Latest / The Oreaganic Podcast / 53: You Are Blocking Yourself - Lacking Direction, Shame Spirals, & Overstimulation
Transcript
- 0:00SPEAKER_00: Hello my friends and welcome back to the Organic Podcast.
- 0:02SPEAKER_00: I'm your host, Reagan, and today's episode we are talking about overthinking and the importance of being aware of where your attention is going.
- 0:11SPEAKER_00: So many of us, me included, lately, can just go through life passively, not really picking a clear direction or a clear path forwards, or kind of having an idea of where we want to go, but not really knowing how to get there.
- 0:26SPEAKER_00: So kind of just putting it on the back burner, going through the motions, and then also feeling bad about that because your brain is constantly thinking, I should be doing more, I should be doing this, I should be doing that, I gotta think about what things coming next, and blah blah blah blah blah.
- 0:42SPEAKER_00: So it's a really weird parallel between having all these thoughts of feeling like you need to be doing more, there's something that you're missing, start doing this differently, and also not really having an abundance of clarity on the direction or the path that you really want to be taking forwards, or what you want your life to look like, or what that even means for you to think about what you really desire.
- 1:06SPEAKER_00: It's a weird point of stagnancy, and I'm just going to speak to this phenomena today.
- 1:11SPEAKER_00: So let's get into it.
- 1:13SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Organic Podcast.
- 1:15SPEAKER_00: I'm your host, Reagan, mechanical engineer, lifelong athlete, and recovered overachiever, here to empower you to pursue your highest potential and live freely as your happiest, most organic self.
- 1:25SPEAKER_00: Every week we'll dive into topics ranging from personal growth, mindset hacks, psychology, and a blend of science and spirituality to give you all the tools you need to stop living on autopilot and start creating a life of freedom, meaning, and fulfillment as your most organic self.
- 1:39SPEAKER_00: If you're ready to become the best version of yourself, then let's find the feed and grow.
- 2:11SPEAKER_00: I think very few people know and appreciate the ability to sit in silence or to just sit and do nothing, to take a walk without their phone, to leave their phone in another room for the entire day.
- 2:28SPEAKER_00: Whatever that may look like for you.
- 2:30SPEAKER_00: And this isn't something to feel ashamed of.
- 2:33SPEAKER_00: It's not something that I think poorly of others for, it's not something that I judge others for because I have 100% and still do lived through the experience of always wanting to distract myself, always being focused on what comes next.
- 2:48SPEAKER_00: What what do I need to do next?
- 2:50SPEAKER_00: Where do I need to be?
- 2:51SPEAKER_00: Where do I need to go?
- 2:53SPEAKER_00: What do I need to handle?
- 2:55SPEAKER_00: And if I'm not focused on managing something, I think there's just always been something that has been drawing my attention elsewhere, where I've always been multitasking.
- 3:06SPEAKER_00: Like I'm working on a homework assignment, but there's a YouTube video in the background, or there's a movie, or I'm driving and I'm listening to music, which is standard, but you get the point I'm making.
- 3:19SPEAKER_00: I have 100% lived the version of life where I was constantly on consumption mode and I was never really on listening mode.
- 3:30SPEAKER_00: Listening to my own thoughts, my own intuition, or just allowing my thoughts to just run without any pressure for telling myself they should be different.
- 3:41SPEAKER_00: The cause of a lot of suffering is believing that where you are right now is not where you are supposed to be.
- 3:48SPEAKER_00: And this connects to the loop of overthinking because when you feel like you are not where you're where you are supposed to be, or you're not doing enough, or you should be doing something differently, your mind is just constantly filled with shoulds.
- 4:03SPEAKER_00: I should be doing this, I should be doing that, I should be taking better care of myself, I should be waking up earlier, I should be focusing on more habits.
- 4:12SPEAKER_00: Like basically the overlying theme that's running in the background of your mind is like I am never doing enough, and there is something that I should be doing differently and better for me to be achieving of this actual vision of my life that feels successful and free and matches the definition of quote unquote doing everything right, following my path, following the vision, and where I am right now is not doing that.
