Imagine Yourself Embracing Change Like a Champ

Are you more likely to say…..

Let’s Shake Things Up a Little!

OR

Please. Don’t. Rock the Boat!

Maybe you are already working on accepting change as a natural and even beneficial gift that life offers OR maybe you feel stuck and afraid to embrace change in your life. Either way, we encourage you to think of change as an invitation to innovation and newness. This world forces us to evolve, and we want you to see the merit of that.

If you are reading this right now, then you are no longer the same person that you were on the day of your birth. You are bigger, taller, stronger, and smarter than the little baby version of yourself. I’m also willing to bet that you don’t have the exact same job that you started off with—do you? Probably don’t live in the same house? That little caterpillar you ran into last week has likely blossomed into a beautiful butterfly by now.

All of this is to prove that change is inevitable. It can be change that we cause ourselves or change that happens without our consent. It can be change that we welcome or change that we truly do not want at all. Regardless, we challenge you to wake up each day anticipating change in your personal, professional, and spiritual life and using that change to re-imagine yourself!!

We took on the challenge to make a change by starting our Imagine Yourself Podcast.

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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Sandy Kovach [00:00:01]:

Life can throw a lot at you, but imagine if your life were different, better, not because of what's coming at you, but because of what's coming from you. Let's get there together. Join us and imagine yourself.

Lanée Blaise [00:00:15]:

Good day, everybody. We would like to welcome you to our debut podcast. I'm Lanee.

Sandy Kovach [00:00:22]:

And this is Sandy. And, Lanae, what are we imagining today?

Lanée Blaise [00:00:26]:

Well, it's like one of those ominous movie trailers. Dun da da da. Imagine a world completely void of change. There's no new flowers, no advancements, no surprises, just stagnant sameness.

Sandy Kovach [00:00:48]:

I don't think I like that world.

Lanée Blaise [00:00:50]:

Oh, well then how about this? Imagine living in a world that welcomes Lanee, and more importantly, imagine yourself fully embracing change with open arms.

Sandy Kovach [00:01:04]:

I like that. I could use a little more of that.

Lanée Blaise [00:01:06]:

Okay. Think about this then. What would it feel like to actually have a happy expectation of daily change, sometimes even huge change in your life. What if you invited change into your life versus fearing it and only allowing for sameness and the old familiar?

Sandy Kovach [00:01:30]:

Boy, talk about a change in perspective. Yeah.

Lanée Blaise [00:01:33]:

Now what now you personally, Sandy, what is your first thought when you hear there's some changes coming?

Sandy Kovach [00:01:41]:

I will be totally honest with you. I would get a little bit stressed because I just want I would wonder, are they good changes? Are they bad changes? What's gonna happen?

Lanée Blaise [00:01:52]:

Well, now I wanna make sure because that is that is a concern. And I want to be sure that we're all on the same page here. There are 2 types of change. There's the type of change that's forced upon you where you have no control over it.

Sandy Kovach [00:02:08]:

The scarier kind of change.

Lanée Blaise [00:02:10]:

It could be it tends to be. It could be some of those things like where I mean, it could be a good Lanee, like there's new trends and new fashion and new fads, but there might be a major change in our world that we can't control. We can't control the weather. Your best friend might move away. You might get pregnant and have no idea how did that happen. Well, that's

Sandy Kovach [00:02:32]:

what else? Some idea.

Lanée Blaise [00:02:34]:

But now, there's also change that you can create in your life. You can go out there and take a leap of faith. You can apply for a new job or start your own business or you might be the one who you move away from your best friend, or you might adopt a baby, or you might even do like us, Sandy, and create a new podcast called Imagine Yourself.

Sandy Kovach [00:03:00]:

I like that change. That is definitely a good example of the creative change. But one thing that I think is an issue, and I know when I said I get stressed out for a change, I was being real. It's those changes that are kind of forced upon you that I think all of us could do better with because what is life but Lanee. Correct?

Lanée Blaise [00:03:23]:

That's true, but I definitely identify with you, Sandy, because I am not a lover of change myself by nature. That is not my nature. I like consistency because it's safe and it's familiar and it's comforting. But I wonder, can different sometimes be better?

Sandy Kovach [00:03:42]:

I think a lot of times different can be better. And looking back, it's really easy to say, oh, I'm really glad that happened. I'm really glad God opened this door, and this happened to me. But if you would ask me before, I would have said, like, no. Thank you. Yeah. Because the greatest growth happens through change. I found this quote Yeah.

