November 21, 2025 • 40 mins
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We trace the line from fear to anxiety, show how freeze becomes a belief of incapability, and share simple tools that restore agency in social settings and morning routines. Clear reframes, practical scripts, and a gentle reminder: what one person can do, any person can learn.
• difference between fear and anxiety as clarity of response
• early sensitizing events and the tiger metaphor
• fight, flight and freeze as practiced habits
• how freeze becomes I am incapable
• morning anxiety, responsibility and control
• reframes and self talk that calm the system
• practical networking tools and polite exits
• replacing avoidance with small trained actions
• training the mind during workouts to build resilience
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:10):
It's a little bit foggy.
SPEAKER_05 (00:11):
It is.
It's a foggy morning.
Which means it might be a littlewarmer up there.
SPEAKER_00 (00:15):
Oh, good.
SPEAKER_05 (00:16):
Maybe like negative three or something.
Can we check?
SPEAKER_00 (00:21):
Yeah, it's probably that kind of fog where the air
is warmer than the groundbecause it's been cold.
You know, it's one of thosethings about where we live.
Like when I look at the spectrumof weather that we have in this
area of the world and compare itto other places.
I mean, I don't think one placeis better than another.
I just think that we get a wideassortment of weather.
(00:44):
And it's a really greatdistraction.
Takes your mind off your otherstuff.
SPEAKER_03 (00:48):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (00:50):
I don't know if that's good or bad, but I know
that it, you know, but yeah,let's do a podcast.
Okay, let's talk about theweather.
SPEAKER_05 (00:57):
It's just natural.
We're Canadians.
In the chat, our coldest morningyet here.
Negative six and be frost, abeautiful front on everything,
and frost.
Yeah.
Frost across the country.
SPEAKER_00 (01:13):
Well, it's wonderful to have people to talk to.
And I really want to encourageeveryone who listens to this
podcast to consider one of twothings.
Either uh joining us at 7:15 inthe morning at the Zoom link
that you can get at the schoolor in Facebook, or send us a
quick note and tell us whatwould be a better time for you.
(01:34):
Because we could be flexibleabout this.
We can uh we can accommodatepeople.
And it doesn't have to be thesame all the time.
It can be different.
You know, if next Tuesday atfour is what works for you right
now, then let's say Tuesday atfour and we give it a try.
SPEAKER_05 (01:53):
Yeah, so we're delving into the idea of anxiety
again.
In school, our our idea is tostart up an anxiety course that
will be available soon.
And this is just getting thatstarted, sort of laying out the
the grid work for it.
SPEAKER_00 (02:14):
Yeah, it gets us talking about all the things we
do to help people with anxiety,but it also I think the real
value in talking about it forourselves as helpers and for
others as helpers, and for allof us who from time to time find
ourselves subject to thisemotional state.
(02:36):
I think there's a lot of valuein just trying to understand
where it comes from.
What are the kinds of thoughtpatterns?
What are the kinds ofinterpretations that trigger
fear?
And then what do we do with it?
Because the problem with anxietyis that it just stays with us,
(02:56):
right?
It's just there.
SPEAKER_05 (02:57):
Yeah, I was saying yesterday, before the podcast
yesterday morning, how you knowI was thinking, well, what's the
difference?
If anxiety is fear, what's thedifference between anxiety and
fear?
And sort of coming to theconclusion that fear is in sort
of short bursts, and thenanxiety is this sustained
(03:19):
feeling that just feels likelike it's not temporary, right?
SPEAKER_00 (03:26):
And I'm gonna suggest that you know, we talked
about grades of fear yesterday,you know, high grade fear and
low grade fear, and how highgrade fear is so imminent and
it's so in your face that youknow what to do about it.
You you just act, you don'twaste a lot of time.
SPEAKER_02 (03:49):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (03:49):
Um, and maybe that's the magic understanding is that
the difference between fear andanxiety is how clear the
response would be, how obviousthe response would be.
Yeah, how natural the responsewould be, which is why we do
(04:10):
some things when we're anxious.
You know, one of the complaintswe get is that, you know, when I
get anxious, I do silly things,I do things I'm embarrassed by,
I do things I don't like, right?
My reactions are notproportional.
Right.
And that's kind of like thelow-grade fear that stays there
(04:31):
with you for a long time,eventually builds up enough that
when some external eventhappening or person, somebody's
words, somebody's actions,something going on in the world,
it just pushes it over the humpto being a high grade fear.
And, you know, this is why somany psychologists say it
(04:52):
doesn't matter what you'reafraid of, it's always the same.
It's the tiger, right?
You're face to face with thetiger, and that everything feels
life-threatening.
And I think that, you know, whenwe remember as hypnotists that
there's a series of events,right?
There's an initial event thatgave us that emotion for the
(05:12):
first time, and then subsequentevents that reactivated that
emotion and brought it forwardagain, so that you're in a
situation where you feel thatfear again, but then it tags
into subconscious mind, it tagsit into those previous events.
And of course, then they allaccumulate in the moment that
you're in, and that's where theoverreaction comes from.
SPEAKER_01 (05:36):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (05:36):
When we are children, when we are infants,
when we are babies, everythingwe fear is a tiger because we
everything that causes us tofear anything at all, it appears
and feels like a threat to ourvery existence, our threat to
our life.
So for most of us, that firstinitial sensitizing event is
(05:59):
over the top.
It's like, whoa, I'm really,really scared.
I'm afraid I'm going to die.
And then that is the fear,that's the experience that gets
triggered by subsequentexperiences.
And that's why we might look atourselves and say we're
overreacting, or somebody mightsay you're acting very childish.
(06:23):
It's just that the series offears backwards that get
activated by the fear now arevery extreme.
They're tigers, right?
It's always this tiger.
And so it's not, I don't thinkit's disrespectful.
I don't think that it'sexaggerating to say to people
who experience these kinds of uhlow-grade fears that become
(06:45):
paralyzing that it isn'tsomething that's activated a
fear of the tiger.
Does that make sense?
Did I make sense, sir?
SPEAKER_05 (06:55):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's all it's always, if youboil it down, it's it's, I
think, always linked to whatdoes this mean about my safety?
You know, am I going to expirein this moment?
But we don't live in that worldreally anymore anymore that
(07:15):
tigers are after us.
It's bill payments and uh, youknow, spiders.
SPEAKER_00 (07:23):
So just thinking out loud, something happens that
triggers a fear response in us,and that activates the
sympathetic nervous system.
And the sympathetic nervoussystem has a very limited number
of choices, right?
The body wants to fight, attack,fight back, the body wants to
flight, to run, to get the heckout of here, to avoid.
(07:44):
And a lot of the people whostudy this now are saying that
there are other aspects of thissympathetic nervous system, one
of which is freed.
And I think that's the one tothink about.
When we experience a fear and wedon't know what to do, we
freeze.
(08:05):
And although the thing that wefear goes away, the fear itself
doesn't.
The amygdala's been activated.
It's in there, it's in that thatheightened part of your brain,
it's in that motivational partof your brain.
It's not been resolved, it's notgone away, the energy of it
(08:26):
still exists, and that becomesyour experience.
SPEAKER_05 (08:31):
The freeze part?
SPEAKER_00 (08:32):
The freeze part.
My experience is this happens, Idon't know what to do.
And that meaning is what createsthe emotion of fear, and that
becomes the experience.
So not only is the emotion neverresolved, but the experience
gets locked in anyway.
(08:53):
And that's why we do it over andover and over.
Because the subconscious mindlearns that freeze wasn't a bad
option.
If we just freeze and we wait,eventually something else will
come along to take thisparticular event's place.
SPEAKER_05 (09:12):
Would freeze not be so literal?
Like we're not frozen in time.
Not not everybody.
I know some people go throughthat, but would freeze also
trickle into like maybe avoidingdoing something, uh, not doing
something, waiting, waiting tobe distracted.
SPEAKER_00 (09:30):
That's exactly what I think it is.
Uh you know, we use the wordfreeze because that's what's out
there in the science fight,flight, or freeze.
And the science is advancing.
Yep, you know, there arescientists who are suggesting
there are other conditions inthis.
What matters to me is that whatwe learn as a person is a
meaning about ourselves.
(09:52):
And the first meaning aboutourselves is I don't know what
to do, which starts to reallymean, just like I am guilty,
I've done something bad, becomesshame.
I am bad, I don't know what todo, becomes I'm incapable.
SPEAKER_02 (10:12):
Yeah.