- 4:39SPEAKER_00: And when that's the subconscious belief that's running rampant in the background servers of your mind, it can cause a lot of underlying stress, it can cause feelings of dissatisfaction, and it sure as hell is not going to help you feel more clarity with what you want to put your attention towards and what is feels most important to you because you are in this loop where it's like you are used to being distracted, it feels safer for you to not listen to your own thoughts, to not slow down, to always be doing something.
- 5:14SPEAKER_00: And because it feels safer and familiar, your brain on a subconscious level is always always going to pull you back to doing these things, it is always going to say, Hey, why this is a little too quiet for me.
- 5:27SPEAKER_00: What are we doing here?
- 5:28SPEAKER_00: Like, why is there so much silence?
- 5:30SPEAKER_00: Hello, let's get something going here.
- 5:33SPEAKER_00: It's like a good example of this in another area of life, is if you are someone who is always used to overpacking per se.
- 5:41SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't even call it overpacking because I'm an overpacker, but I just like being able to have something if I want it.
- 5:48SPEAKER_00: But, anyways, let's say you're always used to overpacking, and you are going on a short trip, and you pack your bag, and you know what?
- 5:58SPEAKER_00: It's pretty light.
- 5:59SPEAKER_00: It's pretty light.
- 6:00SPEAKER_00: Like you got you got space in there, you got room.
- 6:02SPEAKER_00: There's extra room for you to put stuff should you want to, but you genuinely don't really need anything else.
- 6:08SPEAKER_00: Like you really, you really don't want stuff.
- 6:10SPEAKER_00: If you're used to overpacking, if you're used to carrying more than what you've currently packed in your bag, guess what?
- 6:17SPEAKER_00: You're gonna find more shit to put in that bag.
- 6:19SPEAKER_00: You're gonna find random things that you most certainly know you're not going to use or don't need to bring, but you're still gonna pack it anyways.
- 6:28SPEAKER_00: Oh, I only have room, I have room for like three books.
- 6:32SPEAKER_00: Do I need to bring three books?
- 6:33SPEAKER_00: Absolutely not.
- 6:34SPEAKER_00: But you know what I'm gonna be doing?
- 6:36SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna bring three books because I have the room for it, and I'm used to having that much on my plate in my backpack, so why would I not put it there?
- 6:43SPEAKER_00: Like I have all this extra space, so naturally I'm gonna fill it because that's what I'm used to.
- 6:50SPEAKER_00: Same concept goes if you are someone who tends to leave a little bit late for things, or leave right on time per se.
- 6:58SPEAKER_00: When you actually catch yourself being able to leave with an extra buffer of time, an extra 10 minutes, you're gonna be 10 minutes early to something.
- 7:06SPEAKER_00: Whoa, that's a lot of time.
- 7:08SPEAKER_00: Instead of leaving early, minimizing your stress, actually being somewhere on time or ahead of time, you will tell yourself without even realizing it, you will find the most random shit to do.
- 7:21SPEAKER_00: You will say, Well, what if I want two water bottles?
- 7:24SPEAKER_00: What if I want to take two and a half water bottles?
- 7:26SPEAKER_00: What if I want to fill my little straw cup as well?
- 7:29SPEAKER_00: Oh, maybe I should change.
- 7:30SPEAKER_00: Maybe I should do this, maybe I should pack some food, maybe I should maybe should pack a little more food, like, oh, did I forget this?
- 7:37SPEAKER_00: Did I forget that?
- 7:38SPEAKER_00: And next thing you know, your 10 minutes of being early turns into, guess what?
- 7:42SPEAKER_00: I'm right on time again, as I'm always am.
- 7:46SPEAKER_00: Do we get the point that I'm making here?
- 7:47SPEAKER_00: Where your brain subconsciously will always pull you back to what feels comfortable.
- 7:52SPEAKER_00: And this can apply to feeling less stimulated because, as I said, when you start to feel extra gaps of silence without even thinking about it, you will just reach for your phone, reach for music, put something on in the background, find a YouTube video because that's what feels most comfortable.
- 8:09SPEAKER_00: Now that we have this understanding, I think that we can all invite a little more compassion into the room for ourselves.
