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121: Don’t Wait: Stop Living Like Your Real Life Starts Later · The Everyday Awesome Project

• 0:26
  Samantha Pruitt: Hey superstars, welcome back.
• 0:28
  Samantha Pruitt: Polly here.
• 0:29
  Samantha Pruitt: Sam Pruitt in the house.
• 0:31
  Samantha Pruitt: Y'all.
• 0:32
  Samantha Pruitt: Yo, yo, yo.
• 0:33
  Polly Mertens: What's up?
• 0:34
  Polly Mertens: You guys, today's a little bit of a uh sharing more on the thread of what we've been talking about this year.
• 0:41
  Polly Mertens: Oh, Sam's trying to show the book.
• 0:42
  Polly Mertens: So if you're watching this on our YouTube channel, uh The Five Invitations is the book that we're both studying, reading as a part of A Year to Live, a wonderful program that you're in, the Buddhist that you are.
• 0:55
  Polly Mertens: And today we're gonna dive into the first one.
• 0:57
  Polly Mertens: So we're gonna do this as a series.
• 0:58
  Polly Mertens: So stay tuned for all of those.
• 1:00
  Polly Mertens: And what's our first one?
• 1:01
  Polly Mertens: What's the first invitation?
• 1:02
  Samantha Pruitt: Number one.
• 1:04
  Samantha Pruitt: I know.
• 1:07
  Samantha Pruitt: Number one, don't wait.
• 1:08
  Samantha Pruitt: So, real quick, what the five invitations is, is discovering what death can teach you about living fully.
• 1:15
  Samantha Pruitt: Okay.
• 1:16
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, one of the Dharma teachers in the course I'm taking is Frank Astasecchi.
• 1:23
  Samantha Pruitt: He is also the author of this book.
• 1:25
  Samantha Pruitt: I am in love with Frank.
• 1:27
  Samantha Pruitt: It should publicly be known that millions of people are in love with Frank.
• 1:32
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, he is a phenomenal human being and forever was um part of and one of the founders of the Zen Hospice program in San Francisco.
• 1:43
  Samantha Pruitt: And he wrote this book um pretty early on in the game here about his own experience of what he was hearing and seeing and witnessing and being part of as he did this work with the dying.
• 1:57
  Samantha Pruitt: So it's an incredibly powerful book.
• 2:00
  Samantha Pruitt: It's not depressing.
• 2:01
  Samantha Pruitt: Okay, some people would be like, I can't read it, it has the word death in it.
• 2:06
  Samantha Pruitt: I can't gotta run the other way.
• 2:08
  Samantha Pruitt: No, it's not at all that.
• 2:09
  Samantha Pruitt: It's absolutely a call to live.
• 2:12
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, a thousand percent it is a call to live, and to just be honest about what is real in the humanity of living and dying.
• 2:21
  Samantha Pruitt: And it's incredibly inspiring, highly motivating, beautiful work, beautiful.
• 2:26
  Polly Mertens: Yeah, yeah, it's gotten just so many praise.
• 2:28
  Polly Mertens: Like I I went through it so not quickly, but you know, it's it's uh not a light read, but it's way easier to read than the uh year to live for me anyway.
• 2:38
  Polly Mertens: So I just loved, you know, consuming it each night.
• 2:41
  Polly Mertens: And there were times where I was, you know, reminiscing, and times I was just, you know, it's so moving, like the things that it has you think about, right?
• 2:49
  Polly Mertens: You know, from I mean, and it's such an area of life and the world that we don't often spend a lot of time in.
• 2:56
  Polly Mertens: Like this guy's been over in this part of life that, you know, and he's got a lot of stuff to teach us and bring back, you know, it's like when people get really specialized in something and this specialized knowledge.
• 3:07
  Polly Mertens: And like you said, the subtitle of this book is Discovering What Death Can Teach Us About Living Fully.
• 3:13
  Polly Mertens: And this is like, hey, y'all, I've been over here learning this stuff.
• 3:18
  Polly Mertens: Like, like I y'all need to know this, you know, like this is this is what matters, right?
• 3:23
  Samantha Pruitt: It's so beautiful.
• 3:25
  Samantha Pruitt: He does storytelling and he does have it, just how he does it is really eloquent, also.
• 3:31
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, I decided to do two things because I'm not in a hurry to absorb this information, right?
• 3:36
  Samantha Pruitt: I have a year to do be in this program, and I really want to, you know, be in it.
• 3:40
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, um, so I am reading it, yes.
• 3:43
  Samantha Pruitt: And then I'm also doing the audio book, which is in Frank's voice.
• 3:48
  Samantha Pruitt: That's also really lovely since he's one of my Dharma teachers.
• 3:51
  Samantha Pruitt: Like, so hanging out with Frank is also very nice.
• 3:54
  Samantha Pruitt: And how he reads his own book, yeah, is it's very well done.
• 3:57
  Samantha Pruitt: So either of those are available, of course.
• 4:00
  Samantha Pruitt: Or wait till the next class and take it.
• 4:02
  Samantha Pruitt: I don't know if Frank will be part of that next year, but he might be.
• 4:06
  Polly Mertens: There was something lovely when I switched.
• 4:07
  Polly Mertens: I probably led I read half the book ready reading it and then listened to the other half in audio.
• 4:13
  Polly Mertens: And I'm really glad and I I would listen to the audio again and again.
• 4:17
  Polly Mertens: Um, it just there's something about it that it comes to life when he speaks it versus you know trying to interpret it through my own mind and just the words on the page.
• 4:27
  Polly Mertens: So anyway, enough on that.
• 4:28
  Polly Mertens: But but let's start with don't wait, because I love where you where you want to go with this and why this topic.
• 4:34
  Polly Mertens: Um, like, well, A, we're it's part of the series we're gonna do, but like what is don't wait?
• 4:39
  Polly Mertens: You have some thoughts on the like what that means, especially with your background in Buddhist studies and stuff.
• 4:46
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, I mean, a core foundational principle of Buddhism is impermanence, that everything is impermanent.
• 4:53
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, we human beings, obviously, we are interconnected with nature, and we are of the nature to disappear, but also to change, to continuously change.
• 5:06
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, as every single thing around us, a hundred percent of everything around us is changing.
• 5:12
  Samantha Pruitt: I mean, people have this idea that things are like fixed and material things last last forever and all that.
• 5:18
  Samantha Pruitt: None of that is true.
• 5:19
  Polly Mertens: I mean, you can just stray it the way it is, it's always been, it's always gonna be like you know.
• 5:24
  Polly Mertens: I mean, definitely there's people that you're like, okay, they're in a rut, they're not changing.
• 5:28
  Polly Mertens: Okay, so maybe there's some people that are on neutral.
• 5:32
  Samantha Pruitt: Well, we know people can get emotionally stuck, but nonetheless, their body, yeah, their physiology, and in fact, even what they are experiencing moment to moment is forever and constantly changing.
• 5:45
  Samantha Pruitt: To me, that's an incredibly powerful gift when you really not only understand that, but when you bring that into your being, like you say, okay, I'm gonna live from that place of understanding that um my thoughts, my ideas, my pain and suffering, my joy, my physical body, my things, the people that I love, the outdoors that I love so much, it's forever changing.
• 6:11
  Samantha Pruitt: And it will give you a sense of, I mean, it kind of blows your mind.
• 6:17
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah.
• 6:18
  Samantha Pruitt: And it can be disruptive for people a little bit to go there, but you need to go there because it's what is reality.
• 6:24
  Samantha Pruitt: And then all of a sudden you just feel like everything is so precious and beautiful and remarkable, and also it's liberating to know, oh, this suffering or pain is going to pass.
• 6:35
  Samantha Pruitt: These crazy ideas or stories I'm telling myself or whatever, it's gonna pass.
• 6:39
  Samantha Pruitt: It will all pass.
• 6:41
  Polly Mertens: Yeah.
• 6:41
  Polly Mertens: Yeah.
• 6:42
  Polly Mertens: Yeah.
• 6:42
  Polly Mertens: And I think um, you know, in permanence, um, I get you like things and whatever, but like um like the people in our life, you know, you know, it's interesting you and I were noticing how, you know, you signed up for this program.
