The biggest mistake we make is we believe that the way we are is who we are and that we won't change. That who we are right now is who we have to be forever. And the truth is we are simply a set of patterns, a set of systems that can be changed and transformed. Number one, healthy wellness podcast.
Day check, session. You won't be on me. Hey everyone, welcome back to On Purpose where you come to listen, learn and grow. Remember we got over 500 episodes in our library.
So if you're looking to grow on a daily basis, check in to On Purpose. Today's episode is all about something that I think a lot of us deal with. How many of you have something in the back of your mind that just keeps replaying. Could be a conversation, could be an event, could be a thought.
And it just sits there in the back of your mind while you're going about your day for draining your energy. How many of you have something similar? In the sense that maybe there's someone in your life that you're worried about. Maybe they're on well.
Maybe they're going through a difficult time. And the matter whether you're at work, whether you're socializing, whether you're with your family, you keep thinking about that person and what they're going through. Hey, maybe you've moved state or country and you worried about a parent's health. You're always thinking that when you wake up in the morning there's a set of level of anxiety or overwhelm of what could happen to them.
And I can empathize without difficult that maybe. Or maybe in the back of your mind you worried that you're going to lose your job. Maybe you worry that things aren't going to work out. Maybe you worry that things are not going in the right direction.
And there's just this underlying feeling you have that just stays there in the background that super unnerving, super draining and really discouraging. Because every time you feel a glimpse of moving forward, this brings you right back. Sometimes we get hit with something that's always just in the back of our mind. Right?
And what's really interesting about this is that like I said, we all have something and it affects us in the same way. It makes our smile less large. It makes our moment of joy less pleasant. It makes our moment of escape feel fleeting and ephemeral.
And you deal with this very complex emotion. We're not going through the challenge right now. But we feel like we are every single day. We almost put ourselves through that every single day.
And that's why Seneca famously said and wrote, we suffer twice once in imagination and once in reality. The visualization of a challenge, the visualization of a moment of pain can often cause more pain if we're not using it as a processing tool. And when we don't use that as a processing tool, but we use it subconsciously, it keeps us in a state of pain. So what do we do about this?
How do we do it console? We can't get away from it. It's just something that exists there. The first thing I'm going to share with you is anything that you worry about, anything that causes you anxiety.
Don't deal with it first thing in the morning and don't deal with it the last thing at night. When we wake up in the morning, we're barely awake and we're barely prepared to deal with anything stressful. And that's why when we wake up in the morning, we check our messages frantically. When we make a call frantically, when we run around and rush around, it creates more anxiety.
It compounds that feeling of overwhelm of stress or pressure. And when we do something just before we go to bed, we're programming our subconscious to be thinking about it at night. We're programming our subconscious to be attentive and aware of it while we're asleep. So now what we've done is we've depleted our sleep, which is diminished our focus and energy, which is diminishing our intellect and our ability to deal with the situation when we wake up.
We have weakened ourselves so deeply that we don't have the ability to deal with it. So when we wake up in the morning, we want that time to be the time to set a foundation for you at maybe 15 minutes. For someone else, it may be an hour. You want your morning moments to be moments that are foundational, that are sustainable and that are consistent.
Maybe wake up every day and you write a grateful door in your journal study show that when we have grateful doors, we can't have worry filled doors at the same time. So think about that really carefully. If gratitude is renting space in your mind, worry can't rent the same space. If you're having a thankful door in your mind, anxiety can't rent the same space.
So we want to make sure that our tenant is gratitude. We want to make sure that the person staying in our home is gratitude. And this is a practice that we have to build consciously until it becomes subconscious. Here's what's really interesting about patterns of thought, patterns of behavior, patterns are people.
We have to recognize that when we were young, we subconsciously absorbed patterns that became our reality. Right? Maybe there were things your parents said. Maybe there were decisions your parents made.
Maybe there were ways they operated that defined who you were. And now what we have to do is we have to plant conscious patterns that become our subconscious. The biggest mistake we make is we believe that the way we are is who we are and that we won't change. That we are right now is who we have to be forever.
And if that's we offer ever, then there is no shift. There is no transformation. And the truth is we are simply a set of patterns, a set of systems that can be changed and transformed. As Dr.
Joe dispenser says, we have to break the habit of being yourself. He talks about it, lose your mind and create a new one. Right? We think our mind is made up.
We think our mind is what it is. But actually our mind is just made up of patterns. Our mind is just made up of thought. Our mind is just made up of subconscious beliefs that can all be reprogrammed.
And the two key times of the day that are subconscious beliefs are reprogrammed, are first in the morning and lasting in the night, especially that what you do at those two times will program your subconscious. So we want to start our day with gratitude. We want to start our day with a thankful thought. And for a grateful thought to work, it has to be expressed.
It has to be specific and it has to be personalized. When you write something in your journal, you also want to share that with someone. You want to express it to that person. Maybe you're on a text message in the morning, to that individual and express it.
You want it to be specific. Right? A lot of people could say to you, oh yeah, thanks so much. Thanks for that.
