Stop Settling for Stress

But you can do that for yourself. I want to challenge you to do that five times a day, five times a day, where you just take a moment and you go, what’s going on with me right now? And what do I need? Today, we’re going to be talking about how I think we should stop settling for stress. I think a lot of us are way more stressed out than we need to be. And we’re just allowing it and I want us to snap out of it, I want us to control the controllable. We can’t control everything, we can’t control external things. But there’s a lot that we can control that we’re not controlling, especially when we’re in an emotional spiral about something.

So, let me explain you are a body, a mind, and a soul, three things and let’s just talk about the body and the mind for a second. Your body is designed to survive, okay. Your body it’s supposed to look out for danger and then look for opportunity, but it mostly looks for danger and a little bit, it looks for opportunity. And this is really important and all animals do this; all animals want to survive they have a survival instinct. When you are in a tight space, when you see a spider or a mouse or a snake and you have a very fast visceral reaction, it is because the programming as a human says, hey, don’t be bitten by a snake, it’s deep, you guys it’s deep. So your brain and your body are communicating all the time because you’re your body, the eyes in your body are taking in all this data. Just imagine all the things around you, which is why I’m a big fan of minimalism, because if you’re actually looking at open bookshelves of stuff and stuff and stuff and stuff, it tires your brain out to look at all that stuff because it’s like, what’s all in there are we safe? Are we doing okay?

And then your brain and your body are communicating. So the body is taking in this data and the brain is making sense of it. But the brain is also designed to give you like the cliff notes versions of things and set some of the programming to automatic in the back. And for example, you’re not thinking about breathing right now, and that is such a good thing. It is so good that every 30 seconds you don’t have to be like, and breathe in, and breathe out. That’s happening automatically but somewhere along the way, some of our fears start to get relegated to this subconscious programming and listening, just hang with me this isn’t complicated. This is like when your mom calls you and you get a pit in your stomach, and you’re like, oh no, that’s pretty dangerous or you know, you have to return something and it feels like a high level of conflict for you and you have a disproportionate fear reaction to the situation.

And we could definitely, probably answer why, but it doesn’t matter. I’m telling you, it doesn’t matter why. And so, your body and your brain are having these conversations, but let me tell you about your brain it gets a lot of things wrong. We know, cause I’ve, I’ve made this joke on the podcast before where you’re like in the kitchen and your husband gives you a look like just a look and your brain will make the most fantastical story about that guy. Like he looks at you in the kitchen and you’re like, oh, he’s disappointed dinner isn’t ready yet. He works so hard and I didn’t had dinner yet, and I don’t even know what I was doing all day and he doesn’t really believe in me and maybe he doesn’t love me anymore. And then you ask him and you’re like, hey, like, if you were to ask him, hey, there’s a look on your face that looks like something’s wrong. What’s going on? And he might say, oh, the dishwasher is making a funny noise so I’m just, I’m really focused on that right now.

That’s a great example of how your body perceives a threat. Men are threatening us, period. They are bigger, they can hurt us, like, even the sweetest loveliest guy, your brain on a deep, deep level is like, that’s a dangerous thing. So this dangerous thing gives you a look that looks like they might be upset. And then your brain is just like, let’s just run some programs on guesses about why that guy is upset. And then you have all these thoughts and they create real feelings in your body. By the way, in that moment, when I’m telling you the story, you will feel genuine rejection and sadness because of the look that your husband gave you. And so we’re going to bring in the third part right now. The third part of you is your soul, okay. Your soul gets to drive the brain, hey, you are the watcher of your thoughts. Some of the thoughts happen automatically, but you get to guide them. You get to be like, oh, hold on, hey, love, yes we do see a look on the husband’s face but maybe we should check in with him about that.

We have no idea what’s going on in his brain, and so your soul, this part of us that can be at perfect peace. This part of us, it is completely whole, completely lovable gets to decide what the brain is going to do. And for those of you who’ve ever had a dog that was scared of something or rehab the dog we do that, like let’s say you’ve got a dog and you’re walking down the street and your dog is a little bit skittish of strollers. And you see a stroller, you know, the dog is skittish about strollers so automatically this is what I would do as a dog trainer. I would just like, boop, hey little love there’s a stroller, I love you. That stroller is so safe you’re safe with me right now. And then treat and then treat and then treat right. I would just beat my voice, I would change my voice so the dog feels safe and knows that I’m happy. I’m just communicating with the dog, I feel happy and safe so you should feel happy and safe. And then treats are reinforcing like, oh, something, something good is happening right now, what’s happening? And ideally the dog would begin to be desensitized to that stroller and then the stroller could go past.