• 6:56
  Polly Mertens: You signed up in October.
• 6:58
  Polly Mertens: So like you could kind of say, you know, you're halfway through or, you know, halfway into like the study of it or the expression, you know, understanding it, and that and your brother has passed away since you signed up for that, right?
• 7:09
  Polly Mertens: And uh like just looking at like how many people we know that things are happening, you know, that impermanence in their own life around us.
• 7:17
  Polly Mertens: You know, I've got kitty cats are getting sick, you know, and you've got another friend that's diagnosed with cancer and blah, blah, blah, right?
• 7:23
  Polly Mertens: And um, it really puts it in front of you, right?
• 7:26
  Polly Mertens: Instead of like this off, you know, and I don't know if you want to tell the story about the friend that you're talking with recently who, you know, we get up to these lives that things are going, going, going, right.
• 7:36
  Polly Mertens: And we've got plenty of projects and all these things to do, whether it's, you know, you got plans for the next 20 summers of your life or whatever, or you just don't even look out in front because you're so busy with what you're doing right now.
• 7:47
  Polly Mertens: And then you get these wake-up calls called, you know, life interruptions, diseases or whatnot that remind us about the impermanence.
• 7:56
  Polly Mertens: And then the the context shifts.
• 8:00
  Polly Mertens: Like once you have that diagnosis, you know, I think the beauty you and I have is we don't have a diagnosis right now.
• 8:07
  Polly Mertens: So, but we are in the study of this and we can look at people who have, and then we can reflect it on our on our own selves.
• 8:14
  Polly Mertens: You know, like we put ourselves into this program, and then it's like in that context called you have one year to live, like what do you want to be doing?
• 8:23
  Polly Mertens: Like, what matters, right?
• 8:25
  Samantha Pruitt: And it doesn't have to be a diagnosis.
• 8:27
  Samantha Pruitt: I mean, you can use something as simple as, um, well, I hurt my backbuster, but let's say today I was out doing my long run, okay, and let's say, and I'm working towards some very specific goals, right?
• 8:39
  Samantha Pruitt: Physical challenging goals for this year.
• 8:42
  Samantha Pruitt: And if I were to have sprained my ankle in the moment just called today, just doing my regular trail run, right?
• 8:52
  Samantha Pruitt: All of the things at that second, the minute, the second that happened, everything would have changed, right?
• 8:59
  Samantha Pruitt: So this is always happening.
• 9:00
  Samantha Pruitt: I'm using my example of like, oh, sprain an ankle, and all of a sudden I can't do the John Muir, maybe in or whatever the hell the thing is, right?
• 9:10
  Samantha Pruitt: All the time throughout the day, things are always changing, and we suffer because we try and stop things from changing.
• 9:22
  Samantha Pruitt: We try to hold on to as tight as we can.
• 9:26
  Samantha Pruitt: We have this idea, first of all, that we have control.
• 9:28
  Samantha Pruitt: Yes, we have agency over our lives, but we don't have control.
• 9:31
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, these are two very different things.
• 9:33
  Samantha Pruitt: Agency and control are not the same thing, people.
• 9:36
  Samantha Pruitt: Hello.
• 9:37
  Samantha Pruitt: And so we grasp and grasp and hold on to, but I want it to be this way, but it needs to be this way, but da da da, whatever the story is, right?
• 9:45
  Samantha Pruitt: And that's when the suffering comes.
• 9:49
  Samantha Pruitt: The mental and emotional suffering, right?
• 9:52
  Polly Mertens: Yeah, it shows up in that gap between expectation and reality.
• 9:57
  Polly Mertens: Like that's what I'm discovering is like suffering is you expect something, you want something, you have attachment, as the Buddhists would say.
• 10:04
  Polly Mertens: You have attachment to an outcome.
• 10:06
  Polly Mertens: It was gonna happen like this.
• 10:07
  Polly Mertens: We were gonna go on this trip, this race I was gonna run, or whatever.
• 10:11
  Polly Mertens: I'm gonna get this.
• 10:12
  Samantha Pruitt: My marriage was gonna be perfect, and I was gonna forget my children.
• 10:16
  Samantha Pruitt: We were gonna be perfect.
• 10:17
  Samantha Pruitt: You could literally think of a thousand things and one thing.
• 10:20
  Polly Mertens: Yeah, and so that attachment to the outcome, the expectation, if you will, in our mind, right?
• 10:24
  Polly Mertens: It's all a figment of our mind, because you're right.
• 10:26
  Polly Mertens: Like none, it's all just zeros and ones out there.
• 10:28
  Polly Mertens: It's all just you know, energy, whatever you want to call it, right?
• 10:32
  Polly Mertens: You're not there yet.
• 10:33
  Polly Mertens: But then the suffering is oh, that, you know, like the path to that, that outcome that we had in mind ain't happening.
• 10:40
  Polly Mertens: And so I when I want to introduce, so my word for the year is wonder.
• 10:44
  Polly Mertens: And I think this is really a great, you know, attachment to this is you know, in the world of impermanence, in the world of like you have no, let's say, control or whatever, staying in wonder and curiosity.
• 10:57
  Polly Mertens: Like, I notice it when like I'm counseling with clients and stuff, and they get themselves all worked up when you know something happens, you know, like bad news, a lawsuit, somebody's leaving, but whatever, whatever.
• 11:10
  Polly Mertens: And I'm just like, okay, like, yeah, just let's go.
• 11:13
  Polly Mertens: Okay, that's the like okay, you can have your moment or two days or whatever it takes you to like d-ding, you know, rebound emotionally and let's go, you know, like okay, it's it's a it's a speed bump, right?
• 11:26
  Polly Mertens: Instead of a roadblock or whatever it turns into.
• 11:30
  Polly Mertens: But we turn it into more, you know, part with the suffering and then part just the anguish, the anguish that we create.
• 11:37
  Polly Mertens: And I'm just like, all right, what are we gonna do?
• 11:39
  Polly Mertens: Like, so what?
• 11:40
  Polly Mertens: Now what?
• 11:40
  Samantha Pruitt: You know?
• 11:41
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah.
• 11:42
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, talking to this friend who's currently in the hospital right now receiving chemo for five days straight.
• 11:47
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, we were talking about the hospital experience.
• 11:50
  Samantha Pruitt: And there's other people in the treatment center that are resisting, not really wanting it, you know, angry about it, the diagnosis, the treatment, all the things, right?
• 12:03
  Samantha Pruitt: So they're being difficult and they're yelling, and they're screaming, they're just not being nice to the caretakers.
• 12:07
  Samantha Pruitt: Like all of this chaotic stuff is happening.
• 12:09
  Samantha Pruitt: And my friends over here are going literally like, I couldn't be more grateful, I couldn't be more in awe of these people, I couldn't be more receptive to the care I'm getting, like a complete opposite.
• 12:20
  Samantha Pruitt: So we were just discussing it.
• 12:22
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah.
• 12:23
  Samantha Pruitt: And the people who are angry and upset and all the things, you know, they're in resistance to what is true, which is they have a disease and that they have decided to be on a treatment protocol that is very challenging.
• 12:38
  Samantha Pruitt: They, you know, the truth that they have a disease is the truth that they have a disease, you know.
• 12:45
  Samantha Pruitt: So fighting that and pretending that that's not real is not helpful.
• 12:48
  Samantha Pruitt: And then the fact that they made a choice to get the treatment, but yet are pissed off about it, is also incredibly unhelpful.
• 12:54
  Polly Mertens: Like it's just an endless flow of not helping your not helping your energy state.
• 12:59
  Polly Mertens: I'm sorry.
• 12:59
  Polly Mertens: Yeah.
• 12:59
  Samantha Pruitt: But this happens all the time with people in life.
• 13:02
  Samantha Pruitt: In we're talking about uh you were talking about a business environment where it's things change moment to moment in the workplace.
• 13:13
  Samantha Pruitt: Hello.
• 13:14
  Samantha Pruitt: First of all, have you seen something called the news in the economy?
• 13:20
  Samantha Pruitt: That's a whole other it's complicated.
• 13:23
  Samantha Pruitt: There's a lot of things going on in these spaces, right?