Sandy Kovach [00:04:04]:

Coincidentally. Accidentally. Life is change. Growth is optional. Choose wisely. So life is gonna be happening, and you could either stay there and wish that it didn't change or you could kinda deal with it. I think even as, like, our kids get older, sometimes it's really hard and we stay stuck in, they're my baby. Yeah.

Lanée Blaise [00:04:25]:

I'm so used to them this one way.

Sandy Kovach [00:04:27]:

That's an example of change that's just you do see that coming. But then there's other changes, like things you don't see coming. Perhaps losing a job or, in my case, I remember back when I was first starting in radio, I worked at a rock station and that was like my whole persona. I'd grown up listening to rock and roll and I was like this, rock persona kinda. Although it didn't really fit me that well. I just I kind of imagined myself as the rock girl.

Lanée Blaise [00:04:56]:

But you

Sandy Kovach [00:04:57]:

were rock girl.

Lanée Blaise [00:04:57]:

Yeah. I

Sandy Kovach [00:04:57]:

was. I like the music. I still do. But, so we went from playing, like, Nirvana in Pearl Jam one day for a rock station. The next day, we were playing, like, Kenny G and Luther Vandross and Dave Koz smooth jazz. Yeah. And at the time, I didn't know anything about the music. But what happened was, first of all, I'm very fortunate that I was allowed to keep my job.

Sandy Kovach [00:05:18]:

A lot of stations Lanee format, and they fire everybody. They allowed us to stay if we wanted to, and I'm so glad that I did. I just kind of was I felt loosed. Like, okay. I don't have to be a rock person. I can just be me. And

Lanée Blaise [00:05:34]:

comfortable with the change or or or not at first, though?

Sandy Kovach [00:05:36]:

Not at first, though. I was, like, we found out the night before that it was gonna be changing, And I don't remember how many glasses of wine I had that night. I was pretty stressed out about it. Because you think, well, how can I keep my job? I don't know anything about this. You know? What's gonna go on? But then once the change happened and I listened to the music and I got to know some of the people that loved the music. I had the most success in my entire career, like number one ratings in many different years, and that really became part of it. But what freed me to be me was, like, I didn't have to have this persona anymore. I just took off all the airs and became myself.

Lanée Blaise [00:06:16]:

So actually, what you're saying is now that you look back, change was a good thing Mhmm. Even though initially you did not embrace it with open arms like we're trying to imagine ourselves now, but you learn from it and then hopefully you can put that in your little storehouse for future situations where change comes at you unexpectedly. You at least have I hope all of us have some scenario that we can fall back on and and use to our advantage in the future when change hits us.

Sandy Kovach [00:06:47]:

Mhmm.

Lanée Blaise [00:06:47]:

See. Well, now I actually have a problem. Let me tell you what my problem is with change. I have situations where and I've been like this ever since I was a little kid. I would see some little cute kid on television tap dancing, And I decide that I wanna go over and learn to tap dance. So I'd grab a pair of loud shoes and go in the bathroom tile floor and just go at it. Okay? And then my problem was I was shocked. I was shocked that I could not duplicate that little kid's tap dancing with my inner skills, my just natural skills.

Lanée Blaise [00:07:26]:

And sometimes we have to face facts that before we can fully change, we might need some training. We might need time. We might need patience before we actually make it. And that's another one of those things too. I'm sure you your learning curve was not immediate. I'm sure that you had the change at the station and then you ended up having to adapt. And it it took a little time period, a little time, a little patience. Mhmm.

Lanée Blaise [00:07:51]:

And you heard of that 21 day rule? Which is what now? That it only should take 21 days or 3 weeks of consistently doing something before you can turn it into a new and good habit and start to finally feel that level of comfortability with it after 21 days.

Sandy Kovach [00:08:11]:

I've heard similar things, but never heard it called that. So have you tested that out in your life?

Lanée Blaise [00:08:17]:

How about this? I know when I fail at it because I have definitely tried to make changes in diet and exercise and say if I can just make and many times, I don't make it through the 3 weeks. But things like starting a new job, we'll see what happens with our lovely podcast here. After 21 days, I do actually feel confident that my comfortability level will rise by that 21 day mark.

Sandy Kovach [00:08:42]:

Absolutely. It gives hope. So we have examples of change, but I think too, you can look at other people and their lives. It's kinda fun to look around and see what other people have done. I I was reading about, you know, Vera Wang. Right? You're the designer? Yeah. Absolutely. Yes.

