00:00 

Alright, hey there, welcome to Intentional Living with Tanya Hale. This is episode number 308, "Stop Dabbling and Start Doing." Welcome to your place for finding greater happiness through intentional growth, because we don't just fall into the life of our dreams...we choose to create it. This is Tanya Hale and I'm your host for Intentional Living. 

00:22 

Alright, hello there, my friends. So glad to have you here. Welcome to the podcast today. Number 308. Blows my mind. I can't believe I put out, this will be 308 podcasts, for y'all. I love being here. I love creating this content for you and I love that it gives me opportunities to learn to manage my brain and learn to sit down and do things that some weeks feel a little bit more difficult than others. I feel like it also gives me a chance to follow the Spirit a little bit and to try and connect with God. There are some weeks where I am very clear on what to prepare for y'all, where an idea comes to me earlier in the week and I kind of process it and I put some ideas together and I'm like, "okay, that's it, that's what I'm doing this week." And other weeks that I don't have that experience. This morning I woke up and I didn't quite know what to share and what to prepare. And I said a prayer while I was still laying in bed asking God for guidance on what would be a topic that would be needed. And very clearly in my head I heard, "stop dabbling and start doing." 

01:32 

So I will say that I'm not putting myself up there as prophetess or a spiritual leader of any sort, but I will say that I try to connect with God, try to follow the promptings that I get and I felt very prompted as I prepared this one. In fact, it was one of those times that comes along once in a while where I just feel driven to put the information out there. So I think somebody out there needs this. I think I needed this as I was going through this process. So here we are as I'm sitting at my computer getting ready to share my thoughts and ideas. I'm not sure where this is going to go because I haven't been thinking about it for several days, but I'm committed to follow the prompting I received this morning. So let's get started, shall we? 

02:28 

So as I said, this topic may is probably, as now that I finished doing all the prep work for it and I'm sharing it, I know that it was just as much for me as for some of y'all out there. Probably God letting me know that in certain areas of my life it's time to stop dabbling and time to fully commit to doing what I want to do and what I feel I need to do. So let's start off by discussing what dabbling is, shall we? One definition I found says "take part in an activity in a casual or superficial way." And here's another definition I found: "a superficial or intermittent interest, investigation, or experiment." I love the word "superficial" that was brought up in both of those. I think we're gonna use those ideas as we move forward today. 

03:14 

So what in your life are you doing in a casual or a superficial way, when really getting serious about it would change the course of your life in a positive way? What are you engaging in with intermittent interest rather than with full-on commitment? So after my divorce I spent the first nine months...I guess I would call it dabbling. I was stuck in victim mode. I was constantly rehashing to myself and to others how horrible my ex-spouse was. I was moving forward very slowly, like sloth slowly, as I was keeping myself tied to the story of my tragic outcome at the hands of someone else. And I've always been a person on the move so I wasn't just gonna stop. So there was movement, but it's hard to go too far or too fast with an anchor tied around your waist. 

04:05 

At about the nine month mark I came in contact with Brene Brown when I listened to her audio called "The Power of Vulnerability." Now I know I've told this story before but for the newbies: I was mesmerized and I listened to it three times before I had to turn it back into the library. And then I bought a copy for myself, which was kind of expensive, it was about 60 bucks and as a single mom 60 bucks was a lot of money. But I invested in it because I was like "oh my gosh, I need this." And I listened to it four more times in the next year or so. I was spellbound by the concepts that she taught about vulnerability and how it works in our lives and in our relationships to create the exact thing that I wanted so desperately in  my marriage but I couldn't figure out how to get it. 

04:53 

She also talked about boundaries and living in alignment with our values and I began to realize how out of whack my life in my previous marriage had been with regard to these concepts. This was when I really began to understand how I had contributed to the dysfunction of what had been going on, whereas before I had only been able to point fingers and blame at my previous spouse and see all of the ways that he had been dysfunctional. And this is when things shifted for me, when I started to see my contributions. This is when I just stepped up, stopped dabbling, and started doing. I felt driven inside to understand these concepts at a deep level and to learn how to implement them. 