• 13:26
  Samantha Pruitt: There's a lot of complexity to it.
• 13:27
  Samantha Pruitt: And this idea that we think that we can have things go a certain way at all times and keep everything within the guardrails is a false thing.
• 13:39
  Samantha Pruitt: It's just not reality.
• 13:41
  Polly Mertens: You know, um, you just remind me, I don't know why this kicked this off for me.
• 13:45
  Polly Mertens: So my two two of my other words for this year, um, like I have a little family of them, but wonder is the number one, is um flow and flourish.
• 13:53
  Polly Mertens: So those are two of my other ones.
• 13:54
  Polly Mertens: And when I think about what you just said, is like, you know, like life, river, whatever energy, like wants to flow.
• 14:03
  Polly Mertens: Like if you think of, you know, like um a sound going across the airwaves or whatever, it's when you introduce resistance that like you can't hear this tone or the sound, you know, or like you you muffle something or whatever.
• 14:13
  Polly Mertens: And it's like they're just introducing this resistance in their own body, right?
• 14:16
  Polly Mertens: In their life.
• 14:17
  Polly Mertens: And it's like, how can I be with the flow?
• 14:20
  Polly Mertens: Like, and then you flourish when you're with life, when you're with what's happening, when you're not resisting, not fighting your own.
• 14:27
  Polly Mertens: Like, okay, this is this is okay, what's so?
• 14:29
  Polly Mertens: So what?
• 14:30
  Polly Mertens: Okay, now what do we do?
• 14:31
  Samantha Pruitt: I have to read this quote because as you were talking, I was like, this is from Frank's book.
• 14:36
  Samantha Pruitt: Of course it is.
• 14:37
  Samantha Pruitt: The Persian poet Galib wrote, For the raindrop, joy is in entering the river.
• 14:47
  Samantha Pruitt: Talk about beautiful and flow.
• 14:50
  unknown: Wow.
• 14:50
  Samantha Pruitt: The raindrop doesn't want to just drop on the sidewalk and then dissipate and be gone.
• 14:54
  Samantha Pruitt: It wants to be in the river.
• 14:55
  Polly Mertens: Say it, you said it, and I I was somewhat present to it, but say it again because I want I want to take it in.
• 15:01
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah.
• 15:02
  Samantha Pruitt: And then I just put okay, ready?
• 15:04
  Samantha Pruitt: Persian poet Galib G-H-A-L-I-B.
• 15:09
  Samantha Pruitt: He wrote for the raindrop joy is in entering the river.
• 15:17
  Samantha Pruitt: Oh my god.
• 15:19
  Samantha Pruitt: That's what I would envision.
• 15:21
  Polly Mertens: Those little raindrops out here.
• 15:23
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, right.
• 15:24
  Samantha Pruitt: Well, we're all part of the river if we so choose.
• 15:29
  Samantha Pruitt: Okay, and talk about always forever changing and impermanence.
• 15:34
  Samantha Pruitt: You know, a body of water is a perfect example of that, and we are all just pieces within the body of water.
• 15:39
  Samantha Pruitt: But I think why we really want to talk about the number one invitation of don't wait is you'll be waiting around for shit.
• 15:48
  Samantha Pruitt: I don't know what is going on out there.
• 15:50
  Samantha Pruitt: Okay, people are sitting on their rear ends, whether they're literally sitting or they're psychologically, emotionally sitting, not living their lives.
• 16:02
  Samantha Pruitt: They are literally hanging out as if time is endless and that their life is coming soon to a theater near you.
• 16:14
  Samantha Pruitt: What is going on, Polly?
• 16:16
  Polly Mertens: Well, and I think too, I want to just add to that.
• 16:19
  Polly Mertens: So there's the ones that are, you know, like I have family members that do the sitting and parking yourself in front of the boob tube, you know, the TV, and that's called a life, right?
• 16:29
  Polly Mertens: And that, you know, that's like the waiting.
• 16:31
  Polly Mertens: And then there's some that are, let's call it waiting, putting it off by having so much to do, other things to do.
• 16:37
  Samantha Pruitt: Like other busy, busy, busy, busy.
• 16:39
  Polly Mertens: Yeah, yeah.
• 16:40
  Polly Mertens: Or a misalignment, or, you know, either societal expectations, thinking, you know, looking good, you know, what the what what are other people doing, whatever they're doing, you know, that doesn't have them prioritizing what's most important and meaningful, right?
• 16:54
  Polly Mertens: Like living, because I think one of the things you had said before we went on air about your friend who has this diagnosis is, you know, he was very moved by a visit with his son recently.
• 17:05
  Polly Mertens: Whereas, like, you know, you get up to all these things and stuff.
• 17:08
  Polly Mertens: And then when the most meaningful people in your life, like your son, do something or share something, or you know, you have time with them in this context called like, I'm fighting for my life, like, whoa, like it has a totally new meaning.
• 17:22
  Polly Mertens: Like, I remember when my kitty cat was passing away, right?
• 17:26
  Polly Mertens: And I had all these wonderful years with her, right?
• 17:28
  Polly Mertens: And lots of time to hang out and whatever.
• 17:31
  Polly Mertens: And then towards the end, I was like, Oh my God, I need to take some videos.
• 17:34
  Polly Mertens: And so like you, like it, the lens helps you really see, like, like I know some people like I have some friends that don't leave the house because they want to like, you know, be with their pet and all that.
• 17:45
  Polly Mertens: I mean, I'm saying like at the end, sure, sure, sure, but like they really, you know, close themselves down.
• 17:49
  Polly Mertens: Like I I stopped doing vacations and stuff because I just want to be home.
• 17:53
  Polly Mertens: At a certain point, but just having the lens through which you see your everyday life are the things that you're making yourself busy with, or you're you know, and spending your time not doing, you know, just sort of like sitting around on the couch, like you said, not being in action towards what's meaningful.
• 18:09
  Samantha Pruitt: Um what is real.
• 18:14
  Polly Mertens: It's two different ways of doing it.
• 18:15
  Polly Mertens: So I guess one you had you had said a quote before we started about like the antithesis antidote to regret.
• 18:22
  Polly Mertens: What was that line, you know, because like one of the things that people often say is the biggest regrets when they die, right?
• 18:29
  Polly Mertens: And so I think this conversation for both of us is you know what you you don't want to get to the end and then have these regrets.
• 18:37
  Polly Mertens: Okay, so you now take a conscious look at what would you regret doing, saying, being being involved with expressing, creating, whatever.
• 18:45
  Polly Mertens: But pay attention to it.
• 18:46
  Polly Mertens: So as you're going forward in your life, those things are unfolding.
• 18:50
  Polly Mertens: You have no regret because you had the forethought you took advantage of this thing called life and got up to whatever it is, or you just could be small things, like not, you know, like I was out um kayaking last weekend with my friend Jill, and I'm like moved by this, but I was telling her because of this work that we're doing, I was like, Jill, I'm enjoying this so much more because I'm treating this like this is the last time we may kayak together.
• 19:18
  Polly Mertens: Yeah, right?
• 19:19
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, because you don't know, and it's not like it I don't know if it will be or won't be, but we don't know.
• 19:25
  Samantha Pruitt: We don't know, we don't know.
• 19:27
  Samantha Pruitt: And if you at least have the awareness that it could be and that that conversation, that interaction, that shared nature space together, and just the power of that alone, yeah, is freaking remarkable.
• 19:42
  Samantha Pruitt: And if you don't have the awareness and you're too busy in the middle of that kayak, by the way, oh, as soon as I get done here, I have 50,000 things to do.
• 19:49
  Samantha Pruitt: I need to hurry up and get home, and I need to do all these things, and so-and-so is waiting on me, and this is happening, all this shit going on in your head, instead of like, damn, look at my incredible friend.
• 20:00
  Samantha Pruitt: Who am I to have this?
• 20:03
  Samantha Pruitt: What?
• 20:04
  Samantha Pruitt: And look at where I am.
• 20:06
  Samantha Pruitt: Remarkable.
• 20:06
  Samantha Pruitt: I am submerged in nature, literally part of my being, you know, like all of it is just like mind-blowing.
