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Resistance Is the Death of Your Potential (And You Don’t Even Notice It) · Deep Thoughts

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: You probably think you're feeling because of I don't know,
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: a lack of discipline. You tell yourself you're stalling because
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: you're lazy, or or maybe you just don't want it
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: badly enough. We look at our own inability to move
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: forward and we immediately assume it's a character defect.
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: It's an immediate self judgment. But that whole assumption is well,
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: it's fundamentally incorrect. Most people don't stop pursuing their ambitions
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: because they're incapable of progress. They stop because something deep
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: inside them is actively resisting the cost of that movement.
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: There is an invisible force at.
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  Speaker 1: Play, and that force has a name, doesn't it.
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  Speaker 2: It does. It's called resistance. And until you really understand
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: the mechanics resistance, every strategy, every plan, every burst of
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: motivation you feel it will eventually just collapse under its weight.
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: So that's our deep dog today. We want to really
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: dissect why we stop ourselves, and especially why intelligent people
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: seem to struggle with this the most, and how our
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: whole idea of resilience is well is flawed, It really is.
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: It begins with what I'd call the great misdiagnosis.
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: The misdiagnosis. You mean the labels we give things exactly.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: Procrastination, lack of focus, fear of failure, imposter syndrome, perfectionism.
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: We treat these labels as if they are the root
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: of the problem.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: But they're not the problem itself.
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: They're just the symptoms. They're the visible signs of that
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: deeper underlying mechanism. Resistance is, at its core, a system
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: that is designed for.
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: Protection, protection, not sabotage. That's a huge distinction.
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: It's a critical distinction. It activates the moment an action
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: threatens your emotional safety, or your identity, or even just
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: your sense of control.
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: So it's not that we are our own enemies. It's
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: more like a misguided attempt at self preservation.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: Precisely, resistance isn't trying to destroy you. It's trying to
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: keep you safe, and that's why it's so powerful. If
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: it were just malicious, you might fight back. But because
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: it feels like a safety mechanism, we often we listen
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: to it.
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: It's an internal system that sees growth as a threat
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: to what.
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: The status quill, to your current stability. Yes, it wants
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: to maintain things exactly as they are at all costs.
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  Speaker 1: Which brings us to how it speaks to us. I
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: think most people expect resistance to feel like this loud,
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  Speaker 1: screaming panic.
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  Speaker 2: But it never screams. It's far more insidious than that.
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  Speaker 1: It whispers.
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: It whispers. It manifests as a calm, rational voice in
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: your head. It doesn't say I'm scared. It says you.
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: Aren't ready yet, or you need more data.
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: You need more data, this isn't the right time, or
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: my personal favorite, others are already doing this, and they're
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: doing it better.
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: It disguises itself as logic. It sounds responsible, It sounds
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: like you're just being prudent.
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: And this is what creates the intelligence paradox. You'd think
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: that highly intelligent, self aware people would struggle less with.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: This, but the opposite is often true.
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: The opposite is absolutely true. They experience more resistance because
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: their minds are just better equipped to construct these convincing
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: logical justifications for delay. The smarter you are, the better
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: you are at rationalizing why you shouldn't start today.
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: That's a terrifying thought that our own intellect becomes the
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: weapon that keeps us stuck. It explains why so many
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: of us can spend months, even years, researching a project.
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: Without without ever actually doing it, and that leads to
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: one of its most elegant tricks, the consumption trap. The
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  Speaker 2: consumption trap, resistance doesn't block your energy, not always, it
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: redirects it. You still want to create, you still want
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  Speaker 2: to achieve, but it shifts that impulse into the impulse
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  Speaker 2: to consume.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: So instead of doing the work, you you read about
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: the work. You watch videos, you listen to analyzes. You
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: refine your plan for the tenth time.
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  Speaker 2: And that creates a dangerous loop. You get an idea,
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  Speaker 2: you feel inspired, you start planning. Then you hit that hesitation,
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: that discomfort, and to.
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: Make the discomfort go away, you turn to consumption. You
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: look for another article, another tool, and that.
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  Speaker 2: Search for clarity is the trap. Because consumption feels remarkably
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: like productivity. It gives you hit of dopamine, It provides
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: emotional relief, It feels like work, but it carries absolutely
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  Speaker 2: none of the risk.
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  Speaker 1: It's false productivity. You feel like you're moving, but you're
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: just spinning your wheels.
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  Speaker 2: You're spinning your wheels, but you're also doing something worse.