05:42 

That year I read everything Brene Brown, and it was so healing for me to begin to make sense of my own missteps and misunderstandings. Her teachings really helped me to learn how to step out of victim mode and into hero mode. I stopped blaming my ex-husband for all of his misdeeds and began to take a look at my own and figure out how to clean them up, how to become the kind of person I thought I had been but wasn't being, and actually to start becoming her. Because now I understood my contributions, my feelings, my shortcomings. There were a lot less superficial statements about how we were both at fault. I said that before, like this, "well it takes two people, we were both at fault," but I think I still really believed that it was about 90% him and only about 10% me. But now I really started to understand the significance of my own behaviors and see how it was way more than 10% me. When I stopped dabbling in pretending that I was working on moving forward, then I could start doing. When I stepped into the truth of my actions and the lack of my understanding, then I felt the drive to really clean up my stuff and move forward. I just didn't understand where I was in the wrong before and what actions I was engaging in that were so destructive. 

07:04 

And that's part of what I am working to do here on this podcast, is generate more understanding around all of our behaviors that are creating so much damage in our relationships or even in our past relationships so we can clean up and be ready for something else. And I find similar patterns of behavior with many of the people I talk to in their own relationships. They are unhappy, they are struggling to behave the way they want to, they feel disconnected, and yet they are just dabbling in this work. They listen to the podcast, they agree, they think it's a good idea, they go, "oh wow, I haven't seen that before," and yet they are struggling to really commit to doing the work to clean up their own lane, their part of the relationship. 

07:48 

It can be so easy to justify our behaviors, to look away when we know we've shown up cruel or unkind. And yet, until we're willing to take a good, hard look at ourselves, to really commit, we just don't create the movement necessary to make a difference. We're like a sloth, okay? And I get it. This work is just that. It is work, and hard work, to be honest. But until we decide to dig in and really apply the concepts, to see ourselves clearly, to manage our minds and create more loving and kind feelings, we will be stuck in the same thing we've been stuck in for years, until we decide enough is enough, and we absolutely want something different. We will continue to dabble, listening to podcasts, trying things once in a while, and when they don't get immediately results, we don't keep it up. We all know the routine. We, including me, have all done it hundreds of times in our lives with everything from eating more healthy to exercising to spiritual practices to signing up for online courses. We've all dabbled and dabbled and dabbled, sometimes to the point of self derision. It's so easy to dabble. It is hard to really dig in and do. Sometimes we all just struggle to put the pieces together to see what we need to see. I get that too. 

09:18 

This is why I work with a coach, because she helps me to see what I'm not seeing. I'm pretty fabulous, but I didn't get this way all on my own, I'll be honest. There is a lot of coaching that has gone into helping me clean up so much of my crap. So if you need some help seeing be willing to make an investment for yourself and for the people in your life that matter the most, stop dabbling and start doing. At the least if you don't want to hire a coach, start a discussion group with some trusted friends who will also listen to the podcast and talk deeply about them and discover and be vulnerable. Our discussion group that I'm doing right now on emotional and physical intimacy has been so good. We have two more sessions left and it was a pretty inexpensive course. I'll be honest I did it inexpensive because it was the first time I've done that format that way. But I've loved it. I've loved the vulnerability that people have shown up with and how the comments and the the insight has been so great. So I'm gonna be doing some more of these come August. So if one-on-one coaching doesn't feel right for you and you can't find a posse of friends, join me in August for a posse of friends to do this with. One-on-one is ideal if you're stuck  on this, but a group is the next best thing. 

10:38 

So let's talk for a bit about what "doing" instead of "dabbling" would look like. I'm going to start by showing you an area where I dabbled and then I stopped dabbling and started doing. When I first started dating after my divorce, I dabbled. I was hesitant to date, not entirely sure I really ever wanted to get married again, so of course I would dabble. Why would I be all in if I wasn't sure? Dabbling at that point looked like getting on a dating site but doing the free version, right? It looked like trying to make my profile open enough for everybody. I didn't want to exclude anybody because that seemed judge-y, and also what if I excluded my one and only? I also swiped "yes" way more often than I was really interested in because of the fear of missing out, some FOMO going on, right? I was dating from a scarcity mentality, a place where I was afraid of missing my person, and as a result when I did go out on dates, most of them weren't good fits. And though there were some nice men, we didn't connect. And I'll say that I also went out with my fair share, but we had great conversations, dug a little deep into some personal stuff, even first date. They said they would call again, and then they never did. Do I know exactly why? Nope. But I would guess for many of them, I came off a little strong. I know that's a shocker. And it was a blessing. From this place, it can be easy to get discouraged about dating, to think that there are no good men out there and give up. But that happened because I was dabbling. All that stuff happened because I was dabbling. I wasn't taking dating seriously. I wasn't intentionally purposefully searching for my person. Now that may sound a little weird to some of y'all, but once I stopped dabbling in dating, everything changed. 