• 20:15
  Samantha Pruitt: I think a lot of people take drugs for this reason.
• 20:18
  Samantha Pruitt: Okay, they want to like open up their mind to a bigger, expanded way of seeing themselves and others in the world.
• 20:26
  Samantha Pruitt: But I mean, in this work, you don't have to be high.
• 20:30
  Samantha Pruitt: Like this is a regular ongoing thing that you can walk around on the daily, uh, have it in writing or whatever you need to do.
• 20:38
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, tattoo it on your arm if you need to, whatever you gotta do, people to like stay awake.
• 20:45
  Polly Mertens: And the first, the first part of it is being present, you know, like be here now, wake up.
• 20:51
  Polly Mertens: So I think if you create that context of, you know, like in the background.
• 20:56
  Polly Mertens: So when I say like be here now, is like the background of your life is you're here in this moment as much as possible.
• 21:03
  Polly Mertens: Sure, you've got a plan, you've got to think about, and there's things for tomorrow or whatever.
• 21:07
  Polly Mertens: But when you're when you find, you know, because we go like if you look at um an an everyday or an everyday life, if there was a director, there would be scenes.
• 21:16
  Polly Mertens: It'd be like, okay, cut to scene in, you know, getting ready in the the morning, right?
• 21:20
  Polly Mertens: And like, oh, she's in the bathroom, whatever.
• 21:22
  Polly Mertens: And then cut to scene, checking email and cut to scene, you know, like these things, these little micro moments.
• 21:27
  Polly Mertens: And not that, you know, being with yourself is an important time to be present, but like, especially with, you know, and one of the things I was thinking is how much we create familiarity, especially in relationships, especially long-standing relationships.
• 21:41
  Samantha Pruitt: And we oh, yeah, we do.
• 21:42
  Polly Mertens: And with that familiarity, right, we lose the significance, the meaning of it, because we go, I've been with this person, I know this, you know, it's always the same or whatever, but it's for us to have new glasses.
• 21:56
  Samantha Pruitt: We label them, yeah.
• 21:58
  Samantha Pruitt: They're never gonna change, they're always gonna be like that.
• 22:01
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, how ludicrous.
• 22:03
  Samantha Pruitt: How dare I'm not even the same person I was last night.
• 22:06
  Samantha Pruitt: I'm not even the same person I was this morning.
• 22:10
  Samantha Pruitt: I mean, I'm I'm saying it because it's really true.
• 22:13
  Samantha Pruitt: And it's at the cellular level, yeah.
• 22:15
  Polly Mertens: Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.
• 22:16
  Polly Mertens: For sure.
• 22:17
  Samantha Pruitt: You know, and for somebody.
• 22:19
  Samantha Pruitt: To say, oh, that that's how Sam is, that she's just going to be that way.
• 22:23
  Samantha Pruitt: What in the hell?
• 22:25
  Samantha Pruitt: Hell no.
• 22:26
  Polly Mertens: Yeah.
• 22:27
  Polly Mertens: So don't wait.
• 22:28
  Polly Mertens: I think, you know, like we talked about the two things is one is waiting around, sitting on your ass for things to happen, for them to change, for some special date in the future, some special event of retirement, whatever to happen, or busying yourself, blocking your time, your own experience of life with who knows what, right?
• 22:47
  Polly Mertens: And is it meaningful?
• 22:48
  Polly Mertens: Is it is it where you want to be?
• 22:50
  Polly Mertens: Right.
• 22:51
  Polly Mertens: And if not, and maybe at some point we'll talk about that Jesse Itzler calendaring thing.
• 22:55
  Polly Mertens: I think that's really cool.
• 22:56
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, we're about to get there, but I think we want to really say to people, or I do, like to me, this is a call to action because I feel like I did a post recently on getting back fit, getting fit again and fitness and all these things, right?
• 23:16
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, and that it's a verb.
• 23:18
  Samantha Pruitt: You gotta always be doing it, it's actually an action, right?
• 23:21
  Samantha Pruitt: But like there's a whole spectrum to all of these different things in our life that we work towards or we feel good about or we want or whatever the things are, right?
• 23:31
  Samantha Pruitt: And so to me, it's it allows a framework of possibility, right?
• 23:38
  Samantha Pruitt: So if I know things are always changing and I am of the nature to change, and all my circumstances are of the nature of change, I'm like game on, yeah, right?
• 23:51
  Samantha Pruitt: Like how important how incredibly empowering and important is that for us to recognize the possibility of that.
• 23:58
  Samantha Pruitt: It really opens you up to your life, what is possible for yourself physically, mentally, emotionally, and your circumstances.
• 24:06
  Polly Mertens: Yeah, you know, if you if you take it on, like um, you know, what I love that famous line from um Einstein, you know, do we live in a you know, a loving or but I forget what he says, but it's like a something to be feared universe or a benevolent one?
• 24:23
  Polly Mertens: Like, is is the universe out for us or against us, right?
• 24:27
  Polly Mertens: And when we create this resistance and things shouldn't be happening or whatever, when you take it on, like you said, first is it's all possibility, and number two, it's all happening for me.
• 24:36
  Polly Mertens: Like good things are, you know, the the the sense is this there is good unfolding here, like in the arc of things.
• 24:43
  Polly Mertens: Sure, there can be dips or whatever, but it's to approach it in that context of life is happening for me, right?
• 24:51
  Samantha Pruitt: But it's actually more exhausting to stay stuck, to resist against what is naturally occurring, change in permanence, to resist against it is freaking exhausting.
• 25:03
  Samantha Pruitt: And the people who are exhausted and they can't figure out why they're exhausted, because you all be resisting like hell to hold on to something.
• 25:12
  Polly Mertens: Yeah.
• 25:12
  Samantha Pruitt: Right.
• 25:13
  Polly Mertens: And there's definitely when you look at you know the Eastern philosophies and they talk about the qi and the energy of the body and the chakras and things like that, like we have tremendous power and energy capable in our body.
• 25:24
  Polly Mertens: And I think what you're just pointing to is like when we block it, when we energetically block life, block what's happening, block, you know, this shouldn't be block our own potential, right?
• 25:34
  Polly Mertens: Mindset, whatever, we get these diseases.
• 25:37
  Polly Mertens: You know, the energy systems of the body get clogged up.
• 25:41
  Polly Mertens: You know, it's like plumbing that's clogged up inside of us, which creates disease, right?
• 25:45
  Polly Mertens: And the flow isn't happening.
• 25:47
  Samantha Pruitt: So I want to just say one more thing about this.
• 25:51
  Samantha Pruitt: Don't wait before you go into more like operational, like how do we uh get on task here?
• 25:58
  Samantha Pruitt: Don't wait to talk to people.
• 26:00
  Samantha Pruitt: You were in this communication course.
• 26:02
  Samantha Pruitt: We have a couple episodes that speak to this brilliantly, so people can go back and listen to those, but let's just double-click for a hot second on that.
• 26:09
  Samantha Pruitt: Okay.
• 26:10
  Samantha Pruitt: Do not freaking wait to have the hard conversations.
• 26:15
  Samantha Pruitt: And those can be, I haven't talked to you forever, you know, we got disconnected and I just want to reach out.
• 26:20
  Samantha Pruitt: You mean something to me, you know, just like expressing with people that we've lost contact with, of course.
• 26:26
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, that's incredible.
• 26:28
  Samantha Pruitt: Like I was telling you, the friend of mine who has cancer.
• 26:30
  Samantha Pruitt: I mean, I haven't really talked to this person in uh 25 years or something, yeah, 30 years.
• 26:37
  Samantha Pruitt: I mean, we've had superficial connection, but not like a conversation like we had today, for example.
• 26:42
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, and that's the case for so many of us, right?
• 26:45
  Samantha Pruitt: We lose touch with.
• 26:47
  Samantha Pruitt: I have several friends that I was with when they passed in part of their journey that had so many regrets around conversations they never had.
• 26:56
  Samantha Pruitt: One was a mother and son, and she had not ever reunited with her son.
• 27:01
  Samantha Pruitt: I mean, literally broke her physically, mentally, emotionally towards the end of her life, at the end of her life, because of this unresolved, unsaid things, right?
