The Strong Within Affirmation Podcast

Thanks for listening. I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected] phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Thanks for listening. I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected] phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Synergistic Saturdays-#441 March The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Forgive You & I Forgive Myself

"To be angry is to revenge the faults of others on ourselves." ~Alexander Pope

One great lesson I learned is to keep my mouth closed in anger, to keep my tongue still when hurt, and to keep my mind from traveling thorny dangerous trails. Now while I said I learned this lesson, it doesn't mean that I always practice it. Hurt and anger can be explosive emotions. They can be emotions that are like a riptide wanting to sweep you deeper within their wake. It feels good to give up control to something; it feels freeing to not care about the destruction we can do…thinking about how others didn't seem to care when they offended us. But being swept within anger or hurt creates the pathway of thinking revenge is ok.

And it's so strange how so many things come together when we awaken. While I was thinking about this topic, I was listening to the song Disarm by the Smashing Pumpkins. I had just downloaded it, and I hadn't heard it in years. And it moved me to look up the lyrics and research it a bit more.

The lyrics go like this:

"Disarm you with a smile And cut you like you want me to Cut that little child Inside of me and such a part of you Ooh, the years burn Ooh, the years burn

I used to be a little boy So old in my shoes And what I choose is my choice What's a boy supposed to do? The killer in me is the killer in you My love I send this smile over to you"

The lead singer (and writer) Billy Corgan, said the song was about his rocky relationship with abusive parents. How he disarmed their violence with his smile. That he had to grow up too early as a little boy and live in adult shoes. He thought about killing his parents for the pain they caused him, but he chose a different response than returning the anger and violence they taught him—"the killer in me is the killer in you…" so instead he says in the song "my love I send this smile over to you."

Josh Billings said, "there is no revenge so complete as forgiveness." And what a powerful concept that is to understand. And the reason I said understand, is because it's easy to know what it means, but to truly understand means to live it, to embody it, and to live in a higher frequency than one of reaction and payback for those who have hurt us.

I know for me, I want people to feel what I felt, but trying to send back that negative energy, or recreate that feeling in other people, only continues the cycle of violence, self-abuse, and hurt (mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually). Because the only one who is truly getting hurt is ourselves by living within the hurt and revenge; by trying to make others feel and experience what we went through…which will never happen.

Yes, we can tell people how we were hurt, but when we try to make them feel it out of spite or anger from being hurt…it only keeps us locked within our hurt. Most people will say that to heal we need to let go of the past offense, but it's not that simple. And not because you can't let go of the hurt, but it's understanding we never let go of things. Instead of letting go, we are always deciding where to put our energy and focus. So if we focus on letting go, we are still focusing on the hurt. But if we turn and pivot towards a better emotion such as forgiveness, self-growth through difficult times, or maybe seeing that the pain inflicted upon us is more someone else's way of deflecting their internal hurt—then we are doing something more effective in the long run besides trying to let go of something that we'll never fully let go of.

So I don't say let go of your hurt, but know that your hurt doesn't have to be a part of your healing, it can be the background of why you decided to love differently. And the people who have changed the world are the ones who turned the other cheek; they are the ones who spoke out even when they might've been in harms way for doing so. They put their power into something more than anger, violence, or revenge. They decided to live for a higher purpose.

If you think about what revenge is, it's a lower instinct. No animals express it; they either express their dominance or their submission. It is a subbasement level emotion that keeps us below who we are meant to be.

Marcus Aurelius said, "the best revenge is to be unlike him who performed the injury." And it's not that we will become better than the offender, but we will be the example of what people can be. When we stop the cycle of violence or hurt by us acting differently, we change the world. We change the world by changing ourselves first…no matter how much we've been hurt. When we forgive others, it changes the equation…and when we forgive ourselves we cut ties with the cycle of hurt, never to pass on the demons that were given to us. We will no longer take ownership of those demons that were never ours to begin with.

Today's Personal Commitment:

In the song Disarm that I referenced, the 2nd time the chorus happens—a word changes. The first lyric say "what I choose is my choice." And in the later chorus he says, "what I choose is my voice." This song was about a very hard subject, about an abusive family situation, and I found that this song was the act of saying that I will stop the cycle of hurt. I won't pass on what you taught me because I want to express something more consciously about who I am as a person.

