The Resilient Mind - You Are Only One Decision Away - Mel Robbins

Episode Date: April 11, 2025

Mel Robbins is an accomplished author, motivational speaker, former lawyer, and one of the most sought-after self-help experts in America. Her TEDx talk, "How to Stop Yourself Over," has been viewed over 25 million times and has helped millions of people around the world change their lives for the better.Learn More About Mel's training: Make It HappenTake action and strengthen your mind with The Resilient Mind Journal. Get your free digital copy today: ⁠⁠⁠⁠Download Now⁠⁠This episode was created in partnership with Tom Bilyeu. Subscribe to Tom Bilyeu’s channel for more inspiring speeches:https://www.youtube.com/c/TomBilyeu Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the Resilient Mind podcast. In this episode, you will be listening to You Are Only One Decision Away with Mel Robbins. Get access to the Resilient Mind Journal by clicking the link in the show notes. Enjoy. I think motivation is complete garbage. I think it's garbage because at some point we all bought into this lie that you've got to feel ready in order to change. Yeah. We bought into this complete falsehood.

that at some point you're going to have the courage. At some point, you're going to have the confidence. And it's total bullshit, frankly. Are we allowed to swear on this show? Absolutely. It's complete garbage. And so there are so many people in the world, and you may be watching this right now,

and you have these incredible ideas, and what you think is missing is motivation. And that's not true. Because the way that our minds are wired and the fact about human beings is that we are not designed. designed to do things that are uncomfortable or scary or difficult. Our brains are designed to protect us from those things because our brains are trying to keep us

alive. And in order to change, in order to build a business, in order to be the best parent, the best spouse, to do all those things that you know you want to do with your life, with your work, with your dreams, you're going to have to do things that are difficult, uncertain, or scary, which sets up this problem for all of us. You're never going to feel like it. Motivation's garbage. You only feel motivated to do the things that are easy, right?

What do you think that is? Oh, I know exactly why that is. Because I've studied this so much because for me, one of the hardest things to figure out was why is it so hard to do the little things that would improve my life? And what I've come to realize and what we'll talk a lot about today is that, the way that our minds are designed is our minds are designed

to stop you at all costs from doing anything that might hurt you. And the way that this all happens is it all starts with something super subtle that none of us ever catch and that is with this habit

that all of us have that nobody's talking about. We all have a habit of hesitating. We have an idea. you're sitting in a meeting, you have this incredible idea, and instead of just, you know, saying it, you stop and you hesitate. Now what none of us realize is that when you hesitate, just that moment, that micro-moment, that small hesitation, it sends a stress signal to your brain.

It wakes your brain up, and your brain all of a sudden goes, oh, wait a minute, why is he hesitating? He didn't hesitate when he put on his killer spiky sneakers. He didn't hesitate with the really cool track pants. He didn't hesitate with the NASA t-teacher. Now he's hesitating to talk, something must be up. So then your brain goes to work to protect you. It has a million different ways to protect you.

One of them is called the spotlight effect. It's a known phenomenon where your brain magnifies risk. Why? To pull you away from something that it perceives to be a problem. And so you can truly trace every single problem or complaint in your life to silence and hesitation. Those are decisions. And what I do and what's changed my life is waking up and realizing that motivation's garbage. I'm never going to feel like doing the things that are tough or difficult or uncertain or scary or new.

So I need to stop waiting until I feel like it. And number two, I am one decision away from a totally different marriage, a totally different life, a totally different job, a totally different income, a totally different relationship with my kids. Not like one decision I'm divorcing you in the marriage example, but one decision on, you know, you could be having a conversation with your spouse and you feel your emotions rise up and within a tiny window, those emotions can take over and can impact how your marriage goes. Or you can learn how to take control of that micromomomoment and make a decision to act in a way that actually shifts your marriage. your marriage. Your life comes down to your decisions. And if you change your decisions, you will change everything. What you're talking about is the five second rule, which has become

literally my life's work. And it was all a gigantic mistake. I read up on you too and understand how Quest was born out of misery. The five second rule and my life now and my 20 year marriage and everything that I'm doing and the companies that I've built and sold and the company I'm building now, it all comes back to a point in my life that completely and utterly blue. I was 41 years old. I was unemployed. My husband had started a restaurant business, which was his dream. This is actually a funny story when he got laid off from a big job in high tech and I think he was really relieved. You know how a lot of us wait to quit our jobs and then we get laid off. We're like, yes.