- 8:16SPEAKER_00: Because if you're like me and you you wake up sometimes and you're like, fuck, I should have been up earlier, I should be doing more.
- 8:24SPEAKER_00: If I were acting like the future version of myself right now, who's living my dream life, like, would she be doing this?
- 8:30SPEAKER_00: Would she be acting this way?
- 8:31SPEAKER_00: Should I be doing more?
- 8:32SPEAKER_00: Should I be doing less?
- 8:33SPEAKER_00: Should I be thinking more?
- 8:34SPEAKER_00: Should I be thinking less?
- 8:36SPEAKER_00: Uh it's like your brain immediately wakes up and goes into spiral mode where you're like, I should be doing XYZ thing differently.
- 8:46SPEAKER_00: This is really stressful.
- 8:47SPEAKER_00: It's really stressful and it drains a lot of your energy because number one source of stress, I might have already said this, but number one source of stress is thinking that where you are at right now, your circum your current circumstances, who you are, what you believe, how your life looks, is not actually correct and not what it should be.
- 9:04SPEAKER_00: That friction and the difference between these two things causes so much discomfort on a subconscious level that then contributes to you wanting to avoid these feelings of discomfort by guess what?
- 9:15SPEAKER_00: Turning towards the things that are most familiar that make you feel comfortable, such as distracting yourself.
- 9:20SPEAKER_00: And then we get ourselves in this giant loop of feeling stagnant.
- 9:24SPEAKER_00: Let me draw this out a little more clearly.
- 9:26SPEAKER_00: You feel like you have a there's a greater desire for your life.
- 9:31SPEAKER_00: You feel like there is a bigger vision, something, something more out there for you than what you are currently living as.
- 9:38SPEAKER_00: Or you feel like you could be just, I don't know, a more improved, happier, better, more ambitious, driven, action-taking version of yourself.
- 9:47SPEAKER_00: Okay, you have this feeling where it's like, okay, I want to be better, I think I can be better, and you can still absolutely love where your life is right now and still want to be better.
- 9:56SPEAKER_00: So let me add that disclaimer, but you think, okay, I want to be better, I want to improve, I want to have a clear goal and direction towards a future and a clear place to direct my energy so that it's most focused on making progress towards the future and continuing to show up as the person that I want to be and someone who I am proud of, who is living a life that I really truly enjoy.
- 10:19SPEAKER_00: Okay, that's the goal.
- 10:21SPEAKER_00: Great.
- 10:22SPEAKER_00: Next step: the way you're currently living, your habits, your beliefs, your day-to-day actions, these things might feel a little out of alignment, or you're just not super clear of why you're doing certain things every day, or like what you're even doing every day.
- 10:37SPEAKER_00: It feels like you were kind of just going through the motions, or you have this intention of, hmm, I want to have a clear direction for all of my habits, beliefs, goals, actions, but some part of my system is just not fully online because I'm not actually fully clear about what I want that to look like.
- 10:54SPEAKER_00: That creates this idea of where I'm at is not where I'm supposed to be, but I don't exactly know where I want to be, but I don't really know how to figure that out, and I feel ashamed of myself for not knowing better or feeling like I should be doing differently.
- 11:07SPEAKER_00: Therefore, I am going to avoid this feeling of discomfort and shame by turning towards the things that I know are most comfortable that guess what?
- 11:15SPEAKER_00: Also keep you distracted, such as always having something on in the background, always listening to a podcast, never sitting in silence, and then that creates a feeling of stagnancy, a feeling stuck because you can never actually hear your own intuition, your own wisdom, you can never actually just sit just in your own thoughts and find the clarity you're seeking.
- 11:36SPEAKER_00: And then you feel stagnant, you feel bad about yourself, and we start the loop again where it's like, oh, I'm not where I'm supposed to be.
- 11:42SPEAKER_00: Ironically, in this circumstance, in this loop, the thing that will actually bring you the most amount of clarity and bring you like 500 steps closer to feeling like you have clarity on where you want to go and how you want to direct your energy every day is actually just fully accepting exactly where you are at right now.