We can have the tendency to blame our past for who we are. And while it has brought us to where we are, it doesn't have to be the determinant of being who we are. WE MAKE THAT CHOICE. And so the more we defer to the habits of the past as an excuse, then the more we allow what we don't want to be…to control us. And when we continue the cycle of the negative habits we were taught, we allow the riptide of negative emotions to become who we are. We can say it's not my fault, and I agree the past may not be your fault, but the present moment WILL BE if you decide to continue the cycle.

So get out your journal and write down the negative emotions, actions, and anything from your past that is keeping you from moving on to be the person you want to be.

But don't just stop with writing that list. I want you to ask yourself how you can break the cycle.

To become different is possible, but it starts with the belief that you have a choice, and that you can change your present by deciding to think, speak, and act differently.

Those who are trapped in their past have decided it was out of their power. Being stuck is one thing, but choosing to stay stuck is another. Change at any moment is possible but it all begins with the belief that I CAN be different and I will choose to be different in every moment from here on out. The old broken me, is dead, and no longer a part of the new me. The ALIVE part of myself, the conscious choice of self-love, is where I now choose to live.

I Forgive You & I Forgive Myself

Thanks for listening. I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected] phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Thanks for listening. I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected] phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Thanks for listening. I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected] phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Thanks for listening. I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected] phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Tag Me Tuesdays-#437 March The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Lay Down My Burdens

"Under the burden of solitude, under the burden of dissatisfaction the weight, the weight we carry is love." Allen Ginsberg- excerpt from his poem Song

What you are carrying is what you decided to pick up. Everything that is weighing us down is something we decided to carry. And that's a hard thing to hear because it means that we can't place the blame onto anyone or anything else. But it doesn't mean we should place the blame on ourselves either. Because if we do that we are not moving forward but deciding to be weighed down by our burdens.

The definition of burden when used as a noun is—that which is carried; load; or that which is born with difficulty. When burden is a verb and used with an object the definition is to load oppressively or trouble. And the burdens we hold onto load us oppressively. They weigh us down; they keep us from being and becoming the people we wish to be.

Holding onto our burdens is a form of hoarding; it's a form of gathering and stockpiling our pains. We feel it is our duty, our obligation, to go through those pains whether it be for ourselves or for others. And there's nothing wrong with going through the fires of pain, but when we don't let go of those pains, the burdens begin to become too heavy to bear anymore.

If you think about why people hoard physical stuff, sure it could be for a multitude of reasons, but I think it boils down to one big point—we think we might need it someday; that we would be the source to the answer, and so hold onto it just in case. But it becomes unhealthy because the motive is based out of fear. The fear thinking that we may use it at the wrong time, maybe we could accidently give it away when we might need it again, or the comfort of having it outweighs the heaviness of continually holding onto it.

Most problems we've held onto, or walls that we've built, were meant for good measures in the beginning. We held onto them as remembrances to protects us next time so we'd never forget, or we held onto it for another person so we could bear the weight and help them, or maybe it was a way of pushing ourselves to the limit to show how much we care for something. And maybe this is one of the greatest reasons we hold onto our burdens, while we hold it close it gives us an out to not face our fears. Because when we truly face our fears we are able to let go of them as we have come to know what they truly are…and by understanding our fears then we come to understand that they no longer have power over us.

One of the stories I know I've told in my life is that great things involve carrying heavy burdens. That the act of being rewarded means I have to be willing to endure pain to have it.

And I do believe in hard work towards something, but when we carry our burdens habitually…it becomes a way of non-living. And what I mean about non-living is we never enjoy the reward because we have allowed the original protective measure to stay with us even after we have reached the goal we wanted. Or maybe we never reach the goal because our burdens keep us from being able to make the journey with such a heavy load on our backs.

We all have our own unique experiences, but I believe our pains don't differ all that much. We think we are the only ones suffering and no one could understand our pains and burdens, but it's the opposite actually—we all have become experts at hiding behind our masks.

But I have a solution:

If you are tired of being weighed down, and being ladened by your burdens, you don't have to carry them anymore. You can decide right now to lay them down. It's that simple. You don't have to bear the weight anymore, if you choose to be free.

