FWEP00056 David Trotter

Today we have a really special guest with us, his name is David Trotter and he is a transformation coach and author of Empowered to Rise: The Secret to Embracing your True Identity and Recovering your Superpowers and Bringing Inspiration to the World. He’s also the host of Inspiration Rising, a podcast dedicated to inspiring women and the men who support them to rise up in life, love, and leadership. Through his Launch your Life online course and coaching experience he helps women and men overcome painful life transitions and develop a workable plan to make lasting changes. He has over 25 years of experience.
 
 
The onset of burnout
Sometimes, even if we are passionate with what we do. We can still be distracted and can feel burdened if we don’t have the right foundation. Here’s what David said:

(04:16 - 04:22)  Well, in the United States, there’s a huge desire for churches to grow to impact more people.

(04:25 - 04:48) If I as an individual am trying to fill what I would almost call a black hole inside of me through accomplishments and doing it out of a motive that’s trying to fill me up rather than doing it out of  a motive of an overflow of generosity and serving others.

(05:22 - 05:50) For me, even as a pastor I was not taking care of myself, I wasn’t taking care of my soul, I wasn’t providing myself with mental health, physical exercise, relational connectedness. I was really flowing from more of a place of drivenness trying to perform to get people to approve of me rather than coming from a place of a solid foundation.

(05:59 - 06:14)  And when I get into a place like that, it’s not healthy for me and it’s not healthy for most people and so I found myself in a just an overwhelmed, burned out place, I was disconnected from my wife, I wasn’t enjoying my kids and I hit a rock bottom.

The awareness to change
Life’s circumstances often push us to make decisions that oftentimes lead us to a messed up place, this is what happened to David:  
 
 (07:02 - 07:10) Some people move toward overeating, some people move toward gambling, alcohol, drugs these are all coping mechanisms, right? In order to make us feel better in those moments 
 
(07:11 - 07:17) For me, I actually chose to have a relationship with a woman other than my wife.
 
(07:30 - 07:33) Kinda to jump out of the plane so to speak rather than having to figure out a way to land the plane. 
 
(07:36 – 07:41) The plane was the vision that I had for my life, for the church and instead what I did was I bailed.
 
(07:45 – 07:50)  And rather than getting the help that I needed, I said, I just want to start over with my life, a fresh start. 

 (07:58 - 08:07) The woman I ended up connecting with, she ended up leaving me after about a month and I found myself unable to function in life.
 
 (08:12 – 08:32) I ended up checking myself into a mental hospital here in the United States for 3 days in order to get my head straight and clear. And it took a couple of weeks after that for me to come out of a dark place where I’ll be honest with you, I wanted to end my life. 
 
 (08:34 – 08:46) I had thrown away all my education because it was in ministry. I have thrown away my career because once you do something like that people don’t trust you. I had thrown away my marriage and the connection with my kids.
 
 (09:00 – 09:19) After a couple of weeks, something jolted within me and I started to come to my senses. I reached out to my wife and deeply apologized and sought forgiveness. I didn’t seek to come back with her, I just took responsibility for my inappropriate decisions. 
 
 The inspiration to be an inspiration
You can only be an inspiration to others and rise above your circumstances if you know your true identity.
 
 (09:54 - 10:13) If we don’t get help when we’re feeling overwhelmed and we turn to coping mechanisms or ways of trying to make ourselves feel better rather than dealing with the actual problems we end up making some decisions that hurt ourselves and hurt other people. 
 
 (10:18 – 10:36)  I don’t want other people to make choices out of desperation. I want to help women and the men who support them get the help they need before they make a decision like that and that’s what I’m all about. 
 
 (11:09 – 11:41) The key is when we embrace our true identity, we’re coming from a place of health. So, I believe that your true identity is that you are inspired, you are already inspired it’s not a matter of a feeling, it’s a matter of your identity, the word inspire means to be divinely breathed into, that there is a divine breath inside of you. And because you have a divine breath and you’ve been created by the divine whatever you call that divine.
 
 (11:50 - 12:11) Because you have been created by the divine, you are already inspired. You are already enough. You don’t have to do or be anything else to be enough, just as you are. That’s part of your identity. And you are already loved, you don’t have to do or be anything else to be loved, why? Because the divine loves you.
 
 (12:13 – 12:16) Once we embrace that identity, that’s our true identity.
 
 (14:25 – 14:45) If you have a solid foundation, then you can rise up, then you can be propelled but if I’m always trying to prove myself based on where I lived, the car I drive, the clothes that I wear, how fancy my nails are, my education, the size of my bank account, none of that matters when it comes to your true identity.
 
 Going to the next level
It takes courage to come out of darkness into the light. This is what David had to share:

(15:59 - 16:14)  What do I want to see? What do I want to do? In terms of that next level of my life. It’s not about goals, it’s about a mental picture of my preferable future. It’s a mental picture of what I want to see, what I prefer to see in the world in the future. 
 
 (16:23 – 16:26)  I’m not necessarily thinking my whole life because so many things can change
 
 (17:30 – 17:35)  So the first thing that somebody’s got to do is they’ve got to capture a vision for what they want to accomplish.
 
 3 places where negativity comes from
We all have myths that we believe in that cripple us and hinder us to pursue our dreams. Here’s what David had to say: 
 
 (19:01 – 19:05) The first one is what I call our home of origin, your family. 
 
 (19:15 – 19:34)  Our families do the best they can with the skills they have but they have certain expectations of us. Certain ways of operating and those expectations, those certain values, the ways of operating can either propel us or they can limit us.
 
(20:51- 21:01) When somebody’s getting ready to take their lives to the next level, they’ve got to look at their home of origin and say. What are those things that maybe I picked up on that are not helpful for me.  
 
(21:02 – 21:05)  The second is what I call the playground.
 
(21:35 – 21:47) There are things that happen to us early in life that stick to our minds and our hearts and we get made fun of in ways that go in one ear and out the other.
 
(22:01 – 22:12)  Words do hurt you, they hurt a lot, they hurt really bad and those can be limiting factors and beliefs that hold us back and we believe those myths. 
 
(22:23 – 22:30) The th...