We Can Do Hard Things with Glennon Doyle - 58. New Year, Same You: Good News About Bad January Branding

Episode Date: January 4, 2022

1. Why do we spend our lives trying to become what our culture ascribes as “good” only to burn ourselves out, wake up, and realize: I thought it would all be more beautiful than this? 2. Why Glennon says that stillness has been her greatest teacher–and how she was able to find it in her most rock bottom moments.  3. How listening for and committing to the next right thing then leads us to the next thing–and why we should rush towards whatever looks and feels like freedom.

And I continue to believe that I... Welcome to the first we can do hard things of 2002. Whoa. That's weird, right? 2020, what's up? That just explains the difference in our personality. I'm like, what? 2020?

And sister's like, whoa, 2022. And Abby's like, ha, am, 2022. Go. I'm confused. I'm just sad. Abby's excited. Of course. Which means that it might be a new year, but we are the same uses.

Okay. Let me tell you where we are right now. Abby and I are in our office slash recording room slash living room slash chase's bedroom when he's home from college. He is home now for his break. So what we do on podcast day is. we just come in here and we step around all of his piles of clothes and books and we fold up the hide-a-bed couch to set up. And so we're in here now.

This is my favorite room of the house. We have these glass doors. So we can see out onto the street of our little L.A. beach town. And so as we record, we can see little families lugging their kids in gear to the beach, pretending to have a good time. And occasionally we can see a badass woman in a wetsuit carrying a surfboard. which always makes me so happy.

But not today because it's raining outside today, which is an anomaly in L.A. and is my favorite. Because when I wake up and hear rain, it feels like the universe has handed me a get out of jail-free card. You know, because in L.A., it's always freaking sunny, which is wonderful, I guess, but it's also annoying because when you think about it, the sun is really bossy.

Do you know what I mean? It's like an indictment. If you're not at here enjoying the sun, look, you're wasting your life. Not taking advantage. I mean, talking about a pretty bossy human being, you just don't like being boss, do you? No, I don't. I don't like being boss, especially by the sun, which just sits there in the sky, just shaming me for living my home body, home sexual life. That's how I identify is a home sexual.

I love my house. I would marry my home if I were not already married. It's the only identity I've ever had that has stayed constant. You can't even figure out. All right. I don't know if I'm a homosexual. I just identify as queer, but I do know that I'm a home sexual. So, you know, it's just like when the sun doesn't come out and the rain comes, it's just an invitation to just stay snugly and cozy.

So it's a rainy, snugly day. And Abby and I are in the couch, sisters in her, her sister's in her. son's bedroom. That's where she records. And in here, there's a little fire on and our lazy dogs are on the floor and we're talking to you. So so far, 2022 is pretty good stuff. It works for me. Give it a minute. But give it a minute, she says. So the one thing that doesn't work for me that I want to start off with is this January can drive me a bit that shit. Okay. And it's because I've been thinking a lot about this and it's because of the way that January is branded. Okay.

It is as if January has this PR agency that all sat around a table and decided that the way that we will brand January is to capitalize on how much people hate themselves. Right? By creating this tagline of New Year, New Me. Okay. It's actually New Year, New Year, New You. New Year, New Year, New You. New Year.

new you. Okay, so two reasons why this is stupid. All right. New Year, New You is stupid. Number one, it does suggest that all of us hate who we are and are just waiting for the right month to come so we can completely change our horrible, stupid ass hateful stuff. It's so true. It's so insulting. It's so insulting. It's like, what if it was like, New Year, new wife. Yes. New Year, new husband as if like you'd take the first chance you got to throw them to the curb. Exactly. New year, new self. New year, new you suck in other words. So number one, it suggests we hate who we are. But number two, it's, it goes against the way life is and the way people are. Okay. This is not how life works. New year, new me. This is not it. Okay. So what is fundamentally true about people that I have observed in my own life with other people is that on

our core, like at our deepest, truest self, we are unchanging forever. We are always the same self. Okay. Like, I have just recently accepted this. That there, I am not, never, no days in the future, am I going to wake up and suddenly be an adult? Right? Like I just had this idea that there was myself, but at one point out there, I was going to wake up and I was going to be this future self, that I had dreamed up that had more things figured out. That was like now, like everything's been a dress rehearsal. But at one point, it's going to start. Yeah.