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (10:12):
And so it goes from this opportunity really to try
to address to becoming an abelief about yourself that I
don't know what to do.
I am incapable.
And so when we think aboutthings like social anxiety
disorder, where you're put in asocial situation, and maybe
(10:36):
you're just, you know, not goodat meeting people, and maybe
you're just not good at rollingwith people's bad jokes and
people's teasing and things thatpeople do to get over their own
nervousness, their owndiscomfort in those social
situations.
You go into that situation, ittriggers a fear.
(10:57):
That fear creates this, I don'tknow what to do.
So you do nothing.
That then becomes yourexperience of social situations,
and that becomes a belief thatyou say, I don't, I don't, I
don't go to parties, I can't goto parties, I don't know what to
do at parties, I'm no good atparties.
And that becomes a belief aboutyourself so that when you find
(11:20):
yourself moving forward in yourlife, and these kinds of
situations are feeling likethey're necessary for your life.
I have to go to these events, Ihave to go to these parties,
that I don't know what to do,I'm not capable, becomes again,
triggers the fear, and that thefear happens, and the response
(11:43):
is freeze, don't go.
SPEAKER_05 (11:45):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (11:45):
Don't go or hide in the corner.
SPEAKER_05 (11:48):
Right.
When you get there.
SPEAKER_00 (11:49):
So these kinds of things become beliefs.
And I think that this is this isgood to see how the choices we
make in moments of fear createbeliefs about ourselves.
So think about those people whofind themselves in moments of
fear and they act anyway, right?
And when they act anyway,sometimes it works out,
(12:10):
sometimes it doesn't, but theyact.
Yeah.
And so they then lock in thataction, you know.
So what happens to a lot of men,I think, is they get in
positions of fear, and men areheavily programmed with the idea
that they should act anyway.
They're heavily programmed withviolent acting out.
(12:31):
I mean, it's on TV, it's inevery movie, it's in every piece
of media they consume.
They they, you know, thatthey're entertained by boxing
and MMA.
You know, these are the thingsthat men consume and create
their view of what a man is.
So then what happens is in thesame way, they have fear and
(12:56):
they lash out, and that becomestheir experience.
They see a situation, they feelfear, they interpret it, I'm
under attack, I need to attackback.
They lock in those actions andthat emotion of aggression, and
then that becomes theirexperience, and then that's what
they turn back to, and thatbecomes a cycle, which is why
(13:17):
you see some people, menespecially, when they get
afraid, they act, you might sayit's anger, but it is that fight
response that gets triggered,and they got good at that.
So that's what they do everytime.
It's the repeated thing, andthat's why you'll see men who
are afraid lash out.
And I think women do it too.
(13:38):
I'm not saying it's just men,but I think it's a problem that
we recognize easily in oursociety when we consider men's,
you know, anger physicalresponse.
What I'm pointing at is how theevent with the meaning, I'm
under attack, versus I don'tknow what to do, creates an
(14:00):
emotion and that gets lockedinto a cycle.
SPEAKER_02 (14:03):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (14:04):
So standing and freezing is an overreaction to a
fearful event, and you don'tmight not like that about
yourself.
Lashing out becomes a reactionto a fearful event, and you
might not like that aboutyourself.
But to understand how you comeabout it honestly, you know, the
event triggers a meaning.
I don't know what to do.
It triggers a meaning, I'm underattack.
(14:26):
And that triggers the emotionthat causes the response that is
not helpful in the circumstance,only because thoughts become
habits.
Beliefs are habitual thoughtsthat trigger the same
interpretations of events overand over.
Am I babbling here?
SPEAKER_05 (14:46):
No, not at all.
Yeah, and I think for women,maybe maybe I'm painting with a
wide brush here, but I think forwomen it's more flight, freeze
and flight.
unknown (14:58):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (14:59):
And in the same way, it becomes a habit.
It becomes a habit because it'sa well-practiced interpretation,
right?
Something comes up, it's fear.
It's interpreted as get the heckout of here.
SPEAKER_02 (15:12):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (15:12):
Avoid this, get around this.
That creates that emotionalresponse.
And let's say, you know, it canbe, it doesn't have to be
physical, right?
It can be conversational.
You know, somebody confrontsyou, somebody insults you,
somebody says something thatputs you on the spot.
(15:33):
And you might actually developeloquence as a result.
You become somebody who candodge any question.
You become somebody who can justmake up things.
I mean, this is the training wegive politicians.
When they ask you a hardquestion, twist the question so
that you can talk about what youwant to talk about.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (15:51):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (15:52):
And that's why we all get ticked off at
politicians because you ask thequestions and you never get an
answer.
You just get you just get thesame stuff over and over, right?
This is a patterned response.
They get good at it.
Right?
There's the event, there's theemotion, I'm on the spot, right?
Then there's the the the trainedresponse, and it just starts to
(16:14):
become a pattern.
SPEAKER_05 (16:16):
Yeah.
Yeah.
My brain this morning is hardlyworking.
SPEAKER_00 (16:19):
I feel like it's a freeze response.
SPEAKER_03 (16:24):
Maybe, maybe.
SPEAKER_00 (16:25):
No, this is just thinking out loud in terms of
using the tools that we have.
SPEAKER_03 (16:30):
More coffee, yes.
SPEAKER_00 (16:31):
That experience is the sum total of events plus our
interpretation, plus theemotion.
And that, like everything, thisbecomes a habit.
You know, whether it works wellor it works badly, it's still
what the subconscious mind does.
It interprets things.
SPEAKER_05 (16:51):
What would you uh this might be a whole other
podcast, but I have a lot ofclients, and I've experienced it
too, is this anxiety in themorning.
It dissipates after a littlebit, but it's that anxiety that
you have as soon as you wake up.
Like it's right there in yourguts.
What would you say that is?
(17:12):
Is it the subconscious mindrolling all night?
And you know?
SPEAKER_00 (17:16):
My first thought on that is that what happens in the
night can create emotions in themorning.
We have dreams, and there's awhole world of possible
interpretations about our dreamlife, and there's a whole world
of people who uh have spent timethinking about and learning
about and experimenting withsleep life, what goes on in our
(17:40):
sleep, what goes on with ourmind.
So I do believe that what goeson in the night can be brought
forward into the day.
I had that experience today.
But I also think that sometimessleep is a complete break from
the rest of your life.
And when you awake, there's thisautomatic brain response,
(18:04):
thought, I shouldn't say brain,mind response to immediately ask
the question, what should I bedoing?
Immediately ask the question,what have what have I got to do?
SPEAKER_03 (18:14):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (18:15):
There's a real human thing to be asking, what what
should I be doing?
What am I supposed to do?
What am I doing right now?
What needs to be done right now?
And I think that that lack ofclarity about what you're going
to do, that list that you createin your mind of things to do,
(18:37):
the importance that you put onthat list of things to do.
You know, like I have a lot ofsympathy for mothers who, when
they wake up, they have thethings they need to do, but they
have all the things they need tomake sure their kids do.
And they take that on.
That's part of their identity,that's part of who they are.
(18:58):
They believe, for whatever theirexperiential reasons are, that
they're responsible for theirkids and the way their kids
present themselves to the world.
And so, you know, imagine asingle person getting up in the
morning and addressing all thethings that they have to
address.
Well, they're going to work,which means they've got to get
(19:19):
up and they've got to groom andthey've got to dress and they've
got to present themselves in away that's positive and
appropriate for this, this, thecircumstance they're moving
themselves into, and then add tothat the obligation for two
other people the same way of howthey're going to move into their
day and being prepared for theirday and being dressed properly
(19:41):
for their day and presentingthemselves properly to the world
when they start their day, whenthey leave the home.
And that's a lot of obligation.
And because, yeah, you can'tcontrol how other people react
to you.
You can't control how otherpeople react to your kids.
There's an element of fearthere.
SPEAKER_02 (20:00):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (20:01):
And there's there's no group, you know, that that
fear, some fears can't beresolved, right?
SPEAKER_05 (20:07):
Yeah.
And I think that's what ties tomorning anxiety is when it's
really, it's sort of in themind, this this fear that is not
being resolved.
And I think, you know, whatshould I be doing right now when
I think back across clients?
That's that seems to be the thething that catches them in the
(20:29):
morning, whether they're mothersor single people or retired
people.
Yeah, it seems to cross allthose borders.
The common denominator.