And he said, I'm not going to look for a job. I'm going to go into the restaurant business. And I think I said the most famous lines of our marriage at that point. I looked at him and I said, listen, buddy, inspiration is for strangers. You get your butt back to that job and you pay the mortgage. And again, micro moment where I'm being a jerk instead of being a supportive wife. But that's an example of where when he said he was not going to go get a job, but he was going to start a business. The first thing that was there was fear.

Right. And so fear was making the decision for me. God, I love that you can share that, though. That's so powerful. Well, so what happened is he, the first restaurant was a home run. And of course, what do you do when things are successful? You grow it. You grow it really big.

And so they decided to raise some money. And we threw in our home equity line, the kids' college savings. They tried to open a second and a third. And at the same point, a grocery store chain encouraged them to go into wholesale. So it basically got way too big, way too fast. and the wheels started to come off. And they came off so badly that the second restaurant failed, and they held onto it for too long, like a lot of us do.

It's another trick our brains play on us called sunk costs. When you throw a ton of time and a ton of money at something, it's really hard to let go of it. And if you haven't done it in business, we all have a relationship in our past, stayed way too long. That was a trick your brain played on you. So by the time that they closed the second restaurant,

it was an $800,000 loss. Ooh. I mean, that meant our entire home equity line gone. Right. It meant kids' call, I get just choked up, just thinking about how terrifying it was. And so I found myself at the age of 41, like, just feeling like a complete failure. And so did Chris. And to make it worse, not only had we lost all of our savings, but so many friends and family members had invested.

And so there was this real tension between the truth of what was happening and what you had to do in public because it was a public business. Shame, failure, embarrassment. And the liens started to hit the house. The phone started to ring. And it was nothing but collection calls. And I just remember feeling this tremendous shame. And at some point, I think we all hit that moment in life where things just are not going how you thought they would go. And what's amazing about those moments is we all respond very differently.

So my husband, he would spring out of bed and he would head right out that door, 6 o'clock in the morning, and he would go meet his partner and they would go to the bank and they would dig right in and they would face their problems head on. And he's also a smart guy. I mean, he did not want to be in the house when yours truly woke up because I was a raging bitch at that point in our lives. And the reason why is because when you're scared, and you're afraid and you're jealous

and you're overwhelmed with emotion, it is so much easier to point the finger at other people. That's a decision, by the way. One, you may not be aware that you're making, but you're still making it. So what would happen to me is the exact opposite, is Chris would be gone, the alarm would go off at 6 o'clock in the morning,

and I would lie there. And I would think about the lien on the house, and I would think about the bankruptcy that we were facing, and I would think about how much we had fought the night before, and I would think about the fact that I was unemployed, and I would hit the snooze button. I mean, why would you get up when your life is like that? Why would you?

I mean, I needed confidence. I needed courage. I was so tapped out. And, you know, in the scheme of life, hitting the snooze button is not that big of a deal. But here's the thing about life. None of us wake up and say, today is the day I destroy my life.

What we do is we kind of check out because it feels overwhelming. Or we check out because we're afraid. Or we check out because we start listening to self-doubt. And then we make these teeny tiny decisions all day long. And we don't even realize it. Decision to not get up on time. A decision to not eat the right thing.

A decision to snap at your kids. A decision to not speak in a meeting. A decision to not look for a job. a decision to not deal with your finances, a decision to not call your parents, like whatever it is. All day long, these tiny decisions that take you so far off track.