It's like a page loading, loading, loading. And then it gets stuck at 99% and will never fully load. That's how I feel about life. Loading, loading. Loading forever. There is no future version of myself. Like, this is it. Okay.

And I don't mean like our identities stay the same. All right, that shit changes constantly. Like, used to be straight. Now I'm gay. I'm married, divorce, single, non-mother, mother, woman. Those are just costumes, right? Those are just roles. I'm talking about like at our soul level.

Okay, I'm talking about at our consciousness level. Like, what is actually you? What is actually me? What I really am? Like the me that is in here looking out at the world. This weirds me out. I actually just thought of this a few weeks ago. Okay, that the me that is in here looking out at the world was the same.

same me that was in here looking out at the world when I was like 10 years old, like in the backseat of my van, looking out at the backs of my parents' heads. Same me inside that was looking out at the world, right? Same me that's been in here looking out that like was watching doctors deliver chase. Like same me inside that was watching Abby say her vows. Like it will be the same me that is on my deathbed. Like, hopefully, if that's the way I go. Like looking around at people who love me.

Right. Same, same inner self. And this is bad news for January branding. Right? Because the truth is forever New Year, same ass me. Okay. But I think it's good news because actually it makes me feel safe. I'm going to be okay forever because I'm never going to leave me.

Like this self, looking out from inside. at everything is going to be the same self. It's like I also just began to understand yesterday that if I've never switched into this different grown-up adult future version of myself, that means that nothing ever is going to be able to separate me from myself until the day that I die. Which is very comforting.

And also scary as shit. I'm stuck with this self forever. Yeah, good news, bad news. Good news, bad news, people. Good news, bad news. But it's beautiful. It's kind of right. It's like weird. I don't know if I'm explaining it right, but it is weird to me that this inner self that's looking out at the world was the same when I was 5, 12, 25, 40, 60, like the same consciousness. But is it weird because I think in your brain you're making it weird. Like the consciousness self is like this is what I've been trying to teach you all along. Right. That it's just the now. It's just the now. It's just to hear you have always always been. It's exactly like the sun being out all the time and making you feel like you should be doing something.

We are here to say it is January. The sun is shining. Everyone is new year, new yuing all over you. And you get to say, I am not going to accept that shame and expectation that I should be out running around in the sun. I'm not going to accept the the job you've given me, which is to apparently throw my old self to the curve and start fresh and new. That it's always just the next right thing, one thing at a time. And there's no radical promise of transformation, but there's also no radical assignment. Just keeps doing the next thing.

There's no premise you have to accept that who you are wasn't good enough in the first place. Yes. Right? It's a very insulting campaign now that you think about it. Screw you January PR people. Screw you. It's a great way to run an economy. Yes, exactly. It's a great way. It's really about. The PR for January is really just everybody on earth who's trying to sell you this shit that will certainly make you a new year, new you. So it's new rule, new year, screw you. Yes. Screw you. Yeah. Screw you. January is my January. vibe, okay? But what I will tell you is I do not think that you need to be better. I think you are perfect right now. But there is a cool thing, like when I think about this me self, this soul level

self inside of me that's been with me forever and will be with me forever more. That one thing that has saved me at every point of my life, no matter what identities are changing or relationships are changing is returning to that self over and over and over again like a touch tree, right? Like a thing that I'm coming back to. And when I think about what the hell is that that I'm talking about, that self, what I would describe it as is this like churning stillness inside of me. That's the best I can describe it right now, that it is a stillness, but it is a moving stillness inside of me that if I return to it saves me. And so what I would say is let's have an episode today that's about not being better but being still. And how can we use stillness to save us?

I was thinking in prep for this little conversation with you all about how I've kind of experienced life thus far to be three different parts. Okay. It's like, well, from when I got sober. Because I don't know what the hell was before that. That was just a... It was a prolog. Very dicey prolog. It was a very dicey prologue is what it was. Yeah.

Bit of a tornado. But it feels like as an adult, there's this level one where you're just like becoming whoever the world told you who to be. You're just like, you look at the world and say, what is makes for a successful person? And then you just gather up those things as the best you can. Right. Try to become like a good whatever. Whatever your culture has decided a good mother, a good wife, a good partner, a good worker, a good community, whatever.