In this, in this analogy right, your brain and your body is like the dog and you are the dog trainer standing outside of them going, hey, I see that stroller but we don’t need to freak out about it, it’s not going to hurt you. So we’ve been talking about calendars a lot in the membership and we’re getting ready for may and the same thing is true with your calendar. Even just looking at your calendar can feel really scary by the way, all right. You pull it up and you’re like, your eyes see the number of appointments and then your brain runs a fear program and it just believes everything that it thinks that your body will act accordingly. If you’re in a stress state, you’re going to fight flight freeze or fun you’re going to do one of those things to protect yourself. And so, I just want all of you to know when Jesus says over and over so many times you guys, so many times be at peace, peace be with you. He’s saying you are a soul, you are mine. I created you. This body thing is temporary. You are the boss of your brain and your body. Almost nothing is a life or death issue. And I want to even say that if it is a life and death issue, the only real problem is, are you right with the Lord? But that’s not what you’re stressed about all day long. You are stressed about being a bad mom, about money, about food, whether it’s healthy or not, about your body, about your relationships, about time, about commitments that you’ve made in the world with your temporary body.

And you are allowing your brain to tell you a whole bunch of stories. It’s like, hey Sterling, let me just save you time because we freaked out about this in 2017 and that worked so well for us, so we’re just going to run that program again today. It’s just overlaying all of these stories like that stroller Is gonna eat you. So you should probably bark a lot at that stroller and then it will cross the street and you will be safe. And I hope that sounds silly to you in the dog analogy, but we’re living like that a lot. A lot of our guilt and sadness is coming from things that our brain is thinking that are just plain, not true. Now, some of you, myself included, have some painful circumstances. I am not suggesting that we should all just be skipping through life and saying everything is great. But not everything is a tiger that’s about to eat your face. So that’s kind of, I think we perceive danger in that way, but I think another version of that is, leads us to some form of hopelessness, feeling trapped and hopeless.

But that is a different kind of danger, but in those, you’ll see stress responses that are a little more quiet, sad, or heavy. Like right now, do you just feel heaviness about your life? I just don’t know how to do this. I don’t know how to cope. A lot of times, my brain will give me just really big things, like I just can’t do this, which is entirely unhelpful by the way, terrifying, but entirely unhelpful. And so I just want you to know that you are not those things that are happening. I want all of us, myself included, to just step it up and control that dog. She’d be like, hey, We’re not going to keep acting like this. You are a soul and your soul gets to control your brain and that is what makes us different from any other animal on the planet. All the other animals have to be driven by their survival instincts and we do not. We have executive functioning. We can think about our thinking. We can plan things in advance. We can reason through things. We have the ability to think about logic and so if we can get calm enough, and this is why the entire work that I do is called Catholic Mom Calm because you got to be calm first before you can do this work.

So for staring at the calendar we’re breathing quickly and we’re in a stress response. We have to create some safety before we can just set our brain straight. My husband was sad the other day. I don’t even remember why, but he was just having a sad day and previously I would’ve seen that and I would’ve been like, why is he sad? Am I the reason he said, is he sad about our life? Did the kids do something? Like I would have just had all these thoughts about it? And then I would have been like, it’s so dangerous that he said, and of course your brain is not actually thinking that you’re just, you just feel all these feelings because you’re on high alert. If that guy said, are we safe? Can I, can I trust him right now? Is he gonna take care of us? Do I need to take care of us? Right. Just all these thoughts and feelings, but I caught myself doing it. I was in a really good mood and I just want, hey brain, that human is allowed to be sad. First of all, we have no idea why he is sad. And let’s say it was 100% true that he was sad about our relationship. Like if I could crack open his brain, he could be like, yeah, I’m feeling really unloved by you right now and disconnected. And I’m unhappy with our marriage and that is why I’m sad right now. Because in the kitchen dishwasher experience, I explained it like he wasn’t upset at you at all, it was just a dishwasher, but let’s say in this example, he’s 100% sad about me, us in our relationship.

That’s not a tiger. He is allowed to be sad. His sadness is not putting me in grave danger. Now, it might hurt a little bit to watch my person be sad, empathy hurts a little bit, right? And maybe he’ll be sharp with the kids. He isn’t usually when he is sad, but let’s just say that would be a consequence. Remember, you’re your soul and you’re managing your brain and the soul says to the brain, yeah, he might be a little sharper with the kids today, that’s okay. I mean, what are we talking about? Like a tone of voice? We’re not talking about hurting them or hurting me. This is what it looks like to snap out of it. And I’m using some strong language, cause I want you to believe me when we do it in practice, it feels gentle. I’m actually not a huge fan of the military style, like, just get your act together, that’s not what I mean. Right now I’m trying to get your attention and I want you to know that you do not have to be as stressed and unhappy as you are.

