Financial Feminist - 303. Why You Keep Self-Sabotaging with Sabrina Zohar

Episode Date: October 13, 2026

Why do we keep repeating patterns that don’t serve us? Today I'm sitting down with Sabrina Zohar, relationship coach, host of The Sabrina Zohar Show, and author of the new book Why Am I Like This, to figure out why. We’re talking about the unconscious programming behind how we handle love, conflict, rejection, and even our own success. If you've ever over-given, stayed too long, or known exactly what you were doing while doing it anyway, you're in the right place. Sabrina walks through two questions that can interrupt an old belief before it makes a present-day decision, what self-abandonment looks like on a random Tuesday, and how all of it shapes what you think you're allowed to ask for and earn. You will feel seen. You will also feel a little called out. Share it with every woman in your life. Sabrina’s Links: Website: https://sabrinazohar.com/ Book: https://sabrinazohar.com/book Learn the exact strategies to save money, pay off debt, improve your money mindset, and increase your net worth. Get your personalized plan: ⁠⁠https://herfirst100k.com/ffpod⁠. 00:00 Intro 01:35 The pattern women swear isn't a pattern 02:40 Window of tolerance and why discomfort feels unbearable 08:10 The texting spiral, and the two questions that interrupt it 13:20 173 texts: what Sabrina understands about her younger self now 17:00 Gut vs. anxiety (does the pinch match the ouch?) 19:05 Being attached to the story of a relationship 22:55 Finding the belief underneath the behavior 27:45 When your "logical" brain makes the worst decisions 31:20 Getting out of your head and into your body 32:30 Hiring out of fear, and learning to trust yourself 41:35 What self-abandonment looks like on an ordinary day 44:30 Saying no, boundaries, and grieving who you lose 49:10 You're allowed to outgrow people 51:00 How worthiness shapes what you ask for and earn 56:15 Moving through shame instead of ruminating 66:05 Healing doesn't mean never getting triggered 70:05 What to do the moment you notice yourself shrinking 73:40 The self-trust marble jar Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We talk a lot in the show about the beliefs we carry about money, what we think we deserve, what we're willing to ask for, and some of the ways we get in our own way without realizing it. This is what we're calling self-sabotage, right? But those beliefs don't exist in a vacuum. Those self-sabotaging behaviors don't exist in a vacuum. These same patterns can show up in our relationships, our work, and the way we move through the world. Today's guest, Sabrina Zohar is a relationship coach, host of her own podcast, the Sabrina Zohar Show, and the author of the new book, Why Am I Like This?

Her work about the unconscious programming that shapes how we respond to love, conflict, rejection, and even our own success is so absolutely crucial to this moment in time. And if you've ever found yourself overgiving, staying too long, asking for less than you want, or knowing exactly what your pattern is and still repeating it, this episode is for you. We talk about how to recognize when an old belief is making a present-day decision, what self-abandonment actually looks like, and how those patterns affect everything from who we date to what we're willing to ask for. This is an absolute banger of an episode,

and you will want to share it with every single woman in your life because I can guarantee you you will feel absolutely seen and definitely called out. So let's get into it. But first, a word from our sponsors. This podcast is brought to you by Squarespace. When I first started her first 100K way back in 2016, Squarespace was the very first thing I invested in.

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of a website or domain. One of my priorities as CEO and leader of a company is making sure that our team has all of the skills and tools that they need to be most successful. And one of the things we do at HFK is lunch and learns. We do developmental sessions for our team and we've incorporated masterclass into those lunch and learn sessions. Because masterclass helps you learn from the world's best instructors, unlike other learning platforms, masterclass is putting you in the room with the people who defined their field. There's over 200 classes across 13 different categories. So yeah, we got business and writing, but we also have cooking and creativity and wellness.

And three and four members feel inspired every time they watch. 83% have applied something they've learned to their real lives. Masterclass keeps adding new classes, so there's never been a better time to get in. Right now, as a listener of this show, you get at least 15% off any annual membership at masterclass.com slash FFPod. That's 15% off at masterclass.com slash ffpod. Head to masterclass.com slash ff pod to see the latest offer. I am so excited to have you on the show. What is the pattern you watch women repeat that they swear isn't a pattern? Honestly, it's usually dating the parts of themselves that haven't been healed that they swear they have. I see a lot of people,

it's a term called repetition compulsion. We date the parts of us, right? So for me, I had a narcissistic father. I kept dating people that were narcissists because is that was familiar. It's familiar to your nervous system to do what you've always done and what you feel like home, even though home wasn't safe for a lot of us. And I think that's the biggest pattern I see is expecting other people to satisfy your needs in a way that only you can and then not communicating that with them, but then getting upset with them if they don't satisfy your needs in the way that you want or do things, how you want them, which oftentimes can be a trauma from childhood. Well, and talk to me about that friction of wanting to be a better person,

wanting to have dreams and goals, but also not wanting to feel uncomfortable. I would say that's the biggest issue I see in dating and relationships right now, Whitlarge, is that we have this really wild inability to sit in any kind of discomfort, which is the irony because, as you and I know, being entrepreneurs and business owners and scaling, you have got to be uncomfortable a good portion of the time. And I think for a lot of people, right, we have to look at our window of tolerance. And our window of tolerance is essentially just how much you can handle. what's your capacity and bandwidth before you go into hyper arousal,

which is a lot of anxiety and this intensity, or hypo arousal, which is shut down and kind of flight and feeling like you have nothing left to give. And I think for a lot of people, we're treating relationships, whether that be personal and professional, right, this isn't just romantic, very much like Amazon, right? I want it at my door, when I want it, I want it immediate, I want to know the reviews.

I don't want to be unknown. I don't want to be uncomfortable. And if I don't like it, I want it out of my face. But the reality is, for you to grow, you have to be uncomfortable. You have to do things you've never done before. And that's how pearls are made, right? They're squeezed under pressure and then something beautiful happens. But what happens is I think a lot of people, we push ourselves to the edge. Our nervous system says, I can't handle this. And then either we backtrack or we go what's familiar because our brain is designed to keep you safe. It's not designed to

help you grow. Yeah. That's something that I've done a lot of research and continuing to research about that exact sentiment that you just said of your brain is there to keep you safe. Your brain is not really evolved much from caveman days of don't leave the cave and don't eat any of the berries because you don't know if they're going to kill you. Like, we do not know the difference between bear chasing us and asking somebody out. Like, our brain responds the same way. 100%. And that's the problem with like our cell phones have now become these little slot machines, right? They're these little dopamine reward loops every single time where, even some social media cell phones, right? It's not just texting. But I look at it this way. If we, you and I are back in the

day, right? We're in our cave, we're having a conversation. We hear the wind blow that our body and our brain has one of two options, really. Either you sit inside and go, oh, it's no big deal, but then a tiger comes and it eats you, or you go outside and say, oh, okay, it's the wind. I'm fine. And like you said, we haven't evolved beyond that. And that's then what happens when it becomes into the romantic relationships. Nothing will trigger you like a romantic relationship, the closest to your caregivers, right? You will feel all of those feelings. You'll feel small. You'll feel like. a child. Two questions I wrote in this book that literally changed my life and help me to understand is this what I'm seeing? Am I being discerning or is this what I'm fearing? How old do I feel?

