Today we're talking about how much shit we make up in our heads... the stories we tell.
Have you ever felt like your mind is a stage for anxiety's most dramatic plays, complete with unwelcome intrusive thoughts as the main cast? The internal stories we tell ourselves—those fictional narratives of conflict and judgment that can dictate our stress levels and overwhelm our everyday lives.
This episode is all about understanding these cycles and offering you strategies that can lead to a better relationship with these all-too-human experiences. Let's shed light on finding joy in the midst of distress, mastering self-regulation, and staying present amidst life's chaos.
We're not only building awareness, but working with actionable techniques to keep your mental ship steady in turbulent waters. We'll explore the modified 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 grounding technique that taps into the power of our senses, and how a simple mantra, "I am right here," can anchor us firmly in the now.
Get in there and give it a listen for more!
Resources:
Manage Your Stress Mentorship
Discovery call
You can find more about Brain-Body Resilience and JPB:
On the BBR Website
On Instagram
On Facebook
Sign up for the BBR newsletter
Today we're talking about how much shit we make up in our heads... the stories we tell.
Have you ever felt like your mind is a stage for anxiety's most dramatic plays, complete with unwelcome intrusive thoughts as the main cast? The internal stories we tell ourselves—those fictional narratives of conflict and judgment that can dictate our stress levels and overwhelm our everyday lives.
This episode is all about understanding these cycles and offering you strategies that can lead to a better relationship with these all-too-human experiences. Let's shed light on finding joy in the midst of distress, mastering self-regulation, and staying present amidst life's chaos.
We're not only building awareness, but working with actionable techniques to keep your mental ship steady in turbulent waters. We'll explore the modified 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 grounding technique that taps into the power of our senses, and how a simple mantra, "I am right here," can anchor us firmly in the now.
Get in there and give it a listen for more!
Resources:
Manage Your Stress Mentorship
Discovery call
You can find more about Brain-Body Resilience and JPB:
On the BBR Website
On Instagram
On Facebook
Sign up for the BBR newsletter
What is up? Hello there. My name is Jessica Paching Bunch, you can call me JPB, and this is Brain Body Resilience. This is a podcast dedicated to growth, human development and stressing a little bit less so you can go ahead and live a little bit more.
Speaker 2:Hello, my friends, and welcome back to the Brain Body Resilience podcast. I am your host, jpb, and this is episode number 170. Every episode I'm just amazed at how many more. We have, getting up towards 200, and that blows my mind a little bit, because I only do one, one episode per week. So celebrating that win.
Speaker 2:Anyways, today's tale comes from recent events. I have been noticing I am spending a lot of time and energy making up stories in my head about what someone else might be thinking specifically about me, what somebody might say to me at some point, what somebody might be judging me for, and how I can respond to that. None of these scenarios have actually happened, none of this is currently happening, and there's nothing I can do about it anyways, except be prepared for anything that could possibly happen, just in case. Right? No, I keep trying, but that doesn't work. So we like to think that, but our brain is just trying to prepare us for a thing that may never happen. So we think, if we are prepared, if we think about the solution to this, something that's never happened, then we can be prepared for it when it inevitably does happen. But we can't tell the future, so that thing may or may never exist, and we are just spending our precious time and cognitive energy worrying and creating just a bunch of stress for ourselves. And this, my friend, is a symptom of anxiety, trying to control, and really what we're doing is just making shit up. None of that is real and yet it is consuming my thoughts. So let's talk about that.
Speaker 2:It is a cycle. These defensive stories that we have, that we practice, are triggering the same chemical responses as if we were actually in that situation. Triggering that threat response Because thoughts produce the same cascade of chemical reactions throughout your body as if it were actually doing that thing. Your brain and body don't know what you're making up, what you're visualizing, what you're reacting to in your head that you made up or what is really happening, and so your thoughts are triggering a stress response and your high levels of stress are then causing distressing thoughts. You're stuck in this cycle and you need to get out. But how do we do that? First, before we dive in there, I want everyone to know that you're not alone in this. You're not the only one who worries and catastrophizes and has these kind of intrusive thoughts. You're not the only one who is burnt out from stress and anxiety, and the goal isn't to get rid of these things. They are natural responses. Our goal is to have a better relationship with them, to be able to navigate our physiology, to be intentional about our participation in life and how we choose to navigate in our days, giving ourselves space to be, to create joy for no reason to rest, to regulate, just to live, and I want everyone to understand more about how we work internally and that we can participate in that, and that we live in these systems that do not facilitate our health and well-being, and so our participation in how our bodies systems are responding and the ways that we can interact with that is incredibly important. There is a lot out there right now about how to regulate your nervous system, and a lot of that is really great. Obviously, that's what I talk about.