Lanée Blaise [00:09:00]:

Vera Wang dresses, Vera Wang perfumes. Yeah. Yeah. I don't own any of the dresses, but but I've got the perfume.

Sandy Kovach [00:09:06]:

And she actually has an affordable line too that she has at Kohl's now. So you can Oh. Simply bear it.

Lanée Blaise [00:09:11]:

So I could okay.

Sandy Kovach [00:09:12]:

So you could. You could walk over and probably pay $29 and get like a cardigan or something. But she was actually a figure skater. She wanted that was her big dream. Vera Wang. Vera Wang.

Lanée Blaise [00:09:23]:

Okay.

Sandy Kovach [00:09:23]:

She was in the figure skating championships back in the late sixties. She was in Sports Illustrated, but she did not make the Olympic team. So she used that as a pivot, and I'm not sure what her thinking was. But, she said, you know what? I'm gonna go and follow my other passion, which as we know is fashion. She started as an editor of Vogue Magazine. She was the youngest editor, I think, ever. And then she went on to be a fashion designer. We know about Vera Wang wedding dresses and, I mean, I think she did Mariah Carey, Alicia Keys, Kim Kardashian, all these new Okay.

Sandy Kovach [00:09:58]:

So figure skating didn't quite work out as planned, and she nailed it Yep. With the, with fashion. Yeah. She's huge in that industry. Obviously, we know Vera Wang. But at the time, it must have felt very disappointing not to make the Olympic team.

Lanée Blaise [00:10:14]:

Oh my gosh. So that is one of those things that we've gotta keep in mind when we get frustrated because we've had an

Sandy Kovach [00:10:30]:

in asking the audience to do the same. But then think of what may have come out of it. Or maybe somebody right now is actually in the middle of a huge disappointment. And you're like, well, where do I go from here? Always remember that God is in control. Yes.

Lanée Blaise [00:10:45]:

I gotta bring this up and and you probably identify with it also. The bible addresses change for better, for worse and then, of course, the sixties pop song turn turn turn. They they addressed it too. But for everything, there is a season and a time for every matter under heaven. A time to be born and a time to die, which nobody wants that change of of death or having a loved one pass away. There's a time to plant and a time to pluck up. There's a time to break down and a time to build up. And so Lanee is a given.

Sandy Kovach [00:11:23]:

Yeah.

Lanée Blaise [00:11:24]:

And seasons change and cycles occur and unexpected things happen. But how are we going to handle these changes? What are some of the little tricks that you do to help when you have to encounter new change, unexpected change?

Sandy Kovach [00:11:41]:

You know, I guess it depends on the situation, but I go back to thinking about the story we talked about in my life earlier that I might think of something big

Lanée Blaise [00:11:50]:

Yes.

Sandy Kovach [00:11:51]:

Like that. And it's like, hey, remember that and how bad that felt and then it was cool? But other times, I have to be totally honest with you. I will literally freak out on some stuff.

Lanée Blaise [00:12:00]:

So Yeah.

Sandy Kovach [00:12:01]:

I can't tell you that I I have this all mastered. I don't think anyone does. It's like we go through something and we look back and say, hey. It all worked out okay. But yet the next time

Lanée Blaise [00:12:13]:

We aren't so confident. What's up with that? That's human nature. But I gotta tell you what I've learned from some folks in my life that really helped. My mother always encouraged us to go ahead and allow yourself some time to be sad or mad or to freak out like you said. Yeah. That's fine.

Sandy Kovach [00:12:31]:

Okay? Alright. Freak out time.

Lanée Blaise [00:12:33]:

Yeah. But my aunt taught me, don't sit around there and set up camp in that sadness and madness. You know? So, you eventually do have to switch gears. And then a friend, Sandy you know who I'm talking about. In fact, we've even nicknamed her Hope. Because you remember? Yeah. She literally has taught us hope through hard times.

Sandy Kovach [00:12:59]:

Yeah. To carry around hope. Right? Isn't that how you put it? Yes.

Lanée Blaise [00:13:03]:

And to really remember that the fog will lift, God will help us move forward, and we will eventually establish a new normal.

Sandy Kovach [00:13:13]:

Yeah. Something that we probably wouldn't have imagined for ourselves. Wouldn't again have chosen to go through. Just to touch on her story briefly, she went through some pretty how do you wanna say it? Rough patches. Rough patches in her life that Dark times. Just yeah. I mean, there's so much that people go through that can either be caused by circumstances or just issues. We, you know, mental illness is a big thing and that's a topic for another time and it's just way too deep for us to get into right now.

