The Sabrina Zohar Show - 15: Masha pt 3 How your anxiety and patterns in dating are playing out and what does the process of growth and change really look like?

Episode Date: April 28, 2023

On this weeks episode, Sabrina is joined by Masha for a part 3 of our nervous system and anxiety talk! This week the girls chat about how your anxiety and patterns in dating are playing out in other areas of your life. What does the process of growth and change really look like? How your fears and insecurities play out in other areas of your life besides dating, why your nervous system hates change, and what 'doing the work' actually looks like. Want to work with Sabrina? HERE! Stuck After the Podcast? Master Implementation in 8 Weeks with Sabrina's Foundation Course Join the Make It Make Sense: Getting Through a Breakup course HERE! Get Ad-free episodes and 2 Bonus episodes a month HERE! Dont forget to follow Sabrina and The Sabrina Zohar Show on instagram and Sabrina on Tik tok! Video now available on YOUTUBE!  Disclaimer: The Sabrina Zohar Show, formally known as Do The Work, is not affiliated with A.Z & associates LLC in any capacity. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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That's gofundme.com. Gofundme.com. Hello, hello. and welcome to another episode of Do the Work Podcast. My name is Sabrina Zohar, and I will be your host today. Guys, I am so excited. We have Masha back. This is her third episode on because the first two were so incredible.

But this week, guys, we're mixing up a little bit. We're not just going to be talking about anxiety and dating because, spoiler alert, it can show up in other ways of your life. So we're going to talk about how your anxiety and patterns and dating are playing out in other areas of your life. And what does the process of growth and change really look like? You know what? let's not waste any more time. Let's get this going. All right. So excited, guys. I am so so excited to have Masha back. Masha, welcome. Thank you. I am so excited to be back. These are my favorite

conversations. Me too. I mean, because I think a lot of people don't realize Masha and I have these conversations literally every day. And we'll literally, like, we'll be hanging out and we're like, why are we not recording this? Exactly. Exactly. So here we are. There have been some good ones that have been missed. Yeah. And we try to recreate them. Yeah. So today's the day. So I think, something that I think a lot of people underestimate is that anxiety shows up in different ways. Anxiety doesn't just mean that when you're dating somebody, it's going to flare. Or even thoughts of some people are like, wow, this came up later in life for me. And I think it's so important for Masha to be able to share her experiences and her guidance.

And also, y'all, just to preface, today's episode, I'm going to get a little vulnerable. And I'm going to share some shit with you guys that I don't normally share. But that is part of the core, right? part for the course, right? And that's part of what we're doing and why we're all here. So I think, you know, I would love, Masha, if you could just recapitulate to people that maybe are new here, that haven't listened to your past episodes, like what you are up to these days. And guys, I'm so excited. I am joining Masha's course, and we're going to talk more about that. But it is, there's just so many amazing things that Masha does that I'd love you to introduce yourself.

Yes, absolutely. So for those of you who are new, my name is Masha K. I call myself a nervous system and breathwork coach. And I know that means pretty much nothing. to people who first hear it. But what I actually do is I tend to work with high achievers, perfectionist overachievers in helping them learn to regulate their nervous system, learn to optimize their health and overall well-being, and reconnect to who they really are so that they could move into their life and have less burnout and more ease in all areas of life. So they could start to find success that not only looks good on the outside, but actually feels good, right? So they could start to create lasting change in ways that are aligned with the person that they know they could be with their full potential.

And so that's kind of what I do. I do that in a one-to-one container. And I'm super excited because on May 1st, I am launching a group program. So I will be doing that exact work, the work that I do in my one-on-ones in a group container. And I am so freaking lucky to have Sabrina join me. So excited. I can't wait. And here's a little bit of the first.

vulnerability. So I'm so exciting. I'm joining the group coaching with Masha because I have a lot to learn. I know. Might sound like I don't. But I do. There's always more to improve. There's always more to learn. There's always more to learn about myself as well. And I think what became a realization, and Masha and I've had so many conversations about this, but what became the realization for me was like, I didn't realize how anxiety manifested in other ways of my life. I mean, I consciously understood, I would, okay, yeah, you know, my relationship with money is like from when I was a kid or whatever. But I didn't really understand how my nervous system was being affected by it and how just overall I was operating still from that space of anxiety thinking I'd healed it all and I was in this happy

relationship. And that is really when Masha and I started talking. And you said so many amazing things that night. But even just like, I would love you to even share a little bit more of like how you did that night about like how the nervous system changes and is growing over time and the discomfort that comes with it. Just even a little bit on that was so impactful for me that I think so many people will benefit to understand like the nervous system in general and how it can show up in different ways. Yeah, totally. Do you feel comfortable with me talking a little bit about what we spoke about?