- 12:03SPEAKER_00: Not telling yourself, this should be different, I should be doing more, this needs to be whatever, blah blah blah, but instead inviting compassion and unconditional love into the room for yourself so you can actually feel at peace with where things are at.
- 12:19SPEAKER_00: That is what allows you to have the fertile soil from which you can then plant the seeds to grow and continue to grow your future.
- 12:27SPEAKER_00: When it comes to overconsumption, it can be incredibly helpful to understand the greater picture of our entire world at large and why overconsumption is such a problem.
- 12:37SPEAKER_00: Obviously, we have phones, we have the internet.
- 12:41SPEAKER_00: It feels like there is always some screen that is screaming at us to get our attention in some way, shape, or form.
- 12:47SPEAKER_00: You can't even drive on the friggin' highway with half a second of peace because there's advertisements literally everywhere.
- 12:53SPEAKER_00: Sometimes the giant, you know, big screen ones that are just blasting in your face.
- 12:57SPEAKER_00: I how is that safe?
- 12:59SPEAKER_00: First off, whatever.
- 13:00SPEAKER_00: But we always have some form of advertisement being thrown at us, some form of distraction.
- 13:07SPEAKER_00: And we live in an economy where attention is the number one thing that people who are trying to sell things want.
- 13:16SPEAKER_00: And let me just say, this is not all a bad thing.
- 13:20SPEAKER_00: It is not a bad thing that our entire world is centered towards getting people's attention because it is good when good people who have a good goal, who want to help people, who make the world a better place, who have a positive influence, when those people have the attention of a lot of people, it is a good thing.
- 13:40SPEAKER_00: It is a positive gain for the people who are listening to them and for the world.
- 13:46SPEAKER_00: Where we have a problem where we need to have discernment with where our attention goes, is that a lot of companies, a lot of corporations, a lot of even social media platforms, their goal to gain your attention is not really serving you.
- 14:04SPEAKER_00: It's not actually serving you.
- 14:06SPEAKER_00: They just want to sell you something, they want to make money, and not everything is always for a good reason.
- 14:14SPEAKER_00: This is why it's incredibly important to be attentive of where your energy is going.
- 14:19SPEAKER_00: And this includes the news, the stories that run rampant in your mind, like the beliefs that you have.
- 14:25SPEAKER_00: Those come from somewhere.
- 14:27SPEAKER_00: And a lot of the times, especially when it comes to media consumption and news, we will get these narratives in our head that have been planted there very subtly by bigger platforms, bigger corporations, bigger people who are influencing the stories that are told through news platforms, through social media, with a goal of eliciting a certain kind of response or a certain environment in which they find it easier to control people.
- 14:54SPEAKER_00: And I'm not trying to sound conspiratorial here.
- 14:56SPEAKER_00: This is quite literally just how our world works.
- 14:59SPEAKER_00: It is neutral if we think about it like that.
- 15:02SPEAKER_00: Like everything is neutral.
- 15:03SPEAKER_00: We provide the mean or we assign the meaning to it.
- 15:05SPEAKER_00: But when it comes to being protective over your attention, so that you can gain clarity on next steps and what actually brings you the greatest return on investment of your time, energy, attention, money, you need to have an awareness over where you're of where your attention is going in the first place.
- 15:23SPEAKER_00: What are you actually focused on every day?
- 15:26SPEAKER_00: What actions are you taking?
- 15:28SPEAKER_00: What are your habits?
- 15:29SPEAKER_00: What do you believe about yourself and the world?
- 15:32SPEAKER_00: You have to do an inventory of pretty much all of the parts of your life that are shaping your day-to-day experience.
- 15:39SPEAKER_00: And when it comes to finding clarity about what you want in the future, this can feel like a whole different ballgame as opposed to just inventorying yourself right now.
- 15:49SPEAKER_00: Because figuring out what you really want is something that a lot of people probably haven't even really sat down and thought about, like really, really deeply, without some form of conditioning influencing it in their entire lives.
- 16:04SPEAKER_00: And then we get into adulthood or further into adulthood, and we might start down a personal development journey, or we see someone else living their dream life per se, and we say, Oh, I want that.
- 16:16SPEAKER_00: I want better for myself.