And then you wake up like I did and you look at your life and you think, how the hell did I get here? And more importantly, how do you get back over there? And you have no idea. And so I was so trapped. And I know from your story, you felt the same way. Like you knew that there was more in store for you,

but you couldn't figure it. How do you call you? close the gap. How do you find the power that's in you? How do you discover your greatness? How do you solve these problems? It feels so overwhelming. When you can't, I mean, I would go to the grocery store and the items would scan, and I would be sitting there readying my excuse, because there was no way that my check card was going to clear. Wow. So I got in this struggle with myself that a lot of us find ourselves in. And that is, you get trapped in what I call the knowledge action gap. You know what to do, but you can't seem to make yourself do it.

Right? I mean, every one of us is one Google search away from a list of instructions that if you follow any of them, it will change your life. But how do you get out of your head and stop thinking about what you need to do and actually do it. And in my case, this stuff was pretty easy. Get up on time, make breakfast for the kids, get them on the bus, start looking for a job. Be nicer to Chris. Don't drink so much.

Instead of isolating yourself, pick up the phone and call a friend. Get yourself out into the woods and go for a walk. Start running again. Like all these little things that I was capable of, but I couldn't get out of here. could not get out of here. And if you're stuck, that's the problem. The problem is you're in your head, you're thinking.

That is the universal problem. And it all starts with this knowledge of what to do, and then you hesitate and you think about whether or not you feel like doing it. So for a couple months, I was really stuck. I would, Chris would get up at six. I'd hit the snooze, and then I'd hit the snooze, and then I'd hit the snooze, and then I'd hit the snooze. The kids would miss the bus.

And then every night I'd do the same thing. I'd go in bed. Have you ever had one of those nights? probably before you started your company, but were you go in bed and you're like, all right, Tom, that's it. Tomorrow, it's the new me. Tomorrow, tomorrow, I'm going to get up on time.

I am going to go to the gym. I am going to look for a job. I'm not going to drink so much. It's going to be amazing. The new me, the future me. Woo! Let's do this, right? Then you go to bed.

And you wake up seven hours later, and you're like, I don't feel like the new me. Who is that? That's a stupid. See, motivation's garbage. It's never there when you need it. Ever.

Ever, ever, ever. And so here's what happened to me. And thank you for wearing the NASA T-shirt. It's a really stupid story. It's a powerful story. So one night, Chris had gone to bed. I had been struggling, struggling, struggling. We still had all the same problems.

We still to lean on the house, still facing bankruptcy, still fighting like crazy. I was still unemployed. He still, they still hadn't figured out like the solution yet for the business. And I was about to turn off the TV and there on the TV there was this rocket launching and I thought, oh my gosh, that is it. I am going to launch myself out of bed like a rocket ship like NASA right here had launched me out of that bed. And I'm going to move so fast that I don't think. I'm going to beat my brain.

Now, here's a really interesting point. I talk a lot about your instincts and inner wisdom. And we can get into this a little bit later, but a lot of us talk about the fact that you have a gut feeling. But what all this research that I've done for the book and all the speaking that I do, what I've discovered that's fascinating, is actually when you set goals,

when you have an intention on something that you want to change about your life, your brain helps you. What it does is it opens up a checklist, and then your brain goes to work trying to remind you of that intention that you said. And it's really important to develop the skill. And I say that word purposefully, the skill of knowing how to hear that inner wisdom and that intention kicking in and leaning into it quickly. So for me, my brain saying, that's it, right there, move as fast as a rocket mill. I wanted to change my life. And I think most people that are miserable

or that are really dying to be great and dying to have more, we want to change. We want to live a better life. We want to create more for our families. We want to be happier. The desire is there. Again, it's about how do you go from knowledge to action?

So the first thing in the story that's important is realizing that the answer was in me and my mind was telling me, pay attention. It could have also been the bourbon. I had a couple of Manhattan's that night. Anyway, the next morning, the alarm goes off and I pretended NASA was there. It's the stupidest story.

I literally went five, four, three, two, one. I counted out loud, and then I stood up. And I'll never forget standing there in my bedroom. It was dark, it was cold, it was winter in Boston. And for the first time in three months, I had beaten my habit of hitting the snooze button. I couldn't believe. And I thought, wait a minute, counting backwards, that is the dumbest thing I've ever heard in my entire life.