SPEAKER_00 (20:37):
So I think, you know, as we all have anxieties,
I think part of the answer isalways going to be understanding
what you're afraid of.
Sometimes we have a fear ofsomething that is beyond our
control, right?
You know, I have to, today I'mgoing to work and I have to tell
(20:57):
Bill that he's going to get letgo.
Well, what I'm afraid of is howBill is going to react.
And that's totally out of mycontrol.
And it's a big spectrum ofpossibilities.
And so I might have anxietyabout having to tell this to
Bill, and I might not know whatI can do to keep from keep
(21:21):
allowing this to go crazy, fromthis being a really horrible
experience, right?
But I think that comes from theidea that we feel responsible
for it anyway.
And that's where I think there'sa flaw in our thinking.
That's where I think we need toreframe.
(21:42):
So as the mother gets up and hasto groom, dress, feed, prepare
their children to go out thedoor and get on the school bus
or walk to school or take thetransit to school, there's
things that she can't beresponsible for.
She can't be responsible for thebehavior of other kids.
(22:05):
She can't be responsible for thebehavior of teachers.
I mean, they're they've gottheir own life going on, right?
They're, they've got all theirown reasons to be happy or sad
or difficult or friendly.
They've got all their own stuffgoing on.
This is all beyond that mother'scontrol.
And more importantly, she can'treally control her kids.
(22:28):
She can't, you know, my poormother, she had that problem
with me.
She can't really control how thekids are going to behave.
So to take on thatresponsibility is going to
heighten the anxiety, andthere's nothing you can do about
it.
So I think step one isunderstand what you're really
afraid of and accept that thereare things beyond your control,
(22:53):
that there are things that youcan't anticipate, that there are
potential outcomes that youhaven't thought of and can't
think of.
And more importantly, have noresponsibility over.
I think part of anxiety is toremember that it's a message and
to try to be clear about themessage.
(23:13):
What am I afraid of?
What could go wrong?
What is the bad thing I'm tryingto avoid?
What is the worst possibleoutcome?
SPEAKER_05 (23:21):
And I think too, these are also tied to limiting
beliefs about ourselves.
I have a lot of clients that saywith work, they wake up in the
morning or they wake up in themiddle of the night thinking I'm
not doing enough, I'm not goodenough for this, I'm I'm bad.
(23:41):
Uh, you know, what is what arepeople thinking about me at
work?
But then it it cut when it comesdown to it, when we talk about
it, they're doing great.
They're doing great, but they'rejust so hard on themselves.
SPEAKER_00 (23:55):
It's uh it's a habit to challenge themselves
constantly.
It's a habit to ask themselves,what else should I be doing?
It's a habit to think ofthemselves in comparison to
others and to be quote unquotestriving for the best, to be the
best.
(24:16):
That comparison's a dangerousthing, but we can talk about
that another day.
I think being clear about whatyou're afraid of, and then being
clear about what you can andcan't control in that
circumstance helps.
I think there's a lot of valuein self-talk, and I don't think
there's anything wrong withtelling yourself in those
(24:39):
circumstances, I've doneeverything I can do.
I think that's a really usefulself-statement.
I've done my best, I've doneeverything I can.
This part is out of my control.
I think that that's a goodresponse to fear and anxiety.
I'm doing everything I can.
Some of this is just out of mycontrol.
Um, and for those who, you know,who want more, you know, I think
(25:04):
that's the magic moment when youuse that idea of I've done
everything I can do.
Now I give it to God, whateverthat word means, whatever,
whatever way you want to conductthat.
I give this to the universe.
I've done my best.
I've contributed my best to theuniverse.
I'm I'm releasing it, is what'skey.
(25:24):
I'm letting go of it.
I'm not gonna think about itanymore.
I'm not gonna engage it anymore.
And, you know, I've had I've hadclients who have had a lot of
success with that idea of just,all right, I'm releasing this
and giving it over to theuniverse.
SPEAKER_03 (25:40):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (25:40):
To God, whatever word you want to use.
There's things you just can'tcontrol.
And the unfortunate thing is,experience becomes your
measuring stick.
And all you need is one badexperience to change your
measuring stick.
SPEAKER_03 (25:55):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (25:55):
One situation where you didn't know what to do, you
froze, people laughed, peoplemocked, people hurt you, and
that locks in that experienceand that interpretation that
says, I'm I'm no good.
I I'm not capable.
SPEAKER_05 (26:10):
Yeah.
And it doesn't even have to be,I'm thinking myself here, it
doesn't even have to be peoplemocking or laughing.
It can be like an internalembarrassment, right?
I I've been to a couple showsrecently where when I'm speaking
to people, when I'm meetingpeople, it's almost like I start
to, I don't know what'shappening, but I'm starting to
(26:34):
speak really fast or say saysilly things, or like anxiety
comes out way up more than it'sever in my life.
And I walk away going, oh myGod, did I just say that?
Like, you know, what am I doing?
And then I leave the littleconvention or whatever I was at,
(26:57):
and and I think, oh my God, am Icut out for this?
You know, all those, all thosethoughts.
I can't network anymore.
What's going on?
All those, you know, diminishingthoughts that yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (27:10):
So I used to, you know, back in my business
training days, I used to teachpeople networking.
And I never told them, Isometimes would hint at it, but
I never told them that Isuffered from all the same
anxieties about it.
When I could avoid it, I did.
When I could make excuses, oh, Ican't, I would.
(27:34):
But I understood a few thingsabout it.
The first thing about it is thatsense that I don't know what to
do.
And so while other people wouldteach networking and talk about
the importance of, you know,taking your business card and
stuff, I would teach them how toshake hands and practice saying
(27:55):
their name.
And they thought that was silly.
And practice having what I usedto call the seven-second shtick,
which is just here's mymemorized seven-second
introduction to who I am.
That way I have it.
I've practiced it.
When I shake somebody's hand, Iknow how to shake their hand.
When I'm saying who I am, I'vepracticed it so many times that
(28:19):
it just comes off my tonguereally easily.
I don't fumble over it.
I teach them how to look theother person in the eyes and
listen to their name.
When they say their name, yeah,this is hard because people
don't like looking in eyes, butit's it's just a simple place to
put your eyes.
(28:40):
Now you put your eyes at theireyes and you listen to them say
their name, and then youimmediately repeat it back to
them, right?
So I shake your hand and I say,Hi, I'm Les.
And you say, I'm Hillary.
So I say, Hillary, it's nice tomeet you, Hillary.
Tell me about what you do,Hillary.
And I say that three times, andit's amazing how I will remember
(29:03):
your name the next time I lookin your eyes.
It's an old Greek memorytechnique.
The Greeks used to sit in roomsand they try to memorize long
lists, and everything in theroom had something attached to
it.
So if they had a list of ahundred things, there'd be a
hundred spots in the room wherethey have attached each thing on
(29:24):
the list so that they could lookaround the room and be
stimulated by what's in the roomto remember.
And it's just an old, old memorytechnique, and you can do that
using somebody else's eyes,right?
So you say their name back tothem to make sure you pronounce
it right.
And it and in our world, sowe're so multicultural, right?
There are so many names that weare look hearing for the first
(29:48):
time, right?
Really, you know, the beauty ofhuman speaking and names, some
names we've just never heardbefore.
And so it's a really great thingto just try to.
Repeat the name back whilelooking them in the eye.
Right.
And then that to me it wasalways the easiest way.
Hillary, it's nice to meet you,Hillary.
(30:09):
Tell me about what you do,Hillary.
And that three times of sayingit helped me to remember later
what their name was.
And in fact, it helped me somuch that a lot of people were
impressed by it.
Right.
Because we all forget names.
It's what we do.
Yeah.
So for you to actually put inthe effort to try to remember is
(30:30):
actually a really powerful thingwhen it comes to meeting people.
SPEAKER_05 (30:34):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (30:35):
So, and then I taught them that the hardest
part in any of these events istalking, knowing what to talk
about.
SPEAKER_05 (30:45):
Yeah.
And how do you get away fromthem?
Like how do you end aconversation?
I think that's the worst thingfor me.
SPEAKER_00 (30:51):
I would also teach that.
But the thing that I would teachfirst is how to ask questions.
You can make somebody like youquickly by simply asking them
about themselves.
Get somebody talking aboutthemselves, and they will like
you.
So arm yourself before you evenwalk in the door with questions
(31:14):
you're going to ask them, right?
Get them talking aboutthemselves.
And for me, that was what wasalways easiest was to get them
talking about their family.