- 16:17SPEAKER_00: I know that more is available for me.
- 16:19SPEAKER_00: Like my the possibilities are endless.
- 16:22SPEAKER_00: Like I can have anything that I could dream of, obviously, from a heart-centered place here, as always on this podcast.
- 16:28SPEAKER_00: Everything is from a heart-centered place, which comes from God, TYVM.
- 16:32SPEAKER_00: But when you have these thoughts of like, oh wow, maybe I can actually create change in my life.
- 16:36SPEAKER_00: Like maybe, you know, there aren't like the limits that I put on myself are not actually real.
- 16:40SPEAKER_00: Like, holy shit, I can make a change in my life.
- 16:43SPEAKER_00: If other people are doing it, that means it's possible for me too.
- 16:46SPEAKER_00: We get this inspiration from other people, from social media, from podcasts, from books, whatever it is.
- 16:53SPEAKER_00: And we say, Holy shit, I can change my life too.
- 16:56SPEAKER_00: And when you combine this kind of inspiration with also the fact that many of us were not taught to follow our actual, true, like fully 100% organically us, our desires.
- 17:10SPEAKER_00: Like we were taught there's a correct way to go about life.
- 17:13SPEAKER_00: There's a correct path when it comes to going to college, picking a good major, getting a good job, having a stable income.
- 17:21SPEAKER_00: All of these things, again, not necessarily like a bad path or the wrong path, even though it's the most common.
- 17:28SPEAKER_00: My point is that that not but that might not actually be what your soul craves, what your heart desires.
- 17:35SPEAKER_00: But for so long, we've been conditioned to just shut down anything that we truly want that comes from uniquely us, because we think, oh, well, I just have to listen to what everyone else wants from me.
- 17:47SPEAKER_00: I just have to listen to what I'm being told to do.
- 17:50SPEAKER_00: And then that's our baseline conditioning, always kind of looking to other people or looking outside of us for the direction forwards.
- 17:58SPEAKER_00: And then we have all this inspiration to change our lives, and we're like, oh, okay, well, what do I actually want?
- 18:03SPEAKER_00: It's just crickets and white noise because you've never actually sat down and thought about it, and you've never had the boldness to be able to say, like, you know what?
- 18:10SPEAKER_00: I do want to experience this, or I want my life to look like this.
- 18:14SPEAKER_00: I want to have these things, I want to do this, I want to have this job, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
- 18:18SPEAKER_00: So give yourself some credit, man.
- 18:20SPEAKER_00: Like, it is not easy to always figure out what your whole direction of life, what you want it to look like, when you're changing your self-concept and you're changing your limiting beliefs and you're reframing thoughts you've had your entire life, and you're reprogramming your brain.
- 18:36SPEAKER_00: Like, this is not an easy overnight process by any means whatsoever.
- 18:42SPEAKER_00: So if there is one piece of advice that I could give you when it comes to finding clarity on your path forwards, what you really want, what your heart desires, and figuring out how to best center your energy towards these things, it would be to sit in silence, to unplug, to have way less stimulation throughout the day, and to actually just spend time with yourself, with your thoughts, without background noise, without background music, without listening to something else, without always thinking about what do I have to do next, and never actually being in the present moment.
- 19:19SPEAKER_00: Focus on where you are at right now, come to terms with full acceptance of that.
- 19:26SPEAKER_00: Sit with your own thoughts, sit with your own heart, understand that you probably already know a lot of the things that you've convinced yourself you like don't have clarity on, and you just haven't given yourself the opportunity to truly listen deeply in words.
- 19:42SPEAKER_00: And when you take these steps to unplug, to focus more on just listening to yourself, to spending time with yourself and actually just focusing on the present moment, I promise you that clarity will come naturally.
- 19:57SPEAKER_00: And another tip on clarity too, when it comes to especially like greater vision for your life or what to pursue next, the greatest arrow forwards, like the greatest direction forwards is always going to be following what brings you joy, what genuinely brings you such incredible heart-centered joy, not egotistical self-serving joy or things that aren't good for you.
- 20:20SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about what is truly the thing that just lights you up the most.