And where did I learn this from? Because when something happens, something's scary, something feels overwhelming, you feel like you're going to lose your marbles, you can't go on. Oftentimes, that's something probably more familiar than it is something that's actually a legitimate threat. And if we can start to understand how old do I feel in these moments, I feel like I'm six years old. okay, what happened when I was six? My parents used to be dismissive, or my teacher was really mean to me, or I got bullied a lot in school.

Okay, and where did you learn these core beliefs, right? That there's something wrong with me. I'm not good enough. No one's ever going to choose me. When we can start to get curious about the root of the actual issue, that's when we can start to do the work in a certain way of saying it.

And that's also in your career, right? Again, I am a business owner, and I get challenged every single day to not want to just delete everything, give up, and be like, I'm done and I don't want to do this because it pushes you to your limits. But those are the moments when you get triggered and when you think that you want to give up, that if you just hold on a little bit more on the other side of it, that's the aha moment.

Everything you just said was so insightful and I want to like double click into it. How do we actually do that in practice? Like what is the, give me a scenario of the, you know, the problem that arises and the initial response to it versus the more evolved two question response. I love that. Okay. let's use texting as an example because I know everybody on the planet has some kind of relationship with this,

whether it be your friends, your family, or romantic. So let's say you're texting somebody, it doesn't really matter who, and maybe they don't answer immediately. Maybe you send a text, especially if you like them, if you have a crush on them, you're dating them, right? You're in the relationship. And they don't answer immediately.

The initial response, a lot of people have, go right into the knee jerk of like, I knew they didn't like me, I knew they don't, right? They don't want to be with it. I knew I fucked up. Oh, my God, let me go back on my text. X, what did I say?

I'm too needy. Precisely, right? All the narratives. Whereas, but then what also comes with that? If we stop to really get curious, you have body sensations, maybe you get that wave of heat, maybe your chest tightens, maybe your shoulders tense, your jaw starts to clench. We all have different manifestations that come up for us. Once you go into that world, then what happens usually right after is we started to go into

protest behavior. Protest behavior is when we feel we've been disconnected from somebody. We will engage in behavior to try. try to reconnect. I'll give you a quick story when I was dating in my heyday. I would text a guy. I liked as a heterosexual norm and say, hey, I would love to see you again. Like, do you want to grab drinks? I'm not kidding, Tori. Within 15, 20 minutes, if he didn't respond, I was writing back, okay, guess not. Yes. Oh, I want to do that so badly. That's exactly. Okay, I'll fuck you too. All right. You don't want to text me back? Fine. Yeah, because it's a protection mechanism.

It's like, it's, I bid you. Literally, I bid for connection. You didn't give it to me in the time that I needed. And so, oh, guess I can't be vulnerable. And so I got to put a wall up. Fuck you too. All right. That's being it. I couldn't sit in the discomfort because I wanted to be soothed. And that's a big kind of misconception that a lot of my anxious babes have is they think, no, no, I'm trying to communicate. It's like, no, you're trying to get this other person to soothe. And so the more evolved way of thinking about this perhaps would be. So in that moment, right, I see. I see. send that text. And the irony is, about an hour later, the guy texts me. And he was like, hey, you know, great to hear from you. Honestly, I was excited to see you again, but after that text, I'm not interested. And you know what? Rightfully so. Rightfully so. And because had I actually challenged that thought when I had sent the text, what was the narrative that came up? I'm too much. I knew this guy didn't like me. No one's ever going to pick me. I'm going to be single forever. Right. I started going off on my, my narrative. If I had actually stopped to say, how old do I feel, I would have said, I felt like a kid. Okay, what happened? This is how my

dad was very dismissive, very cold. I always felt like I had to earn his love. It was constantly me feeling like I have to be big and perform for him to see me. And then from there, I could have said, oh, so this is nothing to do with this guy. Why don't I let things just play out? I could write it in my notes a hundred times. I can send a girlfriend my message. I can call my friend and say, man, I'm really bummed. And then I could give myself time between the stimulus and my reaction so I can respond. Because when we're disregulated, we think we're up against a wall that the tiger is right there and we have to. We don't have a choice. When we regulate and we come back to the present moment, you start to realize you're an adult with credit cards, a cell phone, a house, and you're not that

six-year-old little kid anymore stuck in the basement or the attic waiting for someone to come save them. That's where this work starts to play out. I've done it in my career, right? You get a reel that doesn't do well or you get a mean comment. The knee-jerk reaction is for us to be like, I knew no one liked me and no one's going to pay on my career is over and everything's done until we regulate come back and say, this is one person's opinion of me that doesn't define who I am. Now I'm going to make different choices on how I want to handle this. Well, and you open this book with one of your most humiliating dating stories, which frankly feels a bit like a copy paste from my early 20s, which is sending 173 text to someone who had already rejected you. What did you understand in that more?

moment that maybe wasn't true. Like what did what was your brain telling you in that moment versus what do you understand now about her then? I didn't realize that you and I had such a similar 20s. Yeah, I slept my way through Manhattan so that I could find myself. Oh, mine was mine was less ho phase and I mean that complimentary and more um trying to like cape hold of a long distance relationship that was doomed from the start. Like, and so because it was doomed and because he was pulling away, I was like, well, I must control it more. And so I became, let's say politely overcommunicative, but really it was like clingy.

It was like me trying to just get some sort of comfort and stability in a relationship that was not at all stable. I really love politely over communicative. That is such a great way to say it. I would say that, that girl, when I see her. I think I was like 24. I realized that after I wrote the book. I see her and I see a girl that just so badly wanted to be chosen,

just wanted to be loved. And now when I look at her, it's like, oh, I wish I could let her know. It's not about just being chosen by anybody. It's about being chosen by the right person, the person that I also choose. Because in full transparency, the irony is, after the whole 173 text, and I was being conservative, that was actually, it was probably more.

I saw him, like a year and a half later, We ended up, we matched again. Somehow the conversation started. He had amnesia. Like he totally forgot about the whole night about everything that happened. We got drinks and I felt absolutely nothing. I so wasn't into him.

Lovely guy, don't get me wrong. Like he was, there's nothing wrong with this man. But there was nothing there for me because it was about the idea of him, right? When I found out that he was dating the girl that I knew and to me that was, I have to win this. And it's so creepy and this is where it gets a little insidious. My father cheated on my mom their entire marriage.

