30 | "What Goes Around, Comes Around." Time Isn't Linear — And Neither Are You.

What would you do differently if you knew your actions would come back around...multiplied by 100 million?

In this episode, I share a story about a long-overdue coffee date with a friend who reminded me what true trust in timing looks like. From the Tibetan Buddhist “Four Great Holy Days” to the rhythm of our own menstrual cycles, this conversation explores how everything, time, energy, & success, moves in cycles.

You’ll hear why trying to live linearly (doing everything, all the time, all at once) keeps us stuck in burnout, and how aligning with your body’s natural seasons can create merit-multiplying results in your health, business, and life.

I also get personal about some shifts in my business, and why I finally stopped fighting the title “health coach” to claim what I actually do: helping women create success and a life worth living by reconnecting with their bodies, their cycles, and their self-trust.

If you’ve been rewriting your to-do list every day or questioning your timeline, this one’s for you.

As always...stay bold, stay balanced, and I'll see you next week.

Mentioned in this episode:
– Practice on the Four Great Holy Days – Lama Zopa Rinpoche, FPMT
– Do Less by Kate Northrup
– Essentialism by Greg McKeown
– The Art of Exploration (Access my FREE masterclass replay here)

Stay bold, stay balanced, and I’ll see you next week.

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Transcript

0:00:00 - (Carly): Foreign welcome to Coffee with Carly, your weekly wake up call to a happier, healthier life. I'm your host, Carly Shade, and I'm here to uncover how good life can get. What would you do today if you knew that your actions would come around, but multiplied by a hundred million? Okay, welcome back, everyone. Another episode of Coffee With Carly diving in with another solo episode here today. And so I just want to take you back. So it was just last Friday, okay? And I am buzzing, literally and figuratively, from this Vietnamese coffee. And I'm two hours deep into this incredibly long overdue coffee day. Catch up with my friend.

0:00:59 - (Carly): So I met this friend in Thailand when I was traveling back in 2014, and we ended up working for the same organization, her and her husband. All that for years and she was just a bridesmaid at my wedding, which happened three weeks ago. Exactly three weeks ago from today. So she is a badass. She's a business owner and she is a poster child for trust and balance in her life. So a lot of times I ask her for advice on, like, how does she juggle it all? How does she make owning a business look as effortless as she does? How does she just allow herself to go live her life, go read a book at a cafe, come back to these jobs and kind of start over when things aren't working for her?

0:01:40 - (Carly): And so two things she said. The first was she meditates every day, right? Building a strong mind, connecting into the body, building charisma, is what she said. And the second is that she said, I know my timeline, so I don't worry about it. I trust that the things will come my way and it unfolds how it's supposed to. And I know that my time is coming. So the first one's pretty common advice. We all know the benefits of meditation. But this second one had me digging a little deeper.

0:02:11 - (Carly): So I kept asking. And it turns out she has a family member who is a very deeply intuitive guide, and she often turns to her for advice. And so this family member has told my friend that success, especially financially, will come to her starting around the age of 40. And in the meantime, you know, opportunities are going to come to you. You'll have chances to make money. Take them. Don't overstress about what it is or what you're doing. It's not going to be forever.

0:02:44 - (Carly): Gain experience, wisdom, knowledge, learn lessons, enjoy life, relax, have fun. I'm like, that sounds like pretty good advice. She is able to relax into life because she knows her timeline. She knows that it's coming and she acts accordingly. So another example are the four great holidays in. Or, sorry, the four great holy days in the Tibetan Buddhist calendar. So there's one day in January, there's one day in April, one day in June, and one day in September.

0:03:20 - (Carly): And it's on these four days that they believe that karmic results of actions are multiplied by 100 million. So certain actions that you take can really give you good merit. But multiplied by 100 million and yes, I did say 100 million. That was not a typo. So whether you believe in psychic abilities or not, there's something here, right? Because my friend, like, life's working out pretty well for her, I come to her for advice. How does she balance it all? She has this just incredible piece to her.