Absolutely. Specifically with you. Yeah, I hope this is reporting well. But yeah, I'm totally fine with it. Guys, like I said, this is going to be a vulnerable episode that we're going to get personal. So welcome. Yeah. And feel free to like stop me and speak. I don't mean to speak for you. but just to give you guys an understanding of how this conversation came up, we were talking about Sabrina and her business and this podcast and her TikTok. And I was kind of saying like, it's incredible, like the growth she's had, me being in this world for a few years. I was kind of being like, it's insane. And I know I always say that to you. And I could tell that like your nervous system

won't really let you take that in. No. And in that moment, you were being vulnerable with me and sharing about your anxiety and overwhelm about the business. And I was kind of saying like, I could tell your nervous system isn't able to really take in how wildly successful this really is and how incredible this is. And she's like, yeah, I guess. And I started explaining why that actually is. So here's what I think is so important to understand when it comes to growth and change. Right. So our nervous systems, there are alarm systems, right? And I spoke about this in a lot in past episodes. But our nervous system identifies safety as familiarity. Yeah. So what is familiar is safe? And Now, if what is familiar to you is always feeling anxious, always feeling not good enough,

always feeling like you're behind and you're not doing well, then even if things start changing in your external world, right, and you actually are starting to get wins and are growing, your nervous system might really not be able to take that in and might really not like that. So our nervous systems see what's familiar as what's safe, right? but they see what's dangerous as what's not familiar, what's uncertain, what's new. And that doesn't just mean bad new things. It means new things that we just haven't experienced. So if this is like, if you're experiencing wild success that you've never really experienced

in your life on this level, your nervous system is going to freak the fuck out. And it did. And it did, right? And that makes sense because your nervous system thinks anything new is potentially dangerous. It doesn't know what's there. It knows what it's like to be anxious. It knows what it's like to not feel good enough. It knows what it's like to be struggling.

I know that might not be comfortable to you, but it is your comfort zone because it's familiar. And so when you really start experiencing growth and success, your nervous system freaks out. And people don't get that and they start misinterpreting it. They're like, well, if I'm feeling this way, something must be wrong. Or if I'm feeling this way, something must be broken.

And you know what happens then? They start, I don't love this word, but this is the best way to explain. start self-sabotaging. And you know why your nervous system does that? Not because it's broken or there's something wrong with it. Your nervous system, quote-unquote, self-sabotages because it wants to keep you safe. And it thinks that success is going to be dangerous. And so it's like, okay, what can we do to bring her down, to bring her back to what's comfortable, what's familiar? And that might be shaming yourself. That might be feeling anxiety. That might be not feeling good enough. And you start to unconsciously

actually do things that might sabotage your success. I mean, no, you are so right on so many of those things. I mean, one of the biggest, I think even the reason that the conversation had kind of started was, I mean, you know, for me, like I've been coaching for a minute, but it hasn't been my entire fucking career. And then when I started turning to social media and this and then the podcast being so new, it was triggering for me because for so long I lived in that state of you're not good enough. You're not worthy. You have to earn yourself. You have to earn your keep and things like that. And so when I would focus on my career, and pour my heart and soul into it, I didn't really understand the correlation between that

was still also affecting my nervous system. I just thought, no, no, it's just the relationships that I'm having and it's just dating and that's the only place this is manifesting when all of this started happening and it's like I could get where I really noticed that it was I could get a thousand comments of people telling me how much they love me and how amazing this is and how this is helping them. And then you get the one person that is just mean, that is just downright, a damn fucking troll that wants to bring you down. And that will cause me to go into a complete spiral. And then that's really how this all started to come of like, well, wait a minute, this can also play out into this part of my life. Because for me, growing up, money, what success was

money. So if you made money, you were successful to my father. And to my mom, I saw her not have anything. I saw her lose her career, like leave her career to have kids and be beholden to my father and never have her own shit. So I put so much pressure on myself to never replicate that and to never do that, that it was always, this isn't enough. I have to do more. I have to do more that toxic productivity of New York thought process. And what did that do? That kept me constantly dysregulated because I was always reaching for this goal that was arbitrary

that didn't even exist. Even when I'd get it, still didn't feel like I got it. Yeah. And what you're saying here, like there's so much we could talk about. But the thing I want to point out is you're kind of describing that what drove you to be successful, what drove you to work hard was fear and shit. Yes. not feeling good enough and a fear of what if I don't have my own money? What if I do put myself in a bad

situation? Right. Like fear and shame is what drove you. Those were your trauma responses based on what you saw. Your nervous systems like never again. And so we're that means when we're like taking action from those trauma responses, that means we are in a dysregulated place. We are in a protective place. And so although that will work short term, it might get good results like that New York energy, right? The hustle that very like fighter flight sympathetic energy. it exhausts us, it drains us. And internally, we're kind of like beating ourselves down, right? Because that inner child that you talk about so often, when you're working from that place of fear and shame, even as you're achieving things, all you're doing is you're telling that inner child, yeah,

you weren't good enough to begin with. Right. So like, if you're like, I need X amount of followers, I need X amount of money because I'm not good enough. And then you go and you get it. You might think you should feel really happy in that moment, but you know what you just did? You just reconfirm to that child that wasn't feeling good enough. Yeah, you were a loser back then. And you better keep this up. And in fact, you better get more. You're just reconfirming that you believe you're broken. And as long as you're like using that to motivate you, you achieve more and more, but you feel less and less successful. You feel more and more broken. Yeah. Right. And that is really the problem. When we try to pursue success from that energy, the results are not great. And I think the parallel could be made to dating. When we are kind of seeking

partners from a place of like fear and shame and not enoughness, we do end up with the wrong partners or we end up in a great relationship and we're sabotaging it. It's the exact same thing. Because how you do one thing is how you do everything. A hundred percent. And like something I even really just noticed with myself was like, it was safe for me to go to bashing myself and hurt and that you're not good enough and you're not worthy and I told you you couldn't do this. And because that one person spoke, because essentially what happened was that one person was that one person reaffirmed to me, they're right. Didn't matter the thousands of other people was because I wasn't, my favorite saying is you'll believe it when you see it. And I wasn't seeing it. Or I'm sorry,