12:34 

I've told the story of working with my own life coach, who helped set me straight about my thought that I would mess up my life with a man. To me, that seemed like a circumstance. It seemed like a truth. And she called me out on that thought. She's like, "well, you know, that's just a thought." And I was like, "whoa, wait a minute." And with a thought like that, why would I do anything but dabble? She helped me clean up my thoughts, decided to get serious about dating. And it was shortly after that that I met Mr. 90-Day Number One. Now you can go back to, I think it was July of '21 when I do a podcast on this relationship right after we broke up. It was just shortly after. And there's some tears and all kinds of stuff, but you can find out about that dating experience. But he and I did not dabble. We jumped in, we dug in, and we figured out how to communicate in ways we hadn't in our previous marriages. So we, at least me, learned how to have vulnerable and intimate conversations, learned how to love in a way that I had not allowed myself to in my previous marriage. That was part of my goal. I wanted to learn how to love how I'd never loved before. And I wanted him to feel loved like he had never felt loved before. I wanted to show up vulnerable. And we started off that relationship in a, "listen, this is a place to practice. This is going to be a safe place for us to practice opening up about the things that have been our greatest struggles." 

14:04 

So there was no dabbling between us, no casual or superficial intermittent interest investigation or experiment. I was determined to clean up my stuff and figure out how to love better. And Mr. 90-Days Number One gave me the space to do that. When we determined we weren't a long-term fit, I had had such a great experience with him that I decided that I wanted to get married for sure and started doing what it would take rather than just really dabbling. I mean I had kind of stopped dabbling when I met him, but then after my experience with him I was like "okay, for sure I want to get married." I remember telling friends that now that I knew a relationship could be easy and fun, because I honestly didn't know that in my previous relationship, that I was going to find my person. I honed my dating profile to be even more clear about who I was and the kind of person I wanted to marry and I realized that my goal there was to weed people out, not to include everyone that I could. There was nothing superficial in my profile that I remember. It was all intentional with the goal of finding my person. 

15:22 

So I dated a few more people on there that I met who also were not good fits, but four months after breaking up with 90-Days Number One, I met Sione online. We were on the paid app eHarmony, which eHarmony was a little bit pricey for me as a single person but I just decided I liked the format. I liked that we had to answer all these hundreds of questions and that it lined us up with compatibility. I was serious about finding my person and I was willing to pay money to do it and I share this story here not because a lot of you are looking to date but because I look back and I see just how focused I was. I wasn't dabbling in dating anymore; I was serious. And once I got serious about finding my person, once I got a little intense on my dating profile, and when we would text and chat then almost everyone I went out with was a pretty good fit in many ways. I saw and understood concepts that I hadn't figured out before about what relationships are meant to do and how they can be. I had the courage from this space of doing and not dabbling to show up in ways that would have been too scary for me previously. Once I decided I was going to find my person, I was determined and I felt it in my bones. I would do what it took. I felt this huge shift in my energy and I'm so so happy that I stopped dabbling and was willing to do the hard things. 

17:00 

Some of those hard things were dating long distance. I was in Utah, Sione was in Indiana, marrying somebody from Indiana when I lived in Utah, choosing to move and packing up my home, a home that was really symbolic of my independence and strength. I'd been in that home since the divorce and I had made it mine and it was it was a symbol for me. Leaving my family and my friends behind was hard, and still is, and joining a group of people who didn't really want me in their lives. It was all tough, hard things, but because I was determined and willing to do what it took, I am in the most beautiful relationship, one that I couldn't even dream of before, because I'd never seen one like it. 

17:58 

So my friend, whatever you want, whatever you really, really want, please stop dabbling. I imagine you are here listening to this podcast because you want deeper, more connected relationships with someone in your life, or you want to figure out your past marriage that was dysfunctional so you can create something very different next time around. Dabbling is easy. That's why we do it in so many areas of our lives. It doesn't require courage today or tomorrow. You don't have to take risks when you dabble. It's comfortable and justifiable. Dabbling is an "easy out" to the difficult focus needed to start doing what we'll create what we want. I say difficult focus, but I noticed for myself that once I really made the decision to find my purpose, my person, there was an underlying energy that accompanied that determination. Almost without effort, I had this focus and this intention that fueled me. 