• 27:13
  Samantha Pruitt: And unfortunately, now her son will never have that conversation either.
• 27:19
  Samantha Pruitt: He'll do his own healing around that, I hope.
• 27:21
  Samantha Pruitt: But those are extreme examples of this is not uncommon that people don't have these conversations.
• 27:27
  Samantha Pruitt: Or even now, I've got lots of people in my life I talk to all the time and I love and I see and whatever, but maybe I'm not saying some things I'm actually wanting to say.
• 27:36
  unknown: Yes.
• 27:36
  Samantha Pruitt: You know, it's not like I'm they're there, but maybe I haven't said what they do mean to me, or things about our shared past, or just ideas I want them to know about me or how I see the world or how I see them and appreciate them.
• 27:50
  Samantha Pruitt: It can be anything, but that is so incredibly beautiful.
• 27:54
  Samantha Pruitt: And while I've been in this course, I've been like, and of course, with you talking about communication all the time, I'm just communicating with all kinds of people in a different way.
• 28:03
  Samantha Pruitt: I was already communicating, but like this is a much deeper level of communication that I've opened myself up to.
• 28:10
  Samantha Pruitt: And it feels remarkable.
• 28:11
  Samantha Pruitt: It really does.
• 28:13
  Polly Mertens: I feel like you and I are not that we weren't sort of deep before, but like we're just hanging out in a in a place in our bodies of you know, more connected to ourselves than ever before and wanting to connect in and tap in with the people in our life from that place.
• 28:30
  Polly Mertens: And like this, you know, like the superficial, like like the social media just like blah blah blah conversation out there.
• 28:37
  Polly Mertens: It's like oftentimes when I'm talking with people, like we go deep pretty quickly, you know, and and it's and I think people are hungry for it, right?
• 28:46
  Polly Mertens: And it's just a um, you know, one of the things I this, I don't know why this reminded me of this, but um I was watching this movie you had to share with me.
• 28:55
  Polly Mertens: There's these little 30-minute movies on Netflix or something about like kind of life in the ICU when people are passing, you know, and those decisions they have to make and you know, like what it's like and whatnot.
• 29:07
  Polly Mertens: And um seeing how many people have at their bedside um at those meaningful times, you know, when when they're they could be dying, you know, or there's a there's a you know, some whatever, it really says a lot about that person.
• 29:21
  Polly Mertens: It's like what was the impact they were having?
• 29:24
  Polly Mertens: Like who were they connecting with so much that somebody flew across this country, drove wherever to like carve out time and be with them, you know, and nobody likes really going to hospitals, you know.
• 29:37
  Polly Mertens: I uh but like they are connected, like that shows you the ties that they have, you know.
• 29:45
  Polly Mertens: And when we just live at a superficial level or we isolate and we just watch TV all the time and we have no connections with people, like those moments when you're you know needing people most in connection, there might it might be empty rooms, you know.
• 30:00
  Samantha Pruitt: And don't wait to say things to that person at their funeral.
• 30:03
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, okay, yeah, that happens a lot too.
• 30:07
  Samantha Pruitt: How insane is that?
• 30:08
  Samantha Pruitt: You think I'm there hanging out in the room listening to you?
• 30:11
  Samantha Pruitt: I've already moved on.
• 30:12
  Samantha Pruitt: I got another job to do.
• 30:13
  Samantha Pruitt: What the hell?
• 30:14
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, I mean, enjoy the party, celebrating me.
• 30:16
  Samantha Pruitt: I'm cool with that.
• 30:17
  Samantha Pruitt: But like, you know, tell me while I'm alive.
• 30:20
  unknown: Right.
• 30:21
  Samantha Pruitt: Write me the letter while I'm alive, make me understand who I am to you now.
• 30:26
  Samantha Pruitt: There was one guy, I don't know where I saw this, but I thought this is freaking cool.
• 30:31
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, he basically gave himself a project.
• 30:34
  Samantha Pruitt: He was aging and yeah, probably in his 80s or something like that.
• 30:37
  Samantha Pruitt: He didn't have a diagnosis, nothing like that.
• 30:39
  Samantha Pruitt: But he just decided I'm gonna spend this next year and I'm gonna make a list of all the people that are important to me.
• 30:47
  Samantha Pruitt: And he made this huge list, okay, like people that have affected his life and and that he wanted to connect with.
• 30:54
  Samantha Pruitt: Okay.
• 30:54
  Samantha Pruitt: So he has this big old list of people, and yours can be one or it can be a hundred, I don't care.
• 30:59
  Samantha Pruitt: And then he reached out to each of these people and he asked them a series of questions.
• 31:04
  Samantha Pruitt: So we basically did interviews of these people, and then he made for himself like a little audio, you know, kind of like a journal, if you will, of this experience.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_03: Wow.
• 31:18
  Samantha Pruitt: And some of the the number one question was, um, like, how did I how did we meet?
• 31:25
  Samantha Pruitt: Okay, because a lot of times we forget.
• 31:27
  Samantha Pruitt: That was cool.
• 31:28
  Samantha Pruitt: And then I think the number two or number three was, um, I want to tell you the impact you had on my life.
• 31:37
  Samantha Pruitt: And so then for each of those people, he would share with them, you know, this thing happened, or we experienced this, or whatever.
• 31:43
  Samantha Pruitt: And this really brought meaning to my life.
• 31:46
  Samantha Pruitt: Like you contributed to my life in in whatever the way it was.
• 31:49
  Samantha Pruitt: But there was a series of questions that he wanted to ask them, and I just thought, oh my God, this is remarkable.
• 31:53
  Polly Mertens: Wow.
• 31:54
  Samantha Pruitt: That's probably what I'm gonna be doing next year after this year.
• 31:58
  Polly Mertens: That is awesome.
• 31:59
  Samantha Pruitt: That's true.
• 31:59
  Samantha Pruitt: Because I was like, damn, hell yeah.
• 32:03
  Samantha Pruitt: I want to sit down and have all those conversations.
• 32:06
  Samantha Pruitt: I want to interview my friends and family.
• 32:08
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, what?
• 32:10
  unknown: Wow.
• 32:10
  Polly Mertens: It reminds me of your um, you're making your playlist, you know, like like you're really in tune with the sounds and stuff like that.
• 32:16
  Polly Mertens: And like this is like another level, like you're really in tune with the relationships that matter, you know, like what what what are the moments, right?
• 32:24
  Polly Mertens: What are the the moments in our life?
• 32:26
  Polly Mertens: So good, so good.
• 32:27
  Samantha Pruitt: I do ask everybody because I am slightly obsessed with this life playlist um project that I started.
• 32:33
  Samantha Pruitt: I have to started creating one for my brother while he was still with us, and then um, of course, had it for his celebration of life.
• 32:41
  Samantha Pruitt: But in the same time, I was creating my own because I'm part of this class.
• 32:45
  Samantha Pruitt: This is not homework.
• 32:46
  Samantha Pruitt: I just made this for myself.
• 32:47
  Samantha Pruitt: This is your project, yeah.
• 32:48
  Samantha Pruitt: I love music and it speaks to me and it really um reflects on me, allows me to reflect on my life.
• 32:54
  Samantha Pruitt: And um, there's so much emotion and stuff there.
• 32:56
  Samantha Pruitt: It's so great for processing emotions, really, really good.
• 33:00
  Samantha Pruitt: And so now I ask people all the time, what are you listening to right now?
• 33:04
  Samantha Pruitt: What's some of your favorite songs?
• 33:06
  Samantha Pruitt: Because I feel it's a way for me to get to know them.
• 33:09
  Samantha Pruitt: So, example of the friend I reconnected with who's in the hospital getting chemo, and I was like, What are you listening to?
• 33:15
  Samantha Pruitt: Because he was a drummer when I knew him, he was in a band.
• 33:18
  Samantha Pruitt: Okay, music is a part of this human's soul, yeah.
• 33:23
  Samantha Pruitt: So I wanted to know, what are you listening to now?
• 33:26
  Samantha Pruitt: So it's whatever the questions are that allow you, me, and the other to be feeling more connected.
• 33:33
  Samantha Pruitt: Oh, I'm I'm getting to know you better, I'm understanding you more now because I know what kind of music you're into.