Sandy Kovach [00:13:48]:

But sometimes going through these things and coming out on the other side can not only give us perspective but allow us to help other people, which is exactly what she did.

Lanée Blaise [00:13:59]:

Yeah. She formed a group of women who were also going through frustrating times so that they could build up and lift up and grow together and try to see their way back to the light.

Sandy Kovach [00:14:12]:

So that again is another thing is to use other people whether they're family or friends, spouses. Yes.

Lanée Blaise [00:14:19]:

I gotta tell you, you can also use strangers because I actually had a wonderful opportunity to sit next to a complete stranger on an airplane just last week. And many times, I either read my book or watch the little movie that's playing, but the movie thing wasn't working. And, my book wasn't all that great. And this man, we talked the entire flight. Wow. And he wanted to he asked me all types of questions, but he wondered what I thought about all the change going on in our downtown area here in Detroit, Michigan because there have been some major changes. There's vibrant new arenas and new projects and things like that going on. And overall, he was telling me as far as this concept of Lanee, because I'm not really a great proponent of change sometimes when it happens to me personally, of course.

Lanée Blaise [00:15:16]:

But he said that if no change is occurring, then there's actually negative change occurring. And I'm like, not always. He said, well, think about this for a second. He said, if you leave a city or a house and it never got a fresh change of paint or fresh plumbing or anything changed for the better, then it will change for the worse. It will deteriorate, and that will be a negative change by default. Wow. So he said you may as well get your boots on and embrace change because you'd rather have it changing for the good than the negative.

Sandy Kovach [00:15:58]:

Yeah. Or even if it changes for the bad, you learning to adapt through that change.

Lanée Blaise [00:16:03]:

Like you did. Yes. We Bring bringing you out

Sandy Kovach [00:16:05]:

on the other side. Yes. So what do we do? I mean, how do we stop fearing change, freaking out? Okay. You said we can have our little freak out period. Fine.

Lanée Blaise [00:16:14]:

Yes.

Sandy Kovach [00:16:14]:

Yes. I wanna know right now, like, what is there a mindset that I can have or meditate on something or keep something in mind so that the next time I walk out the door or get that phone call or however the change happens I mean, literally, one minute, everything is normal. The next minute, you get that text message and your whole life is different. And many times, it's not that dramatic either. I don't wanna make it all sound ominous. But what am I gonna do? What should our audience do?

Lanée Blaise [00:16:41]:

Well, I know that many times people want to Lanee. We want to hope that our first go to is not a point of blame. So when these things happen to us there's a quote by Leo Tolstoy who he's the author of War and Peace. He said, everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself Mhmm. Or herself. And so if our first instinct is to point outward towards blaming and why did this happen and why me, Like I said, you know, we can do that for a second.

Sandy Kovach [00:17:16]:

Okay.

Lanée Blaise [00:17:17]:

But we don't want to stay there. So we get that out of our systems and then we start to think about there are so many things in this world that we cannot control and maybe this particular incident is one of them, but there are things that we can control. We can control our behavior and we can try to ease ourselves into controlling our own mindset. Right. And you gotta tweak yourself.

Sandy Kovach [00:17:43]:

Sounds painful a little.

Lanée Blaise [00:17:44]:

It's it is painful. It is painful. Tweak yourself, not twerk yourself, but you gotta you gotta tweak yourself. And you've really got to go inside for a bit, take a breath, take a moment, and really really try to focus on the fact that this is one of those ones I was not expecting. There will be trials and tribulations in this world that's that's told to us in the Bible also. But you look inward and you look upward and you pray to God to help you through it and you look into your own past and see how you've made it this far. Yeah. And you will have to just continue to make it.

Lanée Blaise [00:18:23]:

And, of course, there's always if you truly cannot make it and you need help, then you need to go for help, counseling, because sometimes we are not able to pull ourselves out. There's a whole study on stressors, the top ten stressors that cause pain in life. This was a study developed in the sixties. It's called the Holmes Ray syndrome. And it's a situation where certain stressors like death of a immediate family member, divorce, things like that can also cause physical pain in your body. And many times you of course, they were strange enough too. There were there were happy things too like marriage and, reconciling and retirement. All of these are changes, big changes for good ones and bad ones that you might need to actually seek professional help for.

Sandy Kovach [00:19:18]:

Wow.