You build that way. And then you burn out from that and you wake up and you realize you look at your life and you're like, what? This is not my beautiful life. You're like, what the hell? I did all the things they told me. and either I crashed and burned or I just feel me about all of it. So then you level up to this level two. I love level up.

Level up. Which is like this time where you actually figure out who you are and what you desire and what your true feelings are and your true ambition and your true intuition and imagination. You create a self separate from what the world told you. I feel like that's what a lot of untamed is about. Creating this self. Like, who am I? What are my feelings? What are, what do I want? What are my boundaries? What are my values? And then you kind of figure out who you are. Okay. And then, you know, that there's this part we're trying to enter into now, which is like this other level. which happens when you figure out you have created such a self that you cannot stand your damn self.

Right? You've created so many boundaries that you can't stand anybody. Your values are so strong that you are kind of not able to see other. You just, you've selfed yourself out. And then I feel like there's this third level, which is transcending the self. It's like we watch. said Ramda, especially recently. It was like, so good. You spend your whole life becoming somebody, but the actual goal is to become nobody. It feels so counterproductive. You spend the whole first part of your life being somebody that you're not. Then you spend the next part of your life trying to find the person in that somebody that you are. And then you spend the rest of your life trying to become nobody to lose thyself, which you just found. Yeah, to become as wise as you were when you were born. And I don't think you really get from level one to level two, level three, and that it's like this permanent thing. I just feel like I'm always dipping in between all of it. Every single day,

I'm like finding myself becoming who the world wants me to be. And then finding my fire and being all and then transcending. Like it's all every single day. Studies of happiness and age find that people are least happy and least satisfied with their lives in their 20s, 30s and early 40s. There is the worst satisfaction of life and midlife, and then you gain an appreciation for life as you age. It's crazy because notwithstanding ageism and sexism and this kind of archetype in the media of this miserable old woman, it's actually women are increasingly happy after age 55. So they're just like, have better well-being and lower levels of anxiety and stress. And actually, women are consistently rank higher than, you know,

men in life satisfaction as they grow older. The happiest people period are women age 65 to 79. So even if you don't, even if none of this rings true, I think there is kind of a low grade process happening in us where either it's like we've learned from our life or we're learning because we're getting closer to death about what's important. God, that's so hopeful to me. It's countercultural because the culture promises us that we are done as women after what. Like now it's probably 18. I don't know what the ages where they tell us we're worthless.

And what I see in my life is what you're saying. That I want to look at most 20-year-olds, 30-year-olds and say, just, honey, hold on. It gets better. Like you stop, you stop. When you finally figure out, oh, I can't please everyone. It's the phenomenon of people saying, I've run out of fucks to give. Like that is, it's a joke, but it's not.

It's like this very deep letting go of, oh, I see the game here and I'm not going to play anymore. And I'm just going to please myself. The very thing that the world tells us we should fear, which is that the world will stop looking at you like an object, is probably what is freeing. Like when the world stops preying on you in a million different ways, not just for praying, like I'm not just talking about sexually and physically, although that is real. But for everything, the world just looks at women as objects to serve, to fix, to,

so when you start to disappear in terms of the culture, that might be the first time you actually can exist inside your own skin. Oh, I feel so exciting. I know. It is. It's like the great giving up. You know, that's what the I've run out of fucks is basically. When you can still strive to meet any kind of standard, it's the striving is keeping you miserable.

When you're out of the game, and I'm not saying, I'm saying from a cultural perspective, you're in pursuit of something else at that point. And I think, I mean, I think that actually dovetels really well with you wanting to talk about stillness today because stillness is a lot of a great giving up. Right. Yeah. You know. This show is brought to you by Alma. When I first tried to find a therapist, it felt like a scavenger hunt with no map, pages of names, long wait lists, voicemails that never got returned.

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which I think sometimes correlate with age. Often 20s and early 30s are this striving to be what the world tells us to be, and then we kind of find our own backbone and heart and soul in our mid-30s, and then we try to. that for a while and then often people like you're saying around their 50s let go of that identity too and when I think about what is the for me what is the magic trick of the leveling up like what is the teacher that has always been there to push me up a level it's always been stillness

in a million different well actually just a few ways getting still has been the greatest teacher of my life, just forcing myself. So I wanted to talk today about, well, I want to tell a story about stillness. Now I first discovered its power. And I'm excited to talk about it because I haven't talked about it in so long. And I don't know how it's going to feel now. I used to think it was so smart. And now I'm, I don't know.