And so that became this weird, I have to get him to choose me because I can't let somebody else win because I'm going to lose him. And that's how deep these patterns run in our lives is that if we actually start to understand where we learn them from, albeit creepy, it doesn't change the fact that that's where our nervous system started to create these coping mechanisms. Because from zero to 18 months, we're nonverbal. We don't speak. We're getting facial expressions. We're seeing how intonation is. How do people attuned to our needs? by the time we have words, your nervous system and your brain have already evolved and adapted to your environment and then it starts to just get compounded from there. And so I think that girl was so desperate for someone to just see her and accept her for who she was. But the irony was she wasn't doing

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now available in Canada and the UK too. And when Quince asked when you heard about them, let them know that it was financial feminist. It's the best way to support the show. Go to quince.com slash FF pod to get free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. What are some signs the decision someone listening is making today is actually being driven by an old belief about themselves? Usually what I look for, right? Is it your gut or your anxiety if we're trying to differentiate between the two? Your gut is a lot more calming, right? If I were to say, Tori, do you like the color of my plant? It's green, white? What option are you really going to give me? You would probably just say either yes or no, right? Yeah, it's cute or no, I don't love it. That is your gut. Your gut gives

you an immediate response because there's no narrative and there's no body reaction versus if I were to say, do you like this? And you start going, oh my God, well, I don't want to say the wrong thing because what if she doesn't like me? And then what if I fuck up? Oh, God, I don't want to interrupt her. Oh, wait, I don't want to insult her. You start to notice how you have a story that comes with it and then body sensations when there's urgency. And usually that's why I always like to ask, does the pinch match the ouch? Does the amount of this energy that we have right now for the situation match the situation? So if it's that the person you like just didn't text you, and now all of a sudden, this is a whole entire thing about your worth and you're never going to be seen and chew. And then usually

what I look at is when you get what it is that you wanted, right? When they text you, does it all just go away? And for me, I'm curious for you if it did. I know for me, the minute, it was like oxygen, the minute they would text me, oh, I'm okay. For now. Until the next one. Yeah, until the next minute, the next second. I'm curious for you, when you were going through that, what was your breaking point, right? So you had that in your 20s. Was there a moment where you were like, I can't keep doing this anymore? Like, it was a classic, like, we broke up and made up like three, four, five times. I think. think we both just got really tired. I think we both just got really, really tired. And I remember when

we broke up for the last time, I was like, I should miss him more than I miss him. And to me, that tells me everything. And I'm sure he felt the same way about me. We were not supposed to be together. We were attached and, you know, I'm doing a lot of writing and thinking about this right now, but like we were attached to the story. At least I was the story of us more than the actual version of us. Because we had met studying abroad and we had this like really romantic start up to our relationship. And I literally thought, and again, so naive. Oh, 20 year old me. I was like, I've got it right and I've got it right on the first try. I was like, ah, because it was my first, like, real relationship. And yeah, I think I wanted the story of that relationship more than I

actually wanted the relationship itself. Absolutely. A good portion of the time, like, we typically only obsess over things that don't make us feel safe because our brain is a predictive machine. And so for you, right, you had something that you perceived as valuable. Not the high value nonsense we see on TikTok. Actual value, right? This relationship, this person. And then when there's inconsistency, there's the hot and cold, there's the, is it going to happen, is it not?

That intermittent reinforcement a little bit, and then you had, it creates novelty. If I told you, Tori, this mic flag is the only one in the world, and there's only one and it's worth a million dollars, you're like, I want it, give it to me at all costs. But if I said they make this for seven cents and you could get it at the store next door, you'd be like, ah, whatever, I'll get it when I get it. But more often than not, that's why we hold on to people.

Because if it really were a healthy, secure, beautiful relationship, the reason that we don't stay hung up on that, one, is because it's predictable. You already knew what you were getting. But second, it's because you would have been two adults that would have had a conversation. You wouldn't be blindsided. You wouldn't be like, oh, my God, how did this happen? And that's why usually after those types of dynamics, there's a bit of a relief that comes because you feel like you can actually breathe for the first time.

And that's why then when you do the work, right, if you actually learn from these situations and try to evolve yourself as a person, you start to realize why all of those didn't work out because you were trying to force a circle through a square peg. You were trying so hard because you liked the idea of them, the story, the narrative, the if I could just get them, what would happen when I'm done with them?

If they love me and let me in, but then it's really not even about them or the connection. It's more about what it gave you and the dopamine that you were getting than it was actually about what you two had with each other. Let's say I keep ending up in the situation. I am overextending myself or I'm panicking when someone pulls away. I am staying somewhere too long. How do I figure out what belief is under the behavior that's actually running the show and calling the shots?

I would start to look at what comes like right before you do the behavior, right? So right before you say yes when you want to say no, right before you say, all right, I'm coming over and I'm bringing you soup and the person lives four hours away and you could just order something. I start to look at what do you think will happen if you don't do that. that's usually like they're going to leave me, they're not going to like me. If we actually start to listen, and that was my thing, in full transparency, right? I slept around in New York, not because I was just like, wow, I'm just, that's just actual creature. Yes, I was finding myself, but I didn't need to find myself that many times. But it was more about the fact that I was avoiding actually sitting with myself.

And that's why we engage in, whether it be people pleasing. Like, people pleasing on paper looks like you're just being nice, but it's actually a bit manipulative because you're trying to avoid either other people being uncomfortable. And that's where I would even say, where did I learn this from? For me, it was my mom, right? My mom will apologize right now for breathing. She just, she apologizes for apologizing. She genuinely believes she's a burden and that she has to earn her keep.

It's why she married my father, right? It's classic. It makes total sense. And what I've had to look at is when I say, mom, how old do you feel or what comes up for you or what do you think will happen if you don't have to earn it? That's where we can start to understand where she'll say, I feel like a little girl. And I'm like, no, no, no, tell me more. go on. I want to hear about this. Because I think a lot of us were so terrified to go back to those wounds

because they hurt. They didn't feel great. And so if we actually look at it through the lens of IFS, I don't know, are you familiar with internal family systems? Yes. Yeah. Love, right? Love. Love IFS. If we look at it through that lens, we have to think about, we have this amalgamation of all these parts of us, right? We've got a million different parts. Every age, every year, every demographic has a part. those parts at that age learned this is what I have to do to keep myself safe. Now, here's the unfair part. Your amygdala stopped growing at around six years old. That's your fear center.

And that's where we hold on to that. But your prefrontal cortex up here, not back here, stop growing, you know, starts to get fully more developed in your late 20s. So we're looking going, wait a minute, my fear center stopped growing at childhood. But yet my rational thinking and the part of my brain that I actually want to access is now developing well into my 20s. So we default, right, when we get dysregulated, it takes, I think, 0.02 of a millisecond to go to your amygdala. It takes 10 times longer to go to your prefrontal cortex. That's why we go right back into those knee-jerk reactions because as children, we are bottom up. We feel it in our body, but without someone there to help us process it, we then create narratives and stories.

As adults, we're top down. We think it, right? That's why overthinking and ruminating is because we just believe at the next corner, that's where the answer is going to be. and then I don't have to feel it. But if we could actually start to blend when you want to overextend or perform or people please or whatever, what's happening in your body,

start to just even notice like, oh, wow, I'm sweating or oh, wow, I'm starting to feel really tense. And then start to understand the narrative because it actually takes 90 seconds for an emotion to run its course, right, when we look at neuroscience, but we start the clock every time we have a new thought. And so I want people to get more into their body

and less into their head because your head doesn't have the answers a good portion of the time. I want everybody to go back a couple minutes and listen to that again. Because that is the awakening I had in my mid-20s is that my brain was often lying to me and not because my brain was bad, but because it didn't have all of the information or it had way too much information. And so I always valued, oh, I'm an analytical thinker. Like, it's one of my strengths.