But when someone's specific, if that's your heart, if someone's happy, thank you so much for how well you made that presentation of work. It was brilliant. That goes a long way. And then you want it to be personalized.
You want it to feel like it was only about you. We all want it to feel like you can just say that to everyone else. So express specific and personalized is how gratitude has to be shared. And I think a lot of us these days, we think that a gratitude journalist, the grateful to the sky and the grateful to the plants and the moon and wherever else may be, being grateful to people is the most reciprocal form of gratitude.
Because when you get to share with someone and see the look in their eyes, when you get to see how it impacts them, can be transformational. And by the way, the way we receive gratitude is as important. And a lot of us have trained ourselves to be modest to say things like, oh no, it's nothing. It's all good.
And when we don't receive gratitude, we also don't get to give that person sharing with us a beautiful moment. I'm so lucky that so many of you come up to me when you see me around, whether a couple of weeks ago I was in Austin, I sat by Southwest. Maybe some of you saw me at Express. Maybe some of you saw me in Mexico.
And I love that you come up to me and you're telling me how much on purpose has helped you, or I don't think like a monk or a wave of love, you love reading. And when I hear that, in the beginning I always be like, yeah, yeah, no, no, thank you so much. I used to feel that that was a way to deal with it. And I realized that actually being able to say back to you, thank you so much, I'm so grateful.
I really needed that. By the way, I do need it. It means the world to me. I appreciate it so deeply.
I'm humbled by it. But I think about you, makes it a moment that we can share. And so what I'm trying to say is giving gratitude and reciprocating back with gratitude are both good for the heart. And I think if we start our mornings that way, we focus on an amplified gratitude so much that the pain we're feeling, the stress we're feeling, it's not that it goes away.
It's that we have the strength to deal with it. This is the point I want you to take on. It's not about getting rid of pain. It's not about moving on from pain.
It's not about just saying it doesn't exist anymore. It's about having the strength and the courage and the support to deal with it. Hey guys, it's Jay Shelley here. And I couldn't be more excited to share this exciting news.
You asked, we delivered. So we talked about the importance of what to do in the morning, but it's equally as important to figure out the evening. When we program our subconscious mind before we go to bed, we have the ability not only to get better rest, but to wake up feeling more energized and ready for the day. Show me about just before we go to bed, we'll do something that induces anxiety.
Maybe we'll think about or ruminate about this thing that's been on our mind. Maybe we'll watch something that makes us feel anxious. Maybe the last thing we'll say is, I really hope that doesn't happen or I'm really worried about this. And that's not something you're saying out loud, it might be to your partner or whoever you're talking to your friend on the phone, but often it's a subconscious idea.
Now, it's natural. When someone asks you the question, what's keeping you up at night? It's probably this thing. The pressure at work, the challenge with your partner, the worry about your parents, write something very real that you can't just say, I'm not going to think about it.
Write, write, say, if you don't think about it, that's the worst advice because you're like, well, Jay, that's why I'm listening, right? So what we need to do is we need to recognize that we can't remove the thought. Often we think our life is about reducing noise, right? The juicing negativity, reducing the thing that's keeping us up.
And that's actually really difficult. And what we have to do instead is we have to drown out that noise, through something else. So a good example is let's say your next little neighbor is throwing a party, or the apartment next door is throwing a party, and the music's really loud. Now, when you went over there and not to their door and say, hey, can you keep quiet for a second and try to focus?
They didn't do it, they didn't listen. And your persuasive skills didn't really work. Now, you have to choices, you can listen to that music. Or you can't listen to some of your own music.
You can have your TV, you focus on what you need to do. In the same way, you can't just drown out a thought that's perplexing you. But what you can do is you can increase the voice you want to hear. So this is where we want to subconsciously program a mind.
I remember when having to do health challenges or difficulties. I often had an affirmation before I went to bed. That said, I am happy, I am healthy, I am healed. There's something really powerful about what I am because it's an acceptance of something we're already feeling.
I want, which feels like it's in the distant future. I am happy, I am healthy, I am healing. I have repeated this affirmation to myself when I've been going through physical or mental health challenges so that I can remind myself that I'm moving in the right direction. And I have found that the repetition of that affirmation has started to consciously reprogram my mind towards moving and finding progress.
Without the repetition of that mantra and affirmation, what ends up happening is I end up stewing, I end up feeling stuck and I'm feeling like nothing's moving in the right direction. So that's definitely something to look at. What are we doing before we get it back? A lot of people say to Jeremy's friends in science, the first thing I'll ask him is, what do you watch last night?
Now, if you watch one of your favorite shows, I'm not against any shows, but I promise you that these shows are designed to create cliffhanger chemicals. What I mean by that is because it's all about what's happening in the next episode, what they're going to do. Oh my God, did you see what happened to them? Oh, will they make it right?
That's the reaction the show is going to create. Now that makes a great entertainment. What we don't realize is that a body and mind are going into that mode just before I hit its the pillow. And so now naturally your body and mind are in a safe anxiety before you go to bed.
