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Hello and welcome back. This episode I call "Four Things That Make You Go Huh." This is a collection of topics that aren't long enough to make a full 10 to 20 minute episode. Some of them are just little two minute snippets or five minutes, and so I collect them over time, and then when I collect enough, I put them all into one episode. And so today I have four of them for you, and the idea is that I just simply want to make you go huh. And so hopefully that's what will happen, and here we go.
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Number one is called the gratitude alarm. So as you may recall, Discipline number 10 is Be Humble, also known as be grateful, because it's impossible not to be grateful and be humble in my humble opinion. And so the question is, do you have a gratitude practice? As the saying goes, what you appreciate, appreciates. And so a dear friend of mine taught me this 27 years ago as I was observing him on a hike appreciating everything, and I thought he was crazy. And so what I started from that moment on is a practice of just saying thank you every night and thinking about the things that I'm grateful for, and it truly changed everything.
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Well, all of a sudden, a friend of mine texts me with an idea called the gratitude alarm. He sent this to two of us, actually. There were three of us that are friends, and he says, "I've got a great idea for you guys. I've been doing this for a few months. It's amazing, and it's called the gratitude alarm." Now, his version of it is that his alarm on his phone goes off every two hours. So he's very intense with this, but every two hours. And wherever he is, whoever he's with, by himself, with others, he stops everything, and either he or whoever he's with, everyone shares three things they're grateful for.
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Now, when he sent that through, I'm thinking, "You're crazy. That's just so..." I kind of shunned the idea, but then it stuck with me for like five days, and so I said, "Screw it. I'm going to try it." So what I do is I just do it once a day. It goes off at noon every day, and it has been so profound. So I've now been doing this for, it's been months. I can't remember exactly how long, but it's been months that I've been doing this now. And so again, every day it goes off at noon.
00:02:53 - 00:03:49
And a couple of specific examples. I was actually interviewing someone to run one of my companies, an integrator role, and we're right in the middle of the interview, and the alarm goes off. And so the way I do it, whenever I'm with someone else, I just say, "Oh, gratitude alarm," and I say, "Here's what it is. It's going to seem a little silly, but are you willing to participate with me because we just basically share three things we're grateful for?" And in this particular situation, this gentleman literally started to break down and cry as he was sharing the things that he's grateful for in his life. It's gone off many times with family, and so that's a lot of fun to do it with family. And what's funny is one of my family members, who's a character, he'll say something funny like, "Let's get out of here before Dad's gratitude alarm goes off." So that makes me laugh.
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I'll be in meetings, and it'll go off. I'll be sitting with a friend for coffee. Whatever it is, whenever it goes off, you stop everything. And if you're by yourself, you think of three things you're grateful for. If you're with others, everyone shares three things they're grateful for. It's been very profound. So I will pass that along to you. I'm also amazed at how many people have now adopted it and are doing it. So my friend taught it to me. I'm teaching it to you, and I'm just passing it on because I think it's incredibly powerful. Try it for a week. Set an alarm. Like right now, just go into your alarm, set it, pick a time that works, and just try it once a day for seven days. Worst case, you can turn it off, but give it a shot.
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On to number two. This one I call relationship advice, and this is something that a friend shared with me that I found quite profound. I've heard this a million different ways in the last 30 years, but the way that he simplified this and put it in a nutshell was just so enlightening. And so here's how it works, and here's what he shared with me. So it starts with, think about a relationship that you're in, ideally your significant other if you have one. And in that relationship, think about a recurring negative feeling or way you're feeling in the relationship, something that occurs, reoccurs over and over and over again.
00:05:33 - 00:06:17
And let's also pretend you're having a conversation with your loved one, and you're having a discussion and a debate and an argument over some issue that's coming up, and you're practicing good communication by sharing how you feel. And whatever that feeling is, whatever that negative feeling, you're feeling unloved, you're feeling unheard, you're feeling unsafe, you're feeling judged, you're feeling disrespected, and I could keep going. There's 100 of them. But whatever that thing is that you're feeling, the process is to look at your childhood. So now we're taking you out of the actual situation.
