo Podcast! Today's episode is all about navigating through life's storms and the importance of the people we surround ourselves with. Last week, we discussed the significance of weathering storms, and it got me thinking about the personal storm I'm currently facing. In this episode, I share powerful insights inspired by my colleague and dear friend, Dr. AnnMaureen Nwabuzor, as she spoke at recent conferences about the impact of relationships on our lives.

We delve deep into the question: Who do you allow into your life? Are your friends uplifting, motivating, and pushing you to be the best version of yourself? Or do you find yourself surrounded by individuals who bring you down, speak negatively about you, and lack purpose? It's time to reflect on the people in our lives and become self-aware of their influence.

Through heartfelt stories and examples, I explore the incredible resilience and strength exhibited by those who have faced unimaginable storms. I recount the inspiring journey of my aunt, who remains unstoppable in the face of cancer, and the importance of the positive relationships that surround her.

I also share personal experiences of friends who have triumphed over adversity and never let the storms hinder their zest for life. We all have the power to learn, grow, and empower ourselves through life's challenges. Remember, you've already survived 100% of your worst days!

In this episode, I provide practical tips on how to assess your relationships and identify the right people to have in your corner. Trust and support, positive influence, mutual respect and empathy, and genuine connection and enjoyment are key factors to consider. Equally important is recognizing when it's time to reassess a relationship due to imbalanced effort, unequal growth, lack of trust and respect, or constant negativity.

Let's align our values and goals with the incredible individuals who bring out the best in us. Surrounding ourselves with like-minded people who share our aspirations can lead to powerful mastermind experiences, providing motivation, inspiration, and a sense of belonging.

So, grab your notebook or a piece of paper and get ready to dive deep into the impact of relationships on our emotional, mental, and overall life growth. Join me as we explore the transformative power of the right people in