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  Speaker 2: You're training your nervous system. Your system learns to associate
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  Speaker 2: action with threat and consumption with safety.
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  Speaker 1: So you're neurologically reinforcing the habit of being passive.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, the body learns that watching videos is the safe
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  Speaker 2: path to feeling good, while creating something is the path
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  Speaker 2: to anxiety.
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: That distinction is so critical. But let's go deeper into
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: that fear itself. We said fear of failure is just
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: a symptom. So if failure isn't the real fear, what
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: is the danger? Resistance is protecting.
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  Speaker 2: Us from failure? You know, it's manageable. We can explain
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  Speaker 2: it away. We can say the timing was wrong or
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  Speaker 2: we didn't have the resources. The real fear is disillusionment.
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: Disillusionment that sounds much heavier.
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  Speaker 2: It's the grief of losing a fantasy. It is the
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: death of potential.
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: What do you mean the death of potential?
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: As long as your project is just an idea, it's perfect,
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  Speaker 2: it has infinite potential. It's the greatest novel ever written,
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  Speaker 2: the most successful business. It's flawless.
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  Speaker 1: But the moment you start, the.
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  Speaker 2: Moment you put the first words on the page or
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  Speaker 2: write the first line of code, that infinite potential collapses
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  Speaker 2: into a single, imperfect reality.
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  Speaker 1: That's a really painful psychological shift. So resistance is protecting
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  Speaker 1: the dream by preventing the reality. If I never actually
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  Speaker 1: write the book, it can stay a masterpiece in my
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  Speaker 1: head exactly.
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: Starting forces what you could call an identity retalibration. You
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  Speaker 2: have to shift from being the person who could do
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  Speaker 2: great things to being the person who's well who is
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  Speaker 2: currently doing a mediocre thing in order to get good
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  Speaker 2: at it.
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  Speaker 1: And that acceptance of limitation of imperfection is painful.
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  Speaker 2: It's psychologically very painful, and resistance shields you from the
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  Speaker 2: grief of realizing you're not as perfect as your potential
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  Speaker 2: suggests you are.
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  Speaker 1: So we avoid the work to preserve this fantasy of
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  Speaker 1: our own potential. But there's a to that isn't there.
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: When we repeatedly give in to this impulse to wait, the.
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  Speaker 2: Cost is cumulative. Every time you obey that impulse, you're
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  Speaker 2: teaching your mind a lesson in avoidance. Your body reinforces
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  Speaker 2: safety through stillness, and worst of all, your self trust erodes.
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: You stop believing your own promises to yourself.
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  Speaker 2: You do, and when you break that promise, a void
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  Speaker 2: is created and self criticism just rushes in to fill it. Eventually,
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  Speaker 2: a resistance stops needing to argue.
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  Speaker 1: It becomes automatic, which is why the hardest attempt is
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: never the first one.
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  Speaker 2: Never, it's the second, or the third, or the tenth,
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  Speaker 2: after resistance has already proven that it has the power
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  Speaker 2: to stop you yah, now fighting against a precedent that
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  Speaker 2: you yourself have set.
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: That's a pretty bleak cycle. So how do we break it?
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  Speaker 1: This has to lead us to the idea of resilience.
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: It does, but we have to completely redefine it. The
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: popular narrative is, well, it's very Hollywood, isn't it, the
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: montage sequence, the hero gritting their teeth.
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: Pushing through the pain, forcing their way to victory.
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  Speaker 2: And that narrative is entirely wrong. We have to debunk
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: that myth of force. Allience is not about powering through.
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  Speaker 2: If you try to fight resistance with brute force, you
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  Speaker 2: will lose. You'll exhaust yourself because resistance is tireless.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, So if it isn't force, what is it.
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  Speaker 2: It's tolerance. True resilience is the ability to stay present
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  Speaker 2: with emotional discomfort without retreating.
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  Speaker 1: So resistance wants you to run away from the feeling.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, it wants you to run to consumption or distraction
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  Speaker 2: so you don't have to feel the anxiety. Resilience is
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  Speaker 2: the capacity to just allow that feeling to exist, to
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  Speaker 2: feel the uncertainty, the fear of the awkwardness, and to
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  Speaker 2: keep acting anyway.
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  Speaker 1: That sounds less like a motivational slogan and more like
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  Speaker 1: a nervous system skill. Yeah, expanding your capacity to feel uneasy.
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: It's about calibration. Let me try an analogy here. Think
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  Speaker 2: of resistance as an overactive immune system.
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  Speaker 1: Immune system it attacks.
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  Speaker 2: Growth, change and visibility because it misidentifies them as pathogens.