Well, the next morning, I used it again and it worked. The next morning I used it again and it worked. The next morning I used it again and it worked. And then I started to notice something really interesting. There were moments all day long, all day long, just like that five-south, just like that five-south second moment in bed where I knew knowledge what I should do. And if I didn't move within five seconds, my brain would step in and talk me out of it. Every human being has a five second window. It might even be shorter for you. You have about a five second window in which you can move

from idea to action before your brain kicks into full gear and sabotages any change. in behavior. Because remember, your brain is wired to stop you from doing things that are uncomfortable or uncertain or scary. It's your job to learn how to move from those ideas that could change everything into acting on them. In the smallest moment. Well, one of the reasons why I'm so excited about this book, and look, you don't have to buy the book. This is an idea that you can use. It's free. It's backed by science. More than 8 million people around the world have discovered it. And you know, you're talking about the number of people.

We've heard from more than 100,000 people in 80 countries that are using this rule. We know of 11 people who have stopped themselves from killing themselves using this rule. I saw one of those outreaches. Yes, there's a guy, Steve, that wrote to us who was a veteran. He was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. He boarded a ferry overseas with the intention to jump over. He walked over to the railing. And his inner wisdom.

kicked in. In that moment, the five-second rule, 5-4-3-2-1, counting backwards, moved away from the railing, asked for help, saved his life. His story has inspired countless other people that have heard me in the speeches that I give around the world about this one tool. And so, you know, the thing that's so cool about this, and I should tell you the science behind it, because I'm going to be honest with you, it is stupid. Had I ever thought that I would find myself eight years after discovering it,

spending my days telling people about the five-second rule. First of all, I would have picked a different name because it reminds you of the one where you have to like pick up food within five seconds off the floor. It was my secret weapon. This was something I did.

I never intended to tell anybody because I went from getting up on time and waking up on time to shaking up my entire life. Because when you understand the power of a five-second decision and you understand that you always have a choice to go from autopilot to decision maker, everything in your life will change.

You will be a different negotiator. You will be different in sales. You will be unstoppable in the gym. Because you will realize the amount of garbage that you put in the way of your hopes, of your dreams, of your potential, of your confidence, of your courage. Everything comes down to the decisions that you make. We all know what to do. None of us know how to make ourselves do it.

So I started researching it. Why does something so stupid work? Why? Why does something so silly create such powerful and profound change? Well, here's why. The rule is a form of metacognition. Metacognition is a fancy pants terms that means something real simple. You can outsmart your own brain in furtherance of goals.

There are tricks that you can use that actually outsmart the tricks your brain. tricks your brain plays on you. In furtherance of a higher purpose. We all know this. You can restrain yourself if you're in a situation that calls for it. You can jump into a raging river to save your dog or your kid. You can direct yourself in ways if it's important to you. And so the rule, what it does is it does something really remarkable.

When you count backwards, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, What you're actually doing is you're interrupting what researchers call habit loops that get encoded as closed loop patterns in your basal ganglia. That's the part of the brain where your feelings, where your emotions, every habit that you have, which is nothing more than behavior that you repeat, that you don't even think about. I've heard it referred to as a gearbox. Yeah. To shift your attention from the person.

Yes. And so when you go 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, it interrupts what's going on here that's spinning without you thinking, and it moves and awakens your prefrontal cortex. So when you hit one, your habit has been interrupted. So you've interrupted self-doubt. You've interrupted maybe snapping at your kids. You've interrupted the desire to grab for a drink. You've interrupted procrastination.

You've also, by counting backwards, done an action. It's awakened your prefrontal cortex. That is the part of the brain that you need that's awake. when you're changing behavior, when you're learning new things. When you hit one, it's also a prompt. So in the language of research, you'll hear people talk about starting rituals. That is something that's proven to help you learn a new habit. The five-second rule, when you repeat, it becomes a starting ritual that triggers you to act with confidence,

that triggers you that this is a moment for courage, that triggers you to shift gears. And because you've also done the manual work of awakening the part of the brain that you need to change, you've set yourself up for success. It doesn't work if you count up, because you can keep going. And also, counting up doesn't require focus. If you count backwards, 5, 4, 3,21, it, again, awakens the prefrontal cortex, and it prompts you to move. When you start to use it, and then you read about it, you'll see that it's being used all over the place. They use it in the armed services in order to align troops and get them to start an exercise.