I just want you to believe it. I believe it in my bones and I’ve just seen it over and over and over again and my clients. You do not have to be as stressed and unhappy as you are. And this is how, but the practice of it should feel gentle. I’ll say it again, like I look at my husband and he looks sad, and I’m like, hey, it’s okay that he is sad. It’s like, that’s actually how I would train a dog. I would just like pet that dog and I would be like, I love you, you’re a good girl and you’re safe right now that stroller is not going to hurt you. That husband being sad is totally fine. Right. Your kids being sad about their friendships, oh my gosh. I mean, I knew it was coming, but I’m in it now. My 13 year old and my 10 year old have lots of thoughts and feelings about friends and I just have to be like, it’s okay. They’re going to have hurt feelings. They’re going to think about things incorrectly. They are going to hurt other people’s feelings, isn’t that wild? And I am safe watching that happen.

And so this is the work that we do. I want you to come do this work with me. You do not have to be as stressed and unhappy as you are. Even if I promise you, even if you are dealing with some gnarly circumstances, I am dealing with some gnarly circumstances and I am able to hold onto myself. And I am able to get my brain to go that is not a tiger. So actually, this is the analogy I’ve been doing for myself. I’ll just go. That is not a tiger, that’s just an annoying dog. Because when we think that something is really dangerous and it genuinely feels like a tiger that’s terrifying. But I want to suggest that a lot of what is right in front of us right now is more like a yappy dog. That’s annoying, like a small dog that’s just yapping and you’re like, I don’t like that, I don’t care for that. But when you see a yappy dog, like, in public and they’re just yapping. You’re like, that’s not my favorite. Why is that dog barking? Why is it here? Why is it allowed to do that? And it’s mildly annoying, but in no way, when that dog is barking, like in the pavilion of the outdoor cafe across the street, are you like it’s going to come over here and kill me. And I just think a lot of problems. We think they’re like tigers who are going to eat us, but really they’re just like barking dogs that are annoying.

And in no way, am I minimizing whatever you’re going through but the idea of what you’re going through is probably way scarier than like whatever it is today. Whatever it is today is probably handleable and if he feels really scary, it’s probably because you have a very big story about it. And let’s just say that somebody you love was diagnosed with stage four cancer, and you’re pretty likely. You’re pretty sure they’re going to pass away. So we’re not even making that up as a story. I’m like, yeah, this is my friend. She has stage four stomach cancer. Definitely definitely going to pass away. But she hasn’t and you’ve got today. What do you want to think about it today? How do you want to be with her or pray for her today? Why are you not trusting the Lord in all of it? Because when somebody dies, our hope is that they go to their forever home with the Lord. And I think we are scared of processing the feelings that will come then. You can tell your brain, hey, we are going to feel the very painful feeling of grief when that happens, but not today. You could process a little bit of it today. You could just be like, I’m going to be pretty sad when that happens but notice it’s not a tiger.

This is what it looks like, this is what it sounds like to have peace in the storm. To be at peace, no matter what God has brought for our lives, it is completely possible. I shared this on Instagram the other day but I’ll share it quickly. I took my kids for a walk and it’s this beautiful, like bike trail by a river. But we park on the side of what feels like a highway to me, not quite a freeway, but like a pretty fast highway. And there’s a, you know, cement barricade up from the car, like you get out of your car and then you walk maybe 200 feet across this cement barricade where the cars are going by really fast and then you get on the path and it’s lovely. So on the way back, my kids get ahead of me and that’s fine. They’re allowed to be ahead of me as long as they can see me. And then two of them, well I just got upset right there to stink about it. I’ll try to calm down and hold up. Two of them are 50 feet ahead of me and they like, put their arms over the cement barricade and are like climbing up and looking over. I screamed so loud and was also loud because of the cars. I screamed so loud, get out of there. What are you doing? Go to the other side. I was just a bloomin’ man, it’s so bad, and of course I was scared. That’s actually the feeling. There’s always a feeling under anger and it’s usually sadness or fear. So of course undermine was fear, you know, It was scary watching them be that close to the cars.

