Today, Kara dives into the topic of regrets and the importance of living a life without them. She reflects on her personal experiences, including the recent loss of her beloved dog, which prompted her to contemplate what truly matters in life. Kara emphasizes the need to take risks, embrace opportunities, and prioritize experiences over material achievements, such as paying off a mortgage early. She encourages listeners to define their own dreams and passions, reminding them that living authentically often means facing naysayers and overcoming self-doubt. With heartfelt insights and personal anecdotes, Kara inspires her audience to design their own dream life and pursue what brings them joy and fulfillment.
Kara's latest podcast episode presents an intimate exploration of regret, loss, and the pursuit of a fulfilling life as she marks the beginning of 2025. The episode opens with a reflection on the recent passing of her beloved pet, a pivotal moment that catalyzes her thoughts on how life's experiences shape our perspectives on regret. Cara articulates her philosophy of living without what-ifs, advocating for a life rich in experiences over material concerns. Her heartfelt narrative emphasizes the significance of cherishing moments and the memories created with loved ones, offering listeners a poignant reminder of what truly matters in life.
Throughout the episode, Kara encourages her audience to embrace their fears and step into their authentic selves. She addresses the all-too-common feelings of comparison and envy that arise when observing others' successes, particularly in the realm of financial stability. Rather than dwelling in negativity, Kara promotes a mindset of internal reflection and gratitude for one's journey. By sharing her own moments of introspection regarding her financial decisions, she presents a relatable perspective that resonates with many. The discussion serves as an invitation for listeners to think critically about their own lives, prompting them to prioritize personal fulfillment over societal expectations.
As the episode progresses, Kara shifts gears to discuss practical avenues for pursuing one's passions, particularly through the lens of service. She highlights the fulfilling nature of being a service provider, suggesting that it can lead to both personal and professional satisfaction. Kara offers insights into her own experiences and announces an upcoming challenge designed to guide listeners in identifying their unique service skills. This segment not only provides practical advice but also promotes a sense of community among aspiring service providers. With a strong emphasis on empowerment and self-discovery, Kara concludes the episode with a call to action, encouraging her listeners to design their own dream lives and live boldly, free from the weight of regret.
Takeaways:
The importance of reflecting on life choices to avoid living with regrets.
Choosing experiences over material possessions can lead to a more fulfilling life.
Recognizing that not everyone will support your dreams, but you should pursue them anyway.
Finding clarity on what you truly want in life is essential for happiness.
Embracing the journey of personal development can help you design your dream life.
Each person's path to fulfillment is unique, and self-discovery is key to success.
transcript:
Hey there, I'm Kara and welcome to Design your Dream Life podcast where we dive in and explore how you can use practical personal development to up level your life.
Whether you are looking to have better or deeper relationships, fix your problems with money, learn to love yourself unconditionally, leave a dead end or high stress career, or just want more happiness in your life, my friend, you are in the right place. Are you ready? Hello my friends and welcome to 2025. Well, this is my first episode I'm recording in 2025, so hello and welcome to the New year.
Oh my gosh, you guys, I have so much to talk to you about today and normally I, you know, try and when I'm doing podcasts, I try and think of a topic and then I kind of script an outline and all of the things and today I'm not doing that at all. I just have a couple of stories I want to share and then I am just talking to you from my heart.
So, you know, if things don't flow or I go off on a tangent, my apologies. I don't have anything to pull me back in and try and keep me on track.
But I will still aim to keep this short and sweet because I absolutely love short and sweet podcasts. So today I want to focus on regrets. And here's why.
You know, everyone talks about the new year and new you and all the fresh starts and all of that, and I am a sucker for all of that. Like I really, really am. But I wanted to talk about regrets today because of a few things that has recently happened in my life.
So over the holidays, right after Christmas, we had to put our dog down and, and he was 19 and we loved him. I mean, my kids are 19 and 18. Yes, my kids are 13 months apart. My daughter's turning 20 and my son will be turning 19.
But right now they're 18 and 19. And so if you can think about that, for our family, it impacted us tremendously because that's the only dog they've ever known.