Transcript

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As we go through these storms, how are we navigating through the storms? How are we choosing to navigate through the storm? Storm. Let's get let's get up in this flow with me, your host, Joe. Welcome back to The Flow with Joe Podcast. I'm so excited to have you here today. And I'm excited to be here today. Happy Monday. So we had an awesome topic last week. Got great feedback from that about going through storms. And as we go through these storms, how are we navigating through the storms? How are we choosing to navigate through the storms? Right? That's what we talked about last weekend. And so I got the resonating and really thinking about the personal storm that I'm going through right now. And a big thing that came up for me this week is the people in my life who have just jumped on board to help me through the process, to help me keep moving, to help me just thrive through the storm, right? And it made me think about my colleague and great friend, Dr. Anne Marine Wabazor. She's a two time best selling author, a children's confidence coach, and she just had two dynamic conferences back to back, a virtual conference and an in person conference. And we had a blast at both. And I was honored to speak at both events. And my daughter was also speaking at the event with me, which made it just that much more special. But Dr. Anne's speech, I asked her to send me the exact wording so I don't misquote her. And so thank you, Dr. Anne, for doing that for me. So she's speaking to parents and children at this conference, right? So these were her words and one of the most powerful parts of her speech to me. Who do you allow into your children, into your life, boys and girls? Who are your friends? Are you hanging out with friends that build you up, challenge you to be better, and speak life into you, who have goals and a purpose? Or do you hang out with friends that tear you down, speak bad about you in front and behind you, and have no goals? You have to change those friends. Parents, it is imperative that you know who is positively or negatively influencing your child. You should have people like your parents, siblings, teachers, coaches who can lift you up when you are down and encourage you. You are the product of who you spend your time with. Gordon McDonald says to surround ourselves with a happy few, not a happy gazillion, but a few people who are there to support you. I remember when I failed out of engineering school. It was a devastating time in my life because that has been my dream since age six to be an electrical engineer. But guess how I got up? It was my parents, siblings, and probably two friends that knew and knew my faith in God that pulled me up the who in your life is an essential piece of success and confidence building. It's so important that my great grandmother often told my mom in Ibu, sor GCK trying to get my Nigeria I'm 22% Nigerian y'all, so I'll try to get my Nigerian language, okay, sorlure GCK, which loosely translates, follow them. Follow them who are doing good work and making progress, and you will see the light at the end of the tunnel and succeed. So, ladies and gentlemen. And that was by Dr. Anne Marine Wabazor. I just got pumped up in chill bumps just reading who is in your life, who is in your life? That is a positive force in your life, pushing you to be your best version of you through the good times and the challenging times. Reflect on that right now. Become aware of that if you aren't already. And we're going to talk about that in this episode today. We're about to dive deep, honey. So if you need to grab your notebook piece of paper, just press pause on this thing and come right back to us. And if you are over on YouTube, press pause and come right back to us. If you are driving, you can continue listening, but make sure when you get back home, you play this baby again and you write this down. So I have seen so many people in my life go through some of the toughest storms, and it always made me wonder, because I love learning from others, how did they get through? This is worse than anything I've ever been through. How did they make it through? And it all goes back to who is around you and your mindset. I have an aunt right now who's facing cancer, right? But back in 2018, she and my uncle lost their 25 year old daughter in a car wreck, which is my cousin. And I just because I still miss her, I still think about her all the time. And every time I hear the song that she loves, it always brings me to her. I can just see somebody with dimples, and it makes me think about her. And I smile because I miss her and I love her, but it makes me feel like her spirit is around me. When those moments happen, it's a beautiful thing. That was the worst thing. And then cancer comes, right? But her mindset still doesn't let her get her down, and her faith still doesn't let anything that's going on get her down. She's still traveling. No matter what the Chemo has done, she is still living her best life. And that is some powerful resilience, some powerful strength. But I have to say, my uncle and my cousin, which are her immediate family and her extended family, they've surrounded her with positivity. And it's just the impact of those relationships, I'm sure, is what keep her going and her relationship with God as well. So that's just one story, another friend. I just see people losing people left and right as I get older. And I wonder, man, how are they getting through? But they don't let the storm stop them from living life. They learn empowered through the storms. So I just wanted to share those examples because if you think you are going through the worst storm of your life, just know that you've already survived 100% of your worst days, right? And so a couple of ways that we can change this and start working on this and be more self aware of this is the impact of relationships surrounding ourselves with positive, supportive individuals to enhance our emotional, mental and physical health, right? And I'm going to put this microphone down because I want to show you an illustration. I saw this illustration by one of my I won't say he's a personal mentor, but he's just a mentor that I haven't paid, but a phenomenal speaker and coach, Dr. Kareem R. Ellis. He's also the best selling author of GPS Your Success. So he did this illustration in the speech, right? And it's so real, and I want to do it for you guys. So relationships, right? This is an empty person in your life. And this is you. This one's full of water. If you are constantly filling this person's cup, your waters going into theirs and your cups depleting, right? A great relationship, a mutual relationship will feel your cup right back just as you're filling theirs, right? But a sign that someone is not for you is they just lost their job. You're filling their cup. They feel like they're in the dark and can't see the light. You fill their cup. Pessimist. You continue to fill their cup. Complaining. You continue to fill their cup. Grandmother just passed. You continue to fill their cup. Look, theirs is becoming full. Yours is almost empty. And this person still isn't pouring back into you, but constantly taking your water and accepting it freely until you're completely empty. The impact of relationships is important for our physical, mental, and overall life growth, emotional growth. Because when you're empty, how are you going to recharge who's in your life? To refuel this water bottle, use this illustration and start to reflect on this. I'm going to give you four signs of someone who is in your life who's the right person. And you can use these four signs to assess any relationship. And that's how you know, hey, this person need to stick around because we are going to win and we are going to win