It was like revolutionary. Oh, my God. Ten years ago. It was epiphany to me. So a long, long time ago, after I found out about the infidelity in my first marriage, you know, we've gotten to this place now with our family that all is well. But that was a horrifying, terrifying, terrifying time for me. I really, you know, for those of you who haven't been with us since the early days,

I was married for a decade and my then-husband told me that he had been unfaithful to me, pretty much our whole marriage. And I was deeply shaken and so afraid because I had no idea what to do. I had very little kids. And I could not see a solution. Like I could not see staying with this person and living with that kind of. pain and dishonesty and betrayal in my own home. And I could not see leaving because breaking up my family at that point felt like an impossibility to me. And so I was just in

a slice of hell. And that was your experience because there's a lot of people out there that that must leave. Or must stay. Or must stay. Clearly. I mean, I did both. Right. I get, I understand completely. But at that moment, I had no, no, you know, those moments where you just feel like frozen because this way is impossible and that way is impossible. Like, I just couldn't, I spent all day just trying to make something make sense in my brain. And I, in my heart, and nothing, there was nothing. And I was so furious. And then when you're a young, when you're a young person, you have children, you can't even deal with your own stuff because your kids are constantly there and you're trying to help them through. Anyway, I was in a rough place and I was going to therapy

and explaining a lot of my rage and pain and my therapist recommended that I go to yoga. Okay. And I was like, no, that's not going to happen. I was much, I was, I was not, I did not have a lot of woo-woo back then. I know, I can't believe there was ever a time where you didn't have woo-woo. It's so wild to think about. I mean, now I'm just woo-wooed out. Five incense burnings a day. Candles lit. We are a fire hazard, literally.

I know. It's just, I did. This smells are so, well, we always talk about that, but it makes me feel like there's more magic when the, when the incense is going. Anyway. Whatever floats your boats. Yes. Thank you, love.

So, so I said no, but then there's this one morning where I'll never forget it. The kids were at the kitchen table. I was at the counter in the kitchen and my ex has been walked over to me and tried to put his hand on my arm. And I yanked my arm away just like really, really hard. And I looked over and the kids were watching the whole thing. And I remember one of them going, Mommy, what's wrong? And I was just like, nothing. Everything's fine.

Everything's fine, fine, fine, fine, fine, fine, fine. And I like sat and grabbed them. And I just thought, oh, this is, I'm in a, I'm just. we're all lying to each other. I'm telling them it's fine. They know something's wrong. I'm teaching them not to trust their own. And it's like all of it was just. So I drove to drop them off at school and then I drove straight to this freaking yoga studio that I'd driven by a million times. Okay. And I walk into the studio and there's all the freaking incense. I'm like, I have no mat. I don't know what's happening. Just where do I go? Okay. So the nice lady sent me

into this room. I sit down in this room and you all know this story. It was 490 degrees. So it was a hot yoga class that you didn't. Well, I didn't know that. I just thought that the air conditioning was broken. I just sat there and thought, why does my life suck so much? Like, all of this is happening to me. And then now I go to the one yoga studio that the air conditioning is broken. it, right? So, but all these other women are sitting around the, they're sitting there in heat. So I'm like, forget it. I'm leaving. I pick up my little rented mat and start to walk out. And then this yoga teacher walks in. So then I just sit right back down. Because I, because we are nothing,

if not pleasing of authority figures. Like, yes, okay. I was just repositioning. Thank you. Exactly. I was like, fuck this. I'm out of here. Fuck this. Oh, hey. Hi. Hi. Hi. Hi. I just had to pee. I'll be right back. Yes. I'm looking to get an A plus in whatever class this is.

Thank you. Oh my gosh. That's so true. So I sit down. The woman says, welcome to hot yoga. And I'm just like, oh, what kind of,

what slice of fresh hell have I stepped into? She sits down on her mat. So I sit down on my mat. Everyone else is sitting on mat. And then she says, let's all set our intentions for the day. Now, how normal does this sound? Now we always set, we set intentions.

We do all of these things, right, babe? Yeah, but the first time, the first go around with somebody setting intentions, it's like, what the hell are you talking about? She might as well come in with a witch hat and a cauldron. I was like, what is this sorcery that's happening here, right? So the freaking lady next to me says, I swear to you, I swear to both of you on this worst day of my life, this lady goes, my intention is to radiate loving kindness to all sentient. Is that how you say the satiate?