Like, I am a very logical person. I am a smart, intelligent person. And yet, actually, when my brain made decisions, especially bigger decisions, it was like some of the worst decision-making processes. Like, it was not actually productive versus my body always knew. And yet my brain ran my body into the ground by trying to analyze every situation because I'm trying to protect myself. Precisely. And then we have to go in and say, you know, here's the thing, right? if you come from that five-year-old, like for me, I realized this, like when I had to change the name of the podcast, that was before I met you guys. And it was catastrophic for me to change the name. Like it ruined so many aspects of my business. But I remember sitting in my coaching session and I kept saying, I'm just scared, I'm scared. And then it hit me that the seven-year-old believed she had to figure out how to make money. She had to figure out how to get people to like her. And that's when I stopped and was like, I need to be the adult here. That was never her job.

And a lot of us are running from those operations. And I'm sure you see it too in your side of the bit. I do relationships and love. You do business and, you know, like we see it manifest in different ways. Because if we're panicked and genuinely believe that a six-year-old needs to figure this out, that's why we're going to keep doing the same shit over and over again until we are the adults to come back online. And I also want to say this too. I think a lot of people here regulate their nervous system and assume that when they do that,

that means like, oh, that's it. It all goes away and everything's fine. All regulating means, like you go. for a walk, you grab two ice cubes, you maybe snap a rubber band on your wrist, like, whatever you choose to do. All that means is you turn your prefrontal cortex on and now you, because your brain can't be at two places and once. That's why I have sour candy all around my house, because when I get really dysregulated, I pop a sour candy in my mouth. Your brain can't be in the past and in the present moment at the same time. By doing that, that's when we can go, oh, I was coming at it like a child,

right? That's when we can start to understand it. And because I am so goddamn tired of seeing TikToks of like just pull on your ear for 30 seconds and you regulate your new restart your nervous system. We're not tomogatchis. You can't just turn people on and off. We're very complex humans. But I think if we can focus on coming back to the present moment, you'll realize that the big shadow that we see that so scary is really just like a little doll on the floor that's casting this big shadow that feels a lot more scary than it actually is. Well, and notice that you did not say in how to regulate your nervous system, think more about it. Right. It is get out of your brain, it into your body. So snap a rubber band. For me, it is not only taking deep breaths,

I'll do it here. It's ridiculous. I'm going to have to step back from the mic. This is what I do. I go, like, that's literally my whole body just calm down. That's literally what I have to do sometimes. I have to like groan. And it does help. It like gets me out of my brain. It gets me back into my body. And so the logical part of us goes, oh, I can just think my way out of this. I can just think my way out of the scary text. I can think my way out of the bank account balance being low. I can think my way out of fight or flight. You cannot. The last time I tried to do that, I love the breathwork. Because, you know, it actually activates your Vegas nerve when you make humming, noises, singing. The last time I did that, I'll never forget, there was this girl that I saw and she,

her podcast was blowing up and she's like a social media girl. And she's lovely. Don't get me around. There's like nothing wrong with this girl. And I saw myself as the, I saw it as like, I'm losing everything. And I was so, I remember hyperventilating. Oh, she triggered something in you. Triggered something in with me. And I said, I have to hire her. And I hired her to help me with my thing. And I paid her a stupid amount of money. And I'll never forget, I sent my good friend, Gillian, the video. And I said, what do you think? And she goes, I'm going to tell you right now, I'm disappointed in you. This is garbage. This is bullshit. This is not you, Zohar. And I remember being like, oh my God. And instantly it, I like snapped me back into place. And I told the girl and I said,

hey, I realized I hired you out of fear. I didn't hire you as an adult making this decision for the best of my business. I hired you because I thought you were going to save me and that you were going to figure this out for me so I didn't have to. I let her go. And like, again, amicably, like, again, she didn't do anything wrong. It just, it wasn't the right fit. And after my shit started to blow up, when I really said, I need to take control and

come back into this. But to your point, it wasn't because I thought my way out of it. But when we make decisions, especially romantic or professional, right, business decisions to hire somebody or to do something knee-jerk because we think they're going to save us, that's usually the times when you are going to be disappointed the most because nobody's going to do that but you. I want to call out what also might be happening to somebody listening is somebody hears what you just said and goes, oh, they got control back on the situation. It was because they let go of control. That's why this happened. And I want to be very clear, I don't think that's what you're talking about.

The answer is not to white knuckle harder and to grip tighter. So what is that answer then? If it means like, okay, I'm making this decision out of fear. To somebody who maybe hasn't done the work yet, that just sounds like, all right, I need to take back control. I can't trust anybody else. I need to just grip tighter. Which I totally understand how that could be the perception, right?

And I think what it really was about was I had to learn to trust myself. And that's what I was doing. I was outsourcing that trust to other people. She knows better. she'll be able to tell me what to do. She can, everybody else knew my business somehow better than I did, the person that grew it to where it was. And when I learned to trust myself, that's actually what made things go really well. When I sat down and started scripting my own stuff and going, why am I hiring somebody to speak for me?

When I've never done this before, that's when my life started to change because I said, I actually do got this. I don't need other people to it. But you know what? To your point, you do have to release control of the outcome. That is huge because all of us, I don't know one person that gets into a relationship or starts a business with the hope that it closes or that you break up. Don't know. Don't know one person that that's why they started is because they're hoping it doesn't work out. And so we have to remember that we do this because we trust ourselves.

There's a part of us that believes that this is what we should be doing. This is our calling and this is the right way to go. And so please hold onto that intrinsic trust because that's what's going to get you further. When you can stop and say, you know what, this isn't for me. And here's the thing too. Sometimes it doesn't work out. Right? Like when I met my partner, I was dating two guys.

Yeah, your girl was playing it. And they both knew about each other. Like, I wasn't like lying to anybody. And in the moment, I had to make a choice. And people asked me all the time, but how did you know it was the right one? I didn't. I listened to my gut. And I said, I chose the part now, three and a half, almost four years later, it worked out.

It was the right choice for me. Had I not, I knew that no matter what I'd be okay. And that is the self-trust that we have to embody. otherwise, if you don't stand for something, you fall for everything. And if you're waiting for everyone else to tell you who to be, you're going to be exhausted and probably just replicating your childhood all over again. And if you make a decision and discover it's the wrong one, you usually only discover it's the wrong one after you've made the goddamn decision.

Because I think that's the other belief is, again, I can analytic my way, I can research, I can analysis paralysis my way into making the correct decision. You do not figure out whether it is the right decision for you when you're still on the sidelines. You have to be in the arena. You have to play the game and then go, oh, yeah, that felt good. Or parts of that felt good. Let me figure out how to figure this out.