you'll see it when you believe it. Good Lord. It's only been two cups of coffee today. But like, you'll see it when you believe it because like for me, I think for a while I really struggled with, nobody cares about what I have to say because that's what my dad used to say to me all the time. Shut up. Nobody wants to hear what you have to say. I remember during COVID, I made a vulnerable post. It was like one of the first ones I made of like, I'm fucking scared. I don't know what's going on. I am terrified. My whole business. I have a clothing line called software. So like, I was so scared of what was going to happen. And it was so well received. And that was the first time I became a little bit more vulnerable as far as my career was concerned. And I remember my dad called me up and said,

what the fuck are you sharing this information? And I said, what are you talking about? And he said, everybody wants to just hear everything is okay. So stop telling them that you have problems when you're fine. I was like, oh, oh, wow, nobody wants to hear me. Silence myself. Stop, stop sharing thing. And that was, that was ingrained in me. And so now when I was trying to shed that skin of, okay, wait, but I think I'm helping people. I think I'm able to. The one person, I honed in on that, and I said, thanks for reaffirming those core beliefs that I wasn't good enough. Thanks for reaffirming that my father was right. Nobody gives a fuck about what I have to say. Yeah. Yes. Wow. And it's so true. It's like, we do. We have a part of our brain, the RAS, right? And it's basically,

like a filter, right? If filters out relevant, if filters relevant information and filters out information that's not relevant. And the narratives we have about ourselves and the world, this filter kind of looks for. And so if deep down, you have beliefs because of these trauma responses, because of your experiences, that I'm not good enough or no one cares about what I have to say. That part of your brain is scanning for that. And so you can get all the, oh my gosh, you're amazing. And that one, and that part of your brain will filter out all the good and just focused on that one, be like, see, I knew and use it to try to reconfirm that, you know, that lie you have about yourself. Yeah. Right. And it thinks it's doing this, by the way, to protect you.

Yeah, well, because the brain loves familiarity. The brain is looking for familiarity. The brain is looking for routine. So, of course, the brain's going, I don't know what these new thoughts are, but we're going to find the old ones because it was safe for me. That was the devil I knew was better than the devil I didn't. And I think for me, it was compounded with, you know, the death of my dog that Clem signified safety for me. He signified through everything I went through. He was my weighted blanket. And you know what? In hindsight, I put way too much pressure on that dog. I put so much pressure on a poor creature that was in my life that was there to support me as he was literally going to save me. And that was where it all kind of compounded onto me and my nervous system and all these new

changes that for the first time I finally was able to stop and feel because I distracted myself for four months of I'm moving and I'm doing this and I have a new relationship and I have this new career that when shit finally hit the fan and I had to look at it, I had to finally own, you're looking for a problem because you can't even fathom. My mom always just say, what are you more afraid of your failure or are you actually more afraid to succeed? Are you actually more afraid to prove to yourself that you can do this, that you can, you are worthy and that your father didn't know what he was talking about or are you better just sitting in that discomfort, sitting in that shit that you know versus accepting that I actually could do something with my

life. And that is so true that a lot of us are we're actually afraid of success because if you're used to failure, right? Failure is going to be familiar and success will be unfamiliar. And like, I hear what you're saying about Clem. Like there's a really good point. It's so beautiful when an animal could be that for us. But there is a danger because we start to believe that I can't do it without him. You're still not believing in yourself. You're like, oh, no, no, I only had success because I had him. And I'm not denying how valuable he was in your life or his role in your life, but it's almost like you, your nervous system used that to disprove that you can do it alone. I'm like, oh, no, you couldn't do it alone. And now when all of this, like when the success is

really hitting, your nervous system can't accept it. And this is where the rewiring your nervous system and understanding it becomes so important because it's so easy to misunderstand that and to be like, whoa, I must be real fucked up if I'm scared of success or maybe it's true that I can't do it. And maybe I should just give up and you start unconsciously making these little teeny tiny decisions that are quote unquote sabotaging your success. Now, I say quote unquote because I want to be really clear about this. I kind of hate that word. Yeah, but it is.

Yeah, because sabotage implies that your nervous system is doing something bad. Okay. When in reality, your nervous system is doing what is there to do. Your nervous system doesn't care about your health. It doesn't care about your success. That's not its job. It doesn't care about your relationship. It's a job.

It's keeping you safe one more moment at a time. It does not care about the long term. That's its job. So it's not sabotaging you. It's doing what it believes is best to keep you safe in these moments. So what a lot of people call limiting beliefs are actually regulating beliefs. They are beliefs you took on to keep yourself safe. Right?

And so a belief like, I can't do this alone. or no one cares about what I have to say, you took that on to keep yourself safe because think about it, you know, with your dad and the things that were being said, it was safer to believe no one cares about what I have to say and keep yourself small than to keep putting yourself out there. It was safer and to regulate yourself to believe that.

It was safer to believe it's clem, not me. Right, right? That kept, made you feel safe. That almost kind of allowed you to not look at certain things. It allowed you to not look at the fact, wait a second. There's a part of me that thinks I'm just not good enough and I'm broken. No, no, it's just, you know what I'm saying? It kind of like blocks certain pain.

It pushes certain pain away. And so it's not long term, yes, it's sabotaging. But the short term, it is working so hard for you. And in my work, it's all about not seeing your nervous system as the enemy because it's not because it's done so much to keep you safe. It's understanding your nervous system and working with it to start to make it an ally because that's what that process of growth that we're going to talk. about. That's what that really looks like. It's making your nervous system an ally and working with it.