They use it at elementary schools, 5, 4, 321, at big assemblies, to get a huge roomful of kids to stop. It's a really simple and interesting example, yeah. Because it requires you to focus. It's not a habit. It will become a habit that prompts you to have confidence and courage. But in the beginning, it interrupts patterns of behavior that you do on autopilot. It helps you assert control. And it teaches you how to become the kind of person that moves from thinking about something to actually doing it.

What's incredible is in five seconds flat, self-doubt can take over and rob you of your power. and rob you of joy and rob you of your potential. Or in five seconds flat, you can actually use one stupid little trick to push yourself to grab it. But see, the real thing that happened for me, and this is something that is a really important topic for me, is that when you talk about personality,

so extroverts, introverts, a lot of us really, I know I did this, I was all wrong about what confidence meant. I thought confidence was a personality trait. I love this. Tell me more. I thought that people that are outgoing are the confident ones, right? And the truth is, confidence is not a personality trait at all.

It's a skill. And a lot of the extroverted people that you know are actually very insecure. I used to be one of them. I used to be the kind of bossy, crass, loudmouth that didn't believe in myself, that that didn't believe in my ideas, that didn't have the confidence and the courage to really be the real me, who I am, who I'm not, flaws and all. There are a tremendous number of introverted people

that feel uncomfortable putting the attention on themselves, but they're very, very confident in their ideas. They definitely believe in themselves. And so when you start to separate confidence, not as a matter of personality, but as a skill that you can acquire, because confidence is the ability to move, in my opinion, from thought to action.

Because when you're a confident person, you believe enough in yourself and your capabilities that you're willing to try, that you're willing to share. To me, confidence isn't the assuredness that it turns out, it's the willingness to try. And that was a huge insight for me. And what a lot of people don't know about me, although I share this on stage, and I'm extremely open about this because this is a topic that's really important to me,

is that the single most profound use of the five-second rule is mind control. And I say that as a lawyer, I will tell you you can use this stupid trick to cure yourself of anxiety. So first of all, I literally have struggled with anxiety my entire life. An anxiety for this conversation, the way I define it, is it is the, habit of worrying spiraled out of control. You know, you may say that you are a worrier. That's not true. You have a habit of worrying. A habit is a pattern of behavior or thinking that you repeat without realizing it. So anxiety happens when that pattern of worrying about things spirals out of control and now it starts to marry and manifest itself with physical sensations too. That's all that it is.

I know that. I say, that's all that it is. Me personally, I struggled with anxiety. I think my entire life, it became quite acute when I was in my late teens and early 20s. I became medicated in the middle of law school. I took Zoloff for two decades. When our first daughter was born, who was now 17, the postpartum depression and the cascading panic was so terrible that not only was I medicated and couldn't breastfeed, but I couldn't be left alone with her. Wow.

So when I say you can cure yourself of anxiety, I don't say that lightly. Four years ago, after I had been using the five-second rule to change my behavior, how I spoke to my husband, how I negotiate in business meetings, how I conduct sales, the kind of parent that I am, my health habits, my eating habits, curbing the drinking. I thought, I wonder if I can use this 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 thing to get control of my thought patterns. not my behavior patterns, my thought patterns. Yes, you can. So we're going to build this conversation, because I want to start with something we can all relate to, and that is how do you stop worrying

and how do you stop listening to self-doubt? This is how you're going to do it. So all day long, you're going to have moments where your thoughts drift, and I use that word on purpose. Because for me, there is a physical sensation when you start to use the five-second rule and you start to wake up,

not only on time in the morning, but you wake up to your life and the opportunities in your life. Your thoughts drift. You'll just be hanging out with your friends, and then suddenly you're like, I'm not sure that that person likes me anymore. I haven't heard from my kids lately.