So, they hear me enough to get off and they start walking to the car, but I’m still behind them. So they all get in the car before me and I am calming down; I’m breathing and calming down. And I thought, first of all, it hit me that I have not screamed at those kids In a very long time. That’s what struck me first. I was like, wow, I do not scream at the kids anymore, which is incredible. That’s what this work does, I promise you, you can just be a mom that never screams unless there’s safety issues. We’re always screaming about the safety issues. And then I calmed myself down and I just, and I, I thought, oh, they think I’m going to be so pissed at them. When I got in the car, they’re all sitting in the car thinking I’m gonna be so pissed at them. And probably not even knowing why. I just looked big and scary and then I checked in with myself. Why would, I think the kids would know not to climb over a barrier. The barrier made them feel safe, they thought the barrier was safe. They don’t realize that cars can slam into barriers or things can fly off of cars, or I don’t even know and I had never told them not to do that. So I get in the car and I’m calm because I calmed myself down and I said, hey, I love you guys. I really enjoyed taking this walk with you and I said, I’m sorry I screamed so much. I was scared for your safety, And I was trying to get their attention.

I wasn’t sorry that I screamed, but it was harsher than it needed to be. So that’s what I was apologizing for. And I told them, I said, I’m not angry at you, you did not know that, that wasn’t okay. I don’t expect you to know things that we haven’t talked about but let me tell you why it’s not okay. Which by the way, one of my kids totally pushed back on, she was like, I think it’s fine. And I did want to murder her, but I calmed down from that too. And I was like, it’s not fine and I said, I don’t need you to agree with me but you will not walk on that side for this 200 feet. You will not be by the cement barrier. You definitely will not climb on it or go over it, do you understand? Yes, ma’am. And so, that was me feeling like there was an actual tiger. It felt very unsafe calming myself down and showing up well for my kids. Building up a level of trust with them so that I’m not the tiger in their life. And it’s always okay to scream at your kids when they’re doing something dangerous, that’s always okay. But I explained it to them and hopefully, Lord willing, taught them the rule and why? So they don’t do it again. I also just as a side note, found a different place to park so that we didn’t have to do that again, because actually it was so terrifying to me. That I was like, I bet there’s a different place we could park that does not require us to walk on the highway. But this is just real moms stuff.

It’s real mom’s stuff when we deal with it all the time. And I just want you to enjoy your life better because I know, had I gotten in the car and continued to rail on those kids, which is what my natural brain programming would have told me to do. My natural brain program would have been like, hey, if we scream at these kids, they will remember this moment and then they will be safe in the future. That makes sense to me, but your brain is wrong and the way I did it was better. And then I wasn’t upset for the rest of the day. Had I screamed at them in the car and continued to be like, what were you thinking that was solely responsible? And I don’t know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Then I would’ve driven home and just felt yucky and bad and then, because I would’ve put on, like, I’m a bad mom glasses or my life sucks glasses, then I just would’ve seen it everywhere for the rest of the day.

And instead I came home and my husband’s on my face. He was like, what? I was like, Ooh, it was a walk and, I said, but it’s fine we talked about it. And then we just had a regular day. And that’s what I want. I want you to stop settling for the stress of believing everything your brain tells you and having it ruined hours and hours and hours of your day. So the doors to Catholic mom, calm are open they close on Friday. Come join us we’re doing two months for the price of one so you can check it out. And we did that because we really wanted to support you before May and through the craziness of May and after May. Come join us! We have a 30 day money back guarantee, you guys. So just try it, If you don’t like it, you just click this button that says I want my money back. And the system does it, you don’t have to talk to me and I won’t know. It is a safe thing to try and it might just change your life. And I want you to tell your friends. T will be like, hey, I’m thinking about doing this. Do you want to do this with me? And I’m not telling you that because I want more sales. I’m telling you that because women are so lonely and if you had a friend that you could talk like this with. Where your friend went, who it sounds like that was a tiger to your brain. How can we make it a little bit more like a barking dog? Like what kind of story could we tell? If you want a friend like that, you guys, it would just be so incredible. And when you join. If you want this as optional, we put you in an accountability group with three other people. And that is usually people’s favorite parts. They’re like, I love my accountability group so much. And if you don’t, by the way, we will switch you the next time we do this, we shuffle them up for anyone who wants every quarter.

Stop settling for this much stress. Stop it! God did not design us to feel this much pressure, this much guilt, this much hopelessness and discouragement and crushing loneliness. We don’t have to live like that. And I can teach you how and it’s just because I have such a massive amount of belief that God wants us to live with peace. And that’s why I just went on this. Crusade to figure out how, because I was not living like that. And the example of me being out with the kids that’s what it looks like. It doesn’t mean it never happens to me, but I know how to get out of it. Go to catholicmomcalm.com. Come sign up, come hang out with us. It’s a magical place. It will completely change how you experienced your life. And it’s just really, really amazing. I love you. I’m praying for you, please pray for me. Thank you so much for listening and have a blessed day.

Thank you so much for listening. and have a blessed day.