Right. Instead of it's like, stop trying to fight the fucking current and learn to work with it so that you can achieve the goals that you'd actually like versus the uphill battle that it seems like it felt like this whole time of I just want to get, I just want to go away. And it's like, instead of it looking at it, let's make this go away. Let's work with it. And let's see what messages this is trying to send me. Yeah, I think the interesting thing that maybe a lot of people struggle with is like, what do we get the question with all the time. It's like, what does do the work mean? How do I actually implement all of this information into regulating my nervous system? And like I know when it came to dating, and I'm sure there's probably a lot of crossovers just because it's dating versus, you know, finances or anything

like that, doing the work for me meant holding myself accountable, really figuring out where are the, where are the core wounds that I have not been tending to? Where is that little inner child that is screaming for my attention and what abandonment have I been doing to myself. And that was really what stemmed for me on doing the work because I knew that I was the definition of insanity. I was doing the same fucking thing over and over expecting a different result. And it wasn't until I really had to buckle down and say, no, bitch, you're the common denominator, whether you like to hear this or not. You are the main source of the points of contention here. So until I take the thorn out of the paw, I'm not going to be able to walk through a little bit

more effectively. But I think for when it comes to nervous system dysregulation, which even after how many times I've talked to you, I'm still learning about it. But I'd love to know more from your perspective of like, what is doing the work on regulating the nervous system really look like? And then how does that kind of impact the rest of your life? Because it's not just dating. It's not just about looking for the patterns and dating because we could do that because it's another person. But maybe something like a career where I might not be able to identify it as quickly. But I would love a little bit more of your knowledge on that.

Yeah. And you're so right. It's like we have had so many conversations on it, but there's this, me and you talk about this all the time. There's a huge gap between intellectualizing. And that's really important. The awareness and intellectualizing comes first, right? And then actually embodying it.

And the embodying it is this ongoing process. And like a lot of what you said for dating like absolutely applies in all areas of your life, right? Like this course that you're joining this group program, it's really about creating lasting change. Like what is the formula for creating lasting change? And that first phase, you know, that I, in the group and in my work in general, is befriending. It's understanding the nervous system, understanding your patterns, understanding the wounds, understanding your emotions, and developing, like, awareness and compassion.

And I think the compassion piece, that in of itself takes work. And I've been talking to a lot of people recently doing consultations. And I'm noticing that's lacking. Like a lot of people have the intellectualizing down, but they're still lacking compassion for themselves, which is where I think understanding how growth actually. what it actually looks like comes in because if you don't understand that growth,

especially when it comes to the nervous system, but this is growth in general. Like every time you change, I don't care if it's in your relationship, I don't care if it's in your career, any kind of change, you're going to be working with your nervous system. Because if you are saying to yourself,

I want to change anything, I don't care if it's your morning routine or your career, right? You are telling you're nervous, I'm about to change something and your nervous system like, whoa, danger. Yeah, the fuck you are. Yeah, exactly.

And it's going to, like, instantly it's going to start to push back. And depending on how big that change, the more it pushes back. Now, if you are not understanding what that pushback is and you start shaming yourself, yeah. You lost the compassion. All that intellectualizing you did, down the dream. The shaming part is what I get.

I have a lot of clients where I'm so embarrassed. I'm so ashamed. And it's like, what would you even suggest for that? Yeah. This is why, like, in the group and in my one-on-one work, I focus so much. Like, it's three phases and the first two months is befriending. Because I think when people jump. to change too quickly, they miss the building understanding, which then leads to curiosity,

which leads to compassion. They don't do that part. And they just jump into change. And when you're jumping into change from a place of I'm broken, I'm not good enough, like we said before, you're just reconfirming that you're broken, not good enough, even if you create the change. And that's why it never lasts, right? So let's say you're like, I'm going to change my morning because I'm such a loser and I'm going to use that fear and shame to motivate me. And you do it for a couple of weeks, right? The second you start feeling good about yourself, what happens? You drop it. You know why? Because all your action is fueled by fear and not enoughness. You almost need to feel bad about yourself to stay motivated. And so that's not going to work. And so what we need to do instead

is start to build compassion and understanding. And for me, that means we're taking change off the table. Yes, you're understanding the change you want to do. But that's going to be phase two. And in phase one, we are actually learning to get genuinely curious about our nervous and not just not just not until intellectual level, but on a, let's watch ourselves on day to day. And as we get activated, instead of judging ourselves, that's bad. That's dysregulation. It's like, ooh, what's happening? Right. Let me get curious. How do I feel it in my body? Where's my brain going? That curiosity and having time to explore that is essential to then stepping into compassion. Yeah, and you need that curiosity first and you need time for it. You can't just jump into change

and because it's going to come from that fear and change. Does that make sense? 100%. And honestly, that's why I'm joining the course, not just. just, there's a multitude of reasons, but because one, I don't know everything. And two, it's because I actually want to become a better version of myself because then I'm a better coach to other people. I'm a better daughter. I'm a better partner. I'm a better friend. I am a better version of every part of my life, the more that I try to understand myself. And I think that's why I'm so excited, hint, hint for everyone that should be joining this course because Masha is so fucking talented at what she does. And this is going to be such a game-changing opportunity that I'm so excited.

to be part of and honored to be part of. But it's also because for me, I think what I also suggest to a lot of people is like, get curious out of a lot of things. Amazon presents Jeff versus Taco Truck Salsa. Whether it's Verde, Roja, or

the orange one. For Jeff, trying any salsa is like playing Russian roulette with a flamethrower. Luckily, Jeff saved with Amazon and stocked up on anti- acids, ginger tea, and milk. Habanero? More like habanier, yes. Save the everyday with Amazon. When you're dating somebody, instead of going into the accusatory, get curious, what's going on?

