Hi guys! Welcome to Episode 150 of the Wildly Successful Lifestyle podcast! I am just coming off a trip to Mexico with friends, it was spectacular! We actually were in Mexico for the 4th of July and let me tell you, they know how to throw a fourth of July party. It was so beautiful and made us feel even more welcome than we already felt.
Have you taken a vacation lately? I hope you have maybe you took one like my little sister, they did a stay cation which looked like a lot of fun! Life can be super busy day to day to the point that we are just sort of going through the motions. Doesn’t it seem like that sometimes? Kind of like driving yourself somewhere and realizing you have no idea how you got there because your mind was somewhere else the entire drive? Do you know how you are able to do that though? It’s because you are so familiar with the drive that your brain doesn’t have to do much work to get there so sometimes you zone out and then realize you are at work and have no idea how you got there. Same thing goes for life…The older you get, if you aren’t switching things up, the faster your life goes by. If your first thought is good, my life isn’t that great, well that’s exactly why I’m talking about it in this episode.
I have talked about it before that I have a generally happy demeanor. I’ve always just been optimistic. It’s kind of my go to state, which I know is really good. But with that comes the thought that I think I should never be unhappy or anxious or worried and And you know what? Life IS supposed to feel good and you ARE supposed to be happy, but you aren’t ALWAYS going to be happy. It isn’t realistic. It’s ok to have a not so great day, we are all going to have those, but are you giving yourself a chance to have more good, happy days then bad? Are you aware enough of your thoughts that you can tell when you’re starting down a path that isn’t serving you? I haven’t always been but I am with all the thought work I’m doing. I’m getting pretty good at identifying thoughts that aren’t serving me and changing them.
So while we were on our trip to Mexico, a few times, I caught myself having to check my thoughts at the door because they weren’t serving me at all. We were going with friends that had to leave early, which I have to admit I don’t love!! It’s a thing for me I guess, anyway, a day or so before they were going to leave I started thinking how sad it would be with them gone, but we had other fun friends still with us so it was really just my brain conjuring up thoughts that weren’t serving me, so immediately I replaced that with all the fun things we still had left to do, So you see I recognized that thought wasn’t serving me and flipped it to just enjoying every single moment and then when they left, which was sad for the moment but we switched things up so that we had completely new experiences and I never gave it another thought!
There are two things I see as being the biggest killers of joy, as far as your thoughts go and the worst part is they are self inflicted. I was worrying about the future of how I would feel when they leave which was doing nothing for my present. There’s nothing that will kill your joy faster than worrying about the future, thinking about the past. If you could simply catch yourself doing those two things and turn them around, your life would be so much better. And sometimes we are so distracted or on autopilot we don’t even realize we are doing it.
We were at the airport recently with friends when they’re plane got delayed by an hour and then it got delayed by another hour and so my friend decided he better call because now he is worried he wouldn’t get home. We are all sitting at lunch and he is having his wife right down things while he is on hold with the airlines when all of a sudden he kind of panicked and said wait where’s my phone it was sitting right here!!!!
We were all just looking at him because he had his phone up to his ear on hold with the airlines. He had so much going on that he didn’t realize his phone was in his own hand at his ear asking where it was. We all laughed because we’ve been there! I’ve been there! I’ve done that! But we don’t want to operate that way!
We want to become super aware of our thoughts to the point that when we start down a thought that isn’t serving us we recognize it and then change it.
How do you know if you’re thinking in the past or the future? If you’re sad or depressed, that’s a good indicator that you’re living in the past. If you’re anxious or worried, that’s a good indicator you’re thinking about the future. In my new kitchen I have a few pieces that my grandmother gave me that I cherish, I started thinking about my grandparents and started to get a little sad that they will not see my kitchen because they would love it, but then I turned it around by saying how fortunate I am that I got my design skills from my grandma and I have several pieces from them that will live on in my kitchen, it took me from sad to grateful with just a thought and bringing myself to the present moment.
When I was in Mexico worried that I would be sad when our friends left, all it took was for me to take a minute and be present rather than anxious about what might come, and ultimately it was sad when they left and of course we felt that for a moment but then we were off to new adventures so it was just fine and I knew they were having fun as well. So see a lot of the times we worry for no reason at all! And We all do that, of course, because we’re human. The key is to not live there. You can feel the feeling but don’t stay there, you aren’t serving anyone by doing that, especially not yourself.
My challenge to you this week is to recognize moments when you are creating a self inflicted bad moment by either living in the past or worrying about the future and flip it around, become super aware of your thoughts and where they are coming from…don’t go looking for your phone when it’s right in your hand…I love you guys and I’ll talk to you in a few days.