And while I said it's simple, it still will take work:

1. It will take the work of committing of going through the pain.
2. It will take the willingness to not avoid the pain anymore but to acknowledge and recognize it for what it is.
3. It will be the process of accepting the faults and errors in your life from yourself and for others…and growing because of them.

We all will mess up, and a mistake is a learning lesson, it's a chance to grow…but the more we hold onto the resentments and anger of the past…then the more we live within the past. And if we are living in the past, which is literally impossible except in our minds, we keep ourselves from living in the present to create a better future.

So instead of holding on for dear life to your pains and burdens we need to find a better way to deal with them before they get too heavy and crush our souls. We need to be able to pivot from pain into a better emotion. It's not necessarily letting go as we will always keep what we have experienced within ourselves, but it's making the choice to be healed rather than stay stuck in something that isn't serving us anymore.

And I believe most if not all of healing stems from forgiveness—the willingness to forgive others and ourselves. When we can forgive, we can then begin putting down our burdens.

Everything we do usually started with a good reason, or we thought it would be a good reason. So while we picked up certain things that no longer serve us, I am giving you permission to lay it down if it is not longer helping you. You don't have to be the answer for everyone and everything. So lay down your burdens and pick up something that you can build on. Pick up things that will help you create a beautiful, free, and hope-filled life. The world is yours when you lay down your burdens.

Today's Personal Commitment:

Mental check, what burdens are you holding onto that are no longer helping you move forward? The best way to find relief from our pains is not to just lay them down only to come back later to pick them up, but to understand why we picked them up in the first place so we can lay them down for good.

So look at the things you've been holding onto that are creating great resistance within and ask yourself:

• Why did I pick this up in the first place?
• What will holding onto this burden do to me?
• What do I really want?
• How can I let go of it for good if it's hurting me?

Everything you are carrying you picked up. Let's be purposeful at looking at why we picked up things so we can be purposeful in laying them down. That way we won't ever have to come back to them again.

I Lay Down My Burdens

Thanks for listening. I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected] phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Mindful Mondays-#436 March The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Am Like The Clouds To The Mountain…Uninterrupted and Undisturbed

"Discontent, blaming, complaining, self-pity cannot serve as a foundation for a good future, no matter how much effort you make." ~Eckhart Tolle

My good friend Catina was an amazing woman. She passed away last year after her 3rd bout with cancer. And while I'm sad that the world lost a great soul too early, I'm glad I had the chance to experience her amazing friendship while she was here.

A few years ago I met up with Catina for lunch at a cafeteria, and we were finding a place to sit down, and I can't remember what I was complaining about, but I was upset that something wasn't going my way. Whether it be money was tight, I was having trouble writing or coming up with ideas at the time, or how poor old me was in a bad place. We got to our seats, and Catina said quite loudly so almost everyone could hear in the cafeteria… "Pity Party…Seating pity party of one…your table is ready."

I was so embarrassed as I looked around to see who was looking at me, as it seemed like everyone was now looking at us. We looked at each other, as she gave me one of those I'm sorry faces as her shoulders raised up and her eyes widened almost as if saying whoops. And we both laughed our butts off and sat down.

That's what was so amazing about Catina, she was truthful, she was in your face, she was real, and she loved with her whole heart. You always knew she cared about you even after she dropped her truth bombs.

Sadness is a part of life. It's ok to get disappointed that things didn't go exactly as planned. In fact, disappointment can fuel us to become better, and it helps us to know that we have work to do in getting better at whatever we've tried. But there's a sadness that can be quite self-destructive and that sadness has to do with self-pity.

What self-pity does for us is give us an excuse to not try. It gives us a reason to say I wasn't made out for this, and thus we begin comparing ourselves to other people making ourselves feel even worse. We deliberately look at someone who is doing better than us; someone who we could supposedly never live up to because again it gives us another reason to feel comfortable in our failures. It gives us that reason inside to say "see it's ok, you could've never done it anyway."

When I was in younger and dealing with depression and suicidal thoughts, the reason my suffering persisted was because I thought I was the only one who could feel this way. Everyone else seemed to have it all together while I was struggling to keep my head above water…rather poorly. It made me feel special to know that I was suffering for a cause, that I was being a martyr. And so those negative emotions instead of pushing me to want better for myself, they comforted me and said it was ok to fail and stay down. They told me that they didn't expect anything from me, and that's an intoxicating feeling. It's was a drug that made me feel like a million bucks from my negativity when actually it was slowly destroying the person I was inside.