19:06 

And right after 90-Days Number One, I thought I would take a few months off of dating. And after about two weeks, during which I cried a lot, I got up one day and I'm like, "nope, ready to keep going." I just had this energy. And I got back at it. I got right back online. The focus seemed to come naturally and the energy to pick up where I left off was easy to access. And I got back on the dating site and got to work because I was determined to find my person. And I really, truly believe we can access the same type of energy in our marriages, in our callings, and in our work. Many of you are scared to really give this work a try because what if it doesn't work? 

19:52 

But my friend, what if it does? What if you clean up your thoughts and your feelings and your behaviors toward your spouse and they shift and they respond in kind? You, too, could be having the type of relationship that you didn't know was possible. And here's another thought. What if you clean up your thoughts and feelings and behaviors toward your spouse and they don't respond in kind? In fact, what if they shut down even more? Well, that's good data. And with good data, you can make a good, clear decision. That decision may be to move toward divorce, or that decision may be to stay, to love how you show up and find your deeper connections with other people in your life, family, and friends. But at least you will start creating the life you want to live rather than just wondering and hoping and putting forth piddly effort now and again. Dive in deep, fully commit to showing up the way you want, courage up, and have the conversations that scare you and share the thoughts and feelings that terrify you and feel vulnerable. 

21:13 

If you are single, I know that there are amazing people out there for you to date, people who want a similar depth of connection and commitment, people who don't want to dabble in intimacy, but who want to dive deeply into it. And I also know from my coaching experience that many of you are married to people who also want this deeper intimacy, but you're both so scared to take the first step, that you don't fully commit to showing up in a way that requires a lot of vulnerability from you. And when you do courage up and commit, when you stop dabbling, you will see miracles when the other person feels safe and seen. I have worked with so many clients who have come saying, "I don't want to get divorced, but gosh darn it, I don't know what to do here," and we have cleaned up their stuff and their whole marriage changes. And after six weeks, they're like, "I don't even know why I thought I was gonna get divorced." And it's this commitment, this space that says, "I will do what it takes to figure this out." And some of you will get a clarity about your relationship that will move you in directions you may not have expected, directions that will help you get unstuck. and move your life forward. Many of us dabble because, to be honest, we're just interested, because we're scared to fully commit, because we don't have the faith that it will actually work out. 

22:50 

 But I promise you, God sees you, He knows you, He knows the desires of your hearts, and He wants you to have deep, intimate, connected relationships. If you ask, you will receive. If you act, you will create. You will find answers when you ask questions. So, I'm gonna share with you an experience that I had several years ago that really brought this idea home to me. So, several years ago, I started a practice that I'm not super consistent with, but it has shifted the way that I interact with the scriptures and with God since I've done this. So I had heard a talk in General Conference about asking questions and how God loves questions and wants to answer them, and I felt impressed to journal a question every day and then read my scriptures and trust God to give me an answer. 

23:51 

And I'll be honest, I was kind of scared the first day I did it because I thought, "what if God doesn't answer? What is that gonna mean? How would that impact my spiritual life?" It's one thing to ask a question in your head but it's another to write it down on paper. But I couraged up. I gathered my faith and the first day I wrote a big Q at the top of the paper and then I wrote my question next to it. Then I wrote a big A on the next line and then I put down my journal and I opened my scriptures. And at this time I wasn't reading in order, I was just opening up my scriptures wherever. But the answer was there, clear as day. Here's my first entry, April 6, 2020. "What can I do to connect with a certain child today?" I happened to open up to The Book of Mormon that day to the the book of Mormon, chapter 9 verse 31. And these are the ideas that came to me from reading that: "Accept my imperfections in the sense that I embrace my humanity. Call this child today and thank them for their patience with my imperfections and apologize for my judgments over the years. That was all I received." And this one I actually wrote the result on because I did that. "I sent this child a text and they responded by telling me how much they loved me and how much they appreciated the things that I had done in the past and the things that I was doing in the future." 

25:30 

And that went on day after day after day. I was super, super consistent with this for about four or five months, and I still do this, not daily. But when I engage with God this way, there is always an answer waiting for me. I ask questions about my children, my marriage, people in my ward, spiritual and religious questions, business questions, and every time I get an answer. Sometimes it's word for word in the scriptures, sometimes it's an overall idea, sometimes it's a thought that comes that has nothing to do with what I'm reading, but I always get guidance. There are answers and a better life waiting for you on the other side of some intentional action. 