Speaker 2:I do see some issues in this. I see people talking about trying to stay regulated and you can't see me, but there was definitely air quotes there Because this is usually just trying to ignore or partition off parts of your experience. Being dysregulated isn't a bad thing. It is a human thing, and dysregulation is absolutely an appropriate response to a lot of things in daily life.
Speaker 2:Along with the never-ending shit that we see on social media or whatever else we're watching, scrolling, listening to, there is a lot of bad shit in the world. There are active genocides, there are people starving, there are people in unimaginable situations. For me, it is unimaginable because I am safe. I am very privileged to just be here in this warm home, talking to you on this microphone. These situations are not unimaginable for the people living through them.
Speaker 2:There's tragedy all around the world. It's happening, and this isn't about comparative suffering, because we all have very real things that we are dealing with in life, no matter what that is. But seeing all of this, having access to witness all of these things, we're not meant to know about the world's tragedies. Your nervous system is meant to keep you specifically you alive, and so I'm not trying to say that we bury our heads in the sand and ignore what's happening in the world, because I don't believe that's an answer at all, but I want you to know that the feelings of anxiousness, hopelessness, fear, uncertainty these are appropriate responses. There's not something wrong with you. These are appropriate responses to what we see happening in the world around us, and so, then, your job is to practice the tools, to grow the resources inside of you that you need to navigate that, because it's not going away and it's not going to feel good, and we have to create the capacity to care for ourselves and also hold some of that, just because it is a shared reality in our humanity, and I am not of the value or belief system that we should just turn our heads and shut that off. So I have gone off topic, but that needed to be said, and so I have been making shit up in my head back to the original story here and using way too much of my time and energy on this. So I am paying attention to what's happening in my head and sometimes I can only get through like one breath without my thoughts intruding and going back into these like imaginary confrontations that I'm having, and this is how it goes sometimes.
Speaker 2:It's not always easy being present and choosing, you know, not to give our present or precious, very precious attention to these kind of intrusive, ruminative thoughts, and so with that it can be. It can be difficult. You'll have to try and try again, and when it's not working, you just keep trying and eventually you will retrain your focus and attention, because all that takes is Intention and practice. That's how your brain works. The more you practice something, the stronger those neural pathways are. The less you practice it, the less you pay attention to it, the less focus and attention that thing gets, the weaker that Specific network and that pathway gets, and your attention and focus will then more freely go to this new or stronger thing. So this, my friend, is why it's so important to become aware of what you are allowing in your mental space, what you are choosing to focus your energy on and your attention.
Speaker 2:In order to bring this awareness and then choose which thoughts you are giving your energy to, there needs to be space to do so, space to Witness your own internal environment and then notice what's going on in there. And so how do you create space? Focus on your breath. This is always going to be my anchor. This is the key to calming both your body and your mind. Your breath is Like it is magic. It's not like magic. It is amazing that we have the ability to control and navigate and change, have influence over Our internal environment, our physiology, through choosing to breathe differently. I am just. It will never not amaze me, and so sometimes we can ignore some of these thoughts that we're having. Like my imaginary knife fight. I wish I remember who said that. I think it might have been James Olivia. I Want to give credit where credit is due, because I love that little same. I had an incredible conversation with them last spring and I'm trying to think. I don't remember the episode number, but I will link that in the show notes because it's such a great conversation about uncomfortable conversations anyways, these imaginary knife fights that I have In my head with people that don't even know that I am in conflict with conflict with them, and so sometimes we can ignore these thoughts, but sometimes they pop right back up and everyone has them and can get you know. They can range from annoying to scary, and so let's just identify a couple of these things.
Speaker 2:Rumination is a form of pervasive cognition that focuses on negative content, generally past and present, and results in emotional distress. So You're just thinking about something over and over and over again, just on loop, and it's usually not something pleasant. And I had mentioned intrusive thoughts earlier. The difference between intrusive thoughts and rumination is that often intrusive thoughts are Something very disturbing to us and possibly full of fear, fills us with fear and you immediately try and push them away, whereas rumination might feel interesting, like maybe this is useful like in the case of trying to defend myself against these made-up stories in my head. So interests of thoughts and rumination are both signs of anxiety and depression, which means that they are signs of chronic dysregulation in the nervous system. It definitely means that your head is full and needs some space without stimulation, and these intrusive thoughts come and go if we let them. So don't try and push anything away, just create some space and then let them move on. We don't need to analyze, we don't need to figure anything out, and if you try to suppress them, they will likely just bother you more and stick around longer.