There's nothing wrong with experiencing heartbreak, sadness, or disappointment..but the more we find ourselves gravitating towards how things weren't meant to be because we aren't good enough, smart enough, or whatever enough…then the more we create the habit to lean on self-pity throughout our lives.

Self-pity starts out as a form of protection. It's a way to not bruise our ego and our pride so that we can feel good about ourselves even during our failures, but where it gets dangerous is when we begin living in self-pity. Self-pity is a choice, and it's a story we decide to tell ourselves why it's ok to stay where we are.

And while it feels safer in self-pity, NO ONE wants to live there. Even clinically depressed people, who don't know they have a choice, don't want to be miserable. They just have resigned themselves to the life they are living saying nothing will ever change…and that's one of the greatest recipes for staying stuck.

So how do we change, if we want to live a more joyful, exciting, and fulfilling life away from the traps of self-pity?

Well, I have a couple of ideas that can help you break the pattern of gravitating toward self-destructive self-pity:

1. Become aware of the stories you tell when you are feeling sorry for yourself. As I said, self-pity is a choice. It's a choice to live within a story you have concocted. Sure it may feel true to you at the time, but that's because you aren't seeing the whole picture. You are looking at the problem from only the point of failure. Self-pity may feel natural, but that's only because we have gravitated towards telling stories of why we can't feel a certain way, instead of asking the question of how we can feel differently.

1. Practice living in appreciation instead seeing reasons why you should be upset. When we can see all the amazing things in our lives, and the opportunities at our fingertips we can see a whole other world. Appreciation is one of the greatest emotions we can experience because it deepens the emotions we experience. It helps us not only to see things better, but to love the things we do see. It's a different way of viewing your life and the things in your life. It breaks the pattern of viewing something negatively and to instead see it as an opportunity.

1. Ridding yourself of complaining. What we focus on tends to expand, so the more we find reasons to complain then the more likely we are to complain. And the more you complain, then the more reasons you have to justify why your life sucks and how nothing will ever change for you. Have you ever been around someone who complains all the time, it doesn't feel great; well, unless you are complaining with them. It's an energy that sucks us in, and the more we do it, the easier it gets. Sure things in life will suck, but we don't have to speak about ever minor inconvenience. When we do that we give more power to the negativity and we then tend to ruminate and focus on it even more. Which then we tend to make complaining our natural habit, and our natural habitat. We become our complaints instead of just voicing them.

1. Face your feelings. Self-pity is a way of avoidance. It's a workaround for dealing with things that sadden us. Sure we deal with disappointment during self-pity, but it's a one-sided story that makes us focus on why things are wrong instead of being willing to face our fears of failure. It's scary to fail, it's scary to try and maybe not be good enough, it's scary to have people judge us and laugh at us for not being good enough. And it's scary to look at our fears because we've made other people the focal point of our fears. If we spent more time worrying about what we want and how we can do what we want, we would stop worrying about fear and understand that our failures are just a stepping stone towards reaching our goals. We know we have to work for difficult goals in our lives, but for some reason in our mind we think we should succeed the first time we try something. And so being unrealistic gives us an out to say, "see I tried it. It just wasn't meant to be." But when you face your feelings, and you focus less on what others will think whether you fail or succeed…you increase your chances of success because you are no longer focusing on why you can't or why it's not possible—you are focusing on the small steps that it will take to make it happen.

I get it; self-pity feels comfortable. In fact, it feels great at times when you get lost in it. Because you don't have to deal with failure, you just keep yourself at the bottom of life. But when you avoid failure, you live within failure. So instead of telling a story of why life sucks, why no one will ever love you, or why you will always be stuck here….what if you were to tell a story of why your life is amazing?

What if you were to focus on becoming more aware of your stories, and finding more reasons to live in gratitude and appreciation, and ridding yourself of complaining, and also facing your feelings instead of running from them?

I have made the depths of self-pity my home for years because I felt it was more comfortable to not have to face failure. But I've also lived in the depths of happiness and sadness from the normalities of life. And you know what, I would choose life over self-pity any day because it gives me something better than the misery self-pity chains to me. Self-pity is always a choice; it's a comfortable choice, it's an easy choice…but I hope you make an even easier choice…to live your life void of self-pity.