And he was a schnoodle and he was so full of life and really the past year he had been declining slowly.
And then, you know, about a month ago it was, it was starting to get more and more and so we had many hard conversations and all of the things and, and we ended up having to put him down right after Christmas on, I think it was December 27th, and it was really hard. And in all of that, even though he had a great life and we were so grateful for him and he was A wonderful dog.
We were still obviously so heartbroken and sad and our was just grieving and it just made me think of regrets. It actually made me think of life in general.
And at the end of the day, for me personally, I believe in when I go out, like, no regrets, no what ifs, what if I did this or what if I did that? Like, and that's, that's one of the things that I think is a driving force for me.
Even though it can be scary and just, I don't like all the fears that could come up, like, at the end of my life, whenever that will be, I want to know that I lived it and I did everything that I could to live my best life and that I tried all of the things and I never let fear win. And for me, that obviously, you know, keeps evolving. And I'll tell you, like, there are things, like, even in my life. So here's a personal example.
So we, majority of us, we have this comparison game that we're always playing. And while I try and detach from the comparison game, I'm really only running my own life.
And I've talked to you about, you know, when you start getting on this path of living your dream life, there will be people who resent you, there will be people who disappoint you, there will be people who are jealous of you and don't ever let them dim your light. And I promise you, this is going to come up and for some of you, it's going to feel. Feel like a wave of shit hitting you.
And for others, maybe it's not so bad. And you'll have more cheerleaders than naysayers in your life.
But I promise you, you will have some naysayers when it comes to you wanting to fulfill your dreams. Because the reality is, majority of people do live with regret.
Majority of people do just live a life where they're just going through the motions of it and they're not trying to live their best life. They're not crushing goals, they're not even setting go.
And then they see you maybe start to turn a corner and you're all excited and you're sharing it and they're going to rip the shit out of your dream. And you have to be strong enough to say to yourself and commit to yourself, like, you know what?
I'm doing this regardless, regardless of what other people are going to say to me, regardless of even the fear that I have, because I don't want to live with regret.
Like, I want to go out and be Like, I did the things, I tried the things, and I might have failed a hell of a lot, but at least I know because I tried. So a few things. I recently, in the past year or so, I've had a couple of friends and even some family members who are like, they're mortgage free.
They've paid off their mortgage, and I'm like, so happy for them. And then I go inside and I'm like, oh, did I make some bad decisions? Now, I will tell you this. I don't believe in jealousy. Not at all.
I believe in internal reflection and questioning yourself about certain things. And I'll tell you the exact same process.
So, you know, friends, family who've paid off their mortgage, instead of maybe me being like, oh, man, they're so lucky. Da, da, da, da. Like, I didn't do any of that. I didn't. I was so happy for them, and I still am. Like, I literally am so happy for them.
And I'm like, oh, my gosh, that is so amazing. Congratulations, like, truly from the bottom of my heart. Like, that's awesome. And then what I do is an internal reflection.
I'm like, man, that must feel so nice to be mortgage free. I am not mortgage free. And while I have a ton of equity in my home, I am not mortgage free.
And so I remember talking with someone about it, and I'm like, oh, you know, I wonder if I made some wrong financial decisions. Like, should I have? And then I. I went back, and this is where regret comes in. I'm like, no. Could I be mortgage free right now? I actually could be.
But I chose over the last five years to travel the world with my children, to buy my vehicles in cash, to have no debt. And at the end of my life, this is. This is exactly what I thought to myself.
At the end of my life, will I be like, I'm so glad I paid my mortgage off five years sooner? No.
But those five years that I had to give my kids those experiences, my family, all those memories, and just been able to do all the things that we have been able to do, I wouldn't take any of that back. And so, yeah, you're right. Are there shoulds? And I think that's it. Sometimes we get stuck in the shoulds. Should I, you know, live tighter? Should.
And I listen, this is not financial advice. I think everybody has to do their own gut check. Like, you are your guru.
I think sometimes we get so disconnected from ourselves, it's really hard to go inside. And so if that's you, like, I encourage you to sit down, journal, connect with yourself, and be like, what do you truly want?