- 20:25SPEAKER_00: That is almost always going to be so deeply rooted in your purpose, in your future path.
- 20:31SPEAKER_00: And when it comes to the things that you desire and actually accepting those, you do not desire things for no reason.
- 20:38SPEAKER_00: If you desire to be wealthy, it is because you are meant to be wealthy.
- 20:42SPEAKER_00: If you desire to have this big, beautiful life, guess what?
- 20:45SPEAKER_00: You're meant to have a big, beautiful life.
- 20:48SPEAKER_00: We do not have desires placed on our heart for random ass reasons.
- 20:51SPEAKER_00: So I encourage you to take some time to just reflect on what actually brings you joy, what makes you happy, what makes you feel peace.
- 21:00SPEAKER_00: And think about it not from this perspective of like all this pressure to have the right answer or say the socially acceptable thing, or like, I don't know, just admit to yourself maybe your path of what you desire doesn't look like what you've been told your whole life is what quote unquote success is.
- 21:18SPEAKER_00: And that's okay.
- 21:19SPEAKER_00: That's okay.
- 21:20SPEAKER_00: It is a whole process to go through unraveling these beliefs and like these just the fact that it takes so much effort to try to decondition speaks to just like how thoroughly ingrained so many of these stories are in the minds of so many of us in the collective in society.
- 21:39SPEAKER_00: Like I think everyone struggles with figuring out what they really want at one point or another.
- 21:43SPEAKER_00: It's almost like it's the hardest part to actually figure out what you desire.
- 21:47SPEAKER_00: But all I know for certain is that your biggest anchors in this process and what can help bring you back to baseline is just focusing on your peace, your happiness, and your joy.
- 21:58SPEAKER_00: And bonus points if that is something that you receive being of service to others, because I really do feel like the more that we put out into the world, like the more goodness that we give, the more we provide for others from like a heart-centered, full cup kind of place, the more we experience happiness, joy, peace, love, abundance, whatever, and it all comes back to us.
- 22:21SPEAKER_00: So I hope this episode had something in it for you that you can take away from today and you can just understand and realize how to be a little nicer to yourself and figure out what it actually takes to decondition yourself from thinking that you need to have everything figured out perfectly, or that you should be somewhere that you're not right now, or that like you're not doing something right.
- 22:41SPEAKER_00: And I encourage you to just come into complete acceptance with your current circumstances, situation, beliefs, habits, patterns, and just analyze them.
- 22:51SPEAKER_00: Like literally just inquire about them with yourself from a very neutral place, and then decide whether or not those are the kind of things that you want to keep in your life.
- 23:01SPEAKER_00: I mean, honestly, an hour of reflection, an hour of deep intentional, honest reflection can give you back so many years of your life if you do it right.
- 23:12SPEAKER_00: Like, so much time can be saved just from taking a step back and sitting with your thoughts, sitting with what comes through, sitting with what's on your heart in terms of what you desire, and actually deciding, you know what?
- 23:25SPEAKER_00: I'm done.
- 23:26SPEAKER_00: Just waiting for this.
- 23:28SPEAKER_00: I am no longer gonna do that.
- 23:29SPEAKER_00: Like, I am going all in on what I desire and what I want.
- 23:34SPEAKER_00: Seriously, an hour of reflection can give you back so much of your time and energy that you may have not been able to center towards a very clear goal had you not taken the time to reflect on what it actually is that you want.
- 23:50SPEAKER_00: So when it feels like a tedious burden to think about sitting down with your thoughts and sitting in silence or journaling and reflecting on what brings you happiness, what your life currently looks like, what your thoughts are like, what your beliefs are like, and what you actually want them to look like.
- 24:06SPEAKER_00: Like I promise you, doing that process will will bring you, give you back so much that you would have lost otherwise, just being passive and reacting to life rather than being proactive.
- 24:19SPEAKER_00: Thank you for being here and spending time with me today.
- 24:21SPEAKER_00: I hope that you are having an absolutely incredible, immaculate, beautiful day, week, month, year, life.
- 24:29SPEAKER_00: And with that said, go be your most organic selves, and I will see you in the next one.