Today's Personal Commitment:

Sadness is a natural part of life. I am not saying don't feel, but I am asking you to process your emotions differently.They say that meditation is not avoiding life, but it's finding a way to not be disturbed by the natural processes of life. It's to not be stirred in unnatural ways. Is the cloud stopped by a mountain? No, it is uninterrupted and undisturbed as it conforms around the obstacle and continues to move on. And that is how our mind must be as well. It's not that we can't feel but more that we find ways to not be disturbed by the natural processes of life; to truly feel ALL of life—sadness and happiness, and ask how we want to continue to move forward from here…instead of being stuck here.

So what stories might you be telling right now that are keeping you stuck? What is keeping you comfortable in your sadness? Look at the places you are feeling sorry for yourself and begin working thru them by asking four questions I talked about early.

• What is the story I am telling, and is it helping me or hurting me in moving on? And if it's hurting me what story would help me to move forward instead of stay stuck in the comfortability of my sadness?
• How can I be more in appreciation during this time to see the opportunities instead of the roadblocks?
• What am I complaining about that's keeping me here, and how do I rid myself of the complaints that I am giving power to?
• How do I stop avoiding the feelings I don't want to face because of fear? And how do I face and continually choose the feelings I want?

So let's give up our table of one for the self-pity party, and let's join the table of a beautiful life by being willing to get uncomfortable with our imposed sadness. Again it's not that you can't feel sadness, but rather let's not make it our home.

I Am Like The Clouds To The Mountain…Uninterrupted and Undisturbed

Thanks for listening. I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected] phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Smiling Sundays-#435 March The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I See Past Minor Annoyances

"Successful people maintain a positive focus in life no matter what is going on around them. They stay focused on their past successes rather than their past failures, and on the next action steps they need to take to get them closer to the fulfillment of their goals rather than all the other distractions that life presents to them." ~Jack Canfield

I was having a conversation with one of my personal training clients the other day. She was upset with how she wasn't the same person she was four years ago. Four years ago, she had the body she wanted. She said that she never had an issue with losing weight ever before. We've talked about what she's eating and about increasing her cardio and resistance training outside of our personal training, but I always bring it back to what I believe is the most important factor in any change we desire for our lives…the change in our stress levels and our mindset.

After she said this statement, I was about to say something to my client about changing her mindset, but she knew what I was going to say and said, "don't give me any of that mindset crap." She was half teasing but I knew she meant it too. She wanted the physical answer to help her change her situation. And I get it; we want the answer to be something that is in our control. Wouldn't it be nice if you ate just these things, or you worked out this amount of time and it would be the exact equation for change? Yes, that would be nice, but being in the industry for over ten years now, I have a different approach.

I've seen people doing the exact same things in their fitness efforts—putting in the same amount of time at the gym, and even being on the same diets. Sure, there probably are fluctuations here and there between each person, and sometimes people lie about what they're actually doing…but, in the end, these people doing the same thing will have completely different results. One person will lose weight, and the other will struggle. Which always begs the question what did the successful person do? The one who is struggling will look at themselves as a failure and will tell themselves stories like I have a slow metabolism, I must have the curse of big boned DNA, or I'm not good enough to change.

And what that does is give us a reason NOT to try anymore. We get our crystal ball out and doom ourselves by determining ourselves as unhelpable or unchangeable. But it also creates a story inside of ourselves saying that trying new things don't work out for us. I will admit that some people lose weight better than others, whether it be their work effort, or whether they have more muscle than someone else so they naturally burn more calories than someone with less muscle mass. But I've come to a firm understanding that it's more about their belief systems and how much stress they allow into their lives.

We all deal with stress differently, and for me, I actually lose weight when I'm stressed. And yes, go ahead and hate on me for being this way but there are a few reasons this happens. When I get stressed I don't eat; I have a lot of anxious, nervous energy, so I need to work it off…and so I either walk a lot or I go to the gym to work it out. My stress levels affect me in negative ways that I actually can't sleep, I can't stop thinking, I can't stop worrying, and I have trouble being still. Where for other people when they are stressed and depressed are trying to comfort themselves in other ways such as eating, being sluggish, or any other matter that is not good for their physical self.