Because you can have wants that kind of overlap each other. Because, example, Kara would love to be mortgage free, but Kara also wants to have amazing experiences with my family.
So I'm like, I can't necessarily, at this current income level, have both.
So while I am paying off my mortgage and I'm making bigger payments, I'm not completely mortgage free, but I do own three vehicles and I don't have car payments. And like I said, I have had so many amazing vacations. I've also gave back and donated a lot. Some of you may know if you've listened to the podcast.
I donated a classroom to a school that's building, being built in Africa, and I'm going there this summer with my husband to the grand opening of the school. So amazing. And so I've done a lot of things and I. I don't have regret about that. So when that little voice creeps up, should you.
Should I have done this? You need to sit there and reflect. Like, what's the trade off and what's the payoff? And what is it that you truly want? And is it a.
Is it a real regret? Or is it just like, oh, this would be really nice because again, yes, I can't wait to become mortgage free.
And I'm very confident I will get there and get there soon enough. But in the same time, it's so funny, we were talking and I'm like, oh, my gosh, like, here's what I realized.
I realized that for me now, this is just for me. My bucket list is complete. And that I feel like, is amazing to say in life. Now, my hubby still has a couple more bucket list places he wants to go.
And does that mean we're not going to travel? Well, no, we are, and there's some cool places, but, like, those big. All the big bucket list trips. Like, for me, I'm good.
Like, if I went out tomorrow, like, I've had an amazing run. I've had an amazing life. Like, every day from this day out is honestly a gift. And I'm so very grateful for every single day.
So there's not a lot of people that can actually say that. And I want to encourage you to be one of those people and whatever that looks like for you, everybody going to be different.
And I think that that's what's amazing about designing your own dream life. Don't design my life, Design your life. What are the things that you want to do?
And while yes, you can get ideas and suggestions from people like family and friends or people you listen to or people you follow on social media, at the end of the day you really have to sit down and get quiet with yourself and figure out, like, what is it that you really, really, truly want. And I, like I said, I've said this before, this should be your year to do whatever you want.
And for me, breaking free, I started out in the service industry. Now some of you may have tried being a service provider and didn't like it, and maybe you that means you haven't found your path.
I love being a service provider. I love the clients that I work with and I also love the cre. I'm a creative and so I love using that creative part of my brain.
And maybe you're not that, maybe you're super analytical or something else.
But for me, I think especially going into 2025, for it to be the year of service, like, I honestly do believe that more and more people, more and more companies, it's been proven they're hiring people who specialize in service in certain areas. So being a service provider is a phenomenal opportunity.
And so if you are thinking about becoming a service provider and you haven't picked up my 100 service provider ideas, which is absolutely free, I have changed the website a little bit. So if you go to designyourdreamlifetoday.com now in the right hand corner there is a little button that says free gift.
That free gift is actually going to link you to a Google Doc and anything that I'm talking about on the podcast, whether it be a free gift or some kind of free resource or an awesome offer, it's going to be there and it's a live document. So that I can just always say, hey guys, go to design your dream life and hit the free gift button. And then all the things will be in one place.
But it is a living document. So I'm going to be deleting things and adding things.
And so if you see something there and you want to check it out or you want to grab it, please go do it. Now.
The other thing that I want to talk about is in a few weeks I am going to run a challenge, an amazing challenge that we're actually going to spend five days to figure out what skill you would love to be a service provider in. So if you think you want to dive in and explore being coming a service provider, this is a super affordable rate. You guys need to check it out.
I'm not even going to tell you what the price is, but I'm going to tell you that it is less than a gourmet pizza. So you should go go to designyourdreamlifetoday.com hit the free gift.
And again, you can download the free gift in the free gift section of the hundred service provider ideas. And then underneath it is the awesome offer which is for the service skills challenge. So you guys can check that out if you want.
And I hope you'll join me there because I'm going to even do a couple free live Q&As and I really the whole goal of this is for you to get super clear on a service that you feel confident about, that you feel excited about and that you're ready to go and dive into 2025, kicking ass, becoming a service provider. All right, my friends, that is it for today's episode. I hope you have an awesome day and I will see you on the next episode.