0:03:51 - (Carly): And it's not about believing in the psychic predictions, but it's certainly got something to do with believing in trust. And then same thing whether you believe in karma or not. You don't have to be a Buddhist. But these four holy days are an incredible reminder that our actions matter and what we do now can affect us later, right? Our actions now, they, they don't just ripple out, but they return to us, sometimes a hundred million times over.

0:04:23 - (Carly): So if I were to ask you to draw time, you'd probably draw something like a watch face, right? It would go 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, and then start again. 1, 2, 3, 4th, 5, 6, 7, eight. Go on. Right? It's a circle, basically. It wouldn't just be a line that just ends right after 11pm, 12pm and then all of a sudden it just falls off. That's not how it works, right? Even if time, it might be a new day that's starting, time itself infinite. It's always replenishing, it's always coming back.

0:05:02 - (Carly): And you want to know what else is a circle? Your menstrual cycle. And you have four distinct phases. You have a follicular phase, an ovulation phase, a luteal phase, and your bleed. And they each repeat and they each come back. And the actions that you take within each phase can have multiplying results. The problem in today's world is that we just keep trying to live life like everything is linear, right? That's where this whole fear, scarcity, lack, that frequency, that's where this comes from. And that is absolutely not a place where the universe is going to reward you, spoil you. It's going to meet you with exactly that fear, lack and scarcity.

0:05:45 - (Carly): Time is not linear. Our energy is not linear. Your body is not linear. But we're afraid to rest, to trust, to relax into life because we believe that we are wasting time, right? The truth is that resting during your bleed can have karmic results, right? Choosing to be social and be visible during your ovulation can have karmic results. And you could also relax during your bleed. Just knowing that really right around the corner, just five to seven days away, is your follicular phase, where you'll have a different energy and you'll have the ability to accomplish different tasks.

0:06:28 - (Carly): Each phase holds its own merit. But a lot of my clients, right, they come to me with this wanting to better manage their time, right? If I could just be more disciplined, if I could just do more in my day, if I could just have more time, then I'm finally gonna feel the peace, the joy, the fulfillment, the stillness that I'm craving, right? But what they're doing is just rewriting a never ending to do list. Like, I know that a lot of you listeners do this. Trust me, I did the same thing. You write down every single thing that you think you need to do basically in a year, and you just keep rewriting it down every day and you keep rewriting the list and maybe it gets a little bit shorter and then all of a sudden it's back to the beginning because you're just trying to fit everything into a full year, right? You keep rewriting this because you're trying to live each day, each week like a full year with all four seasons.

0:07:19 - (Carly): You're trying to fit all four seasons into a day instead of tapping into the specific merit of each phase, right? You gotta trust that every task on your to do list, it has a time and a place, but not all at once, right? And that's the very idea behind one of my favorite books by Kate Northrup, who, she does not know it, but she has been a mentor of mine and a role model for a very long time. She's been a pioneer in a lot of this woman's health kind of management.

0:07:49 - (Carly): But she has this book do less, right? And that's the idea of her book. And cycle syncing does not mean that we just like, don't do anything right during your luteal phase. We don't just, like, maybe we're a little sleepy. We don't just do nothing. Even during your bleed, we don't just do nothing, but we do less at one time. We focus on one merit multiplying task at a time based on the season that you're in, and eventually we actually see that we get more done that way.

0:08:21 - (Carly): Or maybe you're worried that you're running out of time if you stop and smell the roses, or only choose to focus on that top priority, which, by the way, is the definition of a priority. The minute you say you have multiple priorities, it's no longer a priority. That's a line from Essentialism, which is another great book, but. Right. We're so worried that we're running out of time and that we're wasting the day or the week.

0:08:43 - (Carly): But remember, time is cyclical. It's a ring, it's a circle. It's infinite. It's replenishing. It keeps coming back around. And you're just simply on an upward spiral of life. And. Yes, I said upward. Okay. Think about my friend. She's enjoying life, learning from her experiences, studying what sparks her curiosity, knowing that all those actions will multiply, reward her, and return to her. She doesn't know how, she doesn't know when, but it's multiplying results.

0:09:13 - (Carly): So how would you show up differently knowing that it all can come back to you a hundred times better? I have some questions that I want you to really reflect on. Like, are you trying to take actions that aren't aligned with what season that you're actually in? Right. Maybe you're feeling stuck, or like you're just a hamster running on a hamster wheel, doing the same things, getting the same results, going nowhere, but just trying to do more and more and more of it and push.