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grow, this is something that we are continuing to look into to make sure that we have the best tools at our disposal. If your revenues are at least in the seven figures, go to net suite.com slash ff pod. Get your free guide at net suite.com slash ff pod. I'll tell you this too, and I'm sure you can relate. I don't remember lessons. from things that worked out. I remember it when they didn't. I remember the lessons from when I go, oh, that was the wrong hire. That was an impulsive decision. That, but very rarely am I going, oh, yeah, well, that worked out really beautifully. I learned so much from it. Maybe I learned to trust myself a little bit more. But I think we have to be okay, because that's where we start to go into

the childhood of like, I have to be perfect. I can't mess up. I have to do everything right. Because realistically, like actually challenge it. What's the worst that can happen? I had to play that game. When the name change happened and all that. And my friend, she sat with me and she's like, let's do this together. What's the worst that can happen? I said, I lose all my money. And she's like, okay, then keep it going, keep it go. And then once I really started to actually, like, feel it and embody it, I realized, oh,

you're like four years away from losing all your money if you're financially smart about how you're spending and you always have been, right? And then, but what was the biggest fear that I'd be a failure to my father? That was it. And so once you face it and you're like, oh, that's the big bad wolf. Okay. so I'm a failure to him. You start to actually see it for what it is,

and it's a lot less scary because you're not a kid anymore. You will never be seven years old again. For some of us, that's the best news ever. For other people, maybe not, right? But you will never be a child again. You don't ever have to experience those things again. And once you embody that, that's when your life will change, because there's a lot of scary things.

Every day I hear people tell me, well, easier said than done. What in life that's worth it is easy? Was starting a business easy? No. Was starting a podcast easy? No. Is it showing up. Every day for some people is getting out of bed easy? No. But you choose your heart and you do it anyways

because that is how you show up for you. Self-love isn't because you do bubble bass and face masks. It's because you validate your emotions and experiences. You show up for yourself. You speak up for yourself. And no matter what, you show yourself compassion because that releases more dopamine and serotonin than anything external will. I have done so much thinking and writing right now about self-trust. But on the opposite side, we have self-abandonment. And what does self-abandonment look like in an ordinary day. Self-abandonment could look like saying yes, when you want to say no, could be overextending yourself, could be trying everything you can to make other people happy at the expense of your own needs, right? It can be something as simple as I used to self-abandoned,

like this guy that would text me at night and tell me to come over. Instead of going, no, I'm going to stay home. It's 10 o'clock at night. I don't want to leave. I would go, okay, but I don't want him to think I'm a prude. I don't want him to not like me. I don't want him to think anything of me. so I self-abandoned so much to try to get other people to choose me, which then usually, you know what ends up happening? They don't. People don't respect somebody that doesn't have an opinion, right? Like, I want someone that says, you know what, actually, I don't agree with that.

And I'm like, cool, talk to me. What don't you agree? Maybe we can have a conversation, a different perspective, right? That's the beautiful thing. And I think for so many of us, we self-abandoned because growing up somewhere, somewhere along the way. It's not, and this isn't about, I always like to preface. No one's shaming or blaming their parents. I mean, maybe some people are. I'm not. I hold them accountable to the lessons that I was taught

and to the behavior that they exhibited. Like, it's not okay. But I don't blame them for how I turned out. I just want to take accountability ownership of their part and then mine, because it's the only way that I'm going to grow. Otherwise, I'm going to stay in a shame, it's not going to help anybody. But when I used to self-abandon, I have to actually take control and say, I need boundaries. But you know what the biggest thing that scares people about setting boundaries and self-abandoning, you have to grieve. You've got to learn to grieve. You've got to learn to grieve because you're going to lose people. You're going to have people that go, oh, I don't like this. Oh, I liked it better when you said yes to everything. I liked it better when you didn't push back.

Of course they did. They were benefiting from your lack of boundaries. And it will make them uncomfortable because when you set a boundary, it forces them to analyze what's working. What am I trying to get out of this? And most people are not evolved enough to do that. So when you start doing the work, it's going to piss a lot of people off who have not done the work themselves. Saying no has become my favorite word. Oh, I love it. I love being like, no, sorry, can't. And sometimes even not sorry, can't. And I learned that. I have a really good friend. He's very big in the industry and all that. And he will take as much as he could take. And when I find, and I would give and I would give. And one day, I remember I looked at Ryan and I said,

but maybe soon he'll stop this. And you know when he stopped it, when I stood up for myself. And I finally said, no, that doesn't work for me. I'm traveling that day. And I'm not going to inconvenience myself to come onto a recording for you to help benefit your company, to help benefit your bottom line, to do things that help you, that don't do anything for me. Because realistically, adult relationships are conditional. Like they are, right? You need conditions. You can't just treat me however you want and I'm going to stay no matter what, right? That then I don't respect myself and I don't actually love myself because I'm not dating my mom or dad. But when we think about that and now this guy respects me

so much more. He actually will go, oh, you know what, don't worry about it. Totally understand. He now speaks about me in a more highly, high regard because he sees that I am more afraid of losing myself than I am afraid of losing other people. And that is when you will actually have people that respect you for who you are because you're not trying so hard to make them happy. You know that you might lose them and that's okay. We've said it many times on this show, but like if you are living your life just to please everyone and you're going to bed at night and you're like, wow, I'm not even pleasing myself. What kind of life is that? I saw a funny video in the guy who was like, can you go to bed at night knowing you don't know anybody money? No one's kicking your door down because you're a shitty

person. He's like, can you go to bed and just know that who you are is enough? And for a lot of us, that's really tough. And I am not even try to kid you and say, oh, I'm 100%. Healing is not linear. And I know that you will understand what I'm saying. There are days where you feel on top of the world because, yeah, there's some external validation. Maybe you got the brand deal. You got the phone call. you got the opportunity. And then there are other days where you have to have blind faith because nothing is showing you

that things are going well. Nothing is presenting itself in the moment. That is when you have to hold onto yourself because otherwise in those moments, you start going down a spiral, you rabbit hole, you attack yourself. Let me ask you this. Who wants to be around somebody

that hates themselves? Right? Who wants to be around somebody that's self-deprecating, that always puts themselves down, that thinks everyone hates them? It's exhausting. You end up being like,

all right, you know what, dude, grow up. Like I want to be around people that actually think that they have value and that they offer something to the world, not that they always think that they're depleting from it. I mean, I have had to not remove friendships, but not be as close to people who do that, purely because, you know, and they're sweet people, but it is like I find myself leaving interactions with them. I am like, oh. And again, I trust myself and I know myself and I'm tuned in with my body well enough.

I really watch that when I leave people and I'm, you know, I feel on top of the world and I feel really energized. Great. Those are the kind of people I want to be around more. The people who, yep, don't like themselves very much, don't have very positive self-talk. They deplete you of all their energy. And it's not their fault. They're not bad people. But you do get to the end of that interaction, that dinner or that coffee date or that movie night. And you're just like, oh. That's why I don't really love pop culture sometimes because you have best friends forever, the one. And it's like, it's okay. Like my biggest breakup was with a friend, 15-year friendship. And it just ran its course. There's nothing wrong with her.

We just are not, the person I was becoming, it was not the person that I was. And the person that I was was the reason we were so close. And that is part of this. It's like, as you grow and evolve, and the irony is, my brother then came to a dinner and he met a bunch of my friends and he looked at my mom and he goes, this is the first time I can say I love Sab's friends. And my mom was like, do you know why? because she has done the work on herself to bring people into my life, right,

that I genuinely feel good with because I'm more discerning. I'm seeing it for what it is, not for what I'm hoping it will become. And I'm no longer connecting over wounds. You're connecting over values and depth and honesty and transparency. You're allowed to outgrow people. And people are allowed to outgrow you. 100%. 100%.