I wonder if they're dead or, you know, oh, you know, I was like check, like you just start worrying about stuff. Why? Because it's a habit. Because when you're not paying attention, your brain shifts from you being a decision maker and paying attention to you just kind of spinning things on autopilot, and one of your habits

is worrying. The second you wake up and you notice, holy cow, I'm talking some negative garbage to myself right now. 5-4-3-2-1. You've just shifted the part of the brain that you're using. You've shifted from the basal ganglia, which is where your habit loops are spinning, and you've awakened your prefrontal cortex. You've also interrupted that pattern.

Now what you're going to do, because your mind is actually ready to receive a different thought because of the counting, now you can put in an anchor thought. Like if you have a mantra, if you've got a vision about the way that your business is going to turn out in five years, if you just have a thought that makes you really happy and proud, insert that. Now, why does this work? It works because of the counting. And I'm not kidding.

We know, based on research, the positive thinking alone, not effective. In some instances, trying to force yourself to think positive can actually make the worries worse. Why? Well, the reason why is because it's really hard to just change the channel. What we have to do first is basically interrupt it and turn off the TV and then turn it back on with the prefrontal cortex awakened. So the counting is essential.

And so you can start using this today. You catch yourself talking garbage to yourself, because we all know, if I were to put a speaker on your head and broadcast, if you'd be sitting here in the audience, you'd be in an insane asylum, because the crap that you say to yourself is insane. And the problem is, we listen to it. You'll be in a sales meeting, and you'll be undermining yourself. They're not going to buy, oh my gosh, I'm in trouble. You're not even present.

5, 4, 3, 2, 1, switch it back. Get back to that vision that you have about toasting your success. or this customer being really happy or you being proud of yourself. Whatever that vision may be, you can control your thoughts, and this is not just us talking about it, this is a tool that you can use.

So let's take it a step further. So worrying, if you let it go unchecked, what will happen is you will get used to worrying. You will get used to living in a state where you're slightly agitated all the time. Let me talk a little bit about agitation. So what we know based on, research is that physically in your body, so physiologically, being excited is the exact same

thing as being afraid. Let me say that again because it is so important. In your body, being excited is the exact same thing as being afraid. Your body doesn't know the damn difference. Your heart races, your armpits sweat, you're like, you know, you may get tight in your throat. Your cheeks may get pink like my do when I get excited. The only difference between excitement and fear is what your brain says. And the problem is if you have a habit of worrying, guess what you're going to tell yourself is going on, that you're like freaking out, that you're not excited, that something must be wrong. Oh gosh, why would you say something's wrong? Because you've got a habit of saying that all the time. Even as I became a speaker for a living or I'd be on CNN,

when I first started doing it, I would be freaking out backstage. But even though, like, you know, just a couple, just last week, he's standing backstage, about to go on, 8,000 people, heart races, armpit sweat, you know, my hands get clammy. I'm not nervous, though. Not at all. I'm excited. And so I developed this technique and research out of Harvard, not based on my technique, but something very similar, proves that if you basically, Right before you're about to do something, take a test, run a race, public speaking, a business negotiation, ask somebody to marry you, whatever it may be that get your heart racing, just do this. Go, I'm excited to give that speech.

I'm excited to ask him or her. I'm excited to do this race. I'm excited because what happens is you give your brain context so your brain doesn't escalate the stuff going on in your body. Your brain's not worried. Make sense? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you can combine this with a five-second rule. So we know how to do worrying.

You catch your thoughts drift. 5, 4, 321, anchor thought. If you start to feel your heart racing, 5, 4, 321 to awaken the prefrontal cortex and then start going, I'm really excited to do this. I'm really excited to do this. Another technique that you can use is ask, I think they call it interrogatory questions, where instead of giving yourself a pep talk, say, well, why am I ready to do this? Why am I ready?

Because that'll force you to answer the question, which, which is. which then convinces you. So why am I ready to close the sale? Why am I ready to give this speech? Why am I ready? So those are two strategies that you can use back by science that are proven to actually make your performance be much better. Now let's take it a step further to anxiety.