0:09:42 - (Carly): Maybe it's because you're taking actions that aren't aligned with the season that you're in. So two questions that you could really, really reflect on. One, what if I trusted that everything I'm planting now will bloom in its time? Okay. Even when you plant a garden, things have such different growing speeds. And that's a belief in permaculture. Right. You grow things that you. It's like, I'm actually going to not do it justice here. But, you know, you grow things that kind of grow closer to the ground to provide shade for maybe the big pear tree. That's going to take longer to grow.

0:10:21 - (Carly): Right. Each part of a garden of permaculture has a different phase and a different life cycle, and they bloom at different times based on the seasons. So what if you trusted that everything you're planting now will bloom in its time, not all at once. The second question, what would I do differently if I knew that time couldn't be wasted? That's a fun one. What Would you do? What would you do differently?

0:10:52 - (Carly): What actions would you take? How much fun would you have? How much joy? How much could you relax? What adventures would you have in the process, knowing that none of it is wasting time? That's what sparked one of my masterclasses that's free if you want to watch the replay. It's called the Art of Exploration, right? It's about the process. It's about having fun, exploring. And there's so much learning and clarity that comes from action, right? We don't gain clarity and then take action. We take action and gain clarity.

0:11:26 - (Carly): So what would you do differently if you knew that time couldn't be wasted? And before we wrap up today, I want to revisit these four holy days that I mentioned in the Tibetan Buddhist calendar. And I mentioned earlier that the month that each one takes place is different, right? Did anyone catch those four months that they take place in? I'm going to refresh your memory. The first is in January. One is in April, one is in June, and one is in September.

0:11:56 - (Carly): It is also not a coincidence that there are four holy days, because guess how many seasons there are in a year? 4. And each holiday happens to fall in a different season. The January one, winter, the April one, spring, the June one, summer, the September one, fall. And guess how many phases there are in your period. 4. And that they also happen to each represent a different season. You literally cannot make this shit up, okay?

0:12:28 - (Carly): We are nature. We are designed on purpose. And we are part of a much greater creation, collective web of these beautiful things happening that we do not see, but we feel. And maybe we don't even feel, but they're happening. Like, I've traveled all over the world. I've always been curious about different cultures, religions, beliefs. But the most universal truth, right? A lot of these different cultures and a lot of things in life, they're all universal truths, maybe told through different lenses. But the most universal truth that continues to blow my mind is that your body holds all the very same wisdom that we're out here learning in life.

0:13:04 - (Carly): And if you want a reminder of how powerful you are, how wise you are, how freaking cool and magical and, like, mystical that life can be, you don't have to travel all around the world. You just have to look in the mirror. You don't have to travel all around the world. You just have to look in the mirror. So today's episode could not be more fitting for where I'm at in my own life and my business, as I've had a few merit multiplying events over the last year.

0:13:36 - (Carly): So if you have been listening or following me from the beginning, you have probably noticed that my business, my title, my Instagram bio, has taken many different forms. I mean, just tune back into, like, the second episode here. But we're not deleting episodes. We are here for seeing all evolutions of how this podcast and my growth has come to be. But here's the truth. Over the last year, I've really struggled with what to call my business.

0:14:04 - (Carly): What title do I give myself? Because it's based on my lived experiences, the certain things that I've studied, the certain schooling and experiences that I've had. And I realize, well, what if I'm kind of struggling with what to call myself? Because it hasn't existed yet. That's what an entrepreneur is. You're creating something that doesn't exist. You're providing a new way of doing things. So originally, I had settled on, you know, life coach because it sounded. It was broad. It could catch everything.

0:14:39 - (Carly): But then as soon as I would tell someone, I'm a life coach, and then I would say, I would follow up with saying, it's basically like a health coach mixed with an empowerment coach. And so after a season of reflection, I decided to really ditch this life coach title and actually lean into what I do, which is a women's health and empowerment coach. I help women create success and build a life worth living.