26:21 

But intentional means that we are focused, consistent and determined. We can't just wish for better relationships, we can't just dabble in better relationships. Many of us just keep hoping that the other person will change their feelings toward us and start treating us better. That they will see the error of their ways and finally we will feel seen and heard and we will have the incredible relationship we always dreamed of. And that sounds really lovely, doesn't it? But it's most likely not going to happen. If you want better relationships, go get them. Stop dabbling. Every relationship you are in has the potential to be better when you start to see the error of your ways and start seeing and hearing yourself and everyone else. We get to focus on changing our feelings toward them and start treating them better and being doggedly persistent in showing up better. 

27:18 

Many of us want to try one or two things for a week or two and then we get frustrated that 25 years of pattern behavior hasn't changed in two weeks. We dabble a bit here and a bit there with changing our behaviors rather than digging in and really choosing to show up better and kinder and more loving. This kind of change doesn't last when we just white knuckle the better behavior, when we are only using willpower to change behavior. It's never going to stick around. We just don't have what it takes to force ourselves into better behavior for long periods of time. We don't have the energy to do that. That's why we have to start with our thoughts, with being really clear on the kind of person we want to be, with what our values are and getting in alignment with them. 

28:06 

When the changes we make are core level foundational changes, when they come from our big compelling why for making the change, when we are deeply committed to figuring it out, then we are no longer dabbling in change. This is when we start to live a certain way because it aligns with our values, with our reasons for living, with the kind of person we really want to be, creating action from this place, then it doesn't matter how the other person shows up because we're not changing our behavior to get them to change theirs. We are changing our behavior because that's the person we want to be, because it feels so darn good to live in alignment with ourselves. And it also creates so much energy when we are living in alignment. 

29:01 

When we're dabbling, how they respond makes a huge difference in whether we continue on with the better behavior or not. When we are committed, their response doesn't matter at all. Cleaning up your "why," deciding how and who you want to be and living from that place will move you out of dabbling and into doing. And it is amazing and empowering work. It creates energy that you didn't know you were missing. Your life will change when you fully commit to whatever it is you want, and not because other people will change, but because you will love you. You will love how you are showing up so much, and you will gain clarity on situations and relationships. You will stop living in so much indecision, overwhelm, and worry. Dabbling keeps us stuck. Commitment and doing creates movement. 

30:03 

You've got this. If you need help shifting from dabbling to doing, coaching is such a valuable tool. It has changed my life. Choose to invest in yourself and in your relationship, and I promise you won't regret it. Whatever is better for you is just waiting for some action. It's waiting for some commitment. It's waiting for you to stop dabbling and to start doing. I love growing up, don't you? This middle-aged gig, ugh, just can't get enough of it. When I get to old age, I'm going to be sad middle age is over, and not because I'll have so many more wrinkles and not be able to get around so much, but because this space of learning and growing is so amazing. Maybe it'll still be that way when we're old. I don't know. I hope so. I hope I'm always in a place of growing and learning and moving forward. 

30:54 

Thank you so much for joining me here. If you would love some personal help from me, to learn how to step into the energy of doing, to learn how to start creating what you want rather than dabbling and getting distracted and dabbling and getting distracted...get in touch with me. You can go to tanyahale.com. You can click on the "free consultation" button. You can set up a 90 minute consult. I do 90 minutes because I also take time during that consult to do some coaching with you to give you some great first steps. It's a great opportunity for you to see some things you haven't seen before, to feel the power of coaching, to know the direction that you want to go. And if we end up working together, it's an amazing first step to get you started so that then when we start with our first, we call these sessions, we start their first sessions we've already got some momentum moving. 

32:06 

If you decide not to work with me then you have gotten some great tools and information to help you start moving forward on your own. I will tell you, though, that working with a coach you will move a lot faster than doing it on your own just because I will see your crap and I will call you out on it. Very kindly, might I say. I'm a kind coach. I will never be mean. But I will call you out on your crap. Because if you're paying me money, I'm going to do what you're paying me to do, and that is help you see so that you can choose to move forward. OK, that's going to do it for me this week. Have a great week. Figure out where you're dabbling and let's start doing. Shall we? I will talk to you next time. Bye. 

32:51 

Thank you so much for joining me today. If you would love to receive some weekend motivation, be sure to sign up for my free "weekend win" Friday email: a short and quick message to help you have a better weekend and position yourself for a more productive week. Go to tanyahale.com to sign up and learn more about life coaching and how it can help you get to your best self ever. See ya.