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So now step outside of that relationship, reflect on this reoccurring negative thing that keeps coming up. And the idea and the exercise and the process is to look at your childhood and look at where you didn't get that feeling, unloved, feeling unheard, feeling unsafe, feeling judged, feeling disrespected. Where did that show up in your childhood? But here's the aha, voila magic moment that he shared. So if you're following the process, you have these negative feelings in the relationship. Once you see it, what he said at that point is you then just simply need to give that to yourself.
00:07:05 - 00:08:01
You need to give that to yourself. If you're feeling unloved, love yourself. Now, I'm not going to psychoanalyze you. I'm just speaking from my experience. If you're feeling unloved, typically it's because you don't love yourself. If you're feeling unheard, there's something going on. If you're feeling unsafe, find safety. If you're feeling judged, you're probably judging yourself. If you're feeling disrespected, give it to yourself. Because the second aha, voila moment, you will never find it in someone else. And that's what we keep doing. We keep searching. We keep looking for someone who's going to give us that thing, somebody that's going to give us that thing. And only we can give ourselves that thing. And then all of a sudden, we're a much more whole person and much better for our loved ones.
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What's so powerful in that very simple process that that friend laid out is once we have the aha moment, that holy cow, okay, that's where this stems from. And so forgive whoever raised you and did that to you. Let it go. There's nothing you can do about it now. But to see that that's the root, maybe there isn't any work to do because what I believe is possible, and I think it's coming in the snap of a finger, we can just poof, let that go. Again, give it to ourselves. It's already there. We are already loved. It's all there. And again, in the snap of a finger, maybe you don't need to do the work. That is solved. Forward you go. You're a more whole and complete human being.
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On to number three. This one I call list everything. This is like a one minute things that make you go huh topic. And I actually think I may have shared this in the past, but I don't know. But it came up for me, and so I'm going to share it again now because somebody out there needs it. It's so powerful, and it's so simple.
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And so I can't tell you the number of times I sat with somebody who's feeling overwhelmed. Okay, and so if you're sitting there feeling overwhelmed, and it seems like a lot of the world is feeling overwhelmed right now, I do this at least once a month for what it's worth. But the idea is if you're feeling overwhelmed, you just simply pull out a legal pad, something to write on, your laptop, whatever works for you. And again, when this happens, when I'm face to face with somebody, I literally hand them my legal pad and give them my pen, and I say, "Okay, do this," and I sit with them while they're doing it.
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And the idea is you just take 5, 10, 15 minutes and just start writing. List everything going on in your mind, projects you need to complete, things that you're worrying about, things that are scaring you, things that you're excited about. So it's all of it. It's every single thing. It's all in there rolling around in your head. The idea is to get it out of your head and on paper. And on average, you will write 10 things, might be 5, might be 15. Sometimes it'll be 30 things, but you got to get it all out of your head. Now, that's it. And that's why it's a one minute things that make you go huh.
00:10:36 - 00:11:52
But I'm going to expand on a couple of things because I get such joy watching the overwhelm before the exercise and then the look of peace 5, 10, 15 minutes later. So you could leave it there. And so when, like I said, when I'm doing a clarity break in a coffee shop, you know I'm typically doing this at least one out of four of them, maybe every other one. But the power is just to get it out of your head on paper. But then you can take it a step further. And what I do is for each one of those things, I then pour over each one, and I will just scribble some notes, create a plan. And it's just good therapy 80% of the time, and then 20% of the time with those other things, I'm all of a sudden, that's what my clarity break is spent on. I'm going to dig into solving that thing that's weighing on me so heavily. And then the clarity and the peace that comes. And so this is a form of stillness. You could call this journaling. You can call this contemplation, but this is a form of stillness, one of the Disciplines. And so if you're feeling overwhelmed, I urge you to go do it right now.
