Seen and Heard with Prue Aja

Stop Settling: The Power of Vision, Intuition, and Saying Yes to the Unknown

• Prue Aja • Episode 22

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In this solo episode, I share three powerful stories that reminded me why we must stop settling—for the wrong home, the wrong path, or the wrong life.

You’ll hear:

  • The story behind my retreat and why it took me 3 years to bring it to life.
  • A moving encounter with a Somali single mother whose grit, vision, and community support helped her build a life from nothing.
  • The beautiful lesson I received from an 80-year-old client and his wife, who trusted their intuition, bought a crumbling home in the south of France, and created a dream life.

This episode is a reminder that fear and ego will always try to keep us safe—but when we listen to the whisper of our soul and follow the breadcrumbs of excitement, life opens up in magical ways.

✨ Key Themes:

  • What happens when you stop settling and start listening to your intuition.
  • How community can be the key to building wealth and security.
  • The emotional and energetic cost of ignoring your dreams.
  • Why clear vision and playful trust are essential ingredients for manifestation.

📍 Whether you’re craving change, building something new, or just need a little push to trust yourself again—this one’s for you.

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To work directly with me, bookings are available at https://www.prueaja.com

Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Seen and Heard podcast, created for you if you're a consultant, coach or creative and want to enhance your connection to your higher self, evolve your mindset and embody your personal brand, creating freedom, fulfillment and success. Whether you're leveling up or navigating a new chapter, this podcast helps you own your power and show up confidently to be seen and heard. I'm your host, pruaja, personal brand coach, photographer and motivational speaker. Hello, there are three stories I want to share with you from this big week I've just had. I was in Melbourne Monday to Wednesday doing photo shoots and also getting my hair done. So I'm going to start with.

Speaker 1:

I was watching the film the Life List on the flight on the way home, and one of the quotes that really stood out to me was settling is never going to make the fear and the pain go away. I don't know if you resonate with this, but I definitely feel it myself, and sometimes we get this little niggle or this download of an idea of something that we really want to do, but then the ego gets in the way and goes you can't do that, that's stupid, that's not safe, you're not going to make money from that. How are you going to pay your bills? How are you going to survive? Who's going to? You know? Come along on this trip or this adventure. An example of this is the retreat that I ran last year and I cannot wait to run the next one. The idea for that retreat downloaded in 2021, sitting in my apartment in another lockdown in Melbourne, feeling pretty scared, not knowing what was going to happen. And, yeah, I just had this insight. I created the landing page straight away and it was just there. But then there was so much fear in putting it out into the world, thinking is anyone going to like this? How much do I charge? And all of that, and it took three years to actually bring it to life.

Speaker 1:

So I want you to think about if there's something inside of you right now that is niggling you, going, hey, you should do this, and you're ignoring it. Because when you keep ignoring it as well, I find it shows up in other ways. It causes pain and it can cause physical pain and it can cause sickness, and because we push it down and it goes into areas of our body and blocks that energy flow and causes aches and pains. And this is where, like emotional healing stuff comes in and I really believe in the work of that. I know whenever I've been in trouble, kinesiology and energy work has really helped clear it because it's always related back to an emotional issue.

Speaker 1:

So that was something that I want to share with you that don't settle. Don't settle for good enough. Make sure you are getting what you want. I think it's showing up right now actually as well, because we've been looking to move a little bit closer to the beach and we found a dream place in December to rent but they didn't allow dogs so we couldn't move in it. But it just set a benchmark for what we want. So between myself, my daughter and my partner, we've got our dream wish list of exactly like our non-negotiables, our wh, whimsical or nice to have, and yeah. So every time I look somewhere it has to tick all of the boxes, at least in the non-negotiable. So that was in December. It's now April and we still haven't found a place. But it's because I'm not settling. We've seen a few that made it 80% through the list. I'm like it's not good enough. I'm not. You know, moving is a big ordeal. It's a takes a lot of energy and then it also takes time to really integrate and settle into your new home and make it feel like your own space and you want to be there for a couple of years as well. So making sure that it's right. We're not settling on a home. So don't you settle in relationships, your work, the clients you're working, the offers that you're doing, even if you're really well known for what it is that you do. If you've outgrown it, it's fine to move on, and that's something that I help people with.

Speaker 1:

Another really inspiring thing that happened this week is one of my Uber or it was actually a DD driver who drove me from Melbourne city to my hairdresser in Northcote and he she was from Somalia, muslim. The reason I tell you that is because it relates to her story. So her parents moved to Australia when she was 17 and she fell pregnant just before they moved. And they got to Australia, found out that she was pregnant at 17. New country can't speak English, doesn't know anyone, and her parents kick her out of home. Speak English, doesn't know anyone and her parents kick her out of home. So I can't even imagine how scary and terrifying that is. Luckily, someone took her in, took her to Centrelink, got her set up. They put her in a home so that she was somewhere safe and then a few years later she had I'm guessing they were twin boys, because she said she's got three kids and the other ones were eight. So, um, she had them, but then she's not with that father anymore either. So she's got three kids, 32, driving a dd car.

Speaker 1:

But the inspiring part is she has worked hard and showed up and given everything to her kids to give them the best life possible. She's bought a four-bedroom home she also had just bought we were driving around in a new hybrid Toyota Kluger, which she bought outright for $70,000. Bred Toyota Kluger, which she bought outright for $70,000. And I was like, wow, I know people in their forties, like friends of mine, who don't own property, don't have a brand new car, don't even have kids. You know a single and have all this money but still complaining about not having enough money.