And so that becomes your natural headspace throughout your sleep, which is then disturbed. And then when you wake up, I have also found it really interesting to program almost the code of how it went to wake up. And the example I always give is you don't set your alarm the time you wake up. You set the alarm the night before where you program something to ring or have a tone when you wake up in the morning, but you set it the night before.
In the same way, we have to set our programming and code and mindset the night before. I am waking up energized, rejuvenated, and ready for the day. I am waking up with health, vitality, and energy. Right?
Having that as your repetitive affirmation before you go to bed gives you a chance again to subconsciously program your mind to make that its code. So I highly recommend about the morning evening routine that is away from the area that's challenging you and you may require 30 minutes of time before bed and bed and bed in the morning or 15 minutes before bed is enough. Even five, actually, you know what? I'm going to get five minutes before bed and five minutes when you wake up to this journal, all your anxieties and all your thoughts to really get them off your mind.
To really get them out of your mind and onto the page. I think often we try and fix things and solve things in our mind. And what's really interesting about that is how many times have you had a re-amazing reflection or a re-amazing realization and you don't even remember it a week later. I've had this happen so many times.
If I don't note down amazing ideas, insights, thoughts, they disappear. And we think, oh, I have this idea now. I'll always understand this. The truth is it doesn't work like that.
So five minutes before bed, five minutes when you wake up, just a general of that anxiety to put it out onto the page to actually feel that release. I think we are confident that weakness never release anything. I just want to solve it in my head, I just want to deal with it, I'm just going to tolerate all of it. And the truth is you can try that, but they can feel like you're starting to carry a real weight.
And I feel that for a lot of people, we're just carrying a heavy, heavy weight. Because we keep adding to it. Right? It's not that it disappears.
If we don't release it, consciously, it's subconsciously, it continues to build and build and build. Do when we have a really tough moment, what we do want to release it. And when it comes out, it buys me luck. Maybe we take it out or someone at work.
Maybe we take it out in a friend. Right? It does come out. It always comes out.
But they may not come out in a healthy way. I think it's really important to recognize that when we have things going on, it's okay to stay busy. I think sometimes they be busy. Yeah, it's a hard time.
It's really healthy because it allows us to process it in different ways. I find that when I have a busy day, when I have a busy schedule, when I'm moving around, it allows me to make sure that I deal with what I'm struggling with at the right time, but then not let it bleed into the entire day. And that's what I mean by keeping busy. When I'm not taking a nordie issue, if we ignore the issue, it will just grow.
If we ignore the issue, it will actually get stronger and bigger in combat car. It's so important that we say busy by creating times of the day where we do focus on this. I think working out is simply being physically active when you have something to mind. Again, it allows you to release it, release that energy in a different way.
Now, a lot of people say something, especially in spiritual circles, this idea of we just have to tolerate it. We just have to accept it. And while there is truth in that, there's a beautiful statement by an amazing part of Divinity called Chetania, who says that we should be as tolerant as a tree. Now, what a lot about this statement is that a tree is extremely tolerant.
If there's longer seasons, it deals with the cold, it deals with the heat, and all the time it provides shade to others. It provides fruits to others. It tolerates that the soil around it may not be great, so the roots grow in a particular way to get into nutrients. We have to be as tolerant as a tree.
But if the thing is a tree can't move. So if tree could move, it probably would. And so if you can move, if you can change, if you can shift, we shouldn't just tolerate it except. We should learn to tolerate it except, but things we can't change.
But the things we can change, we should change. If you're dealing with an issue, it's so important to need no stone unturned in solving the problem. Often what we do is we go into acceptance before action. But it's the other way around.
If you've taken every action, you possibly can. If you've taken every action within your control, if you've taken every action that will help you, get out of a situation you're in, and then it doesn't shift, then we can practice acceptance and tolerance. But if you haven't tried everything, if you haven't pushed and questioned and then curious, right, I often find this when I'm stronger with my health, it's so easy for me to say, you know what, that's it, find anything else. And I realize there's another modality I haven't learned about.
There's another guide, there's another teacher, there's another doctor, there's another healing process that I haven't opened my mind to. Please, please, please realize this. Whatever you're dealing with, first deal with it with action. Before we get into this pseudo-spiritual place of, I accept it, I'm surrendering, we have to take action.
Right, the old statement of, the universe helps those who help themselves. We have to start helping ourselves. Before we expect help from anything else, start there. I really hope that this episode gives you a sense of courage.
I hope that it gives you a sense of comfort, and I hope that it gives you a sense of some really practical tips and insights to solve this challenge for you. I'm rooting for you, I'm always in your corner. Thanks for listening. You will also allow my interview with Charles Duhead on how to hack your brain, change any habit effortlessly, and a secret to making better decisions.
Look, can I have to do this on this because I'm scared of making the choice because I'm scared of doing the work? Where am I sitting with this? Because it just doesn't feel right yet. There's a lot of talk about mindfulness these days, which is fantastic.
I mean, we don't want to be more present in self-aware, more patient, less judgmental. We discuss all these themes on the podcast, but it's hard to actually be mindful in your day-to-day life. That's where calm comes in. I've been working with calm for a few years now with a goal of making mindfulness fun and easy.
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