• 33:39
  Samantha Pruitt: It can be really simple things.
• 33:41
  Polly Mertens: That's cool.
• 33:42
  Polly Mertens: That's cool.
• 33:42
  Polly Mertens: And I love just, you know, it's like people find their ways to, you know, I love going to potlucks because I get to try everybody else's food, you know, and it's a little bit like I'm sampling people's music because there's always cool stuff that shows up at these potlucks.
• 33:53
  Polly Mertens: I'm like, what the hell is that?
• 33:54
  Polly Mertens: You know, right?
• 33:55
  Samantha Pruitt: Totally, totally.
• 33:57
  Samantha Pruitt: So true, so true.
• 33:59
  Samantha Pruitt: All right, let's give them some how-tos.
• 34:01
  Samantha Pruitt: You ready?
• 34:02
  Polly Mertens: Yeah, yeah.
• 34:03
  Polly Mertens: Well, you know, one of the things I want to introduce, um, if you don't know who Jesse for a minute earlier.
• 34:13
  Samantha Pruitt: Coach Polly is currently frozen, can't be for a second.
• 35:44
  Samantha Pruitt: And she's back.
• 35:46
  Samantha Pruitt: Sorry about that.
• 35:46
  Samantha Pruitt: All right.
• 35:47
  Polly Mertens: I have to start that over again.
• 35:49
  Samantha Pruitt: I apologize.
• 35:50
  Samantha Pruitt: Just remember you're gonna have to do a little edit on this one.
• 35:53
  Polly Mertens: Yeah, yeah.
• 35:54
  Polly Mertens: And then my camera's gonna be a little messy because it's not gonna match.
• 36:00
  Polly Mertens: Okay.
• 36:02
  Polly Mertens: So I was let's see.
• 36:03
  Samantha Pruitt: Jesse Etzler.
• 36:05
  Samantha Pruitt: So you're just introducing him.
• 36:06
  Samantha Pruitt: Is it recording?
• 36:07
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, still recording.
• 36:09
  Polly Mertens: Okay.
• 36:11
  Polly Mertens: So what I want to talk about is about Jesse Itzler.
• 36:14
  Polly Mertens: And if you don't know who he is, he's the husband of Sarah Blakely.
• 36:17
  Polly Mertens: And if you don't know who she is, she was the one who invented Spanx, which is like undergarments or whatever.
• 36:22
  Polly Mertens: Anyway, billionaire, right?
• 36:24
  Polly Mertens: And they're just a cute couple, so I enjoy them.
• 36:26
  Polly Mertens: He created, I can't remember how long it's been ago, maybe five years or something, this giant calendar, right?
• 36:31
  Polly Mertens: So I don't know when he got his mind around, like he learned something about someone's book, and it's like when you see your life in like these like spreadsheets, you can see how many weeks, like where you are in your life, if you have 80 years or something like that.
• 36:44
  Polly Mertens: And so he created these giant calendars to help people know, like, okay, you're at 50, 40, 60, wherever you are in your calendar to the week.
• 36:54
  Polly Mertens: Like, okay, this week, whatever.
• 36:55
  Polly Mertens: How many weeks would you have in a let's say normal life type thing?
• 37:00
  Polly Mertens: And then it's really one of his key things is like your calendar reflects your real priorities.
• 37:07
  Polly Mertens: Right.
• 37:07
  Polly Mertens: It's not like, oh, I want to do this thing, or you know, whatever.
• 37:10
  Polly Mertens: We talk about those people that have a lot of busyness and a lot of things that they're doing that maybe aren't meaningful or important, right?
• 37:17
  Polly Mertens: So it's really about like scheduling what matters.
• 37:20
  Polly Mertens: Like that's his key point on this.
• 37:22
  Polly Mertens: And I think it's important to introduce in this conversation of don't wait is like, I mean, you and I have been pounding on this message since we probably started the podcast.
• 37:31
  Polly Mertens: Like, that's just like, you know, I was thinking like this don't wait.
• 37:33
  Polly Mertens: I'm like, you know, this is kind of like Gandhi.
• 37:36
  Polly Mertens: Like, I think it's the story of our life, right?
• 37:38
  Polly Mertens: Like, our life is our message.
• 37:39
  Polly Mertens: It's like, yep, we haven't really sat around, you know, putting off too much, you know, like we get about it.
• 37:46
  Polly Mertens: So his point is schedule it, right?
• 37:48
  Polly Mertens: So your calendar reflects your priorities.
• 37:50
  Polly Mertens: So, like what matters, you have to intentionally put it on your calendar.
• 37:53
  Polly Mertens: So this might be one activity is like, A, you know, sometimes you can look at the end of your life and look backwards.
• 38:00
  Polly Mertens: Like one of the questions that I've heard asked is like, um, you know, if you could have anything at the end of your life and you look back and say, wow, that that occurred, right?
• 38:10
  Polly Mertens: Whether if you want to get married, you want to have kids, you want to create a foundation, you want to, you know, save the whales, whatever you want to get up to.
• 38:16
  Polly Mertens: Yeah, thinking about it then and going, okay, what's the gap, right?
• 38:20
  Polly Mertens: Okay, well, then work backwards.
• 38:21
  Polly Mertens: Like, what would you have to be doing?
• 38:22
  Polly Mertens: Or if you like I have a bucket list, right?
• 38:24
  Polly Mertens: You know, I know the, you know, approximately how many summers I have left, how many trips, you know, can fit in a year type thing.
• 38:31
  Polly Mertens: Okay, what's on my bucket list, right?
• 38:33
  Polly Mertens: You know, and this is where, you know, when people ask me to do things or go places, I go, um, yeah, I kind of have my bucket list for the next thing, you know.
• 38:40
  Polly Mertens: Like, is that more of a priority than the things that I've already said are a priority, right?
• 38:44
  Polly Mertens: Because like you've got X amount of time.
• 38:47
  Polly Mertens: So are you calendaring?
• 38:49
  Polly Mertens: Do you know what's present and what's meaningful to you?
• 38:52
  Polly Mertens: And it may not be those.
• 39:02
  Samantha Pruitt: She froze again.
• 39:04
  Samantha Pruitt: You froze again.
• 39:05
  Polly Mertens: Sorry, lady.
• 39:06
  Polly Mertens: I don't know what's happening.
• 39:07
  Polly Mertens: I'm not, nothing's happening over here.
• 39:08
  Polly Mertens: Like it might does say my internet's on table, but it does look like it's okay.
• 39:12
  Samantha Pruitt: Do you want to turn the video off?
• 39:14
  Polly Mertens: No, because I need we need a video for the end of it.
• 39:16
  Polly Mertens: So let's just do I'll talk a little bit and then turn it over to you.
• 39:21
  Polly Mertens: Okay.
• 39:23
  Polly Mertens: I was saying so.
• 39:25
  Polly Mertens: It's just about calendaring everything.
• 39:26
  Polly Mertens: It's like get it in your calendar if it's meaningful, um, and knowing what is meaningful to you, right?
• 39:31
  Polly Mertens: It could be the little things like more dates with your spouse, it could be more friend events, whatever it is, or charities, donating, volunteering, right?
• 39:40
  Polly Mertens: So calendaring all that.
• 39:42
  Samantha Pruitt: We kind of spoke to two different things here.
• 39:43
  Samantha Pruitt: One is the people that might, their life might look like they're parked.
• 39:49
  Samantha Pruitt: You know, my life uh coming to a theater near you soon, kind of thing, right?
• 39:53
  Samantha Pruitt: Like and they're distracting themselves with whatever they're in a place that is frozen, if you will.
• 40:01
  Samantha Pruitt: And then you have the busy busy busies.
• 40:05
  Samantha Pruitt: Both of these people could do this exercise, by the way.
• 40:08
  Samantha Pruitt: What in the hell do I even value?
• 40:11
  Samantha Pruitt: And what are the things?
• 40:12
  Samantha Pruitt: So you're talking about like get these things on the calendar, recognize the impermanence of your life, and the do not wait is you have so many summers, so many years, so many of this left.
• 40:24
  Samantha Pruitt: But a lot of people will be like, I just don't even know where to start because I don't know.