I've had people tell me that, hey, I'm done with this friendship. And you're like, hey, thank you so much. It was a good run. Yeah. But if we try so hard to hold on to it, that's self-abandonment. So we spend so much time on this show and in our work talking about money without really talking about money because it's about the beliefs we carry, right? So many of our actual financial decisions, as we've talked about many times, have nothing

to do with math, have nothing to do with numbers and everything to do with our mindset, with our beliefs about ourselves, with, you know, money trying to compensate for something. So how do all of these beliefs shape what we think, we're allowed to ask for or think we're allowed to earn when it comes to money. If you don't think you're deserving and worthy of somebody spending money on you or giving you money, it's going to be very difficult to receive that. And then you're always going to be playing small, right? When I first started my career, buying a laptop, I had a panic attack. Because who am I to spend $2,000 on something myself? Because growing up, my dad used money as a

means of control. He would give and he would take. And like the one story I have is that my mom took me to Ross for my eighth birthday because we didn't get presents. My dad, he did not spend on us. He didn't believe in that. His response was, you get enough year round. He didn't. We didn't get anything. What would we get? We had a house. Like, thank you for bringing me into this world. I didn't ask for it. And that was the first time somebody saved money and bought me one thing. It was like $8, but that didn't matter. What mattered was you cared about me. You loved me enough to do something, like take money, take me on a private thing that no one knew that she was doing this to show me that I mattered. And I think for so many of us, money is safety. I know for me it is.

If I have it, but that's the problem. It's a moving target. You could have $10 million in the bank and you'll be worried you're going to lose it. You'll be worried it's not enough. You'll be always on this hamster wheel because it's not about the actual dollar amount. I can have $5 or $5 million. I'm still going to think it's not enough because we have to actually believe and demand that. When I started setting boundaries in my career saying I don't give free advice, like I don't just answer my DMs and set and talk to people endlessly all day, I got people that got upset with me. And you know what I also got?

Made a ton of money charging people for my time because I know I have value. I know what I offer people, and I know that I can actually change people's lives if you sit with me, but I'm going to charge accordingly for that because I've worked this hard for that. That is a belief that took time to cultivate

because at first I didn't think anybody was ever going to even listen to me. And that's okay, right? Confidence isn't built because you know it's going to work. it's built by doing things and then realizing it works. And so I think anybody that's listening, if money scares you, it did for me. Money is terrifying to me. And the reason I have so much of it saved is because I'm scared of it at times. And that's where I've had to learn. It comes and it goes. But if you really want to understand, I would start to say and get curious about what part of you believes that you're not worthy of it, that you're not deserving of it, that you are never going

to get it, that everybody else can, right? Like you see the, at least in our industry, I see people get these crazy half a million dollar brand deals. And then you get the brands tell you, sorry, we only have 5,000. And you're like, I don't understand. And it took me a while to actually believe that I could make that money too. I haven't. Don't worry. Not yet. Not yet. It hasn't happened yet. But I could make that. Why is that person better than me and why is their value seen as more than mine? But you have to hold that conviction, which means also losing things if that doesn't align. Because if you need $100,000 salary, that's what you need, right? Just we're throwing a number out there. You need 100K a year and you're looking for a job. And this is the same in relationships,

right, if you're going to accept less than you deserve. You know that this is what you need to pay your bills, to live your life, right, to not have to stress all the time. But when you're so scared, if you don't actually think you're going to get it and you go get a $20,000 job, your needs are never going to be met, you're always going to be wanting more. You're constantly going to be struggling because you have to be okay losing the things that are not right for you to wait for the ones that are. That's just how this is going to work, but you have to believe that you are worthy and deserving of somebody doing that for you. Otherwise, you're not going to be able to receive it. And your nervous system is going to constantly push it away. I run a multi-million dollar business. And part of running a

business means using things that you can rely on. It means using incredible software that you can rely on. And that's why we love Squarespace. This podcast is brought to you by Squarespace. And they've supported our show since the very, very beginning. And we would love you to support them too. When I first started her first 100K way back in 2016, Squarespace was the very first thing I invested in, truly the very first thing. When you've heard me talk about me starting a multi-million business with just $40, that was my Squarespace domain and my Squarespace website. They have cutting-edge design tools at Squarespace with drag and drop. They also have SEO tools so you can get discovered quickly. And one of my favorite things to do on Squarespace is be able to sell your

content. It makes it really easy to sell courses, blogs, videos, memberships all inside. your Squarespace website. Head on over to Squarespace.com for a free trial. And when you're ready to launch, use offer code FFPod to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. When we do something that we are not proud of, when we are reactive, when we allow the child version of us to take over, when we spend mindlessly, when we text that person 173 times, how do we not linger in shame as the initial response?

How do we not stay there and instead move forward to learn? So that's big on like ruminating, right? Ruminating is we get stuck thinking just at the next thought, I'm going to figure this out. Processing is allowing ourselves to feel the emotions, feel the weight, feel everything that comes with it. And so there's ACT acceptance and compassion therapy or whatever it is. And what the biggest thing of ACT is,

if you can make meaning of the situation, then you can learn from it. And so, for instance, the 173 text, right, if we look at guilt versus shame, guilt is I've done bad, shame is I am bad. So if we're starting to go into the, oh my God, I'm a terrible part, that that, that, da, da, one thing that changed everything for me was having just a simple mantra, given everything I've been through, of course it would make me feel like this. Because just right there, you're showing yourself compassion and saying, of course, man, like you've had a really tough life, you went through a lot going up. So of course you messing up is going to mean that this is going to impact you. And then I go and say, okay, so if I see that that's a 10 year old little girl and she's saying, but I knew it,

I fucked up, I know one's going to like me, and I'm an idiot and I can't believe I did that. What was I thinking? Then I would start and say, if she were sitting right next to you, what do you think she would need to hear? Or they? And most people, the PC answer is like, you're fine, everything's okay, you're going to be okay and you have enough money and everything's fine. But that's dismissing them. Then what you're doing is you're just, doing what everyone did to you. Instead, maybe what that part needs to hear is, I am so sorry that I am doing to you what everyone else did, that I'm attacking you, that I'm putting you down, that I am just being terrible to you. What is it that you need for me? You need me to speak kinder to you? You're right.

You're right. I am not being nice to you right now. That's the type of conversation you can just have with yourself. You could sit in a room. I do that in the shower. Sometimes I'll feel my little and I'll be like, wow, you feel like a terrible person right now because you said no to somebody, but I need you to know that you're allowed to do this. It's okay. And I love you. And I think you are the bees knees. And I'm really proud of you. That right there. Then you're like, okay. To somebody who's never done it, it sounds crazy. Like I'm going to talk to like capital C crazy. Oh, I'm going to talk to myself. And like, who do I think I am telling myself I'm the best? And it's like, you should be telling yourself you're the best. Like you should be talking out loud, calming yourself down and

being like, I love you. I'm not going to leave you. I'm not going to abandon you. We will figure this out. And you know what? I will make sure that no matter what, like my friend even brought up a good point. He's a neuroscientist. And he was like, you don't ask your little what they want to do. He's like, that's a child. You tell children what they're going to do. And so maybe it's getting curious. Like for me, I used to hide in this one house that was my house of horrors, I call it. And so when I feel she's back there, I literally tell her, I'm like, get the fuck out. Get the fuck out. I'm like, you are not allowed here anymore. We're going to the pink palace. You're going to go relax and you get to be a child. And mama's. here and I'm going to be the adult. Or even, hey, this is not, you know, this is not a great place for you. I'm going to take your hand and we're going to walk out the door and then we're going to the pink palace because I think for me, I have to talk to myself very kindly. I can't be like, we're getting the fuck out here. I'm just like, hi, hi, this isn't good for you. You know this isn't good for you. So take my hand and we're going to keep walking. Yep, you're doing great. Oh, you're walking so strong. You're being so brave right now. You've got this. And then I walk her out of it. Right. Whatever.