Is it station? I think it's sation. I don't know. I just have only heard you say sentient beings. That's how it's spelled. And I usually say things how they're spelled because I only read. How do you spell it? S-E-N-T-I-E-N-T.

But s-s-s. I wanted to stab this peaceful lady. I just felt like my intention is to make it through this class. Yeah, she was upstaging everybody with her freaking intention here. I mean, are you serious? We're just trying to get through the day. I give an intention. I say my intention is just to make it through whatever's about to happen here over this next hour without

picking up my mat and running out the door. Very good intention. And well, actually, it was, I think it was a good intention because the yoga instructor looked at me like I had said something very revolutionary. Like you were a sentient, satian, whatever it is being? Yes. I was one of those beings they were talking about. So she looks at me and she says, okay, you just sit there and stay on your mat.

And I was like, okay, I can probably do that. Okay, so here's what happens. The woman starts the class. She's telling everyone to do all of these very, very, Choreographed situations. Okay. The other people know how to do the choreographed situations. I sit there on my mat for 50 minutes in the 150 degrees while everyone else does their

stretches. And what happened to me was my first experience of deep, deep stillness. Okay? because what I figured out is I was running so fast from what had just happened to me in my life. I was, had been running, I think, since I actually first got sober. I think this was my first deep sobriety experience in that class because when I got sober 10 years before, I immediately was like, I was pregnant. I got married when I was sober for four minutes. I was like trying so desperately to become, I was level oneing.

I was trying so desperately to become everything. I was trying to be a good girl. I had been a bad girl my whole life. I was trying to be a good girl. Well, that's what I had. And I just decided I'm just going to push under the rug. Like I'm going to put everything, push it under the bed, all of my addiction, all of my pain. I'm just going to push it under there.

I'm going to become this upstanding citizen. Right? And then this thing happened in my marriage and I was so terrified of the future and I was so ashamed that this is my life and I was avoiding all of it. And then while I was sitting there for that 50 minutes, I just let it all come up. It was like every single fear, every single bit of shame, all my anger, all my memories, all of my, they just started all popping up one at a time, like one of the, like a twisted game of whackamol where like all the moles are your worst, the things you think will kill you if you feel them. And I had no mallet.

And I was just like crying and just it all came up. And then at the end of the class, there's this thing that they do in yoga called shavasanon. Shavasana. Anyway, it's a nap. It's a little nap. It's the best part. And they just did that the whole time. So hold on.

So your teacher just told you just to lay there. Yes, she was amazing. And then she, no, I didn't lay there. I was sitting. Oh, I see. You just sat there, just sit there the whole time and you just didn't move. Exactly. And she exercised her intention.

She just stayed true. Yeah. She stayed on my mat and didn't run out. And I'm telling you, this yoga instructor knew something big was happening. She was looking at me with her encouraging face. Her encouraging face was like, you're doing a good job. I mean, I was bawling. Clearly she knew something was happening. Then at the end of yoga, I was in the nap, laying down, just wrung out with sweat and tears and all of the things. And that was. the first experience I had with the power of doing nothing, like the power of not running, the power of not, of staying on your mat, of not picking up your mat and running out of the room, which is what I was symbolically doing with every feeling that I had because I felt like if I let the memories come up, if I let the pain arise, if I let it all be and looked at it, I would die. And I think that was my real first understanding of what sobriety is, which is just a not running. Because I had really kind of replaced the running with booze to the running of achievement and of identity building. And so that's when I stopped being afraid of my feelings.

It was like that deep stillness of refusing to run from emotion, it didn't free me from pain. I feel pain all the time, but it freed me from being terrified of pain. I don't have to be afraid of pain anymore. I can allow it all to come up. I've heard you tell that story so many times. And it's the first time that I have thought of the fact of stillness, like that perfect storm happening because it was the first time that you didn't have motion in your decisions too. You know, you had when you, when you got pregnant with Chase, okay, I'm getting married. I'm having a family. I'm doing the thing. You get the house. You have the kids. You get the family together. You're going, going, going, going. I'm just thinking for the first time is part of that ability to have that stillness set in was precisely because there was no forward motion in your ability to make the decision. Because if you had been like, I'm staying.

no matter what, then you would have been like, insert, you know, couples, therapy, insert everything we need. Like you would have project managed that. Or if you were leaving, you would have been project managing that. But the fact you were in this, you know, intractable middle space where you couldn't make a decision made you have to. Wow. That is so interesting because at first of all, I've never thought about that before. But it also is how I tend to fix problems. It's like rush into something else.