Lanée Blaise [00:19:18]:

Sometimes we are not able to pull ourselves out, but many times we can use encouragement from others, encouragement from within, encouragement from past experiences to try to pull us up.

Sandy Kovach [00:19:29]:

Yes. But like you said, we should never be afraid to ask for help. And I think sometimes, especially in our society, you know, this whole pull yourself up by your own bootstraps, which is it's fine. You know, we we wanna be It's a good a tough line. Yeah. It's a good goal. But like you said, there are just things in life that we can't deal with by ourselves. And we shouldn't let our pride or feel weak about it.

Sandy Kovach [00:19:52]:

Yeah. Our goal is to excel after change or make great changes and, have it benefit ourselves or others. But sometimes we hit a wall and we gotta reach out.

Lanée Blaise [00:20:05]:

That's true. And there's another thing too that I just gotta mention daily strength. So now that we are clear, there will be something that happens in our life unless we die in the next 10 minutes Yeah. That will be unexpected and might really hit us hard. Okay? But if we try our best to daily wake up and kind of put ourselves together, put our strength together, even if it turns out that it's gonna be a great day. Right? But you start off setting the tone for your day with a positive affirmation, with something that says, I am going to really try to see myself embracing whatever this day has for me. And you start off strong, it tends to help set the tone for the day and make it turn out a little more bearable. Yeah.

Lanée Blaise [00:21:05]:

That's what I believe. I know there's a book by Laura Casey called Make It Happen. It's a really great book. She told us that when you wake up and you start your day with prayer or with affirmations and you also move forward and think, I'm gonna move through this day and hope to only make sure that I get 2 or 3 positive things done that will help further my goals and because these are the ones ones where you can actually change. Sometimes you take a leap of faith and you're making a change Right. For the better in your life. You're leaving a bad relationship or a bad situation and you have to strengthen yourself for that too. But you just concentrate on 2 or 3 things that you don't get totally blown away by the magnitude of of everything.

Sandy Kovach [00:21:46]:

Okay. Yeah. I mean, that's something we didn't really talk about too much, but there are definitely things that we need to initiate ourselves and you mentioned bad relationship or sometimes a career change. There are can be many things that can be very scary but can be very good for us.

Lanée Blaise [00:22:01]:

Yeah. Things that you decided to make a change in, like you said, with career or that you had no control over, like in your previous situation with the radio station. Daily strengthening, I think, is just a good way to try to face your day when you know that the unexpected could be around any corner.

Sandy Kovach [00:22:18]:

I love it. You got any other takeaways?

Lanée Blaise [00:22:20]:

Absolutely. So our takeaways for the day, some things you simply can't control, but you can always take just one thing and work on for yourself. Also, when you're sitting there and you do fear change, please remember, like my wonderful stranger friend on the airplane said, if there's no change occurring, there might actually be negative change occurring, and you do not want that. Also, you want to pair change with hope and time and patience. Give yourself some time to get there. You don't have to tap dance on the first try. Also, start with just one thing you wanna change for the better in your life or or 1 or 2 things that you wanna do for that day and work on it. It might be big.

Lanée Blaise [00:23:07]:

It might be small. But save some time in your schedule and start your day off with just concentrating on that small thing so you don't get overwhelmed. And remember, it only takes 21 days before you can get comfortable with the new change. And don't forget Vera Wang.

Sandy Kovach [00:23:24]:

Every time you walk into Kohl's, go buy something from or you don't have to buy it. Just pass by the Simply Vera section and remember how she turns her life around.

Lanée Blaise [00:23:33]:

So And think about Sandy Lynette. You know? That's right. There you go. Because we're starting our we are changing. We are starting this podcast with you all, and we really, really hope that it turns out to be magnificent. This is something we're taking a leap of faith.

Sandy Kovach [00:23:47]:

That's right. And we are going to each week imagine ourselves in this case, we're imagining ourselves embracing Lanee, but every time that we do a podcast, we'll be imagining something different that everybody listening hopefully can benefit from.

Lanée Blaise [00:24:04]:

Yes. So I encourage you to imagine yourself waking up every morning and spreading your arms open wide to invite change into your day, your world, and your life.

Sandy Kovach [00:24:21]:

Thanks for listening. Now we'd like to hear from you. Got an idea for the show? Wanna share your story or just say hello? Make sure you connect with us. You can do that at imagine yourself podcast.com, and we'll talk to you again next time when we have something new to imagine.

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