It's like, whatever your little needs, that's what our job is. Because then when you do that, then if somebody comes to you and says something disrespectful or rude, you're like, uh-uh, baby, I got this. You stay back. What did you just say? Right? Then the adult can be like, I have got this and I'm going to handle it. And I get it.

Trust me. I know it sounds woo-woo. I know people are like, I'm not talking to myself. No, it is. It will change your life, everyone listening. Like, I promise you it will change your life. And I could say that in a way that's like click-baity, a hook on Instagram. No, like, this thing will actually change your life. It changed my life.

It is like the tool that I point to that I'm like, this is probably the biggest reason I've been able to be successful, period. If I can be the girl that was broke, didn't know what the fuck I was doing, sleeping with two guys a night because I just want one in the morning, one at night, right? Like, yeah, I did that to the person I am now, then anybody could do this, right? We're not a victim of our own circumstances. Learned helplessness is very much a real thing. But when you, you change the way you speak to yourself, even something as simple as, that didn't feel great. And I'm going to acknowledge that, right? We don't gaslight ourselves to be like, you're just being dramatic and this. No, I didn't love that. That didn't feel great. What you're doing is you're

standing up for yourself in a way that maybe nobody else did because then you won't allow other people to do it to you. But when you do it to yourself, you can't be shocked when people treat you like shit. And the thing I keep coming back to in the work I'm doing right now is you think you're being productive by ruminating. You think that that is actually making you a better person and you think that is processing. If you are actually trying to improve yourself, if you're actually trying to get a step closer to your goals, no matter if they're financial, if they're, you know, you trying to create a positive dating life, like whatever that goal is for you, create a business. The productivity isn't, I am going to run this into the ground and look at it from every angle. That is actually

sabotaging your ability to move forward. It's so important that you understand that the thing you think is productive. The thing you think is, oh, yeah, I'm processing. It's like, no, you are white knuckling and again, running that thing into the fucking ground. And a question I always ask is, I'm like, by doing that, what do I get to avoid dealing with? Right? By doing that, by staying, when we get to stay super busy, right? Like, even me, I got sick last to sick as a dog when I was in way in New York. And I came home and I had to cancel my whole week. Oh my God. I felt so guilty. And I, every, all day, I'm like, no, no, no, let me go live. and Ryan's like, you don't have a voice.

Go on the couch and please do nothing. And that took a lot for me to be like, hey, you don't have to earn rest. You get to just do it. Because when we try so hard, right, if a real doesn't do well and you're like, all right, let me make 10 more. That's coming from fear.

That's coming from scarcity of like, I have to, I have to, versus, you know what? Today's not my day. And I'm allowed to feel collapsed. I'm allowed to feel frustrated. I'm allowed, we all know we hate social media. I'm allowed to feel that. And tomorrow's a new day and I'll try again.

that right there is how we can then be like, okay. Otherwise, when we try to ruminate and ruminate and ruminate and ruminate and you stay in your head, what do you avoid feeling? Feeling like a failure, feeling like you can't do it, feeling like you're not enough, that's where we want to be. It's okay if you go in your room and cry. That's fine. Let it out.

There is this belief that I am healthy when I'm never triggered again. I've done the healing work when I never feel triggered again. And I want to call bullshit on that. Tell me more about the feelings of being triggered and the response that we need to have in order to be the healthiest versions of ourselves. Whoever told you that you will never get triggered means you healed has actually lied to you. Because a trigger is a neutral action or inaction, right? So somebody slams the door. To the average person, maybe they just go, okay.

But if you had a childhood experience or PTSD, whatever, all of a sudden you jolt. somebody didn't text you, right? To the other people, it's no big deal. A trigger is a neutral action or inaction, which means, of course people are going to trigger you. That's part of this. What we're looking at is what's my reaction to it? What am I doing?

What's my baseline versus what am I doing with it to then respond? Because I've had my partner say things, and instead of, right, I'll give you an example. I asked Ryan to go to home goods one day. He said no. He just went now. And the knee-jerk reaction of me was, what the fuck do you mean?

No. Are you kidding me? Like, are you that much of an asshole? But instead, I stopped and I said, what triggered me so much? He's allowed to say no. Oh, it reminded me of my dad. My dad's very dismissive and he just goes and walks off. Oh, okay, that's what it was.

So when he came back in the room, I was able to say, hey, can I share something with you? Yeah, what's up? I said, you know, when you said this, it triggered me. I want you to know, that's not your responsibility. You are allowed to say no. But moving forward, what would be really helpful for me, could you at least just give me the reason why so I don't make up a reason? And I explained my dad.

and he was like, oh my God, that makes so much sense. We have, to this day, never had that issue. Because your partner is going to piss you off. Your partner is going to drive you insane. There are going to be times you want to Bart Simpson their neck. That doesn't mean it's not the right partner for you. What that means is that you now get to choose how you respond. And I am so exhausted by the trigger conversation

because people think, you triggered me is like this get-out-a-jail-free card for them to treat you however they want to. But that just means that you need to grow up and take control of your own life and have some emotional regulation so that you can understand a trigger is on you, not on them, and then you can articulate and have a conversation with people.

But it's not about blaming or shaming the other person because that is why I think the pendulum swings. Either we leave the second we feel uncomfortable, right? The minute something's wrong, oh, they made me feel anxious, I'm out, or we stay way too long. And we think like, oh, it's fine, it's fine. Red's my favorite color.

I don't need to see all the flags. We want to find a little bit of a baseline that a trigger is, to me, an invitation and an opportunity for me to learn more about myself. And if I can actually take that invitation, I will be able to grow from the situation, be able to communicate more effectively, and come back home to myself in a way that maybe I haven't prior.

When a woman notices herself shrinking to keep the peace, let's say it's this week. It's at work. It's with her money. It's in her relationships. What do you want her to do in that exact moment? Honestly, I'd love that person to take a couple of deep breaths, to just sit with themselves and say,

what is playing small protecting me from? Playing small is protecting me from losing my job. Okay, well, maybe we could start to get curious about how factual that is. And listen, I understand there are times, like as women, what have we been taught? Be a good girl. Don't ruffle any feathers, right?

Don't piss anybody off. Don't piss anyone off. Keep sweet. Be and be good. And now we're learning that we as women have the most freedom we've ever had. We're making the most money in the industry, in the world that we,

this is the most free in history that we have been where we are. And I think for a lot of people, playing small feels like it's going to be safe because it's going to keep you safe. That's where I would say, it's okay. You want to play small, that's fine.