And that is what makes me feel like progress is happening. That is a bit of a numbing too. It's like sometimes is our stuckness. It's almost a claustrophobic feeling of like, oh my God. Like there has to be, it's a suffocating. Like there has to be a decision that will relieve this pain. And when there is no decision that will relieve the pain, is that perhaps an invitation to stillness? Like there's still more that needs to be healed or faced and your life won't allow you movement until you've faced that which stillness will bring up.

I think maybe that we will avoid stillness at every possible cost. And so because we will only succumb to stillness when we absolutely have to, maybe it's those places of stuckness where we kind of get that gift because if we can move left or move right versus staying still, we absolutely will. So it's those moments that you have that are horrible. I wouldn't wish them on anyone. But they are unique in that you're so definitely. desperate for any kind of shift and there is no external shift you can make. So it has to be an internal shift. Yeah. I mean, I couldn't agree more. I feel like all of us, I mean, I can just remember the times in my 20s. I've had friends who were trying to get me into meditation and

do more yoga. And I'm just like, oh, yeah. But deep down, I knew that that was the thing that was helping me the most. Like I knew deep down that sitting quietly for 10, 15, 20 minutes a day is going to be a thing that can help. But like, why wouldn't I do it? I know, because it's the hardest thing. And so that's an interesting point because I'm thinking when I think about the moments of stillness that have changed my life, they always are right after a massive rock bottom. Okay. So a massive rock bottom and then there after that is the is the big stillness. that has shifted something for me. So is it the fact that stillness is is the gift of rock bottom? Or is stillness always there? We just only will go there when we have completely run out of any other option.

I think that's exactly when it is. I mean, I think it's the latter because of course it's available to all of us. We just only take it when it's the only thing available to us. I mean, it's available all the time to all of us. but we will only take it when it's the only thing available to us. Yes, that's right. It's like praying to God for me. It's like praying to God at the end. Yeah, you're like, I'm literally out of every other option. I will do anything.

I promise I'll go to church on Sundays from now on. I believe in you from now on. Right. And then there's meditation after that. After that. That's right. It's because it's very hard. It's the simplest, hardest thing.

The truth is in the stillness. And who the hell wants that? I think it's fear for me. Of what's going to come up? I just, I feel like I've been afraid of my internal world self. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Of finding out who I am.

I'm like I'm a fraud. Like I'm an imposter. Like any second now people are going to like catch me for not being real and true. Totally. I always feel that way. The fuck is that about. I don't know. Well, let's talk about.

that because, Glennie, you said that's the first time that you were still with your feelings that you weren't afraid of them. What does it mean

about us that we're afraid of our feelings? What is it that we are afraid of? Like, what is the thing that keeps us in motion?

Well, I don't, I mean, I have a couple thoughts in this moment. One is, as we talk about a lot, we are not

taught that's right how to experience uncomfortable emotions. Yes. Like we think if the pain that the pain of uncomfortable emotions ends in death. Like we do not understand that we can feel rage and anger and sadness and heartbreak and that it will go through us and pass because I think we just live in a culture that is so obsessed with happiness. Sadness is not marketable.

Right. It's just not. It's not like, you know. Sad Christmas. Right. Sad holidays. It's like happy everything. Everything is fucking happy.

That's right. Happy Christmas. Happy holidays. Happy New Year. Yeah. We should change it. And then I think... Medium.

New Year. Mediocre. Have a mediocre new year. Mediocre day. Well, happyish. I've always liked happiest. Happyish ever after. And then maybe there's something that our feelings will make.

us do, there are conversations that I need to have that when I feel my anger kind of remind me that I have to have that conversation or like resentments where I feel like, oh, that's right. Like you still are in that friendship that is not good for you. In the stillness, your feelings kind of guide you toward hard decisions. They guide you towards truth. Yeah. And those truthy things are decisive, hard thing that are disturbing to your life. This show is sponsored by Midi Health. Parimenopause and menopause aren't personality flaws or phases. They're medical transitions. And yet nearly three out of four women who actively seek help are sent home with nothing.

