Imagine not being as confident, capable, creative, strong, self-assured, or brave as you are meant to be. Imagine not fully living your life because someone else is deciding for you what is right for you. This is what happens when you give away your inner-authority to someone else.
I would know, I’ve done it. And working as a strength and fitness coach, I see people do it every day, unfortunately.
Trusting the Instagram influencer more than your own intuition. Listening to a well-meaning clinician’s advice because ‘they’re the expert’ even though there’s a voice inside you saying ” get another opinion.” Following a workout plan to the letter or doing a diet because it’s en vogue despite your body clearly telling you that this is not working for you.
We all have within us the power to know what is right for us, to listen to our inner-authority, to self-govern, to be autonomous. But there are many places where you end up giving this power away, if you’re not mindful.
Giving Away My Inner Authority
For me, I gave away my ability to be the one who decides what is right for me when I let doctors tell me that being dis-eased – dealing with chronic infections, exhaustion, gut issues, skin issues, emotional dysregulation, and much more –

was “just how I was.”
I reclaimed my ability to self-govern over the course of the decade or so that it took me to fully heal all of the things those doctors told me were not something I could heal.
And in doing so, I became so much more confident in myself, more capable of solving problems and handling tough situations, and more self-assured than ever about me, my body and what it needs from me to thrive.
So if you’re wishing you could reclaim autonomy that perhaps you didn’t realize you’d given away, I’m here to tell you that it’s not too late, you still can reclaim it. How do I know?
Because even though I had this amazing experience of claiming my inner-authority in my choices for my health and well-being, I had to learn the lesson again in business.
Learning My Lesson Again
I naively let an “expert” help me early in my career. He put out a version of my business that wasn’t me at all because “this is just how it’s done.” Does that sound anything like what those doctors said to me back then? It sure does for me now, but it didn’t at the time. Because I didn’t know what I didn’t know when it came to business.
Maybe this is how you feel about your body? You know that you don’t know what you need to know, and you’re worried you won’t figure it out.

Giving my ability to self-govern my business away to someone else caused such an incredible amount of harm… It created a ring of ripples, waves really, one after the next, that have taken a decade to subside. Those waves nearly drowned my confidence as a business owner. They made me second-guess myself far more than I should have otherwise. The never-ending waves that person caused made me exhausted from constantly trying to keep afloat as they crashed into me, one after the other.
I was too naive to trust my inner authority in business back then. I was too afraid that if I didn’t do it the way ‘they’ told you to do it, that I’d never make it. I thought there was a magic pill, so to speak, and if I could just get those answers, I’d magic pill my way forward.
There is no magic pill for your life. Not for your body, your business, your relationships, or any other part of your existence.
Reclaiming My Inner Authority
I had to break free from those doctors and from the methods of that “expert”, and start building in a healthy, holistic way. Quietly and alone for a long part of it.
And now I am long past both issues – the expert and the doctors. And there are still waves sometimes, more like ripples. But there’s also light reflecting on those ripples…

The workout and lifestyle program I created to support readers of my book truly aligns with my values, my heart, and my spirit. When I launched my lotion bars as the first Fit For Real Life skincare product, I was amazed at how effortless the process felt.
I found myself able to solve problems easily, think more creatively than I have in years, and take action more confidently than ever before.
A friend recently said to me, “you seem to be moving right along bringing your bars to life, and it looks like you’re having a good time doing it.” I felt deeply in agreement with my friend’s assessment, I was moving right along, and I was absolutely having a good time doing it.
Reflecting on that is why I wanted to write this article. I had no idea just how much letting someone else be the expert of my body and my business tamped down my ability to feel confident, capable, creative, strong, self-assured, and brave. Really, how much it negatively impacted my ability to be Me.
So if you’ve inadvertently given away your inner-authority in some area of your life, and you’re nervous about taking the first steps to start reclaiming it and taking the ownership role of that area of your life, remember that when you reclaim your inner-authority, you’re also going to reclaim a whole bunch of You.