What is happening here? I mean, I even suggest that all the time when people say, what should I say to someone that falls off or like that doesn't really text? I'm like, tell them, hey, I've noticed a shift. Am I reading that correctly? Start to find out what is going on under the hood and below the surface and also implementing that now with your nervous system to understand why am I feeling this and learning that sitting through the discomfort like we talked about with the ice bass is where the growth happens. So when you're starting to feel that dysregulation instead of doing the I need to end, so let me text this person so I can end it, start to get curious. What does this feel like? What is it? What am I? Where is this coming from? What is it feeling like? What are the sensations?

Okay, control your breathing? Like there's so many steps that you can do to get curious. that maybe even start small. It doesn't even necessarily mean that you need to go and fucking read every book that was written on the planet, but just understanding too, like your nervous system is trying to tell you something good or bad to start to listen. 100% and you're,

oh, so much of what you said is so good, but that curiosity piece really is so essential. And it's very different than intellectualizing. Like, yes, be curious and read and educate yourself. But most people who are listening to this podcast probably do that too much. Right. And what they don't do enough is being curious about themselves.

And you've made a really good point. The reason that you're so judgmental of other people and so hyper-focused on them and their behavior and judging and accusing, it's a reflection of how you are with yourself. You judge yourself. If you notice you judge others harshly, I will bet any amount of money you judge yourself harshly. That is all it's reflecting, right? And so when you're jumping to conclusions with other people, I can guarantee that you're not being genuinely curious with yourself. You're not being compassionate with yourself. And it's so important to build that as the foundation because to me, that curiosity and compassion

and warmth towards yourself is the foundation on which you build change. Yeah. Right. It's step one. It's the foundation of self-love. We talk about it. We throw that word around so loosely. But self-love is really having understanding and compassion for yourself and being able to hold

yourself accountable, which is like that next phase. So I didn't answer your first question, to be honest, loop around. Yeah, we're going to loop around to, okay, but what does like change actually look like in terms of the nervous system? Because all change is working with the nervous system. Any change, you are working with your nervous system. And what it actually looks like is once we have that foundation of self-love, remember, I said that has to be there, otherwise fear and shame.

We fall into that old cycle, right? Once we have that, then we need to start taking gradual steps out of our comfort zone. Now, comfort zone is what's familiar. It is not what's comfortable. Your comfort zone might be toxic men. Your comfort zone might be burnout. That's your comfort zone. It's starting to take new actions.

And every time you take a new action, you're stepping out of your comfort zone. And every time you step out of your comfort zone, your nervous system gets a little triggered. Here's where we start working with it. We don't want to take steps that are too big. Because if you take a step that's way too big and just try to ignore your nervous system and willpower and grit through it, your nervous system is really smart. It's like, whoa, that's too much change. change. I don't think we have the resilience to handle that. And that's where the sabotage comes in.

So instead, we want to take gradual steps forward, have the tools to regulate ourselves, which hopefully we're developing, reflect on that experience. Give you a nervous a disconfirming experience. We thought we were going to die if we took that step. But actually, we're okay. And I learned from it. I grew, and that reflection and having someone really kind of push you on that, like, what did you learn? Right. Again, because if you're really hard on yourself, you might not be doing that reflection. and might not be showing your nervous system it's safe. And so it's taking these gradual steps. And every time you take a step out of your comfort zone and then regulate and show your nervous

system you're safe. You're expanding your nervous system's capacity. Right. It's like your comfort zone is expanding. How much your nervous system can hold is expanding. And that is really essential for success because most people's nervous system cannot hold the weight of their really big dreams, success, the, you know, people watching them, like all that comes, their nervous system can't hold that.

So we need to like expand our nervous system capacity through these gradual steps and through taking a step forward and then pulling back. Yeah. And on the live, we were talking about heart rate variability and you're like, yeah, that's really interesting to me. And I want to kind of connect the two. So heart rate variability, it's the measure of kind of the resilience of our nervous system. It's the best measure that we have.

Right. And there's some great apps right now helping you work with that. You know, you have like a wearable or there's great apps where you don't even need a wearable. I'm working with one called source. That's really awesome. But what kind of we know about expanding the nervous system's capacity is we take a step forward. We push out of our comfort zone. We go into the stretch.

We could only stay in that stretch zone for a very short burst of time. This is where all the New Yorkers and the hustle culture does it wrong. If you stay in that place for too long, you start plummeting. Your performance plummet. And you go into burnout. So we need to do is we need to move out of our comfort zone, like push that edge a little bit, right? Stay there for a short period and then consciously and intentionally pull back regularly. And that movement of going into discomfort and then pulling back, going into discomfort and pulling back is how we build resilience.