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And last but not least, number four. This one I call it ain't them. So here we go on this one. Now, this one is going to sound eerily similar to number two, the relationship advice, but it is different, similar but different. And hopefully, you'll clearly see that. So here's what I need you to do. I need you to actually play along with me. I'm going to take you through a process. And so I need you to think about a relationship in your life where someone continues to frustrate you, trigger you, take you out of the best version of yourself. It could be any relationship, work relationship, personal, friend, family. So but I need you to clearly see the relationship and see the moment that continues to frustrate you, trigger you, take you out of the best version of yourself. Now, I need you to get there. So please, once you're there, worst case, hit pause. And assuming you're there, get ready.
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It ain't them. It's you. It's all a mirror. And they are simply showing you something in you that you might want to take a look at and heal. And so this relationship that you're in and this triggering and this frustrating and this taking you out of the best version of yourself, these are called trauma bonds. These are called soul contracts where like the two of you literally signed up for this. There's a lesson for you to learn so you can grow and ascend to the next level. You two found each other so that you could heal this thing. And even if you don't believe in all that kind of woo-woo stuff and how you got here, keep it real tangible. Just make it very, very practical. This person is triggering you, frustrating you, taking you out of the best version of yourself. It's not healthy. It's not good for you. It's not good for them. So worst case, just take advantage of the opportunity to learn something and grow as a human being.
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The idea now, once you're there and you realize it's you and it's a mirror and this is a great learning and growing opportunity, in its simplest form, just pay attention. You might sit, you might journal, you might meditate, you might ponder, however you do, but just pay attention. Observe the situation. Notice what's going on. Notice the set of words that lead up to your triggering. Just become aware and own the fact that, and say to yourself, "It's me." And then again, do the work.
00:14:56 - 00:15:40
Again, whatever that means for you. For some, it's going to be a snap of the fingers. Some need five years of psychotherapy. It's up to you. So it's up to you, but do the work. But the point is when you're able to see it clearly, it will strengthen you. When you start the process of healing it, seeing it, hopefully a snap of the finger heals it. But it may not strengthen you at first. There might be a complete unraveling because we're dealing with the ego here, and it's your ego that's simply trying to protect you.
00:15:40 - 00:16:30
It's going to unravel. It's going to dissolve. So let's hypothetically pretend it's an insecurity inside of you. And every time they say that thing, they know exactly how to push your button. They push the insecurity button, and all of a sudden, your ego needs to prove to you that you're the most secure person on the planet. And so you then flip into trigger mode and defend yourself mode, and you got to prove to that person that you are confident and you are worthy and you are whatever. And I'm just giving you a hypothetical example. But in clearly seeing that and observing that, that is like 95% of the battle. And at the end of that journey, snap of the finger, five years of therapy, you will be different.
00:16:31 - 00:17:12
They will notice the difference in you, and it may change the relationship. It's going to go in one of two directions, either for the better or for the worse. For the better means the relationship strengthened, and you're meant to stay together. And in some cases, that person has taught you their lesson, and it's time to move on because if, in fact, the triggering, which you will heal, you realize that that person maybe isn't the best for you because now you're strong, now you can set boundaries, now you can stand up for yourself.
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If, in fact, you discover that that person is abusive, is critical, is judgmental, is jealous, is controlling, whatever the dynamic is, you may realize that's who they are. And with that clarity, certainly try and solve that, repair the relationship, address that issue, discuss it, get to the root of it. But if it can't be solved, if they're not willing to change, then it's probably time for the relationship to end. That's your decision, not mine. The beauty in all this is you will have the clarity to make the right decision for your life. And as I've said 10,000 times in helping people with relationship issues, life is too short. Life is short. Make the best decision for the long-term greater good.
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And those are the four things to make you go huh. And so I hope you went huh four times in the last 10 or 20 minutes. Thank you for listening in today. We truly appreciate you taking the time to spend with us. And please tune in for the next episode. Until then, we wish you all the best in freeing your True Self. Stay focused and much love.