Right.
Now, how do you get out of theconversation?
It's really simple.
You look somebody in the eye andyou say, I'm sorry, but there's
somebody over there I have to gomeet.
(31:35):
Will you excuse me?
That's all you have to say.
I promise to meet this person.
They've come in the door.
Could you excuse me for asecond?
And then just go straight to thebar.
But the point is, is that's agreat way to end.
It's very polite.
It's very allowed.
It's very encouraged, especiallyat a networking event.
So this is the stuff that Iwould arm them with.
(31:57):
And now that thought that Idon't know what to do, I don't
know how to do it, it starts tofade.
In fact, they start to think,well, I'm pretty good at this.
So I can tell them honestlytoday, I still don't
particularly like doing it, butI have the tools that I need to
be able to survive those events.
SPEAKER_05 (32:16):
Right.
Yeah, that's pretty good.
I'll try those at the next fair,psychic fair.
SPEAKER_00 (32:23):
Yeah, the biggest one to always remember is
question.
Have questions.
Have a short list of questionsyou ask people, and that will
always keep the conversationgoing.
And you'll find easy segues intothat.
SPEAKER_05 (32:38):
Yeah.
I get so nervous sometimes.
I've noticed I've oh man, I'venoticed I've been doing this.
This is random, I know, butsomeone will ask me, How are you
doing?
Right.
And I'll I'll answer and I won'task them back.
Oh my God.
And then I walk away and then Ithink about it all night.
And I get so nervous that mybrain shuts off.
SPEAKER_00 (33:00):
I think that there's lots of little things in life
that, you know, nobody taught usand it needs to be taught, you
know, like handshakes.
SPEAKER_03 (33:09):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (33:09):
Right?
Like there are people I avoidbecause they think it's uh arm
wrestle.
Right?
SPEAKER_02 (33:14):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (33:15):
I'm even to the point now when I see those
people, I do a fist bump.
SPEAKER_02 (33:18):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (33:19):
Right.
Because they think thatsqueezing your hand really hard
is the appropriate thing to do,right?
And it it's not, right?
If you catch somebody's handwrong, it hurts.
And what's gonna happen, quiteliterally, is they're gonna
dislike you.
That's what you do to yourselfwhen you put when you go around
(33:39):
with a handshake that's a killerkung fu grip, right?
Yeah, you make people dislikeyou.
SPEAKER_05 (33:44):
Oh, I see what you're saying.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (33:46):
Right?
Like you don't want that.
That's not your purpose.
You want people to respect youand like you.
You don't want people to say,oh, what a goof.
He squeezes my hand till theblood comes out my fingertips,
right?
Like it's just awful what somepeople do, and they think that
it's the appropriate thing todo.
SPEAKER_05 (34:02):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (34:03):
Which is why I used to teach it.
SPEAKER_05 (34:05):
Yeah, someone taught me to match their handshake.
SPEAKER_00 (34:08):
That was me.
SPEAKER_05 (34:08):
I can't remember.
SPEAKER_00 (34:13):
Squeeze exactly as hard as they do.
SPEAKER_02 (34:15):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (34:16):
If they give you the kung fu grip, you gotta do your
best to give it back.
And if they uh give you the deadfish, then you do your best to
give them the dead fish back.
SPEAKER_02 (34:26):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (34:27):
Some people, that's their response to the people
with the kung fu grip, is theymake their hands so limp that
the person with the kung fu gripis is afraid to give them the
kung fu grip.
Anyway, these are just sillyexamples.
SPEAKER_05 (34:41):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (34:42):
That when we are are anxious about certain
circumstances, we take the timeto understand why we're afraid
of it.
We consider if our answer toourselves is, I don't know how
to do it, I'm not sure how todeal with that, I don't know how
to go to a party and becomfortable, right?
(35:03):
The fear wants resolution.
The fear wants satisfaction.
And sometimes you have to say toyourself, what am I afraid of?
And then go out of your way tolearn how to satisfy the fear.
SPEAKER_05 (35:19):
Yeah, because not going to the party is also
satisfying the fear.
SPEAKER_00 (35:23):
Well, it becomes the habit, doesn't it?
Whereas if you took the time tosay, Well, when I go to parties,
what happens?
What is it that I'm afraid of?
What is it that that I amfreezing over?
And the the the emotion requiresresponse.
The emotion requires release,the emotion requires
(35:44):
satisfaction.
Now, I don't know if this islike, you know, a
world-shattering discussion ofanxiety or just some trivial
examples of things that thatpeople can uh use in the future.
SPEAKER_05 (35:55):
Well, I think people like to hear examples because it
makes them feel like, oh, I'mnot alone in this.
Because it is easy to think thatyou're the only one.
You know, like at a networkingevent, you look around and you
think everyone's really good atthis except you, you know.
I think it's important forpeople to know that we're all
suffering in our own little way.
SPEAKER_00 (36:16):
Anxiety is real, it's real for everybody.
It comes in degrees and it getsexacerbated, it grows because it
becomes habitual in our in ourresponse, which is often to do
nothing, which then getsreinterpreted as I'm not
capable.
SPEAKER_03 (36:35):
Yeah, yeah.
You are capable.
I'm capable.
SPEAKER_00 (36:40):
Well, maybe this will be the reframe for the day.
I think I watched a movie once,and I've forgotten the name,
it'll come to me.
I watched a movie once where thetheme in the movie was what one
man can do, any man could do.
Now, just change that so it'snot sexist and crazy.
What one person can do, anyperson can do.
(37:02):
We have natural abilities andtalents, and we have abilities
and talents that we acquire outof practice, out of intention.
But the truth is that what onehuman can do, any human can do.
And that's the truth.
And the difference is the beliefin themselves and the effort
they've put in to being able todo it.
(37:23):
So absolutely, you could be aconcert pianist, but you
probably don't want to.
It doesn't appeal to you.
It's not exciting, or it's justnot, it does just doesn't fit
you.
SPEAKER_02 (37:34):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (37:34):
That doesn't mean you couldn't do it.
What it means is there's nothinginside you motivating you to
try.
And that's your authenticity.
That's why we don't try to dowhat everybody else does.
We try to find that thing inourselves, that calling, that
vocation, that that interestyearning.
We try to find that, thatcuriosity in ourselves.
(37:56):
But what it means is when itcomes to general social
environments or generalsituations in life, it's
important to remember that whatone person can do, any person
can do.
And the person who's doing itwell, that I admire, took the
time to learn it.
And the person who feels likethey can't has not yet taken the
(38:18):
time to learn it.
And so it's not about, it's notabout that there's something
wrong with me.
It's about I haven't tried yet.
I haven't practiced yet.
I haven't learned that yet.
So what one person can do, anyperson can do.
And remember, I am alwayslearning.
I am always learning.
There's things I don't want tolearn.
(38:40):
I don't want to learn the knit.
Some people love it, but I justdon't want to learn to knit.
It just doesn't appeal to me.
It doesn't intrigue me.
It doesn't get me excited.
Some people love it.
God bless them.
Doesn't mean I can't knit orthat I'm incapable of knitting,
or that I'm not smart enough toknit.
Just means I don't want to learnthat.
SPEAKER_04 (38:58):
You need to, in the comments, you need to zen the
knit.
SPEAKER_00 (39:03):
There you go.
And that's what the greatknitters do.
That's what the great knittersdo.
And for me, I, you know, I don'tknit.
I pick up a guitar and I noodleaway and I zen my noodling.
I sit down with the guitar.
Nine times out of ten, the dogcomes and sits at my feet, and I
just play around on the guitar.
SPEAKER_05 (39:22):
Yeah, in the comments or zen the workout,
which you've got down.
SPEAKER_00 (39:27):
I've started to get pretty zenny in my workouts.
Yeah.
The great thing about working,your body is your mind is
looking for something to do.
What it tends to do is I hatethis, I hate this, oh God, this
is awful.
And when you can get a grip onthat, and you and you say, no,
no, no, no, no, no, no.
This is making me stronger.
I'm getting stronger with everyrepetition.
SPEAKER_02 (39:47):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (39:48):
What do you mean, 10 burpees?
I only want to do eight.
These extra two burpees aremaking me strong.
SPEAKER_05 (39:53):
Yeah.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (39:54):
It's what you do with your mind while you're
doing other things.
SPEAKER_05 (39:57):
Speaking of working out, it's time.
It's time.
We gotta go.
Thanks for joining us.