So anxiety is what happens when the habit of worrying spins out of control. Your body gets really agitated and then you allow your mind to escalate it into a full-blown panic attack. So for those of you that have not had the pleasure of having a panic attack, let me explain what it's like. So have you ever been in your car and you're driving down the road and you go to change lanes and all of a sudden there's like, oh my God, there's a car right there? Right? And you swerve a little bit and then your heart's like, and you may sweat a little bit and you grip the wheel really tight and you're super locked in on the road ahead of you. But then that car pulls away and the near-miss scenario passes and your mind starts.

going, okay, you're all right now. Right. You're all right now. That's it. That's what a panic attack is. Only it happens while you're standing in front of your coffee pot. Seriously. You have that same, oh my God, way behind.

And your heart's racing. And the problem for your brain is that your brain can't look around and say, holy cow, we almost got hit by a car. Right. Your brain's saying, what the hell is wrong with her? She's making coffee and she's freaking out. And so now your brain is a problem. Because what's your brain's job?

It's designed to protect you. So your brain will now do whatever it can to magnify the problem. Remember, we talked about the spotlight effect. It'll start telling you all kinds of crazy stuff because it can't figure out contextually what the hell's going on. She's just making coffee. Now her heart is racing and she's breathing really. Holy cow, maybe she is having a heart attack.

A lot of people that have panic attacks say, I think I'm dying. Oh, my God, what's happening? Or you'll see them do the deer in the headlights thing where they got to get out of the room. That is the spotlight effect in your brain, now taking control and magnifying everything to get you out of whatever it was.

So here's how you use the five-second rule. You use it to stabilize your thoughts before the panic escalates. And then what happens is it drifts into worry and then it disappears. So the second you feel worry, you catch it, you train yourself to do that, If you start feeling yourself getting, you know, your heart racing, you can 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 and use the I'm excited, I'm excited.

If you, if that doesn't work literally, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, and just give yourself an anchor thought, literally, of you being okay. I'll give you another quick example, because this is one that we have a tremendous number of success with and people that hear the example use it immediately and are blown away. I used to be terrified of flying. terrified. Every bump I'd be freaking out. And so I started using this strategy with the plane. So the second that you feel yourself getting nervous, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, and then your anchor thought is a vision of what you're going to do when you get to where you're going. So when I get on the plane tomorrow to fly back to Boston, I'll think about walking in the house and the place is like a disaster. It'll look like everybody's stuff got loaded into a cannon and fired all over the, you know, first floor. And so if we hit

turbulence, 5, 4, 321, I'll think about that vision because cognitively for my brain, if I'm walking in the house and it's a disaster, the plane made it. Well, I think we're all flawed, and that's the beauty of who you are. And instead of trying to make yourself perfect in every area, it's so much easier when you accept the things that you're terrible at or that are your weaknesses or that are the things about your wiring. Look, if I were diabetic, I would take insulin. I happen to be somebody that's wired for anxiety. No big deal. So figure out how to, instead of fighting those things, actually trick it.

Because the truth is that you're never going to feel ready to make these changes. You're never going to feel like doing them, but you can always make a decision that's always in your control. Staying with somebody that treats you like garbage is a decision. It is. Staying at a job that you hate is a decision. Staying in the body that you are not proud of is a decision. Is it going to be easy? No, it's not going to be easy to change.

It's simple. Do a Google search and then use a five-second rule to force yourself to do that stuff. Change comes down to five-second decisions. And this is why the five-second rule is important for everybody to know. It's your job to push yourself. And I don't care if you're Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Or your Michelangelo or your Lynn Manuel Miranda who wrote Hamilton, you will struggle with self-doubt.

And everybody that you admire, everybody. And the list is the same for every. Oh, Oprah Winfrey. And I want to be like, you know, Tom. And I want to be like, you know, Branson. And I want to be like Jay-Z. And I want to like everybody's list is a Bill Gates. And do you know what those people do?

They do not have the habit of hesitating. They trust themselves. Thank you for tuning in. Continue strengthening your mind by listening to our other episodes.