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Okay. To feel the energy of motion inside. Yeah. It's like what, yeah, emotion, right. Energy in motion. Like it's energy and motion. So it can't be completely stagnated. We can't ignore it.

It has to be released in one way or another. I mean, that's what we teach our kids. It's okay to feel this thing. How do you feel? You know, there's a lot of adults that get to the point where they don't know how to feel their feelings. and how to sit with it. And so that was a big epiphany from me. But there was this second experience that I had with stillness that taught me something

completely different. Okay. So this was a teacher where a time when stillness was a teacher again for me. But it was, it taught me something completely different. Okay. So sometime later when I was still in this like shitstorm of what am I going to do? We'd already been through. This is my first marriage.

We'd already been through. tons and tons of therapy. I could not find peace to save my life. I could not find peace about going. I could not find peace about staying. I did not know what I wanted to do. I did not know what I wanted to do. I would go back and forth every single day. Argue with myself. Argue with myself. One night I find myself sitting on the bed, just shoveling Ben and Jerry's into my mouth and Googling. Okay. What do I do if my husband is a cheater, but also a really good dad. Enter. Okay. So I was Googling my one wild and precious life. Okay, I was, I was asking a bunch of bots and trolls if they knew what I should do. I love this. With my life.

Bots and trolls. Yeah. And I mean, I had, that was looking at that question in the Google search bar, you know, was like a wake-up call to me. It was like, oh my God, when did you start trusting literally everyone else on earth more than yourself? Wow. Right? And up to that moment, you guys, I have been calling everyone, calling friends asking them what I should do, what would they do, reading every single article that anyone has ever written about infidelity and broken up families and yada, yada, yada. I had taken freaking buzz-free quizzes, you know, those quizzes at 16-year-old.

to make in their parents' basement. I was getting advice from those. I'm like, who am I? I will never. I will always take all the quizzes. I love them. But I realized looking at that, the computer that night, I am never, I have one life. And I am never going to live my one life. If I don't figure out what I want to do, if I don't keep desperately searching out, side of myself for somebody to tell me what to do. If I don't quit living my life by inquiry and consensus and permission. So that is the kind of moment that, that, that rock bottom, that kind of like advice rock bottom, I guess lack of self-trust rock bottom, desperate searching for approval rock bottom is when I committed myself to stillness again. It's when I decided that's when

I started to sit in my closet for seven minutes at a time to try to like, you know, I just kept feeling like every day I'm waking up and asking the world what I should do. If you want to do that, it's easy to do because the exterior voices in our lives are so freaking loud. Yeah. Here's your next audiobook, here's your next TV show, here's your next expert, here's your next, you know, minister, teacher, whatever. There's all these voices on the outside of ourselves that it drowns out this kind of knowing that we all have inside of ourselves. And that was a weird return to stillness. It was just like this desperation for some kind of wisdom. So you were going in the closet for seven minutes and doing a kind of meditation, like, how did you learn about this meditation? Or you were just

sitting there quietly? Because I kind of think that that's my favorite definition of meditation. Just sit quietly. Yeah, I didn't have any like special technique or anything back then. I just was committed to quiet. You know, stillness had already taught me something. And I kind of instinctively knew that that was the place to return to when I was last. And instinctively knew that there was something to be found there that I would never find in all of my desperate searching outside of it. So that time is when I found this inner, it's not a voice. It's just what I call the knowing. It's intuition, it's spirit, it's whatever, you know, you call it gut, Abby, right? Like, it's this inner guide that always knows what I need to do next.

It never tells me like the five-year plan, but it always guides me towards the next right thing. And then when you commit to the next right thing, it gives you the next thing. And then it's like becomes a yellow brick road, right, where you can find your entire way home just one thing at a time. So do you experience that knowing or that intuition? how do you experience the knowing? And do you find it in stillness? Well, intuition, first of all, everyone experiences it. It's not just if you believe in the woo-woo. I mean, it's a real thing. Like, intuition is the ability to know something without analytical reasoning. It bridges the gap between conscious and non-conscious parts of our mind. So whether you believe in the woo-woo knowing

or not, it is a thing that's happening. The science shows that intuition operates, through the entire right side of the brain and through our gut. That's why it's called gut instinct. So the entric nervous system is located in your gastrointestinal track and it's full of neurons that convey information just like the brain does. So you are having, whether you acknowledge it or not, your body is sending signals through your gut and through the right side of your brain. So I just feel like whether you believe in it or not, it's there.