Speaker 1:

And here's this woman that came here at 17, was kicked out of home, had absolutely nothing, and is now a single mom of three kids and a four-bedroom home in the inner city well, kind of inner city. Um, you know she is working six days a week in a pretty hard job in a factory, but she doesn't care. She's got her goals, her vision, what she works towards, and she says that she doesn't ever hesitate to spend money on her children, like she'll take them shopping and spend two thousand dollars and buy them clothes, like everything and anything that they want and need. And her daughter's the same age as my daughter, is doing really well at school, wants to be a doctor um, she has a tutor for her a couple of days a week and I'm just like, wow, you are so, so inspiring.

Speaker 1:

But what really stood out to me was understanding how she was able to buy a home. I guess because she had a job so she was able to get a mortgage. But it was really interesting. So there's a community that she's a part of of 20 people and so to help her get the hundred thousand dollar deposit for her house, everyone threw in five thousand dollars each, and so there's one woman that manages the money and helps people be able to have that chunk of money. And I realized like if 20 of my friends got together and we all put in five grand each so one of our friends could buy a home and be safe and secure, I would do that, and it just makes me so frustrated the lack of community that we have in our Australian culture, especially having a partner from Argentina with an Italian heritage, and the strong family and community values they have, and it just really makes me realize how much we don't have that in Australia, um, but anyway, so that's what they do. They get together and then she pays back $500 a fortnight to that group, um, and then, yeah, it kind of goes around to each individual.

Speaker 1:

I want to get more details than that, because I think that's a really powerful way for women to come together and help each other as well and also just knowing, like, when you don't have family I don't really have much family um that you've got people that have got your back when you need it too. So what's that shown me is the importance of saving money and being really disciplined with money and really setting yourself up for life, and no one's got any excuses not to do that. Community and coming together together, helping one another, and just how lucky we are in Australia. Our opportunities that we have compared to, I would say, 80% of the rest of the world, is so incredible. So I think when people have come from other countries that don't have as many opportunities as us, it's really good to learn from them and be reminded what is available here for us.

Speaker 1:

Then the other thing, little story I wanted to share. I met with a new client yesterday. They are a lovely older couple and I can say that because he's 80 and he's starting another business which I'm helping him do the brand for for a skincare range, and they just told me a really beautiful story. They lived in France for the last 10 years after selling one of their other businesses, and he rides motorbikes. So they're down in the south of France and they weren't planning on living in this certain area but they're out riding one day.

Speaker 1:

And then it got to five in the afternoon and they pulled into this cute little village in town like oh, this is quite nice here. And there was a real estate agent right there. They were just about to close and they said, hey, we're actually looking to buy a house. And they said come back tomorrow morning, I've got three houses for you. The next morning they went back. There were three houses. The first one they went to it was all run down. It was a huge property and this big fence kind of falling apart and all overgrown. So it was a deceased estate that had just completely run down and they looked at it and just said we'll take it. And so they spent the next 10 years renovating it and having this beautiful life.

Speaker 1:

I was really curious about, you know, being isolated in another country, not speaking English again, because this is something I'm planning on doing with my partner. We're planning on living in Italy and they said it was amazing. They were introduced into the community very easily. Their next door neighbor had recently lost she'd lost her husband, so she really took them under her wing and they took her under their wing as well, with her now being single, like creating that home and that family and connection and community for her too. So they had an absolutely beautiful life over there and they're just ready to come home back to Australia, to Bangalore, as their grandkids were getting older.

Speaker 1:

But what I love about this is how, when you just trust your intuition, you follow your heart, you follow those things that really light you up. The universe opens up to you and these little, you know, moments that happen that lead you to the next step in the journey, and it should be easy. This is the thing manifesting and bringing things into our life's, like you know, having an idea in mind, surrendering and not pushing for it as well, and trusting in the process and following those little breadcrumbs that light us up is similar to how I met my partner. We met on a flight. I was on my way to Antarctica in 2023.

Speaker 1:

So it was a very last minute decision to go.

Speaker 1:

It was a very last minute flight.

Speaker 1:

I booked, went and I was so excited.

Speaker 1:

I was following that energy that was lighting me up. I was in that high vibration because I was excited as well, and we sat next to each other on a flight and we've pretty much been together and connected ever since and everything has always just been really easy, for our relationship as well. It was never one of those ones that I'm like oh, what do I write back to this message? There were no red flags, there's been no anxiety. It's definitely been passionate arguments, but it's good because these emotions just come up and get cleared and processed and they're done and we move on and we just grow closer together.

Speaker 1:

Anyway, I'm going a little bit off track, so I just wanted to share those little magical things about not settling, trusting in the process, being clear on your vision and what you're creating and things will work out for you. If this episode has inspired and motivated you and you know it could help someone in your network. Please share it on your favorite social media platform. To explore other ways you can work with me as a personal branding coach or photographer, visit Pruajacom or join one of my personal brand transformation retreats where you reinvent yourself and walk away feeling excited and energized, with clarity on who you are and photos to show the world. Thank you for tuning in and remember to own your power and shine your light. I'm your host, pruaja.