Speaker 2:Remember your thoughts are just things. They come and they go and are not absolute truth in any way. They're just shit the pops into your head, just random sometimes, and other times they can show us what's important to us, the things that we worry about, tell us what we value, and so, remember, these repetitive anxious thoughts are triggered by unchecked stress, and practicing conversations in your head is your brain's way of helping you to prepare and have some control. But we don't usually have positive, pretend interactions. When it's brought on by stress and anxiety and worry, your body and your brain are always trying to help you to avoid pain and stay alive. So this is not a bad thing, it's not something wrong. It's just something you're trying. It's not something we're trying to get rid of. We just need to recognize what it is, which is a cognitive tool, and then move on.
Speaker 2:So what do we do? How do you do that? First, bringing that awareness. Awareness always comes first. We can't do something about something we don't already know about, so we have to be aware that this is happening. We have to be able to identify that we're having these ruminating or intrusive thoughts and be able to name them. So identify it as an intrusive thought, get curious. What is this about? What part of this is important to me? And then my go-to is always to get out of my head is always I am right here. Just repeat that. That is like my get out of my head mantra when am I? I am right here. I'm actually, you know, in my shower. I'm in this room. I'm sitting on my couch. I am not actually in this place having this defend myself, conversation with who you know, whatever's happening in my head that I'm making up. Where am I? I am right here in this space.
Speaker 2:And so, after you recognize that, you can turn your focus outside of your head and into your senses and practice a grounding exercise like the 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, or some variation of that, where we are looking for four things. I always cut one out Because I don't think it's that useful, but we're looking at four things that we can see near far different textures, different colors and be able to name those. And then we're doing four, three things, really, how many ever you want. There's no specifics to the 54321 method that makes it any better. You are just focusing on your senses so that you can come back into your body and get out of your head a little bit. So you're going to notice the things you see colors, textures, shapes, near far. And then things that you can hear, pick three, pick four, I don't care Near far again. Different tones, different types of sounds.
Speaker 2:And then a couple of things that you can smell. What are they? Again, are they sweet, salty, smell, pleasant or not? Anything, you can taste. This one's hard for me. A lot of the time I can't really taste what's in my mouth unless it's leftover lunch or something that was flavorful. And then, what do you feel? So I guess that's the one I skip is the taste, because that one doesn't really make sense to me. If you can taste things, count those. And then this one's important what do you feel? You feel the seat you're sitting on, do you feel comfortable? If so, how do you know that these clothes are comfy. This pillow is comfy, this blanket is comfy. I feel supported. This chair feels firm, this floor under me is supporting me. I feel hair in my face, whatever it is Really paying attention to what is happening in your body and the sense of that, and then, once you're a little bit more grounded, breathe and become mindful of your breath, how and where you feel it.
Speaker 2:Is it fast, is it slow, is it long, is it short? And then name the things that you can control In this situation. Maybe, in particular, you want to focus on whatever imaginary fight is happening, and these things that you can control should be a short list of you, your thoughts, your actions, your attention and energy spent Outside of that. It's not your business because you can't do anything about it, and it's not you. It's not you or somebody else to manage and navigate. And so I want you to ask yourself the question what is one thing that I can do to decrease the stress and anxiety creating these recurring thoughts and stories, and it's your nervous system hygiene. Pick one thing, and I'm always going to recommend your breath to create some space. This can also just be get off your screens, spend time in silence, be mindful of your thoughts and how your body feels in those moments when you're having these thoughts, because I guarantee you're not going to feel relaxed, you're not going to feel at ease. You're going to feel your shoulders raising up, your jaw getting tight, which is how you know you're stressed out and you need to do something to then create some more space.
Speaker 2:So get intentional with the thoughts that you allow, discuss them, stop them in their tracks and say, okay, this is interesting, I'm going to explore this. Don't try and force them out. Just say, hmm, this is interesting. However, you want to get curious about it. We're not trying to figure anything out. We're not trying to analyze why this is happening, why we're thinking these things or get some meaning out of it. They are just thoughts. So choose to pay attention or not. That is your superpower and so, going into this next week, what are you choosing to pay attention to? Want you to really, really, um, want to use other words, but pay?
Speaker 1:attention.
Speaker 2:Pay attention to what you, what you were giving your time and energy to. That's all I have for you today. I am wishing you a beautiful week. We will do this again next week and until then, if you found this episode useful, always please do share it with a friend so they might also find some use in it. And I haven't told you all for a while, but I always, always, am so grateful for you being here. And while we're talking about time and attention, I am grateful that you choose to spend that here with me, and I love when y'all reach out and tell me what resonates and ask for specific episodes and just to connect with y'all. So thank you for that and keep doing it. Alright, until next week. Peace out.