Think of it like the gym. When you go to the gym, you lift heavy weights. You want to push to your edge, but you don't want to do too much because you'll get hurt, right? And then what do you do? You rest. And you understand that by doing that over time, you could pick up, hold more weight without it actually feeling like more weight. Same with your nervous system. As you expand that capacity, you could handle more stress without it feeling like

more stress. It's progressive overload. Exactly. You don't want to, and as a former 12-year New Yorker who understands what burnout looks like, and I remember someone, my brother saying, if you ever find downtime in New York, you're doing it wrong. And just having that mindset of like, always go, go, go. And you have to be doing more. And even like my mom is so, she's been so supportive of when I will tell her like I'm exhausted. She's like, you deserve the rest. Go take a day. And of course, leave it to me to be like, are you kidding me? Take a day off. Are you on crack? Woman, what's wrong with you? I'm like, I can't do that. And it's like, but then I've noticed when I'll take three days off the gym and I go back and like fucking crushed it. I killed it. I was stronger. I was more aware or even like next

weekend, Tuck and I are going away for my birthday. And I said, you know, I'm taking two days off. And that was a lot for me. That was huge for me to block off. I even left off two hours in the morning on Thursday so that I wasn't like, well, and I'm totally taking the day off because it's incremental, but it's those small steps of changes over time that start to chip away. It's not going to be progress, not perfection. It is not going to be where you dive in head first and all of a sudden your fucking swimming laps. It might be where you flail a little bit. Your nervous system might trigger back and you might go back into those moments. But again, what that tells to me is get curious again. Understand where are those hiccups still? Where is that belief, maybe that belief system that you're not

able to push through or that you can't keep going or whatever? Start to understand more about what your fucking body is trying to tell you, especially when it comes to dating since we always really revert back to that. But if your body is telling you somebody looks dangerous, something looks unsafe, or I, this feels familiar to me, then why do you continue to engage? And I will say that now with every aspect of your life. If there is something that feels sticky, if you feel like you have to force, If your body is continuously telling you with your nervous system, something feels off, please stop ignoring it. Because eventually what's going to happen is then your body is going to go into overdrive

and start to, then it's really going to start to compensate with the burnout and things like that. And 100%, and this is just where it gets tricky for people, right? Because the reality is what I just said is to grow, you're going to need to step out of your comfort zone and get triggered. And what you're saying, which is also true, is when you're getting triggered, you need to know what to do with that. Doesn't mean you're doing something wrong or not. And this is where people get really confused because they're like, wait, if I'm doing my business correctly, why the hell am I getting triggered? And it's like, no, no, you're getting triggered for a good reason. It's what you do with those triggers, right? The same could be said in dating that the good guys, the guys that are good for your nervous system, they're all, you know, we're not trying to pass judgment here. But they actually might feel triggering to you. And it's learning to work with your nervous system of like understanding the different states and understanding where is like me pushing kind of.

coming to the edge, stepping out of my comfort zone. And where is me pushing way too far? Like the part of you that's saying, I can't take a day off. Are you crazy woman? Right? Is your nervous system being like, it's not safe to pull back, even though you need to pull back, right? And it's honestly, if you want to learn to expand your nervous system's capacity, you really need to get very good at understanding where is my optimal? Right. Like, where am I a little out of my comfort zone? And how do I stay there for a short burst? And how do I pull myself back? Because pulling yourself back for high achievers, perfectionist overachievers, which you're describing, right, is incredibly hard, which is why they end up in burnout. And then they get very good at ignoring their nervous system.

So when the red flags are hitting, they're like, no, this is great. And then that could translate into dating and all these other areas. So it's really understanding what the process of growth looks like, how to take these gradual steps to learn, where is my optimal? Where is it too much? And to learn to pull back using these regulation tools. And when you work with that, you can create change in any area of your life because that really is the formula of understanding, befriending, understanding where it's all coming from developing compassion, then taking these gradual steps forward and then integrating that back into your life. Right. That's where, you know, rethinking, what a success look like to me? What a successful relationship look like?

Then we have to like integrate all these new techniques and modalities and practices and ways of being back into your life before you start working on another goal. And that process repeat. pizza itself, you know, like that's kind of why I called my program the mind, body recalibration formula, because it's not like a one and done. It's a process that I hope you can use over and over again any time you're saying, I want to create a big change in my life. I want to be the creator of my reality. And I want to make sure I'm doing that in a way that's sustainable. Like I'm building a strong foundation so that change can last versus I push, create a huge change, and then move backwards into burnout the way most of us are doing it when we're trying to change,

from a place of fear, shame, and not enoughness. God, so well said. And I think, like, I mean, even what, what else can I say after that besides also understanding it takes time? It takes fucking time. I get it. Like, I know that you want the immediacy. I know that you want to see it.

I mean, how many times we'll get, even just when we were alive, how can I speed this up? How can I get somebody to do something? How can I just not feel anymore? I don't want to feel this pain. That's unfortunately not the reality of it because it's the same as like, you want to to start a business. Oh, you want to be at the top. You want to be the badass boss, babe, that has 500 employees. What do you think you need to do? You think that's going to happen overnight? You've got to eat shit for a little bit. You've got to get uncomfortable. You've got to start doing

things that are different for you. You have to get yourself into a different mindset in a different space to also know, I have to crawl before I can walk. My nervous system isn't going to all of a sudden be this magical creature that's open and receptive and things. And even we had a good friend and she was going through a breakup. And we were talking to her saying, you're not, you're looking at it as if nothing has changed. As, well, it didn't work and this didn't happen and I didn't get the results that I thought I was going to get. So that means nothing changed. As opposed to going, wait, I'm really proud of myself. Look at all the changes I implemented into this and look at all these new things I tried. And you know what? You're right. It didn't last. This relationship didn't last

as long because I knew better and I protected myself and I made new steps. And it's missing out on all these beautiful, important aspects of why you're doing things just because you're in a relationship. just because you start a business doesn't guarantee that it's going to fucking work. And if your goal-oriented and everything you're doing is to get a desired and like achieve a desired result, you're missing out on the entire part of the journey. 100%. Yes. That is so well said. And like the time, the journey, what it actually is. And like you were saying, you know, everyone wants quick results. Like I want it right now. How do I speed this up? Guys, if you're asking yourself that, if you're saying, why is this not going fast enough? I want to do this faster.