• 40:28
  Samantha Pruitt: Which, first of all, yeah, you do.
• 40:30
  Samantha Pruitt: Okay.
• 40:31
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, you do.
• 40:32
  Samantha Pruitt: But people say that all the time, right?
• 40:35
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, so get first clear what are the things.
• 40:39
  Samantha Pruitt: Like I value these things, and therefore I that's how I should be spending my time.
• 40:43
  Samantha Pruitt: And then I have these lists of things I'd like my life to, you know, upon my deathbed or whatever, at whatever junction, I want to be able to identify that I did it, I did do these things.
• 40:56
  Samantha Pruitt: I this was my life.
• 40:58
  Samantha Pruitt: You know, my life story was like this, without a lot of regrets and missing holes, parts and pieces, right?
• 41:03
  Samantha Pruitt: Spend some time making these lists, people talking to someone if you need to to help them extract it out of you.
• 41:11
  Samantha Pruitt: Sometimes that actually you gotta have that stuff coached out of you, believe it or not.
• 41:15
  Samantha Pruitt: We get it, totally get it.
• 41:17
  Samantha Pruitt: There were parts of my life where that was definitely the case.
• 41:20
  Samantha Pruitt: I couldn't have answered these questions.
• 41:21
  Samantha Pruitt: I was too busy surviving.
• 41:23
  Samantha Pruitt: I don't know what the hell's going on.
• 41:24
  Samantha Pruitt: What?
• 41:25
  Samantha Pruitt: Right?
• 41:26
  Samantha Pruitt: So that might be you, the listener.
• 41:28
  Samantha Pruitt: And so there are people that can draw this out of you, coach this out of you.
• 41:32
  Samantha Pruitt: And then once you have that written down in that clarity, then you bring the calendars out and you have your life on the calendar.
• 41:41
  Samantha Pruitt: This is how I'll be spending my time.
• 41:43
  Samantha Pruitt: These are the places I'll be going, these will be who I'm hanging out with.
• 41:46
  Samantha Pruitt: By the way, this is how I'll be spending my money.
• 41:49
  Samantha Pruitt: So, really, how will you be putting your resources into building this life?
• 41:55
  Samantha Pruitt: People will say to me all the time, Well, yeah, of course I value health and fitness.
• 41:59
  Samantha Pruitt: And they're literally doing investing zero.
• 42:02
  Samantha Pruitt: And I'm like, I'm pretty sure you're not.
• 42:05
  Samantha Pruitt: I don't see it.
• 42:08
  Samantha Pruitt: Right.
• 42:09
  Samantha Pruitt: Not one, not one day is there exercise happening.
• 42:13
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, what you're putting in your mouth, right?
• 42:14
  Samantha Pruitt: So it's like, come on now, come on now.
• 42:17
  Samantha Pruitt: But if that is true and what you want your life to reflect, then let's help you by getting that onto the calendar and making those things happen, right?
• 42:28
  Samantha Pruitt: Structuring your days and your life accordingly.
• 42:31
  Polly Mertens: And I think the one thing I want to speak to here, because I can already hear in the back of people's minds the monkey mind going off, like, well, that's nice for you, and I don't have this, and I can't win the, you know, like the excuse itis has just shown up in a lot of listeners', you know, minds and they're listening of themselves and potential and possibility, and well, you know, like look at my life, you know.
• 42:53
  Polly Mertens: So just notice that it's there and it's just some thinking that's going on, right?
• 42:58
  Polly Mertens: Because it's largely driven by fear and whatever's kept you in the mode that you're in currently, it wants to keep you in that mode, right?
• 43:06
  Polly Mertens: Like your mind doesn't like to, doesn't like change, right?
• 43:09
  Polly Mertens: So if you're introducing ideas and possibilities and like, what about this?
• 43:13
  Polly Mertens: And we could do this.
• 43:15
  Polly Mertens: The mind's like, hold up, wait a minute.
• 43:16
  Polly Mertens: I'm I'm that takes more energy to have to think about all that stuff, and like all those unknowns, you know, start to show up of.
• 43:24
  Polly Mertens: And then the other one is um like the putting off, like the putting things off.
• 43:29
  Polly Mertens: I think people, you know, it's it's one disease states are really good ways of like you know, bringing the like importance of things, right?
• 43:41
  Polly Mertens: Yeah, but they're sharp.
• 43:42
  Polly Mertens: We're so good at sh, you know, shifting to how much time we have.
• 43:46
  Polly Mertens: And when I started looking at like how many possible summers I had left, I was like, oh my god, you know, like I've already had more summers than I'm gonna have.
• 43:55
  Polly Mertens: Like, wait a minute here, you know, and I love summertime, you know, not that you know, wintertime, whatever your choice is or whatever, but like days, weeks, vac number of, you know, I don't know how many vacations you take or how many things you like to do, whether it's volunteering or date nights or whatever is important to you.
• 44:10
  Polly Mertens: It's like, how many of those do you have left?
• 44:13
  Polly Mertens: Right.
• 44:13
  Polly Mertens: And so really get clear on like, oh, okay, this this this probably can't wait.
• 44:20
  Samantha Pruitt: It makes it easier to say no to a lot of things because you're like, well, I have, you know, whatever, 20 summers.
• 44:27
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, yeah, no, I'm not going to Anthelma's, you know, high school reunion, whatever the things are.
• 44:33
  Samantha Pruitt: That that's a no.
• 44:34
  Samantha Pruitt: Next done.
• 44:36
  unknown: Okay.
• 44:37
  Samantha Pruitt: Um, I'm also I'm working with a couple young people right now, uh, young male, 18, 19, age group, and about what do I want to do with my life kind of thing, you know, what's the path for me?
• 44:50
  Samantha Pruitt: Struggling, trying to figure some things out.
• 44:52
  Samantha Pruitt: And the conversations are really interesting.
• 44:54
  Samantha Pruitt: And really, what I keep hearing from them is that they feel like their options are limited, right?
• 45:00
  Samantha Pruitt: They feel like there's only a few things that could be possible for them.
• 45:04
  Samantha Pruitt: And I'm just like, nay, if I could be 18 or 19 again, what the right?
• 45:11
  Samantha Pruitt: This is unacceptable that we, either society or their family or whatever, their friend group, whatever they're they've been hanging out, wherever they've been hanging out, has somehow imparted upon said young mind that opportunities are limited.
• 45:29
  Samantha Pruitt: And then, of course, they latched onto those and now they're holding on to those for dear life, right?
• 45:32
  Samantha Pruitt: Like one's just absolutely sure there's one, only one job he can do, and he's gonna be doing that job.
• 45:37
  Samantha Pruitt: And that is, and I'm like, what in the hell?
• 45:39
  Samantha Pruitt: You don't even know what the options are yet.
• 45:41
  Samantha Pruitt: It's like you haven't even looked at the menu.
• 45:44
  Samantha Pruitt: You haven't even looked at the menu.
• 45:45
  Samantha Pruitt: You're going to a five-star restaurant called Your Life with a 10-page menu.
• 45:50
  Samantha Pruitt: You haven't looked at it, but you're pretty sure you should eat the Caesar salad.
• 45:53
  Samantha Pruitt: Okay, because I gotta get that.
• 45:55
  Samantha Pruitt: That's a known entity.
• 45:56
  Samantha Pruitt: I'm gonna eat the Caesar.
• 45:58
  Polly Mertens: Yeah, or just start at the end of the day.
• 46:00
  Polly Mertens: I'm just gonna have bread.
• 46:01
  Polly Mertens: I just came into it.
• 46:02
  Polly Mertens: I'm just gonna have the bread, you know, just because bread and water.
• 46:04
  Samantha Pruitt: I'm gonna have bread and water.
• 46:05
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah.
• 46:06
  Samantha Pruitt: I'm like, oh hell no, you're gonna try half this menu before we even sit down and discuss.
• 46:11
  Polly Mertens: Oh, okay.
• 46:12
  Samantha Pruitt: You know, like no, but anyway, people do these kind of things all the time, don't they?
• 46:17
  Samantha Pruitt: You know, yeah.
• 46:18
  Samantha Pruitt: So inherited belief systems, yeah.