But that's only one part of the equation of change. The stress response I just talked about is the physical actions we take when stressed. So it's good to know what you physically do when you're stressed because it will be part of your change in curbing behaviors that aren't helping you. But I think it goes even deeper than the physical. Stress has been linked with creating more cortisol in our bodies which has been linked to creating more fat in our bodies.

And I believe that when we are constantly stressed, we are taking on loads mentally, physically, and spiritually that is doing damage to our minds and bodies. It's weighing us down literally and metaphorically. And the world we live in we've gotten accustomed to being stressed 24/7. Which is not a productive way to live.

In his book Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers: The Acclaimed Guide to Stress, Stress-Related Diseases, and Coping, Robert Sapolsky talks about the stress responses and what happens to our bodies. When we are constantly stressed it prevents our bodies from doing the long-term building projects that promote wellness within our bodies. We get accustomed to being in emergency fight or flight mode all the time. He says that we don't get into an exhaustion phase of depleting our hormones, but something else happens. And Dr. Sapolsky states that:

"It is very rare, that any of the crucial hormones are actually depleted during even the most sustained of stressors. The army does not run out of bullets. Instead, the body spends so much on the defense budget that it neglects education and health care and social services. It is not so much that the stress-response runs out, but rather, with sufficient activation, that the stress-response can become more damaging than the stressor itself, especially when the stress is purely psychological. This is a critical concept, because it underlies the emergence of much stress-related disease."

Later in his book, he will use the example of a Zebra running from a lion. The life of a zebra's stress is only about 5 minutes as when running from a predator it will either escape or be eaten. During that stressful activity, all the other processes in the body get shut off except the blood flow to the legs to escape. So it's reproductive system shuts off, it's digestive system shuts off, and even the salivation in its mouth will be affected. The same thing happens to us, he uses the example of us being nervous to give a speech infront of people and how our mouth will get dry. Our stress-response will shut off the areas it feels aren't important at that moment.

For that Zebra, the stress response is a very minimal amount of time in its life. For us we spend days, weeks, or years worrying about our mortgages, our jobs, our relationships…and as he stated before it's not that we run out of bullets (or hormones to be exact) to protect our bodies, but actually the stress response becomes more damaging than the stressor itself.

Now while that is all great info to know that our stress might actually be harming us more than it's helping us…how do we do something about it? Well that's a whole can of worms that might be different for everyone, but I think it all starts out with two simple tips and tricks:

• -Becoming more aware of your feelings, your thoughts, and what is going on your life.
• -What minor annoyances are you focusing on?

Now I know the minor annoyances might sound silly, but when I was talking with my client about her weight loss problem that was bugging her we discussed the things that are in her life that add up over time and turn into big issues. Those small annoyances might seem insignificant at the moment, but the more we hold onto the small things that bother us, then the more they build up. That's why I'm so adamant on being deliberate on what we focus on.

I try to help people pivot from their bad feelings and emotions to more productive emotions and thoughts. It's not that you can't look at those bad things, but what I said is we must NOT FOCUS on them. And that's the key, most people don't realize that the negative emotion they are looking at actually becomes a focal point for them to target and ruminate over. We see the problem and grip too tight on the problem rather than looking more for the solution.

We get accustomed to looking at and finding the small things that bother us, and soon it gets to be a point where one small thing will ruin your day. Like someone cutting us off in traffic and wasn't paying attention to us, or how there's no coffee in the coffee pot at work, or how your coworkers are gabbing and getting on your nerves instead of doing their work, or maybe even how you just can't seem to get a break when you need one.

I'm sure you have a million things that could ruin your day. It's not that these things aren't real, but it's the power that we ALLOW them to have over us. It's as if they determine how our day will turn out. The only reason you will have a great day is if you decide to have a great day, if you decide to see the great in the moment instead of finding fault with it.

There will be outside stressors for sure, but you will be the one who decides to let those outside factors influence you, or you can become more aware and find a better truth to be excited about instead of being annoyed by one more thing on your plate. I have come to believe, and science is backing some of these ideas as well, that the more stress we have in our lives, the more we process stress negatively. The more we do that then the more issues we will have with our wellness.

