The Importance of Healing and Introspection

For me, it's about that willingness to keep going. And I always try to. When I'm thinking about my life, I try to think, where did I luckily choose to keep going when I could have stopped? And if we don't recognize and honor ourselves during those times we demonstrated strength or commitment or the wherewithal to get back up, stand strong, and go at it again, then we never get stronger in our own identity. I hope you feel blessed to have this moment and this breath on this day. And today's topic is about healing and freedom. So often we have something in our past that has caused us trauma, stress, difficulty, upset, anger. And we carry it along with us. You know, we carry a lot throughout each of our weeks. And if we don't take a moment at the end of those weeks to release and reset, then what ends up happening is month over month, year over year, decade over decade, we carry all of that baggage and pain and hurt and frustration right along with us. So when I'm doing a lot of emotional freedom work or helping people heal, I always like to teach. My little framework are the four Rs. And the four Rs are just a simple way of maybe learning to think about your past in a different way, especially those moments where you wish you could let go or you still have a lot of emotional feelings or trauma bound up to it. Now, I'll share this framework here. In no guise of this being a therapy session, it is not. I'm not a therapist. I'm not a neuroscientist, I'm not a psychiatrist. I'm nothing that ends, as far as I know, in ist. So it's just a little framework I like to give in personal development, tell people conceive of how they might get to that point. Often if you know that for years you've been carrying along something or you have a trauma, you've still is holding you back. I highly recommend that we get over the stigma of mental health and you go book a therapist and start doing the work to overcome, to get back on track, to find the moments of freedom in these very seconds, to be yourself. And ultimately, I think all therapy is leading people to learning how to make better decisions for themselves, their relationships and their future. And so this is not one of those sessions. I'm just going to help you maybe take something from the past. And let's work through this for our framework to find some healing or freedom. The first R is about reframing. It's about reframing the events of our past that cause us Troubles in such a way. A reframe doesn't mean you look back that past traumatic or difficult event, and you pretend it didn't happen. When we're looking back and we're trying to heal something, a reframe says, you know what? I've probably taken from that particular event and I have framed it up as the world is unfair, things are awful. And when I think about it, the framing all around it is, why did this happen to me? That's unfair. I hate it. I won't ever heal from it. And I don't pretend that those are easy things to overcome. But I say, maybe now, as an adult, consciously, today, taking a deep breath in, we can reframe it and say, let me. Whether those things are true or whether I felt those things or not, let me reframe that event now as an opportunity. As an opportunity to decide what that event means to me. Let me reframe it as, okay, that happened. And now I'm going to, in this moment today, as a conscious adult, choose how to frame that. Am I going to frame it as that was a learning experience. Am I going to frame it as that was necessary for me to come this far? Am I going to frame it as that was useful in at least helping me become more empathetic, Compassionate understanding. Was that something that. Even if we're reframing it, it's still a challenge to overcome, to deal with. But I will do that in a positive light versus an avoidant or a hateful or a upset light. I think that's something that's powerful. It's like, okay, something happened. I'm going to choose today how I'm going to frame that. Not based on how you've judged it in the past, but today. A new frame that might be more empowering and allow you to at least look at it, at least face it, and at least try to learn from it, try to grow from it, because there's no other option. Either it's something that holds you back and blocks you forever, or you say, I'm going to learn to work through that. I'm going to learn from that, and I'm going to grow from that. And that we all know is possible. The second area is to relabel an event. You know, when an event happens to us, as, for example, when we're children or teenagers or younger in our lives, we label it based on our consciousness. At that point, we label the event ourselves, the world, and other people. We label people as good or bad. We label the world as helpful or hurtful. We label ourselves as smart or dumb, capable or incapable, worthy or unworthy, lovable or not. And those labels were often applied by a youthful, unconscious, unaware, reactive self. And those labels are labels that are not real. They were mental projections of our consciousness at that point. You know, maybe when something happens to us when we're younger, we don't have perspective to realize that it's happened to literally a billion other people on the planet. What we do is we think it only ever happened to us. And so we label ourselves as bad without realizing it's actually entirely relatable. And because it's relatable, because it's happened to others, we can also relabel it. We can choose that it wasn't something that is just us, that the events of life, no matter how traumatic, no matter how difficult, has literally happened to billions of people around the world. I have that unfortunate reality of being a life coach where I've had to share with people that they weren't the first ones to lose a child to cancer. They weren't the first ones to be mistreated or hurt or harmed or molested or abused as children. They weren't the first ones to have someone cheat on them. They weren't the first ones to go bankrupt. They weren't the first ones to make a really bad decision they regretted. They weren't the first ones to hurt somebody. That we've all done some things in the past that we weren't proud of, and some things in the past have happened to us that we wish hadn't. But maybe we can relabel it as a conscious adult now. We can relabel that fight of yesterday to mean something different. Because yesterday you called your spouse an evil, awful, terrible, worst person on the planet. Today, maybe with some perspective, they don't deserve that label. Maybe that's a grace you can give yourself or others. The third idea to move through this process would be to release, to release the tension, the emotion, the harm, the hurt that we carry with us. As you know, I teach the release meditation technique, which is literally a mantra based meditation where you repeat the word release with the goal of releasing the tension in your body and the thoughts in your mind. And I believe as a practice, when you do that every day, which I do usually two sessions each day, maybe 10 minutes each, where I just release all the tension in my body, release the thoughts coming to my mind. I practice, I practice, I practice, I still work on it. And ultimately you learn not to hold on to old thoughts, old feelings, old emotions. That are no longer here in the moment. Not always easy, but always required. And the last idea here is to remember. To remember all the strengths and the good things above and beyond those things we disliked, we