And yeah, if you're listening onYouTube or Apple Podcasts or
Spotify or any of your listeningstreaming services, just check
the description and you'll findour links to our website, also
(40:19):
the link to our school.
Have a beautiful day too.
And yeah, send us questions,join us live.
There's so many ways of gettinginvolved.
Have a good day.
It's a little bit foggy.
SPEAKER_05 (00:11):
It is.
It's a foggy morning.
Which means it might be a littlewarmer up there.
SPEAKER_00 (00:15):
Oh, good.
SPEAKER_05 (00:16):
Maybe like negative three or something.
Can we check?
SPEAKER_00 (00:21):
Yeah, it's probably that kind of fog where the air
is warmer than the groundbecause it's been cold.
You know, it's one of thosethings about where we live.
Like when I look at the spectrumof weather that we have in this
area of the world and compare itto other places.
I mean, I don't think one placeis better than another.
I just think that we get a wideassortment of weather.
(00:44):
And it's a really greatdistraction.
Takes your mind off your otherstuff.
SPEAKER_03 (00:48):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (00:50):
I don't know if that's good or bad, but I know
that it, you know, but yeah,let's do a podcast.
Okay, let's talk about theweather.
SPEAKER_05 (00:57):
It's just natural.
We're Canadians.
In the chat, our coldest morningyet here.
Negative six and be frost, abeautiful front on everything,
and frost.
Yeah.
Frost across the country.
SPEAKER_00 (01:13):
Well, it's wonderful to have people to talk to.
And I really want to encourageeveryone who listens to this
podcast to consider one of twothings.
Either uh joining us at 7:15 inthe morning at the Zoom link
that you can get at the schoolor in Facebook, or send us a
quick note and tell us whatwould be a better time for you.
(01:34):
Because we could be flexibleabout this.
We can uh we can accommodatepeople.
And it doesn't have to be thesame all the time.
It can be different.
You know, if next Tuesday atfour is what works for you right
now, then let's say Tuesday atfour and we give it a try.
SPEAKER_05 (01:53):
Yeah, so we're delving into the idea of anxiety
again.
In school, our our idea is tostart up an anxiety course that
will be available soon.
And this is just getting thatstarted, sort of laying out the
the grid work for it.
SPEAKER_00 (02:14):
Yeah, it gets us talking about all the things we
do to help people with anxiety,but it also I think the real
value in talking about it forourselves as helpers and for
others as helpers, and for allof us who from time to time find
ourselves subject to thisemotional state.
(02:36):
I think there's a lot of valuein just trying to understand
where it comes from.
What are the kinds of thoughtpatterns?
What are the kinds ofinterpretations that trigger
fear?
And then what do we do with it?
Because the problem with anxietyis that it just stays with us,
(02:56):
right?
It's just there.
SPEAKER_05 (02:57):
Yeah, I was saying yesterday, before the podcast
yesterday morning, how you knowI was thinking, well, what's the
difference?
If anxiety is fear, what's thedifference between anxiety and
fear?
And sort of coming to theconclusion that fear is in sort
of short bursts, and thenanxiety is this sustained
(03:19):
feeling that just feels likelike it's not temporary, right?
SPEAKER_00 (03:26):
And I'm gonna suggest that you know, we talked
about grades of fear yesterday,you know, high grade fear and
low grade fear, and how highgrade fear is so imminent and
it's so in your face that youknow what to do about it.
You you just act, you don'twaste a lot of time.
SPEAKER_02 (03:49):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (03:49):
Um, and maybe that's the magic understanding is that
the difference between fear andanxiety is how clear the
response would be, how obviousthe response would be.
Yeah, how natural the responsewould be, which is why we do
(04:10):
some things when we're anxious.
You know, one of the complaintswe get is that, you know, when I
get anxious, I do silly things,I do things I'm embarrassed by,
I do things I don't like, right?
My reactions are notproportional.
Right.
And that's kind of like thelow-grade fear that stays there
(04:31):
with you for a long time,eventually builds up enough that
when some external eventhappening or person, somebody's
words, somebody's actions,something going on in the world,
it just pushes it over the humpto being a high grade fear.
And, you know, this is why somany psychologists say it
(04:52):
doesn't matter what you'reafraid of, it's always the same.
It's the tiger, right?
You're face to face with thetiger, and that everything feels
life-threatening.
And I think that, you know, whenwe remember as hypnotists that
there's a series of events,right?
There's an initial event thatgave us that emotion for the
(05:12):
first time, and then subsequentevents that reactivated that
emotion and brought it forwardagain, so that you're in a
situation where you feel thatfear again, but then it tags
into subconscious mind, it tagsit into those previous events.
And of course, then they allaccumulate in the moment that
you're in, and that's where theoverreaction comes from.
SPEAKER_01 (05:36):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (05:36):
When we are children, when we are infants,
when we are babies, everythingwe fear is a tiger because we
everything that causes us tofear anything at all, it appears
and feels like a threat to ourvery existence, our threat to
our life.
So for most of us, that firstinitial sensitizing event is
(05:59):
over the top.
It's like, whoa, I'm really,really scared.
I'm afraid I'm going to die.
And then that is the fear,that's the experience that gets
triggered by subsequentexperiences.
And that's why we might look atourselves and say we're
overreacting, or somebody mightsay you're acting very childish.
(06:23):
It's just that the series offears backwards that get
activated by the fear now arevery extreme.
They're tigers, right?
It's always this tiger.
And so it's not, I don't thinkit's disrespectful.
I don't think that it'sexaggerating to say to people
who experience these kinds of uhlow-grade fears that become
(06:45):
paralyzing that it isn'tsomething that's activated a
fear of the tiger.
Does that make sense?
Did I make sense, sir?
SPEAKER_05 (06:55):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's all it's always, if youboil it down, it's it's, I
think, always linked to whatdoes this mean about my safety?
You know, am I going to expirein this moment?
But we don't live in that worldreally anymore anymore that
(07:15):
tigers are after us.
It's bill payments and uh, youknow, spiders.
SPEAKER_00 (07:23):
So just thinking out loud, something happens that
triggers a fear response in us,and that activates the
sympathetic nervous system.
And the sympathetic nervoussystem has a very limited number
of choices, right?
The body wants to fight, attack,fight back, the body wants to
flight, to run, to get the heckout of here, to avoid.
(07:44):
And a lot of the people whostudy this now are saying that
there are other aspects of thissympathetic nervous system, one
of which is freed.
And I think that's the one tothink about.
When we experience a fear and wedon't know what to do, we
freeze.
(08:05):
And although the thing that wefear goes away, the fear itself
doesn't.
The amygdala's been activated.
It's in there, it's in that thatheightened part of your brain,
it's in that motivational partof your brain.
It's not been resolved, it's notgone away, the energy of it
(08:26):
still exists, and that becomesyour experience.
SPEAKER_05 (08:31):
The freeze part?
SPEAKER_00 (08:32):
The freeze part.
My experience is this happens, Idon't know what to do.
And that meaning is what createsthe emotion of fear, and that
becomes the experience.
So not only is the emotion neverresolved, but the experience
gets locked in anyway.
(08:53):
And that's why we do it over andover and over.
Because the subconscious mindlearns that freeze wasn't a bad
option.
If we just freeze and we wait,eventually something else will
come along to take thisparticular event's place.
SPEAKER_05 (09:12):
Would freeze not be so literal?
Like we're not frozen in time.
Not not everybody.
I know some people go throughthat, but would freeze also
trickle into like maybe avoidingdoing something, uh, not doing
something, waiting, waiting tobe distracted.
SPEAKER_00 (09:30):
That's exactly what I think it is.
Uh you know, we use the wordfreeze because that's what's out
there in the science fight,flight, or freeze.
And the science is advancing.
Yep, you know, there arescientists who are suggesting
there are other conditions inthis.
What matters to me is that whatwe learn as a person is a
meaning about ourselves.
(09:52):
And the first meaning aboutourselves is I don't know what
to do, which starts to reallymean, just like I am guilty,
I've done something bad, becomesshame.
I am bad, I don't know what todo, becomes I'm incapable.
SPEAKER_02 (10:12):
Yeah.
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (10:12):
And so it goes from this opportunity really to try
to address to becoming an abelief about yourself that I
don't know what to do.
I am incapable.
