Hi guys! Welcome to Episode 387 of the wildly successful lifestyle podcast. I hope this finds you keeping your wits about you. Regardless of what’s going on in your world.
I talked in episode 386 about the idea that when everything feels like it’s a mess, you have to keep your whits about you. You have to keep yourself together, meaning don’t let your head make matters worse by creating things that aren’t there. It’s never helpful unless of course you’re being optimistic and creating ways to make things better but that’s not our go to, is it?
There are always things to look at that make no sense. Senseless violence. Senseless fighting. Senseless hate. There’s tons of that. Always has been.
That’s a big problem for us. Trying to make sense of things that don’t make sense and never will make sense. Its our human tendency to try to make sense of things so that we understand it or we can wrap our heads around it.
There are things in this world, you have to be willing to accept that maybe you wish you didn’t, if you’re going to thrive in this world there are things you’re going to have to accept as a part of life and a big one is you can’t make sense of the world around you and when you try to make sense of the senseless it wreaks havoc on your inner world.
It’s tempting to look at the horrible things that happen around the world and think the world isn’t a safe place and no one can be trusted. Especially people that look like “this”. This last week there was news that some insane person across the world called for a day of jihad and for his people to spill the blood of non believers. I remember going out on that day and for the most part not worrying but I was walking into Costco at one point and there were two men in front of me that gave me pause. Do they want to hurt me? Do they have weapons? Of course, They didn’t and would probably be pretty insulted that I had even had that thought. I allowed that news message creep into my mind.
You know how many really great things happened this last week? Probably not, I don’t, because no one talks about them. Bad scary news sells.
Our minds left on autopilot or our minds distracted are so easily swayed. The sense we make of the world if we aren’t careful is whatever the person screaming the loudest says it is. Or whatever our news of choice decides it is. Our opinions sway with the wind if we aren’t careful. So does our mood.
There are going to be wars. People are going to disappoint you. Life is going to change in a moment and not always for the good. No one gets to escape the circumstances of life.
Everyone has circumstances they can’t control. Everyone has stuff in their lives that they wish were different. We all have hard things. It’s what we do consistently that makes a difference.
We aren’t going to make sense of the whole world, but we can make sense of our world.
So can you thrive when things seem so bad? You can and you must.
I realized last week that in a super stressful time, it’s more important than ever to do the things that help me thrive. And some of us live in super stressful times all the time. So what I observed last week when my life was very hectic and uncertain…and stressful Kenzie was in the hospital, none of the drs expected her to come out, Eric was out of town, I had a couple projects with work that were a little unpredictable, and war broke out in various parts of the world.
What I realized is I wanted to hide. I wanted to cry and be mad and distract and eat comfort food and not exercise. I also realized it’s imperative to stick to a routine when things seem overwhelming. My fight or flight was strong and that makes me want to not exercise, not clean my house, not eat healthy, not meditate…I wanted to distract myself…basically stop doing all the things I do that make my life better, stop doing all the things I do that make me stronger. Isn’t that interesting? When we need it the most, it’s the hardest to do.
But Because my routine is so ingrained…I didn’t completely go off the rails. I simply modified. So instead of hard workouts with Kevin I did yoga. Instead of sprint runs I made sure I kept my walking up every day. I read books instead of getting on social media and looking at those horrible videos coming out of Israel all day. I allowed myself 15 minutes to touch base with it and then turn it off. I also planned out and decided up front how I wanted any phone calls for work to go before I made them.
At one point, I had to make a call to a vendor that had blown me off three times about window treatments I had ordered which is pretty frustrating and somewhat out of the ordinary. I knew I needed to go over how I wanted that call to go otherwise I could have been a ticking bomb because it was such a stressful week. And so that’s what I did. I went over the call in my head. And I was really proud of how it turned out. I didn’t get mad I just asked him how I could help him help me. Turns out he too has had a rough week with his child being in the hospital. You don’t know what other people are going through either. Never forget that.
So how making sense of my world looked this last week..had me eating mostly healthy, with a few comfort food additions. It had me still moving my body, just in a gentler way, it had me filling my mind with a book of my choice instead of being dragged through the gauntlet of social media all day. I allowed for a little time but guarded my mind for the most part.
When you can’t make sense of the world it’s crucial you make sense of your world.
My challenge to you today is first of all make sure to create a solid routine for your mind and body so when things get rough and they will, you have that to fall back on and when it really gets tough, and you can’t hit your whole routine. Modify it. Don’t eliminate it. Your sanity really does depend on it. Share this with anyone struggling to make sense of the world right now. I love you guys. I’ll talk to you in a few days!