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  Speaker 2: It sees them as foreign bodies threaten the whole system.
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: That's a powerful image. Our psychology attacks our own ambitions
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: because they threaten our current identity, just like the body
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  Speaker 1: attacks the virus exactly.
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  Speaker 2: So, if you see it that way, resilience isn't about
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  Speaker 2: suppressing your immune system. That would be a disaster. It's
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: about calibrating it, teaching the system that these new activities,
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  Speaker 2: writing that chapter, making that call that they don't require
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  Speaker 2: a full blown defense response.
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: How do we teach the body that, I'm guessing we
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: can't just think our way into feeling safe. We all
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: tell ourselves, I'll do it when I feel ready, or
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  Speaker 1: I'll act when I feel confident.
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  Speaker 2: And that's the great causality error. We believe we must
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  Speaker 2: feel confident before we act. We wait for the feeling
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  Speaker 2: of readiness. But readiness is a myth. It's one of
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  Speaker 2: the most seductive lies resistance tells.
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  Speaker 1: Us because safety is never granted before the action.
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  Speaker 2: Never, It's only recognized after survival. You have to do
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  Speaker 2: the thing to prove you can survive it.
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  Speaker 1: So you act, you survive the exposure, and then the
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  Speaker 1: system learns.
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  Speaker 2: It learns this didn't destroy me. That retrospective learning is
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  Speaker 2: the only thing that reduces resistance over time. Confidence doesn't
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: precede action. Action precedes confidence.
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  Speaker 1: You have to act your way into a new way
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  Speaker 1: of thinking.
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  Speaker 2: You cannot think your way into a new way of acting.
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  Speaker 2: It doesn't work.
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  Speaker 1: That completely reverses the order of operations for most people.
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  Speaker 1: We're waiting for a permission slit that's never going to come.
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  Speaker 1: But let's manage expectations. If someone does this, if they
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  Speaker 1: act before they're ready, if they tolerate the discomfort, does
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  Speaker 1: resistance just go away? Does work become effortless?
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  Speaker 2: No, absolutely not. And this is the uncomfortable truth, resistance
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  Speaker 2: doesn't disappear when you're on the right path.
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  Speaker 1: It can get stronger.
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  Speaker 2: Often it intensifies as you get closer to work that
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  Speaker 2: really matters to you. The stakes get higher, the threat
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: to your old identity becomes more real.
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  Speaker 1: That's so counterintuitive. We think, if it's hard, we must
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: be doing something wrong. You're saying, if it's hard, we
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: might be doing it right.
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  Speaker 2: The presence of resistance is not a stop sign. It's
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  Speaker 2: a signal. It's like a Geiger counter telling you that
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  Speaker 2: you're close to something meaningful. If you felt no resistance
• 10:03
  Speaker 2: at all, it would probably mean you were just doing
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: something trivial.
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: So we have to reframe that feeling. When that logical
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: voice starts telling us to wait, that's the sign that
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: we're exactly where we need to be.
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  Speaker 2: We have to fundamentally change our relationship with that feeling.
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  Speaker 2: The goal isn't to defeat resistance. It's just for it
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  Speaker 2: to lose its function. And it loses its function when
• 10:22
  Speaker 2: discomfort stops being interpreted as.
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: Danger, when imperfection stops meaning failure.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly, it's not about being a hero.
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  Speaker 1: It sounds like the opposite of heroic.
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: It is resilience. Is not loud or dramatic. It is
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: the quiet, non glamorous decision to just remain in a
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: state of feeling awkward, uncertain, and unfinished and moving forward anyway.
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: And that's the only way real movement begins, staying with
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: the awkwardness.
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: The key takeaway from all of this is to stop
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: waiting for the internal weather to change. The conditions will
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: never be perfect, your mind will always find a reason
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: to wait. The only variable you act control is your
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: capacity to act while the storm is still present.
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: In realizing that the storm isn't a sign that you're broken.
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: You are not broken. You're simply a human being with
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: a protection mechanism that is working a little too well.
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: Your job isn't to fix yourself. It's to show that mechanism,
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: through small, repeated options, that you're actually.
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: Safe for everyone listening. I hope this really shifts how
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: you see that hesitation you'll feel tomorrow morning. It's not
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: a stop sign, it is a path. Thank you for this,
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: It's been a real pleasure. We'll see you next time.
• 11:33
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• 11:35
  Speaker 2: Deep Thoughts podcast. I hope you found insights and inspiration
• 11:38
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• 11:56
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