And so when we think aboutthings like social anxiety
disorder, where you're put in asocial situation, and maybe
(10:36):
you're just, you know, not goodat meeting people, and maybe
you're just not good at rollingwith people's bad jokes and
people's teasing and things thatpeople do to get over their own
nervousness, their owndiscomfort in those social
situations.
You go into that situation, ittriggers a fear.
(10:57):
That fear creates this, I don'tknow what to do.
So you do nothing.
That then becomes yourexperience of social situations,
and that becomes a belief thatyou say, I don't, I don't, I
don't go to parties, I can't goto parties, I don't know what to
do at parties, I'm no good atparties.
And that becomes a belief aboutyourself so that when you find
(11:20):
yourself moving forward in yourlife, and these kinds of
situations are feeling likethey're necessary for your life.
I have to go to these events, Ihave to go to these parties,
that I don't know what to do,I'm not capable, becomes again,
triggers the fear, and that thefear happens, and the response
(11:43):
is freeze, don't go.
SPEAKER_05 (11:45):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (11:45):
Don't go or hide in the corner.
SPEAKER_05 (11:48):
Right.
When you get there.
SPEAKER_00 (11:49):
So these kinds of things become beliefs.
And I think that this is this isgood to see how the choices we
make in moments of fear createbeliefs about ourselves.
So think about those people whofind themselves in moments of
fear and they act anyway, right?
And when they act anyway,sometimes it works out,
(12:10):
sometimes it doesn't, but theyact.
Yeah.
And so they then lock in thataction, you know.
So what happens to a lot of men,I think, is they get in
positions of fear, and men areheavily programmed with the idea
that they should act anyway.
They're heavily programmed withviolent acting out.
(12:31):
I mean, it's on TV, it's inevery movie, it's in every piece
of media they consume.
They they, you know, thatthey're entertained by boxing
and MMA.
You know, these are the thingsthat men consume and create
their view of what a man is.
So then what happens is in thesame way, they have fear and
(12:56):
they lash out, and that becomestheir experience.
They see a situation, they feelfear, they interpret it, I'm
under attack, I need to attackback.
They lock in those actions andthat emotion of aggression, and
then that becomes theirexperience, and then that's what
they turn back to, and thatbecomes a cycle, which is why
(13:17):
you see some people, menespecially, when they get
afraid, they act, you might sayit's anger, but it is that fight
response that gets triggered,and they got good at that.
So that's what they do everytime.
It's the repeated thing, andthat's why you'll see men who
are afraid lash out.
And I think women do it too.
(13:38):
I'm not saying it's just men,but I think it's a problem that
we recognize easily in oursociety when we consider men's,
you know, anger physicalresponse.
What I'm pointing at is how theevent with the meaning, I'm
under attack, versus I don'tknow what to do, creates an
(14:00):
emotion and that gets lockedinto a cycle.
SPEAKER_02 (14:03):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (14:04):
So standing and freezing is an overreaction to a
fearful event, and you don'tmight not like that about
yourself.
Lashing out becomes a reactionto a fearful event, and you
might not like that aboutyourself.
But to understand how you comeabout it honestly, you know, the
event triggers a meaning.
I don't know what to do.
It triggers a meaning, I'm underattack.
(14:26):
And that triggers the emotionthat causes the response that is
not helpful in the circumstance,only because thoughts become
habits.
Beliefs are habitual thoughtsthat trigger the same
interpretations of events overand over.
Am I babbling here?
SPEAKER_05 (14:46):
No, not at all.
Yeah, and I think for women,maybe maybe I'm painting with a
wide brush here, but I think forwomen it's more flight, freeze
and flight.
unknown (14:58):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (14:59):
And in the same way, it becomes a habit.
It becomes a habit because it'sa well-practiced interpretation,
right?
Something comes up, it's fear.
It's interpreted as get the heckout of here.
SPEAKER_02 (15:12):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (15:12):
Avoid this, get around this.
That creates that emotionalresponse.
And let's say, you know, it canbe, it doesn't have to be
physical, right?
It can be conversational.
You know, somebody confrontsyou, somebody insults you,
somebody says something thatputs you on the spot.
(15:33):
And you might actually developeloquence as a result.
You become somebody who candodge any question.
You become somebody who can justmake up things.
I mean, this is the training wegive politicians.
When they ask you a hardquestion, twist the question so
that you can talk about what youwant to talk about.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (15:51):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (15:52):
And that's why we all get ticked off at
politicians because you ask thequestions and you never get an
answer.
You just get you just get thesame stuff over and over, right?
This is a patterned response.
They get good at it.
Right?
There's the event, there's theemotion, I'm on the spot, right?
Then there's the the the trainedresponse, and it just starts to
(16:14):
become a pattern.
SPEAKER_05 (16:16):
Yeah.
Yeah.
My brain this morning is hardlyworking.
SPEAKER_00 (16:19):
I feel like it's a freeze response.
SPEAKER_03 (16:24):
Maybe, maybe.
SPEAKER_00 (16:25):
No, this is just thinking out loud in terms of
using the tools that we have.
SPEAKER_03 (16:30):
More coffee, yes.
SPEAKER_00 (16:31):
That experience is the sum total of events plus our
interpretation, plus theemotion.
And that, like everything, thisbecomes a habit.
You know, whether it works wellor it works badly, it's still
what the subconscious mind does.
It interprets things.
SPEAKER_05 (16:51):
What would you uh this might be a whole other
podcast, but I have a lot ofclients, and I've experienced it
too, is this anxiety in themorning.
It dissipates after a littlebit, but it's that anxiety that
you have as soon as you wake up.
Like it's right there in yourguts.
What would you say that is?
(17:12):
Is it the subconscious mindrolling all night?
And you know?
SPEAKER_00 (17:16):
My first thought on that is that what happens in the
night can create emotions in themorning.
We have dreams, and there's awhole world of possible
interpretations about our dreamlife, and there's a whole world
of people who uh have spent timethinking about and learning
about and experimenting withsleep life, what goes on in our
(17:40):
sleep, what goes on with ourmind.
So I do believe that what goeson in the night can be brought
forward into the day.
I had that experience today.
But I also think that sometimessleep is a complete break from
the rest of your life.
And when you awake, there's thisautomatic brain response,
(18:04):
thought, I shouldn't say brain,mind response to immediately ask
the question, what should I bedoing?
Immediately ask the question,what have what have I got to do?
SPEAKER_03 (18:14):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (18:15):
There's a real human thing to be asking, what what
should I be doing?
What am I supposed to do?
What am I doing right now?
What needs to be done right now?
And I think that that lack ofclarity about what you're going
to do, that list that you createin your mind of things to do,
(18:37):
the importance that you put onthat list of things to do.
You know, like I have a lot ofsympathy for mothers who, when
they wake up, they have thethings they need to do, but they
have all the things they need tomake sure their kids do.
And they take that on.
That's part of their identity,that's part of who they are.
(18:58):
They believe, for whatever theirexperiential reasons are, that
they're responsible for theirkids and the way their kids
present themselves to the world.
And so, you know, imagine asingle person getting up in the
morning and addressing all thethings that they have to
address.
Well, they're going to work,which means they've got to get
(19:19):
up and they've got to groom andthey've got to dress and they've
got to present themselves in away that's positive and
appropriate for this, this, thecircumstance they're moving
themselves into, and then add tothat the obligation for two
other people the same way of howthey're going to move into their
day and being prepared for theirday and being dressed properly
(19:41):
for their day and presentingthemselves properly to the world
when they start their day, whenthey leave the home.
And that's a lot of obligation.
And because, yeah, you can'tcontrol how other people react
to you.
You can't control how otherpeople react to your kids.
There's an element of fearthere.
SPEAKER_02 (20:00):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (20:01):
And there's there's no group, you know, that that
fear, some fears can't beresolved, right?
SPEAKER_05 (20:07):
Yeah.
And I think that's what ties tomorning anxiety is when it's
really, it's sort of in themind, this this fear that is not
being resolved.
And I think, you know, whatshould I be doing right now when
I think back across clients?
That's that seems to be the thething that catches them in the
(20:29):
morning, whether they're mothersor single people or retired
people.
Yeah, it seems to cross allthose borders.
The common denominator.
SPEAKER_00 (20:37):
So I think, you know, as we all have anxieties,
I think part of the answer isalways going to be understanding
what you're afraid of.
Sometimes we have a fear ofsomething that is beyond our
control, right?
You know, I have to, today I'mgoing to work and I have to tell
(20:57):
Bill that he's going to get letgo.
Well, what I'm afraid of is howBill is going to react.
