“I don’t know what to do next.”

“I feel stuck.”

“I have to…”

“I just need to…”

“I don’t really have a choice, do I?

How often have you heard yourself say (or think) things like this?  

From the outside, it may look like crisis, emergencies, or anxieties should serve as fantastic motivation for change, action, planning, and initiative.  Instead, crisis overwhelms our brains.  Every small crisis feels like a big crisis.  When everything hurts like the end of the world, we are going to react like it’s the end of the world.  In times of even low-grade, chronic crisis everything around us seems to be removing or reducing our choices.  Even our own choices can effectively remove our future options and choices.

This can frequently lead to a sense of being frozen, stuck, or shut down.  Again, from the outside this can look like apathy, avoidance, and procrastination, when it is in fact a trauma response.

In this episode we'll talk about a way to untangle that sense of being frozen, shut down, or obligated.  Making an Option Inventory will NOT result in a whole new to-do list, but it will give your brain a break and allow you to see options you might otherwise have been blind to.

Every month you meet with 10 of your closest friends.  You share a beautiful, chatty dinner, everyone gets caught up, talking about their latest adventures, and then at the end of the evening everyone in the room hands you a crisp $100 bill.  And EVERYONE is excited.  

What's going on here?

Lucky you!  You're part of a susu or merry-go-round savings club.  Popular in the Caribbean, these community-building clubs function as both credit and savings. 

Learn more here:

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2017/08/19/542436391/how-to-buy-a-goat-when-you-re-ultra-poor-join-a-merry-go-round

https://www.essence.com/news/money-career/what-is-a-sou-sou-savings-club-facts/

The last of our short run on procrastination!  What surprised you about our deep dive into procrastination and how to undermine it?

What topics do you want to hear about next season?  Let's talk!  [email protected]

Continuing on with the cycle of procrastination.  Let's follow the kind of messed up logic of not trusting ourselves and apathy.

How have you seen procrastination result in little crisis that snowball into big crisis?  I'd love to hear your story!  [email protected]

You've put off that one little task for weeks now, and today's the day!  You work up the nerve and knock the task out and it took all of 90 seconds!!!!  Why couldn't you have just done it weeks ago?  What's wrong with you???

Well there is NOTHING wrong with you!   The procrastination cycle is hard to get out of once you get in to it.  But there are ways to undermine procrastination and it starts with knowing how the cycle works.  This is our first episode on the huge, overwhelming, intimidating enemy that is procrastination!

(Spoiler alert:  undermining procrastination is surprisingly simple!)

Reach out:

[email protected]

Just because you're focused on it doesn't mean it's a goal.  Obstacles have a sneaky way of telling us they are goals!  How did this impact what we focus on, what we choose to do, and how likely we are to get to our ACTUAL goals?

Reach out!

[email protected]

Twitter:  hanna_morrell

Taking a break from Financial Skepticism to talk about a related issue... we, as a people are NOT good at talking about money.  What do you say when someone you care for is struggling financially?  Let's talk about some Do's and Don't!

Ready to talk?  Come right this way!

Be well!

Hanna

[email protected]

What did you notice as you were looking for those lighting-fast internal rules that we all use to motivate ourselves, make decisions, stay on task or get things done?

Let's take a rule I use ("I don't have enough time") and talk about how it has the potential to hurt me.

Reach out! 

[email protected]

Twitter:  hanna_morrell

We all have a set of internal rules, strategies, wisdom and truths that are informing every choice we make.  If they are good tools, they help us get to our goals, but if their bad can be undermining everything we work for.  

How do we evaluate if an internal tool or rule we are using is any good?  It all begins with an inventory of the tools you are currently using!  

Upcoming M.I.N.E. Discussion group:  https://www.pacificstoa.com/upcoming-events

What is Financial Skepticism?  Why is it important to evaluate the tools, rules, and strategies we use to make decisions?

What are those lighting-fast decision making rules that you use?  In this episode we talk about how to begin the process of evaluating the internal rules that guide our behavior and achieve our goals.    It all starts with being a scientist AND a wild animal!

Email me at [email protected]