0:15:06 - (Carly): But the reason that I'm different, the reason it maybe hasn't existed, is because I'm gonna help you get there by learning about your period. Okay? And I realized that I had so much resistance to including health coach into my title because for my early years as a dietitian, that was my first introduction into, like, health care, right? And so I helped people who didn't want to be there kind of try to lose weight.

0:15:31 - (Carly): And that was really kind of what it was. And just, like, all people wanted was like, tell me what to eat and tell me what to cook and yada, yada. And there was just, like, no empowerment. It was just tell me what to do. And so I realized that that was a huge block of mine. I was so afraid to call myself a health coach because I was worried that people would have that same expectation that they wanted me to just lose. Help them lose weight, to tell them what to eat.

0:15:53 - (Carly): But again, I remembered that I am an autonomous adult, and I get to make up the rules this time. And an entrepreneur means that you do something that hasn't been done. And so my goal, yeah, it is about health, but it's about women's health. It's about hormone health. It's about the science and the soul of your cycle. And it's about empowerment. I'm the girl who reminds you that you bleed with the moon and then encourage you to buy the plane ticket because the story alone is an roi.

0:16:21 - (Carly): Because fulfillment is also health. And guess what? I would not have ended up here with this level of clarity, with a mission that is so much bigger than I initially suspected. Scares kind of the shit out of me with all the ideas I have, right? It's a mission that's about preventing burnout, about not treating this band aid because we're living in a world that supports our design. It's about rewriting the rules of our health, productivity and work, right? About cutting this at the source, not just band aiding these solutions.

0:16:52 - (Carly): It's about supporting women who have chosen to leave a system that was maybe never meant for them in the first place. Unlearn society's expectations and try a new way of living, right? That sometimes choosing one priority, one merit based action can multiply. We can stop trying to do everything in all seasons, all the time, all at once. Try a new way of living, working and leading. One that's not going to sacrifice your sanity, your health or your family.

0:17:22 - (Carly): But if I didn't let myself go through all those messy actions, if I didn't trust that my actions, even the ones where I was maybe inaccurately labeling myself as a life coach, wouldn't have merit multiplying results, I trusted that I ended up. I would end up where I'm supposed to. And I've had fun in the process. This podcast is an absolute living example of all that messy action, of all the merit building results.

0:17:48 - (Carly): And now we're at over 2000 downloads and I just launched this in January and we have what this is like episode 31, something like that. That's incredible. That's merit multiplying results. In six years when I'm still doing this, who knows where that's going to be? What's 2000 times 100 million? That's a lot, right? But I've had, and I've had fun in the process and I've spent a season planting seeds and now I'm ready to harvest because that's the season that I'm in.

0:18:17 - (Carly): So all this, the point here is to tell you that you may see some changes in my work. You know, I did have a mini series inside this podcast called Feminine Freedom that really each episode was about the home work, finances and women's health. And so that really, if you want to go back and listen to those episodes, are going to be great kind of introduction, introduction into actually what I do and my mission and the work.

0:18:43 - (Carly): But yeah, you will see some changes in my work a little bit. And if you are craving this kind of cyclical approach to life, to success, to your business, however you want to apply it, whether it's being an entrepreneur, whether it's being a mom that's doing everything for everyone except herself, I'm creating something for you and it's coming very, very soon. And I'm just going to tell you, it's a free Facebook community, so if you're not already on the email list, subscribe to Weekly Brew. There is a link to that both in the show notes and then also on my Instagram bio.

0:19:16 - (Carly): So you can be the first to know when this group is launched because do not underestimate the power of support and just being surrounded by other women who are gonna help you live differently, who are not gonna call your crazy dreams and ideas crazy because we're gonna support you. And then also, if you don't follow me, be sure to follow me on Instagram. It's just Arlyeshade again, all in the show notes to stay in the loop for this Facebook group. There's also gonn program that's coming down the pipeline.

0:19:45 - (Carly): Again, merit multiplying results. That's how we got here. So thank you guys again for tuning in. I hope you enjoyed today's episode. I had a lot of fun with it. Anytime you can find some synchronicities in life, there's a lesson within that. So as always, my friends, stay bold, stay balanced, and I will see you next time.