But I think I really resonated. with what you said before about kind of be coming from the most desperate moments where we literally have nothing else that we can turn to that are the kind of some of the best practice zones for that. And I think it is for for me when things were miserable enough that I was desperate enough to try to figure out whether there was any, kind of something better, a better idea or a better way to feel, that happened right after my divorce. And I think that that wrecked me so much in my view of how the world worked that I wasn't willing to rely on how the world was working anymore. And that how it kind of, in that darkness,

I started looking for any kind of light for anything that made me feel alive. I didn't know what I wanted or I didn't know what a plan would be. I didn't even know how to trust what I wanted because of what I'd just been through. Ashley Ford's new book, somebody's daughter, which is so amazing. In her book, she has this incredible story of this moment in her life. And she says, inside of myself, I let go. For half a minute, I was flying. For half a minute, I knew I had it in me to tell the truth and be loved anyway. And for me, that's what inner knowing. feels like, like what joy and freedom and anything that makes me feel alive, it just always shows up just about for half a minute. It's never sustained and it's not a static place of arrival.

It's sadly and tragically, it's just for kind of half a minute of believing and half a minute of seeing another way for yourself. And at that time in my life, I was so desperate for anything that made me feel a little more alive, that I just started to take a chance that I could go towards that and eventually feel more alive. That, to me, is how we know that something is for us. How we know that something is of our knowing and our choosing is that we can practice learning what our intuition is by running toward anything that feels like a half a minute. of being alive and I think anything that feels like freedom to you

is what you can trust. That's good. Have you ever hit a point at work where everything just feels heavy? Not just a bad week, but the kind of burnout where you're staring at your laptop thinking, I can't keep doing it like this.

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flexible, private, and built around the reality of your life. Go to Strawberry, strawberry dot me slash we can do hard things and try a coaching session for 50% off. Strawberry dot me because your career should feel good again. I just have one question for you about that. The 30 seconds of freedom when you experience that feeling and then everything goes back to shit normal Monday in life. Always. Always and inevitably.

Right. Exactly. So are you able to tap because the feeling isn't enough, right? Like, are you able to tap back into the feeling, remember the feeling and make decisions in your mundane life based on what that flash of freedom taught you? Yeah. Yeah. I think, I think so. I mean, I think in a day, in a month, and a year that is in that claustrophobic and tractable middle place, like you were just talking about for those two times where, you know, you couldn't go left or right.

and the internet wasn't even telling you what to do. And there's nothing that I think those 30 seconds at a time that are these kind of like raindrops in a desert. It's not going to fill you up. It's not going to take your thirst away. But it's enough to remind you that water exists, right? It's enough to show you it isn't always going to be exactly like this. And there is a better place for you, but it's not here and it's not right now.

So you have to rush toward wherever, whatever looks like and feels like that freedom, because that's going to take you closer to the place that is not right now. Yeah. Yes. That's good. All right, you all, for the next right thing today, I think we, just find a minute of stillness? Oof, one minute.

I mean, if you feel... Can we do a minute? If you're feeling like kind of hardcore, like get to two. No, we're not going to do two. We can do hard things. We can't do impossible things. One minute of stillness pod squad and see what comes up. We love you.

Next episode, I'm going to talk about some new stillness that is kind of rocking in my world these days. Ooh, can't wait. things get hard this week. Don't forget. What are we not going to forget, love bug? We are not going to forget that we can do hard things. See you soon. Bye. I give you Tishmilton and Brandy Carlisle. I walk through fire. I came out the other side.

I chase desire. I made sure I God was mine And I continued to believe that I were adventurers and heartbreaks a map

A final destination They've stopped asking directions To places And to be to be known We'll finally find We can do a heart A brand new star

And sometimes Things fall hard I continue to The best people are free And it took some time But I'm finally fine Because we're adventurers We've never

A final destination We've stopped asking directions To places they've never been And too hard adventurer To play We Can Do Hard Things is produced in partnership With Cadence 13 Studios Be sure to rate, review, and

follow the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Odyssey, or wherever you get your podcasts. Especially be sure to rate and review the podcast if you really liked it. If you didn't, don't worry about it. It's fine.