And that's totally out of mycontrol.
And it's a big spectrum ofpossibilities.
And so I might have anxietyabout having to tell this to
Bill, and I might not know whatI can do to keep from keep
(21:21):
allowing this to go crazy, fromthis being a really horrible
experience, right?
But I think that comes from theidea that we feel responsible
for it anyway.
And that's where I think there'sa flaw in our thinking.
That's where I think we need toreframe.
(21:42):
So as the mother gets up and hasto groom, dress, feed, prepare
their children to go out thedoor and get on the school bus
or walk to school or take thetransit to school, there's
things that she can't beresponsible for.
She can't be responsible for thebehavior of other kids.
(22:05):
She can't be responsible for thebehavior of teachers.
I mean, they're they've gottheir own life going on, right?
They're, they've got all theirown reasons to be happy or sad
or difficult or friendly.
They've got all their own stuffgoing on.
This is all beyond that mother'scontrol.
And more importantly, she can'treally control her kids.
(22:28):
She can't, you know, my poormother, she had that problem
with me.
She can't really control how thekids are going to behave.
So to take on thatresponsibility is going to
heighten the anxiety, andthere's nothing you can do about
it.
So I think step one isunderstand what you're really
afraid of and accept that thereare things beyond your control,
(22:53):
that there are things that youcan't anticipate, that there are
potential outcomes that youhaven't thought of and can't
think of.
And more importantly, have noresponsibility over.
I think part of anxiety is toremember that it's a message and
to try to be clear about themessage.
(23:13):
What am I afraid of?
What could go wrong?
What is the bad thing I'm tryingto avoid?
What is the worst possibleoutcome?
SPEAKER_05 (23:21):
And I think too, these are also tied to limiting
beliefs about ourselves.
I have a lot of clients that saywith work, they wake up in the
morning or they wake up in themiddle of the night thinking I'm
not doing enough, I'm not goodenough for this, I'm I'm bad.
(23:41):
Uh, you know, what is what arepeople thinking about me at
work?
But then it it cut when it comesdown to it, when we talk about
it, they're doing great.
They're doing great, but they'rejust so hard on themselves.
SPEAKER_00 (23:55):
It's uh it's a habit to challenge themselves
constantly.
It's a habit to ask themselves,what else should I be doing?
It's a habit to think ofthemselves in comparison to
others and to be quote unquotestriving for the best, to be the
best.
(24:16):
That comparison's a dangerousthing, but we can talk about
that another day.
I think being clear about whatyou're afraid of, and then being
clear about what you can andcan't control in that
circumstance helps.
I think there's a lot of valuein self-talk, and I don't think
there's anything wrong withtelling yourself in those
(24:39):
circumstances, I've doneeverything I can do.
I think that's a really usefulself-statement.
I've done my best, I've doneeverything I can.
This part is out of my control.
I think that that's a goodresponse to fear and anxiety.
I'm doing everything I can.
Some of this is just out of mycontrol.
Um, and for those who, you know,who want more, you know, I think
(25:04):
that's the magic moment when youuse that idea of I've done
everything I can do.
Now I give it to God, whateverthat word means, whatever,
whatever way you want to conductthat.
I give this to the universe.
I've done my best.
I've contributed my best to theuniverse.
I'm I'm releasing it, is what'skey.
(25:24):
I'm letting go of it.
I'm not gonna think about itanymore.
I'm not gonna engage it anymore.
And, you know, I've had I've hadclients who have had a lot of
success with that idea of just,all right, I'm releasing this
and giving it over to theuniverse.
SPEAKER_03 (25:40):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (25:40):
To God, whatever word you want to use.
There's things you just can'tcontrol.
And the unfortunate thing is,experience becomes your
measuring stick.
And all you need is one badexperience to change your
measuring stick.
SPEAKER_03 (25:55):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (25:55):
One situation where you didn't know what to do, you
froze, people laughed, peoplemocked, people hurt you, and
that locks in that experienceand that interpretation that
says, I'm I'm no good.
I I'm not capable.
SPEAKER_05 (26:10):
Yeah.
And it doesn't even have to be,I'm thinking myself here, it
doesn't even have to be peoplemocking or laughing.
It can be like an internalembarrassment, right?
I I've been to a couple showsrecently where when I'm speaking
to people, when I'm meetingpeople, it's almost like I start
to, I don't know what'shappening, but I'm starting to
(26:34):
speak really fast or say saysilly things, or like anxiety
comes out way up more than it'sever in my life.
And I walk away going, oh myGod, did I just say that?
Like, you know, what am I doing?
And then I leave the littleconvention or whatever I was at,
(26:57):
and and I think, oh my God, am Icut out for this?
You know, all those, all thosethoughts.
I can't network anymore.
What's going on?
All those, you know, diminishingthoughts that yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (27:10):
So I used to, you know, back in my business
training days, I used to teachpeople networking.
And I never told them, Isometimes would hint at it, but
I never told them that Isuffered from all the same
anxieties about it.
When I could avoid it, I did.
When I could make excuses, oh, Ican't, I would.
(27:34):
But I understood a few thingsabout it.
The first thing about it is thatsense that I don't know what to
do.
And so while other people wouldteach networking and talk about
the importance of, you know,taking your business card and
stuff, I would teach them how toshake hands and practice saying
(27:55):
their name.
And they thought that was silly.
And practice having what I usedto call the seven-second shtick,
which is just here's mymemorized seven-second
introduction to who I am.
That way I have it.
I've practiced it.
When I shake somebody's hand, Iknow how to shake their hand.
When I'm saying who I am, I'vepracticed it so many times that
(28:19):
it just comes off my tonguereally easily.
I don't fumble over it.
I teach them how to look theother person in the eyes and
listen to their name.
When they say their name, yeah,this is hard because people
don't like looking in eyes, butit's it's just a simple place to
put your eyes.
(28:40):
Now you put your eyes at theireyes and you listen to them say
their name, and then youimmediately repeat it back to
them, right?
So I shake your hand and I say,Hi, I'm Les.
And you say, I'm Hillary.
So I say, Hillary, it's nice tomeet you, Hillary.
Tell me about what you do,Hillary.
And I say that three times, andit's amazing how I will remember
(29:03):
your name the next time I lookin your eyes.
It's an old Greek memorytechnique.
The Greeks used to sit in roomsand they try to memorize long
lists, and everything in theroom had something attached to
it.
So if they had a list of ahundred things, there'd be a
hundred spots in the room wherethey have attached each thing on
(29:24):
the list so that they could lookaround the room and be
stimulated by what's in the roomto remember.
And it's just an old, old memorytechnique, and you can do that
using somebody else's eyes,right?
So you say their name back tothem to make sure you pronounce
it right.
And it and in our world, sowe're so multicultural, right?
There are so many names that weare look hearing for the first
(29:48):
time, right?
Really, you know, the beauty ofhuman speaking and names, some
names we've just never heardbefore.
And so it's a really great thingto just try to.
Repeat the name back whilelooking them in the eye.
Right.
And then that to me it wasalways the easiest way.
Hillary, it's nice to meet you,Hillary.
(30:09):
Tell me about what you do,Hillary.
And that three times of sayingit helped me to remember later
what their name was.
And in fact, it helped me somuch that a lot of people were
impressed by it.
Right.
Because we all forget names.
It's what we do.
Yeah.
So for you to actually put inthe effort to try to remember is
(30:30):
actually a really powerful thingwhen it comes to meeting people.
SPEAKER_05 (30:34):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (30:35):
So, and then I taught them that the hardest
part in any of these events istalking, knowing what to talk
about.
SPEAKER_05 (30:45):
Yeah.
And how do you get away fromthem?
Like how do you end aconversation?
I think that's the worst thingfor me.
SPEAKER_00 (30:51):
I would also teach that.
But the thing that I would teachfirst is how to ask questions.
You can make somebody like youquickly by simply asking them
about themselves.
Get somebody talking aboutthemselves, and they will like
you.
So arm yourself before you evenwalk in the door with questions
(31:14):
you're going to ask them, right?
Get them talking aboutthemselves.
And for me, that was what wasalways easiest was to get them
talking about their family.
Right.
Now, how do you get out of theconversation?
It's really simple.
You look somebody in the eye andyou say, I'm sorry, but there's
somebody over there I have to gomeet.
(31:35):
Will you excuse me?
That's all you have to say.
I promise to meet this person.
They've come in the door.
Could you excuse me for asecond?