I need this to be quicker. That is a major. sign of dysregulation. And that is what you need to work on in the same way as when we were talking about like our friend in the relationship. If you're catching yourself being super hard on yourself, not being able to see progress, that is the dysregulation. That is the trauma response. That's the piece to work on. Yeah. Right. I think we are very focused on changing the external, the relationship, the money, the business. When in reality, we need to look at what is the internal that is getting in the way. And it is, I need to do this faster. It is. I'm not making enough progress. Those are all signs of dysregulation. Those are all trauma responses. And when you start healing those,

when you start doing the inner work of creating outer success in any area of your life, that's when things start to move faster. That's when it starts to feel like, am I manifesting? Like, what is happening? How am I doing less but getting more? This is how. Yeah. And there's like, I, it's not magical. No, although it feels like, I even noticed even with the success of the social and everything, when I stopped, when I stopped watching paint dry, when I stopped watching every drip go into the coffee pot and then just started looking at how the cup was being formed, that's when I was like, oh, I put, I knew, I wasn't just making a vision board and singing at home, hoping that the universe provides.

I was taking actionable steps that it was, but I was also learning to, to work with my nervous system and be compassionate with the help of you of understanding that it's going to take time. isn't going to happen overnight. Comparing myself to other people isn't going to yield any fucking positive results. And what I really needed to do is accept it and accept myself that this is where you are and this is the journey you're on and it's okay. And showing myself that love and compassion and kindness to myself that I give to everybody else, but I wasn't showing to myself who also reinstated to me the trust that I have within myself and that little me knows she is protected and taken care of still. And then I haven't abandoned her just because something is going wrong.

Yeah, and that, yes, that is so powerful because it's like when we go into the, oh, you haven't grown, why isn't this moving faster? And like, what we're saying to that, to that inner child is you're not good enough. What's wrong with you? We're treating it the same way our caregivers treated us, right? Yeah. We're abandoning that part of ourselves. And so that really is the work of how you respond to yourself when you're triggered.

Because again, I think, I hope everyone here understands that the process of growing, especially in business, but even in relationship, is very much getting out of your comfort zone, doing things that scare you, making mistakes and learning from them. Right. I think we understand that as a theory. Right. Right. But when we're actually doing it, how we treat ourselves in that process, that is the work. Are you able to be loving with yourself? Are you able to see your growth? Are you able to say, you know what? I trust myself enough to not need it to be right now. Because think about it. When we say, oh, I need this right now and it's not going fast enough, where's that coming from? That's coming from a place of if this doesn't happen now,

everything's going to fall apart. If this doesn't happen now, I'm going to have to feel like a loser again. It's not coming from like a loving place. It's coming from a, I'm not good enough. Because, you know, I always give this like comparison to clients, it's like if right now, God, universe, whatever you believe in, came down and was like, that thing you want, you're 100% getting it and more. That and more is 100% coming in your lifetime and it's going to be more amazing than you could ever know. I'm just not telling you when. If that happened, would you still be rushing? I remember, would you be like, cool.

Yeah. Would you be like, okay, great. Yes, you would still be taking action. You'd be excited. I'd be going into my business with a very different energy. I'd be going harder, but I wouldn't be panicked. I don't know about you. And that's like what made me realize of like, oh, I'm panicked because sometimes I don't believe

in myself. I don't trust myself. Well, yeah. And especially even like what we talk about with like the texting and dating stuff. It's like when you don't get that immediacy, it's trying to, instead it's like, give me a favor. try sitting in this and talk to me, what's the worst thing that can happen? Face your fucking fear.

It's so the anticipatory anxiety about all of this is so much scarier, but I want you to actually sit and feel what would this look like if it didn't work out in the way that you wanted it to? And by becoming okay with that, you're pretty much telling your nervous system, either way, I got this, babe. I'm going to be fine no matter what, because whatever you throw at me, I'll be okay. And by feeling it and allowing yourself to feel that discomfort, it's also strengthening your resolve to say,

but I trust myself. And I know that it's going to be okay as opposed to, I need to quick fix, I need to get this out because you're just perpetuating, taking it off of you and putting it on to somebody else. There's something else here now.

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Oh. And the reason that's true is like, yes, because sometimes you dodge a bullet. There's that. But an even bigger reason if the worst case scenario, this doesn't work out actually happens. And in that moment, you use that as an opportunity to really work on how you speak to yourself, to really work on your confidence, to really show up for yourself and that little you, then you become fearless. Then you're like, if I could face it, I could face anything.

And now you can go back into that thing, whether that's your business or dating or friendship, with kind of a renewed self of self-trust of like, wait, even if the worst thing happens, I can handle it and I could love myself and I could accept myself and I could feel good about myself. Like, again, that is the actual work that I think people miss. They are just focused on the outcome. And this is not about the outcome. And you know how that's true. Me, and you were talking about this right before it started, because we know so many people that have gotten every outcome they ever dreamed of and more. And then they actually feel depressed. Yeah. Because it does not change anything internally. It is about changing the internal. And then that internal changing the

external, not vice versa. Because external solutions will never, ever, never fix internal problems. No, the best thing that could have happened to me last year was all the bad things that happened. I mean, minus my dog passing away. That would be the only thing I would say, really wouldn't, didn't want that. But even that, it took that to happen for me to make changes. It took me facing my worst fear for 10 years. I literally would repeat, I can't live without him. No, no, no, no. I can't go on without this dog. No, no, no, this is it. Like he's my end, I'll be all. And I was face to face with him dying in front of me and watching me and watching me and What it did was it showed me so many things.