together. So the first sign, trust and support. Can you trust this person? And this person someone you can always rely on, someone who you can tell you're going through something and you know, it won't get to Betty, it won't get to Philip, it won't get to your neighbor across the street, but it'll stick with them. And you can trust them for that, right? And support. So are they helping you elevate to where you want to be? Are they helping you make good decisions for you? Because sometimes in life we always want to consult with someone, right? Hey, what do you think about this? And it's not always good to have, yes, people in your corner, right? But it's good to have people who's going to keep it real in your corner. And sometimes that keeping it real might be very uncomfortable, but do it anyways because your relationship is going to benefit from it, right? Whatever decision you may come up on, are they going to tell you the truth about it? Right. Are they going to tell you if you're wrong or if you're right or whichever way to handle it? That's that trust and support to think about you in the long term of that decision, to think about your growth, your future in the long term of that decision. Trust and support. One sign, sign number two, are they a positive influence? And what I mean by that is, do they inspire you? When I say inspire you, your friends should inspire you. If you're happy for your friends, when your friends are doing great things and that inspires you, some people, it makes jealous and envy. Okay? Please be aware of yourself if you start to feel that way because you need to really do some inner work, okay? But when your friends inspire you to do better and want to elevate man and be a better person personally and professionally, oh, my goodness, yes. Keep them in your corner. Somebody who's always going to be lifting you up no matter what is going down in your life. And you always lift them up when something is going down in their life, right? A mutual respect and empathy, that's self explanatory. If you have a mutual respect for each other, you know that this person isn't going to talk about you behind your back. You know that this person got your back. You know you can rely on this person. You know that this person is going to feel you if you call them, say, hey, they ain't just going to be non empathetic to whatever you got going on, you know what I'm saying? Because they love you, then that's the person for you. Number four, that the sign that this is the right person. It's a genuine connection and enjoyment. Are you having a good time around this person? Is the vibe just always on when you all are together, when you all are together, does it feel like, man, I probably ain't seeing you in two years, but it ain't like we missed a beat, dog, you know what I'm saying? So that's a genuine connection and that is enjoyment when you all can genuinely enjoy your times together with no distractions, right? Because a lot of people can confuse that. But if you're on the phone the whole time or the other person is on the phone the whole time. That's not enjoyment because somebody's not paying attention to what's going on. So that's four signs that you know you're around the right people or have the right people in your circle. So use those to assess it. Trust and support, positive influence, mutual respect and empathy, genuine connection and enjoyment. Right? Now, let's talk about three signs that you know you need to reassess this relationship. And it could be any relationship, right? We're not talking about a specific type of relationship, but really to know if this person needs to be in your life or you need to kind of distance yourself or just say Bombayage, right? Imbalanced effort and unequal growth. Imbalanced effort, right? It goes back to that illustration, what you call demonstration. Demonstration, right? So are they pouring into you as much as you are pouring into them? Or are they constantly just taking are they negative all the time, complaining all the time? Boy, that is energy draining, right? And if you're growing and they're down here somehow, I can bet you jealousy and envy is going to creep in somewhere, right? So always have somebody that's with you, that's growing with you or wants to continue to grow and improve themselves, right? So that is imbalance effort and unequal growth. No. Another one is lack of trust and respect. If you have lost respect for this person, you don't trust this person. Why are they in your life? Put it in the chat, put it in the comments. Send me an email at flow at Joe Pod@gmail.com why are they in your life? You don't trust them. You don't respect them. Self explanatory. The third one is constant negativity. Why do you want to be around somebody who is constantly negative? That's draining, man. They'll take all of your energy, they'll take all your beautiful sunshine right on out. Like, we're not trying to be around people that dim our lights. We want to be around people that accept our beautiful sun shining bright, shining light, right? Question that. So that's three signs, right? Imbalanced effort and unequal growth. Lack of trust and respect and constantly negative. So if the relationship constantly brings you down, lacks trust and respect, or hinders your happiness, baby, it might be time to prioritize your own needs for the sake of your own emotional and mental health. Assess the people in your life and make the right adjustments. Now going into the second piece is aligning values and goals. Do the people in your life align with your values and goals? And not everybody has to, but it is nice to have a group of people and their values align with your values, their goals align with your goals, right? Man, you can have some powerful masterminds when you have people who are like minded and have the same goals that you have. Because for one, they're going to provide motivation, inspiration. You're going to have a sense of belonging, right? Because a lot of us have always felt like outliers. But once you find your tribe, baby, you start to thrive. Okay, so it's the power of synergy, the collaboration in achieving personal and professional success, winning relationship goals. Okay. Hey, did y'all hear that Beat drop? That beat drop took me by surprise. It got me the little crack up in here. Hey, let's get with people who we equally align with and celebrate that Ick, because, baby, we are here to get our Ick together. So analyze who is in your life. I just gave you the assessment tools you need to start to analyze, reflect, and look at yourself, am I putting in to this relationship and nurturing these relationships like I should be? Am I telling this person I'm grateful for them? Be grateful for the relationships. When somebody does something for you, even if it makes you uncomfortable, keep doing it, because you will eventually become comfortable. Right. Do it. Man, it feels so good when someone says, oh, I'm grateful for you, man. You motivated me to do this, this, that, and the other. And I love it when I can tell somebody the same thing, because if they get that same feeling that I get when someone tells me that, then, man, that's made my day. Because I know that I have lifted somebody's feelings and made them feel good in that moment, whether it lasts all day or not. But they need to know that, hey, I'm riding with you just like you riding for me, and I appreciate you in my life, right? Because people think that, oh, I'll tell them next week. No, we ain't got time for that. Next week ain't promised to any of us. So go ahead and let them know now, nurture that relationship, and have a blessed week, y'all. I'm out of here. We'll see you back here next Monday,

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00 a.m. Central Standard time to get our Ick together. Toodles poodles.