And then just go straight to thebar.
But the point is, is that's agreat way to end.
It's very polite.
It's very allowed.
It's very encouraged, especiallyat a networking event.
So this is the stuff that Iwould arm them with.
(31:57):
And now that thought that Idon't know what to do, I don't
know how to do it, it starts tofade.
In fact, they start to think,well, I'm pretty good at this.
So I can tell them honestlytoday, I still don't
particularly like doing it, butI have the tools that I need to
be able to survive those events.
SPEAKER_05 (32:16):
Right.
Yeah, that's pretty good.
I'll try those at the next fair,psychic fair.
SPEAKER_00 (32:23):
Yeah, the biggest one to always remember is
question.
Have questions.
Have a short list of questionsyou ask people, and that will
always keep the conversationgoing.
And you'll find easy segues intothat.
SPEAKER_05 (32:38):
Yeah.
I get so nervous sometimes.
I've noticed I've oh man, I'venoticed I've been doing this.
This is random, I know, butsomeone will ask me, How are you
doing?
Right.
And I'll I'll answer and I won'task them back.
Oh my God.
And then I walk away and then Ithink about it all night.
And I get so nervous that mybrain shuts off.
SPEAKER_00 (33:00):
I think that there's lots of little things in life
that, you know, nobody taught usand it needs to be taught, you
know, like handshakes.
SPEAKER_03 (33:09):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (33:09):
Right?
Like there are people I avoidbecause they think it's uh arm
wrestle.
Right?
SPEAKER_02 (33:14):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (33:15):
I'm even to the point now when I see those
people, I do a fist bump.
SPEAKER_02 (33:18):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (33:19):
Right.
Because they think thatsqueezing your hand really hard
is the appropriate thing to do,right?
And it it's not, right?
If you catch somebody's handwrong, it hurts.
And what's gonna happen, quiteliterally, is they're gonna
dislike you.
That's what you do to yourselfwhen you put when you go around
(33:39):
with a handshake that's a killerkung fu grip, right?
Yeah, you make people dislikeyou.
SPEAKER_05 (33:44):
Oh, I see what you're saying.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (33:46):
Right?
Like you don't want that.
That's not your purpose.
You want people to respect youand like you.
You don't want people to say,oh, what a goof.
He squeezes my hand till theblood comes out my fingertips,
right?
Like it's just awful what somepeople do, and they think that
it's the appropriate thing todo.
SPEAKER_05 (34:02):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (34:03):
Which is why I used to teach it.
SPEAKER_05 (34:05):
Yeah, someone taught me to match their handshake.
SPEAKER_00 (34:08):
That was me.
SPEAKER_05 (34:08):
I can't remember.
SPEAKER_00 (34:13):
Squeeze exactly as hard as they do.
SPEAKER_02 (34:15):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (34:16):
If they give you the kung fu grip, you gotta do your
best to give it back.
And if they uh give you the deadfish, then you do your best to
give them the dead fish back.
SPEAKER_02 (34:26):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (34:27):
Some people, that's their response to the people
with the kung fu grip, is theymake their hands so limp that
the person with the kung fu gripis is afraid to give them the
kung fu grip.
Anyway, these are just sillyexamples.
SPEAKER_05 (34:41):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (34:42):
That when we are are anxious about certain
circumstances, we take the timeto understand why we're afraid
of it.
We consider if our answer toourselves is, I don't know how
to do it, I'm not sure how todeal with that, I don't know how
to go to a party and becomfortable, right?
(35:03):
The fear wants resolution.
The fear wants satisfaction.
And sometimes you have to say toyourself, what am I afraid of?
And then go out of your way tolearn how to satisfy the fear.
SPEAKER_05 (35:19):
Yeah, because not going to the party is also
satisfying the fear.
SPEAKER_00 (35:23):
Well, it becomes the habit, doesn't it?
Whereas if you took the time tosay, Well, when I go to parties,
what happens?
What is it that I'm afraid of?
What is it that that I amfreezing over?
And the the the emotion requiresresponse.
The emotion requires release,the emotion requires
(35:44):
satisfaction.
Now, I don't know if this islike, you know, a
world-shattering discussion ofanxiety or just some trivial
examples of things that thatpeople can uh use in the future.
SPEAKER_05 (35:55):
Well, I think people like to hear examples because it
makes them feel like, oh, I'mnot alone in this.
Because it is easy to think thatyou're the only one.
You know, like at a networkingevent, you look around and you
think everyone's really good atthis except you, you know.
I think it's important forpeople to know that we're all
suffering in our own little way.
SPEAKER_00 (36:16):
Anxiety is real, it's real for everybody.
It comes in degrees and it getsexacerbated, it grows because it
becomes habitual in our in ourresponse, which is often to do
nothing, which then getsreinterpreted as I'm not
capable.
SPEAKER_03 (36:35):
Yeah, yeah.
You are capable.
I'm capable.
SPEAKER_00 (36:40):
Well, maybe this will be the reframe for the day.
I think I watched a movie once,and I've forgotten the name,
it'll come to me.
I watched a movie once where thetheme in the movie was what one
man can do, any man could do.
Now, just change that so it'snot sexist and crazy.
What one person can do, anyperson can do.
(37:02):
We have natural abilities andtalents, and we have abilities
and talents that we acquire outof practice, out of intention.
But the truth is that what onehuman can do, any human can do.
And that's the truth.
And the difference is the beliefin themselves and the effort
they've put in to being able todo it.
(37:23):
So absolutely, you could be aconcert pianist, but you
probably don't want to.
It doesn't appeal to you.
It's not exciting, or it's justnot, it does just doesn't fit
you.
SPEAKER_02 (37:34):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (37:34):
That doesn't mean you couldn't do it.
What it means is there's nothinginside you motivating you to
try.
And that's your authenticity.
That's why we don't try to dowhat everybody else does.
We try to find that thing inourselves, that calling, that
vocation, that that interestyearning.
We try to find that, thatcuriosity in ourselves.
(37:56):
But what it means is when itcomes to general social
environments or generalsituations in life, it's
important to remember that whatone person can do, any person
can do.
And the person who's doing itwell, that I admire, took the
time to learn it.
And the person who feels likethey can't has not yet taken the
(38:18):
time to learn it.
And so it's not about, it's notabout that there's something
wrong with me.
It's about I haven't tried yet.
I haven't practiced yet.
I haven't learned that yet.
So what one person can do, anyperson can do.
And remember, I am alwayslearning.
I am always learning.
There's things I don't want tolearn.
(38:40):
I don't want to learn the knit.
Some people love it, but I justdon't want to learn to knit.
It just doesn't appeal to me.
It doesn't intrigue me.
It doesn't get me excited.
Some people love it.
God bless them.
Doesn't mean I can't knit orthat I'm incapable of knitting,
or that I'm not smart enough toknit.
Just means I don't want to learnthat.
SPEAKER_04 (38:58):
You need to, in the comments, you need to zen the
knit.
SPEAKER_00 (39:03):
There you go.
And that's what the greatknitters do.
That's what the great knittersdo.
And for me, I, you know, I don'tknit.
I pick up a guitar and I noodleaway and I zen my noodling.
I sit down with the guitar.
Nine times out of ten, the dogcomes and sits at my feet, and I
just play around on the guitar.
SPEAKER_05 (39:22):
Yeah, in the comments or zen the workout,
which you've got down.
SPEAKER_00 (39:27):
I've started to get pretty zenny in my workouts.
Yeah.
The great thing about working,your body is your mind is
looking for something to do.
What it tends to do is I hatethis, I hate this, oh God, this
is awful.
And when you can get a grip onthat, and you and you say, no,
no, no, no, no, no, no.
This is making me stronger.
I'm getting stronger with everyrepetition.
SPEAKER_02 (39:47):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (39:48):
What do you mean, 10 burpees?
I only want to do eight.
These extra two burpees aremaking me strong.
SPEAKER_05 (39:53):
Yeah.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (39:54):
It's what you do with your mind while you're
doing other things.
SPEAKER_05 (39:57):
Speaking of working out, it's time.
It's time.
We gotta go.
Thanks for joining us.
And yeah, if you're listening onYouTube or Apple Podcasts or
Spotify or any of your listeningstreaming services, just check
the description and you'll findour links to our website, also
(40:19):
the link to our school.
Have a beautiful day too.
And yeah, send us questions,join us live.
There's so many ways of gettinginvolved.
Have a good day.
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