Not only was I strong enough to take care of him as his mother and step up in a way that I never thought I could. And I never knew that I had that within me. But then when he passed away, it was finally be facing myself to say, you faced your biggest fear and here you are. I might not be okay with it. I might not be every day roses and running down the street

skipping like fucking daisies, but I did it. And I faced it. Was it as scary? Yeah, that was probably the only thing I will have to say that the shadow match. what the actual fear and pain was. But here I am. I'm here, right? We're doing all this. And from that experience, I broke up with a guy that was not, he was, oh yeah, you're fucking texting me every morning. Where were you when my dog passed away? My career, I changed careers completely and like really

shifted my focus. I moved. I made all new friends. I have a great relationship. All of these things on the other side of the worst pain I've experienced were there for me because I needed to experience it and go through it. So instead of looking at the adversity and all of these things as why is this happening to me? Look at it what's happening for me. And what is this trying to show me? And where are the kinks? Where is the fucking work that I still need to do?

Because this shit doesn't happen just for nothing. 100%. And that is so beautiful. And I think it's so beautiful how you gave his passing and his life meaning. Oh, yeah. And I think it's important to speak on that because, look, terrible things happen to all of us. Life, you know, doesn't ever go the way we planned.

And for a lot of people when terrible things happen, it's a downward spiral. And they even go into an even darker place. And that's understandable. But there is actually a skill of taking problems and alchemizing them into opportunities. And that's a skill that you build. Right. And I think you did that really beautifully by giving it meaning.

When we give hardship meaning, like that's not to say, oh, it happened for a reason. I actually don't believe the saying things happened for a reason. I hate that saying because there's horrific things that did not need to happen in the world. Right? Like we don't need to go into what they are. of we've probably all experienced at least one, things did not need to happen. But we can give meaning to hardship and we can use it to grow and thrive and heal. And when you develop that skill that you just described so beautifully of taking problems, taking hardships, taking challenges,

and alchemizing them into opportunities for deeper growth and healing, deeper than the situation itself. Because the growth it gave you was so much more than that time period. Like you're going to take that in to the rest of it. of your life now, right? And that is the skill. That's what growth actually needs to look like. And that is a skill that we learn, right? And for me, it's, it's funny that you brought this back to that because that was kind of like the central idea around creating this course of helping people figure out how to do that because I learned that my clients who were the most resilient learned that skill of how do I take any problem and alchemize it. How do I, that gives you a very

different level of self-trust when you know you can do that. It doesn't mean the hardship is any less painful, right? Not at all. No. It just means that you start to believe, wow, I'm pretty limitless. Like, there's potential within me that I didn't even know. And that is so empowering, even in the darkest moment. Totally. Like, how do you turn pain into purpose? And it's like, I did that with software when my mom almost passed away and I created a company out of it. And it's like, that is something that I've become very accustomed to because when the worst moments, that's where I thrive, Not for the best. But that's why I'm so excited for the course.

And I mean, guys, I mean, I think we're going to have to do it episode four at this point because we could keep going. But good Lord. Masha, can you share more about the course for anybody that wants to join and just how they obviously everything will be linked in the show notes. Don't you all worry. But in general, maybe you could just share a little bit more. And if people want to are interested, how they can contact you.

Yeah. So the course is called the mind-body recalibration formula. It's a hybrid of group and one-on-one. It's six months. And it's six months for a reason. because all those overachievers, perfectionists, the anxious attachment, who are saying, I need change right now. We're going to break that habit because change does not need to happen.

Instantaneously, it needs to happen gradually so it could be sustainable and you need to feel supported and need to feel worthy of taking time and feeling supported. So that like six month time period is really important to me because I want that sense of like support and nourishment for your nervous system. And so it's going to be trainings. It's going to have a monthly group hot. seat coaching calls and it's going to have a couple of one-on-one sessions with me. So the work that you're doing in the hot seat coaching, in the trainings, in the community check-ins, which are going to be

weekly, if something comes up, you have an opportunity to get one-on-one with me and go a little deeper, the places that require that. So it's going to be this hybrid. And, you know, I've kind of been calling it as like a formula for like doing the inner work to create outer success. I love that. I can't wait to be part of it. So for anybody that joins, you're going to see my bright. little face on every fucking week or whenever we know, however often we meet. And I just, it's going to be an incredible course. And listen, if you can't join the course, it's okay. You can always have a session with Masha too. Yeah. She's always here for that. Exactly. I'm here for sessions. The course is launching May 1st. And if you join early, you could be one of the

founding members with Sabrina. And there's some perks to that. But it's going to be ongoing. Yeah. So whenever you're listening to this, you could definitely join. And if you are looking for kind of a little bit of a one-on-one catch up with me to understand, is this even a good fit? is your nervous system sabotaging your success? Is that really what's needed for you? I'm super excited to be able to offer a discount code, Sabrina. Hi. For a 50-minute nervous system audit with me. So if you guys are interested in that, probably heard it in past episodes, that's still available. It's going to be a great way to understand, is this work for me? Is this what I need? Would I be a good fit? And how do I start doing this work? Like, this is a process? And what does

even starting look like. Totally. So all of this will be linked in the show notes so you guys can find everything if you need all of the links. So Masha, thank you again for joining us. Thank you for bestowing so much wisdom. And thank you for making episode 14 even better than I thought it would be. Thank you for having me. These are truly my favorite. We do. Guys, I'm so honored to be here. Love you all. And can't wait for next time. Yay. Go follow Masha. Okay, love you guys. We'll see you next week.