And for my personal training client the issue was with fat reduction. It's my greatest belief that for her issue we need to get a better handle on her stress levels and how she processes things. Yes, we should move and eat right…but if we don't get a handle on her stress, her awareness, and her mindset to help her change in the ways she wants to...if she doesn't change the way she sees the problem, it won't matter what she does because she's teaching her body to protect itself in ways that are damaging to herself—physically, mentally, and spiritually. But this podcast is not about her, it's about you. So what are the ways you are focusing incorrectly, that are keeping you from your goals?

Maybe the only reason you aren't changing is because of how you're dealing with your stress. Not all stress is bad; it becomes bad by how we experience and process it. So maybe, just maybe, if you thought and focused differently, if you began to rid the minor annoyances in your life and re-write how they affect you…I bet you would find your goals and your health coming more easily to you…instead of always having to fight for it.

Today's Personal Commitment:

Go one whole day recording all the minor annoyances you find bother you in that day. Record each one with the time, the location, and what happened. Write down everything during your day that bothers you. If you can't write it down at that moment because you may have prying eyes asking why you were annoyed with them, just make a tally on a sheet, your phone, or some way to remind you to write it down later.

What this will do is help you see how many annoyances get to you. And it may shed some light on how those annoyances can build up into big issues in your life.

Now I know there will always be things that happen that annoy us, or that we wish didn't happen. Sometimes we can't change that fact, but we can change how we decide to respond to it. As Dr. Sapolsky said, it's not that the stressor is bad, but it's how we look things consistently that can cause the stress response to become more dangerous than the stressor itself.

I believe the things that ail us are deeper than the physical fix. If we want to lose weight, if we want to have more peace and calm in our lives, if we want to be more creative, if we want to be healthier, along with a whole list of other benefits of reducing our processing of stress…then we have to experience things differently and decide to become a different person—not let the external event control our outcomes.

So this exercise will help you become more aware, and when that happens, you can start devising plans to change your outcomes. And most importantly you will become more successful in your changes.

I See Past Minor Annoyances

Thanks for listening. I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected] phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide

Synergistic Saturdays-#434 March The Strong Within Daily Affirmation Podcast

I Am Committed To Creating Excellence

I wanted to do something a little different today. I was thinking about what were the things I learned from doing this podcast, so I created a list of ten things that happened by me taking a leap of faith in this endeavor. It was the act of jumping knowing that I was going to fail in many areas, but I was willing to learn from those failures and be excited instead of afraid of looking foolish. I've learned a lot from this journey, and I hope to continue to keep learning.

So let me share the Top 10 things I learned by doing this podcast:

1. Sometimes all you need to do is pull the trigger. The exhilaration of reaching people trumps the fear of not doing it right. Making mistakes made me better, and being willing to make mistakes made me see that my fears were more imaginary than real.
2. It made me realize that I had more stories and ideas than I thought. We all think that we are boring and that nothing cool happens in our lives. I think that all the time, but by doing this podcast it made me look back at my life, to be aware of the great things are happening every day. It's opened my eyes to appreciate things more. It's helped me see that the smallest seemingly insignificant things in my life are really powerful and beautiful reminders about how amazing life really is. By challenging myself to do this podcast it has made me have to be more creative. It has made me have to be more awake in my life.
3. I have to be all in to see the results I want. It's easy to put your foot in the door halfway hoping it works out. But I've forgotten that making a difference is not just trying something, but committing to something. There's more to this podcast than just a rant or small snippets of info. I created a short podcast so people could start their day off on the right foot in a digestible way to help them change for the better. I decided to do this podcast to put value in the world, and if I'm half-assing it…I'm doing a disservice to myself and others. By doing this podcast I've learned how to commit to a higher belief and more worthwhile outcome.
4. I'm reminded constantly that sadness and pain aren't bad; in fact it helped me to transform. I went through a rough time in my life before the creation of this, but I set my mind to a goal of what I wanted which was to finally stop stalling and create a podcast. My movement took my mind off the pain and helped me transform that suffering into growth and joy by creating something beautiful. The podcast helped me to connect deeper with myself and with others in a way I never thought possible.
5. What we put out into the world is not about perfection; it's about learning. I get stressed trying to make every podcast perfect, which is great that I want it to be the best, but I get so stressed focusing on perfection that it adds pressure and stifles my future creativity. By focusing on perfection, I try to force instead of allowing great things to happen. All I need to do is sit down and put in the time to allow great ideas to come to me.
6. I was reminded about collaboration not isolation. By putting my mistakes out there, people collaborated with me to help make it something better than I could've on my own. The mistakes connected me, instead of isolating me. It brought people closer to me as they wanted to help me make something better. They gave me suggestions which I was grateful for, and so it no longer was just mine…but it became ours.
7. It reminded me about the value I am to the world. We live in a world where we can feel invisible, we can feel forgotten, and we can feel insignificant. And by doing this podcast, people have emailed me and let me know how it's helped them in ways I never imagined. I thought people would listen to it by themselves, but I've had husbands and wives listening to it on their morning routine of getting ready for the day. I've had families contact me and let me know their whole family listens to it together. And that still totally baffles me. It's quite a humbling experience thinking that not only one person is getting something from my podcast, but many people in the same household are. It makes me think of that saying—being humble isn't thinking less of yourself, it's thinking less about yourself. And by doing this podcast it reminded me that I have a great purpose and message to share with the world, just like you do. And doing this every day has reminded me about the things I'd forgotten. It has reminded me I am enough, and I have something left to share with people…as you do to.
8. It's made me have to be more deliberate with my schedule and time. This takes a lot of my time out of my day to do this. It can be stressful, but it's made me commit to finishing something. And there have been nights where I was up till 2 am so I could get it out on time. It's made me be committed to what I said I was going to do, and it's made me committed to serving you in the best way that I can. So, yes it's teaching me about commitments, and it's making me realize how much more efficient I need to be with my time management.
9. It's made me more consistent with living my word. It's easy to tell people what they need to do, but by doing this podcast it's reminded me not just to be a talking head. It's reminded me to live what I speak. Sure I fail at times, and I'll fail many more times. But by doing this podcast, it's continually reminding me to ask more of myself. I sometimes find myself asking this…"Chris you asked your listeners to do this…are you willing to do it too, or are you faking things?" So all of you are my accountability partners whether you know it or not, so thank you.
10. It makes me re-believe in myself every day. I know this may sound silly to some as I've done over 400 consecutive daily podcasts so far, but every day I still question whether can I write another word, or whether I can find another story to tell, or whether I can create something good again. And somehow, something good always happens if I just sit down and write. If I commit to the act of being patient in being consistent with sitting down and being willing to find something to talk about no matter what. I am always surprised after I finish creating a podcast, and it feels like it wasn't even me anymore, as I connected to something deeper than just myself.

So there you have it. 10 lessons from stepping out of my fear and committing to doing this podcast. Before the creation of the podcast I spent so much time trying to make things perfect, trying not to do podcasting wrong, being in fear of looking foolish, along with a whole lot of other fears. And sot I wasted two years of my life being afraid instead of just jumping in. They say everything that we want is just right out of our comfort zone. So, what if you were to step out of your comfort zone a little more each day and do the things that scare you? How different would your life be?

I know this podcast has done great things for my life, and I know I'll continue to see more great things by staying consistent with it. I had to jump, I had to pull the trigger, I had to do it afraid…and I was rewarded for being willing to fail. So I am reminding all of us, because I need to hear this all the time too:

When you jump in, willing to fail, you will be rewarded with things you could've never imagined. By giving up trying to be perfect, you will be giving up the fear of looking foolish. Because we all look foolish when we first start something, but with practice and effort to become better we become something we never even dreamed of…just because we decided to ask a little more from ourselves.

Today's Personal Commitment:

What's something you have been procrastinating on? And what if you were to start? Maybe you might have your 10 best things happen to you because you stopped waiting and took action.

And while you think or look at what new endeavor you want to start that you've procrastinated on, look at something you committed to and write your own top 10 list of things you've learned. You might just be reminded about the awesome things that have happened by you taking a leap of faith on yourself.

I Am Committed To Creating Excellence

Thanks for listening. I'm sending great energy your way as we become Strong Within together, Personal Development Life Coach- Chris O'Hearn

Contact info- email: [email protected] phone:865-219-3247

Music by: - Zest by basematic (c) copyright 2011 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. - I Have Often Told You Stories (guitar instrumental) by Ivan Chew (c) copyright 2013 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (3.0) license. Location: Knoxville, Tennessee USA but available worldwide