But then you're not going to be able to have the big life that you dream. And that's okay. That's a choice you're making and I respect it and that's fine. But if you really do want to have that life, then I would start to get curious about what you're scared of happening

if you take up space. And then here's the biggest thing. I don't want anyone listening to think that they need to go from playing small to all of a sudden setting boundaries all day every day. that is never going to work. That's why New Year's resolutions don't stick. You've got to start painfully small.

You have to allow your nervous system, right? So if I were to say, Tori, we're going to go run a marathon and you're like, girl, I have asthma. I can't even walk down the block. I'm not going to sign you up for 26.2. What I would do is I would say, for a week, put your shoes by the door. And then for another week, start walking around your house. Then for another week, maybe walked up and down your street because what you're doing is you're telling your nervous system, this is safe, I can do it, and you're building that

capacity. And so I want everyone to take it small. Maybe it means testing it with the barista at the coffee shop that you normally wouldn't say anything, but this time you say, excuse me, my coffee's cold, right? Very low stakes. A friend that you trust, let them know, hey, I'm trying to take up space. Can I practice that with you? If you have a really good friend, they're going to be like, hell yeah, I'm here, baby. Let's go. Let's take it up. And then learn to grieve. Because when you take up space, you're going to have people that say that you're too big. That's okay. That's just a threat to them. They want you to dim your light because it makes them feel inadequate about the fact that theirs is not bright. The metaphor I've been turning to, which is a derivative of Brunei Brown's

great metaphor about the marble jar. Have you heard this story? The marble jar, yes, but I'd like to yeah. Yeah. So she talks about, you know, having this metaphor with friends of, based on her daughter at school, when they did something good, teachers put marble in the jar, when they did something bad, marbles got out of the jar, and eventually I think they get a pizza party or something. If there's enough marbles in the jar. And she talks about friendship as a marble jar of like when your friend shows up for you, when, you know, your parent gets sick and they are checking in on you. It's marbles in the jar. When they don't show up for you, it's marbles out of the jar. But I am thinking about that. It's like it's a self-trust jar, right? And you're putting marbles in the self-trust jar.

And I think everybody believes it is these big actions. And this is what she says with friendship, too. Like, everybody thinks it's, oh, it's when they, you know, do something crazy and they fly a car. a country for me or whatever. And like, maybe. But she's like, it's in these little moments of like, your friend remembers your parent name, your friend remembers that you have an appointment coming up that you're really nervous about. It's in these like small moments that we start feeling better connected to people. And I think it's the same logic for ourselves. Like, we believe that self-trust and moving away from self-abandonment is these big moments of, you know, almost like cinematic standing in your power.

hour and look at me go. And it's like, no, it's like, oh, I have to pee. And rather than waiting an hour, it's, I'm going to go to the bathroom right now. Like, it's something as simple as just like, oh, my body's asking for something. I give it to my body. When it asks, I don't wait. I don't punish my body. Yep, something doesn't feel good. I say no. Something feels amazing. I say yes. Like, it's these small little moments where your marbles go in the self-trust jar or your you know your pennies in a piggy bank it's like it builds over time it's not you're not saving 10,000 dollars in that piggy bank at once you're saving pennies it's something is it but what I realized too was like oh I need water right I need food basic things that we think are oh come on really it's like yeah right even I'm going to take three deep breaths

before I respond I'm going to put I usually what I used to do to like and this is the type of thing too the tools that we're talking about, at first you're like, oh, this is so clunky. Then after you do it enough, you don't need to keep doing things like this, right? But like I'll set my clock for a minute and then I will say, I'm not going to respond to something, especially like a mean review or something where you want to snap back and you're like, I'm going to fucking end this person. I will set my clock for a minute and then after, or even sometimes an hour, right? Like start small.

Then after I will assess, do I still feel this intensity? Do I still want to say this? and if not, what's an alternative that I'd like to respond with? Because by just doing that, you're giving yourself permission to fall in love with who you are. And I think, like, that was a question my therapist asked, what are the parts of yourself that you don't think are lovable? And I remember saying my anxiety and no one's ever going to love that. And then I remember just looking at her and I was like, you dumb bitch, I see what you just did. And she was like, those are the parts that need you. Because the more you try to turn away from them and be like, ah, the more they're going to persist.

They're just going to keep rearing their ugly head until you become the chief operating officer of all of your part. They're going to run the show and the inmates will run the asylum. And so I love the marble jar analogy of start really small. Something as simple as in the morning I'm going to eat breakfast. In the morning, I am going to wake up five minutes earlier

so I could do a meditation in bed before I even start my day. Those little things add up into such a monumental way because it's brick by brick that you will start to build this building but you don't just wake up and all of a sudden have this house there. And if you want the house, this is what it's going to take. There is no shortcut. There is no hack to building the house. And I don't think you would be listening to this and listening to this show more generally if you didn't want to build a really solid house that you love living in.

So it will take this. It will feel uncomfortable. But again, choose your discomfort. Would you rather keep beating yourself up or would you like to choose these small moments of discomfort that ultimately do make your life better, brick by brick? And don't be surprised when other people don't want to do this too, right? I get that a lot, especially in the dating world, people will say, well, I did all of this work. Why haven't I met my person? And it's like, oh, wait, you're not doing this work for a specific outcome. You're doing it so that you can feel better in your body and being home with yourself, taking up the space, right? Like a lot of people see my content. They're like, oh, you've always been confident. I'm like, you didn't know me five years ago. You didn't know who I was and that I was terrified of a lot of these things. But I had to be okay with me. And that's why I did that. I met my partner. That was a nice to have. I started my business. That was a nice to have. But even if I had none of this, as long as I could be okay with me, that's the end game. And so don't be shocked when so many people that you meet are not interested. That's why there's a lot of people that don't own businesses. That's why there's a lot of people that are not doing this work, that are not having the healthy, secure relationships and communicating like openly and honestly, even to a fault when it's uncomfortable.

Yeah. Because for a lot of people, the hell they know is better than the heaven they don't. And they would rather stay in something. Remember, your brain wants to keep you familiar because you only have so much energy in a day. When we go into black and white thinking, it's so much easier to do that because it saves us energy versus going in the gray, holding nuance and space and being like, wait a minute, is there another way to see this? That takes energy. Don't be surprised when a lot of people don't want to do that. I am so excited for people to read this book. I think that so much of our work is similar. And I can't talk about it publicly yet, but I have a project coming out next year where I'm just like, oh, it's just like all of this work is so absolutely crucial

for women getting to where they want to be. And it just makes me so happy. So plug away, my friend. Where can people find it? You guys can find, why am I like this? Available anywhere books are found worldwide, right? Which is really fun. You can come listen. Tori will be on next year, the Sabrina Zohar show or Sabrina Zohar on any social platform. You will see my face at nauseam. So just feel free to look it up. This was such a banger of an episode. Thank you. Thanks, dude. It's stoked to be here. Thank you for listening to Financial Feminists, produced by Her First 100K. If you love this show and want to keep supporting feminist media, please subscribe or follow us on your preferred

podcasting platform or on YouTube. Your support helps us continue to bring this content to you for free. If you're looking for resources, tools, and education, including all of the resources mentioned to this episode, head to herfirst00K.com slash s.fod.