• 46:20
  Polly Mertens: So it's looking at what's important to you, right?
• 46:23
  Polly Mertens: Investing a little bit of time and getting out of the way whatever's in the way, whether it's a a fear or a doubt or a disbelief or other people, you know.
• 46:31
  Polly Mertens: I can't tell you how many people, and I get you can be in a relationship with people, right?
• 46:36
  Polly Mertens: And that relationship matters a lot.
• 46:38
  Polly Mertens: And I'm not saying go against like your vows or something like that, but people put other people in their relationship as a roadblock for them, you know, like, oh, they won't travel with me, or oh, they they won't be okay with it.
• 46:51
  Polly Mertens: I'm like, hold up, this is your partner.
• 46:54
  Polly Mertens: Like you guys are on the same team.
• 46:56
  Polly Mertens: You want each other's lives to be extraordinary.
• 46:59
  Polly Mertens: Or if not, then like have that conversation first, whatever.
• 47:03
  Polly Mertens: But like, oh, I can't because of X person, like, no, okay, all right.
• 47:08
  Polly Mertens: And then there's there are some definite, I get it, there's some limitations.
• 47:12
  Polly Mertens: You and I are not like ignoring, like, you may have financial limitations, you may have some uh logistical limitation, like, but guess what?
• 47:21
  Polly Mertens: You're also resourceful.
• 47:22
  Polly Mertens: We're also damn resourceful when we want to be, right?
• 47:26
  Polly Mertens: And I think you know, looking at, well, how could it?
• 47:29
  Polly Mertens: You know, like, oh, I wonder if that could happen.
• 47:32
  Polly Mertens: What what you know, just opening up to that wonder and that possibility instead of nope, nope, nope, nope, can't do it.
• 47:39
  Polly Mertens: So yeah.
• 47:40
  Polly Mertens: Just keep don't wait.
• 47:42
  Polly Mertens: Yes, yeah.
• 47:44
  Polly Mertens: So if we're not waiting, I don't, you know, mean like negatives, like, don't wait.
• 47:47
  Polly Mertens: Okay, so then it's like, get up to it.
• 47:51
  Polly Mertens: Like, get up to it, get out there, get into it, get over it, get get going, get it.
• 47:57
  Samantha Pruitt: I had this total visual when I said that of being in a waiting room.
• 48:02
  Samantha Pruitt: Have you ever been in a waiting room when you're like waiting to go to the doctor or you're waiting for someone to come out of surgery, or whatever?
• 48:09
  Samantha Pruitt: There's some kind of waiting room element to it, and you're sitting there and it's quiet and it's uncomfortable and it's awkward, and it's all of the weird things, you know?
• 48:20
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, and nothing's happening.
• 48:22
  Samantha Pruitt: You don't have any answers about what's gonna happen next, sort of thing, you know?
• 48:27
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, it's so weird.
• 48:29
  Samantha Pruitt: And if you think about it, would you spend much of your life in a waiting room?
• 48:34
  Samantha Pruitt: Would you willingly say I should sit in this waiting room for about 10 years and then get busy doing the things?
• 48:43
  Samantha Pruitt: No, you wouldn't do that.
• 48:45
  Samantha Pruitt: No, it's totally, totally ludicrous, right?
• 48:48
  Polly Mertens: No, it's like you know, I remember when restaurants you have to used to have to like put your name in and then wait in the like in the wherever their little hangout, whatever.
• 48:56
  Polly Mertens: And then they came up with those little devices that are like, go ahead and roam, we'll call you or text you or something now.
• 49:00
  Polly Mertens: It's like, all right, see you, I'll be back, right?
• 49:03
  Polly Mertens: Like, cool, I'll come back for that.
• 49:05
  Polly Mertens: All right, you know, it's like your partner, it's like, yeah, they're there.
• 49:07
  Polly Mertens: If they don't want to take that trip with you, it's like, okay, well, I'm just gonna go for a few days and I'll I'll be back.
• 49:11
  Polly Mertens: Like, okay, we got it.
• 49:12
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah.
• 49:13
  Samantha Pruitt: So I'll be back healthier and happier.
• 49:15
  Samantha Pruitt: Peace.
• 49:16
  unknown: Yeah.
• 49:18
  Polly Mertens: All right.
• 49:18
  Polly Mertens: I think we I think we've set our piece.
• 49:21
  Polly Mertens: Yeah.
• 49:22
  Polly Mertens: So what's your one thing?
• 49:23
  Polly Mertens: What's your leave them with one thing?
• 49:25
  Polly Mertens: What's what do you want them to?
• 49:27
  Samantha Pruitt: To me, first of all, let's just start with the truth that we are all of the nature of change or impermanence.
• 49:35
  Samantha Pruitt: Everything around us, this body, this brain, this life, everything that I come in contact with is fleeting.
• 49:46
  Samantha Pruitt: It's changing, it's fleeting.
• 49:48
  Samantha Pruitt: And by no means should I not live in that place of reality with that, right?
• 49:54
  Samantha Pruitt: Because I think that is what leads to the slippery slope of staying stuck, not doing, making excuses, etc.
• 50:03
  Samantha Pruitt: etc., you know, not getting busy.
• 50:06
  Samantha Pruitt: So just spend time pondering that.
• 50:10
  Samantha Pruitt: Maybe write yourself a love letter about it or a journal or have a conversation with somebody that you love or you trust about it and see what kind of comes up with you.
• 50:19
  Samantha Pruitt: I think we should start with that for many, many people.
• 50:22
  Polly Mertens: I think my one thing, we haven't said it, but it occurred to me is like looking at your day or your week or whatever's on your calendar and just being like, am I doing what matters?
• 50:34
  Polly Mertens: Like, like, does this really matter right now or in the big scheme of things?
• 50:38
  Polly Mertens: Like, if I didn't do this, like would it really matter?
• 50:42
  Polly Mertens: You know, and you just start to hone in.
• 50:44
  Polly Mertens: Like, it's sort of like um, I think about like when people go through the closet reinvigorating your closet, right?
• 50:52
  Polly Mertens: It's like, get rid of whatever you don't need for the season or for like what's not you anymore, right?
• 50:58
  Polly Mertens: Like pare it down, like paring down your life to the core pieces, the core, you know, like I love decluttering and stuff.
• 51:05
  Polly Mertens: It's like this no longer applies, no longer matters.
• 51:08
  Polly Mertens: And the same thing is for the activities and the people that you're spending time with or what you're investing your life into.
• 51:15
  Polly Mertens: Like, look at it from a like if I was clearing out the closet, how much of this am I not using anymore?
• 51:19
  Polly Mertens: Or I need to not, you know, not stop wearing that old shanky thing, you know, like upgrade.
• 51:25
  Polly Mertens: So yeah.
• 51:26
  Polly Mertens: All right.
• 51:27
  Polly Mertens: Well, this has been fun.
• 51:28
  Polly Mertens: I can't wait for our future one.
• 51:30
  Polly Mertens: So, you guys, I we highly recommend again the five invitations is what this is based on.
• 51:34
  Polly Mertens: Check it out.
• 51:35
  Polly Mertens: Uh, audiobook is fantastic, can't recommend it enough.
• 51:38
  Polly Mertens: So, what do we want to leave them with?
• 51:40
  Polly Mertens: Uh, as we always do.
• 51:44
  Samantha Pruitt: Check out Frank.
• 51:45
  Samantha Pruitt: Say hi to Frank for me.
• 51:46
  Samantha Pruitt: Yeah, yeah.
• 51:48
  Samantha Pruitt: How your life feels.
• 51:49
  Samantha Pruitt: Oh gosh, someone just said this back to me the other day, and it was so lovely.
• 51:53
  Samantha Pruitt: They're like a really wise person said this to me, and then they spit it back out at me.
• 51:58
  Samantha Pruitt: I was like, oh my god, you're so sweet right now.
• 52:00
  Samantha Pruitt: Look at you trying to break my heart.
• 52:03
  Samantha Pruitt: How your life feels is more important than how it looks.
• 52:06
  Polly Mertens: And every day is your opportunity to find your awesome.
• 52:10
  Samantha Pruitt: See you next time.