You’ve heard of the glass ceiling?  Something you can’t see and yet prevents women from attaining the top positions?  Well, I discovered a nylon ceiling.  One that is equally invisible and keeps us from reaching our potential.  And what’s worse, it’s just flexible enough to let us grow – a little.  If you want to grow more than that?  You have to break free from that nylon ceiling.  Your upper limit.  On this episode, I talk about how I got caught, and what you can do to break free.

Play Episode

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

On This Episode

Rhythm of Life – Coming Home
Random Riffs – Go Ahead…Jump
Feature Segment – Break Free – Past Your Upper Limit

Today’s Quote

It’s not whether you get knocked down.  It’s whether you get up.  –Vince Lombardi

Rhythm of Life – It Was Like Coming Home

Have you ever gone to a conference or trade show and felt like you simply didn’t belong?  Like others are so much more successful, have their acts more together, and are more confident?  Oh, and everyone else is there with friends and you’re there alone?

That’s happened to me on more than one occasion.  Enough that I’ve been realizing that I need to set clear intentions before I go, and pray too.  I did that before I attended a recent conference in Los Angeles, called Voice Of Success.

And this time I didn’t feel bad.  I didn’t feel alone, even though I went not knowing a soul.  I felt at home.  Listen to the episode to hear why,

There’s an important lesson here.  Sometimes we feel out of place because of insecurity. Because we’re new at something and intimidated by others’ success.  Sometimes we feel out of place because it’s simply not where we belong.  It’s not home.

You might want to gently explore those feelings of “not home”.  Pay attention to what you feel when you walk into a room.  Attend a conference or meeting.  Or do something you haven’t done before.  It’s all good information.  Don’t ignore it.  Explore it.  You may see something you’ve never seen before.  It could even change the course of your life.

Random Riffs – Go Ahead…Jump

A quote I’ve seen a lot lately is this one by Theodore Roosevelt:  “Failure is not falling down, but refusing to get back up.”

That got me thinking about an old song from the 80s.  Listen to the segment and see if you can guess what it is.

And, in case you want to sing along, here’s a link to the YouTube video.

Feature Segment – Break Free – Past Your Upper Limit

You’ve heard of the glass ceiling – invisible yet ever-present barrier to women reaching the top.  I found another ceiling.  I call it the nylon ceiling.  It’s also invisible like glass, but not as rigid.  It doesn’t break either.  It stretches with us a little but doesn’t let us go too far in any one direction and catches us in its net.

It can even look like safety net.  But it isn’t.  I got caught in it the other day.  I’m sharing my story so you can recognize the signs of the nylon ceiling and learn from my experience.  Find a way out.  Break free from your upper limit.

I’ve taken several actions since I left my job in December.  Many are to help me grow in places that have stagnated while I was working.  Some has to do with my voice.  It’s taken a beating between grief, stress, insomnia, and my voice teacher dying of Alzheimer’s.

So I haven’t been sitting around doing nothing.  I’ve been moving forward.  And I took some pretty definitive actions when I returned from the conference.  I was proud of myself.

Except I couldn’t sleep.  Why not?

Dr. Gay Hendricks would say I was bumping up against my Upper Limit.  We talked about his book, The Big Leap in Episode 034.

You know how I told you in Episode 086 to observe and ask questions?  Now would be a good time.  Ask myself “What reasons can I think of for now sleeping last night?  Possibly an Upper Limit Problem?”

Now I took an even bolder action.  Prayed.  And got an answer that was better than I could have even imagined.  And I celebrated…for about an hour.  Now I saw that I was hitting my upper limit.  Was trapped in the Nylon Ceiling.

Maybe this happens to you too.  Here are 6 secrets to breaking free from your upper limit.

1. Observe and question. Go back to Episode 086 to hear more about that.
2. Look at symptoms and timing.
3. Identify the root cause.
4. Reaffirm your Why.
5. Overcome negativity with truth.
6. Default to action.

Any time an Upper Limit Problem rears ugly head, take these actions.  Not just once.  As often as needed.

You got this.  I believe in you.  Break free from your Upper Limit today.

Have you seen evidence of a Nylon Ceiling in your life? Share in the comments.