were hurt for and we hated. To remember what and who we are. To remember our future. To remember our dreams. To remember all those things we have done that have been good. To remember all the graces and the kindnesses other people have extended to us. To remember the opportunities in front of us. To really take a moment, to be mindful with all the good things and all the opportunities that hold in the future versus being stuck back in the past where we remember the traumas, the difficulties. No. Remember the bright side. Remember the more bigger truth that there's a next chapter ahead. To remember that you're stronger than you think. To remember the future holds good things to you. To remember each day you get to wake up and now choose your attitude. To remember each day you get to wake up and now choose your behavior. To remember that there's so many blank pages ahead that you can make new decisions, new choices. To remember that journey of growth, it doesn't end, but to remember that it can begin each day. To remember that so much is available to us in this world if we can get out of our own way and release some of the things from the past and live here gratefully, optimistically, confidently, ready to serve, ready to start again. To ready to make our difference. To remember that every day is a great day to grow. Hey guys, it's Brandon. I'm jumping in here real quick. First, I want to make sure you've gone to progressmode.com to join the newsletter because I have a resource for you related to this episode and I have an upcoming meetup with my private group, Ultra. If you've ever liked to be in a private group with me where I help you get more progress towards your passion projects or to build your business or your brand in a bigger way. Just go to progressmo.com, click on Private Group to apply to see you can get into Ultra and we can take it to the next level by getting in person and meeting up virtually once a month online as well. Just go to progressmode.com so today why don't we take on that topic of introspection? You know, obviously so much of our work in personal development is to gain greater self awareness and we do that by looking within. We always teach people here there's two things that change your life. Either something new comes into your life, right? A new Opportunity, a new person, a new thing. Something new comes in and it shifts how you do things, how you think of things. It's that moment where because fate, destiny, luck, universe, God, introduce something new into your life, you forever changed your course. But there's also another way to change your life, and that is something new doesn't come from without, but something new comes from within. And the way that we access what is within is we learn to become more introspective, more mindful about who we are, how we operate in the world, what we feel, what we need, what our intentions are and what we hope for in our lives and the lives of our families and those who we strive with. And so I'd like to share four ideas for you today on introspection. Because people ultimately, at the end of the day, I can say, hey, go journal on this topic or score yourself in these habits or take these challenges or share with the community, but if they don't make you look more deeply within, then we're not doing enough by ourselves in our own personal development work. Of course you've been given the tools in the past, of course you've read the books, of course you've watched the courses, of course you've done the work of personal development in the past. But it really takes reflection, time alone, thinking about our own thoughts. And I really encourage you to spend that time every day, whether that's your meditation, your prayer, sitting in silence, journaling, whatever it takes to look within every single day so that you start to understand yourself and peel away all the layers to discover that authentic truth, that genuine soul within, I think that's the work. And so when people ask me, well, how do you do introspection, what do you like to think about? Well, at a casual level, I like to think about four things. First, when I'm being self reflective, when I'm thinking internally about who I am and about my life, I think a lot of introspection comes down to thinking about my attitude. Attitude, one of the most important topics in all of personal development, because we all learned from Viktor Frankl, in Man's Search for Meaning, the last of the human freedoms is the ability to choose one's own attitude. And if you have never read Man's Search for Meaning from Viktor Frankl, I encourage you to do that because his survival of the Holocaust and his reflections and his writing about how human beings find meaning even in the most difficult of moments, even the most atrocious of times can be really instructive to all of us. And it's one of the most popular and highly recommended books in personal development's history by all other self help and self improvement and, and psychologists. And I really, really encourage you to read it. But that that profound insight, the last of the human freedoms, is the ability to choose one's own attitude. So when I think about my life, when I'm being introspective, I also, I often think about that, huh, how's my attitude been? What was my attitude like when something happened that I didn't like? What's my attitude like when things are going good? What's my attitude like when I had that difficult conversation? What's my attitude like when this thing happened? And more importantly, have I been choosing my attitude? Have I been intentional about that? Have you? You've probably heard me teach in the past the concept of bringing the joy, that I want to be a blessing to other people's lives and I want to bring good energy into the world. And so that in every situation I choose my attitude and I choose to bring the joy to the situations of my life, I choose to bring the joys when that camera turns on, I choose to bring the joy. When it's dinner time, I just try to choose and adopt a great attitude and a great energy so that I can be living my life from an intentional place, but also a positive place. So I think about my attitude a lot. Another thing I think about a lot is the labels I apply to times, events, people, circumstances, the situations of life. You know, the labels of good or bad, the labels of hurtful or helpful, the labels of different or similar, the labels that we cast to others in our judgments or our stereotypes, the labels that I apply to myself when I fail or when I succeed, the labels that I apply to my family members, to my friends, to my team. We're such a judgmental species. And being aware that often judgments happen through the plastering of a label on things, you know, it's like our mental projection is like putting post it notes on everyone's forehead and labeling them. That's what we do in our social relationships. And so I always think about that. How do I label today? Good day, bad day, when that thing didn't go right, how do I label it? Because obviously our labels lead to what our attitudes over a period of time. And so getting the root cause of how I'm naming things and categorizing things, how I'm acting from my biases or my judgments or my privileges to decide that I'm so holier than thou that I can tell people who they are or tell them what to do, or judge their behavior because it might be different than mine. All of these things can lead to a lot of pain. And so I'm always thoughtful. It's like, how do I label that? Another thing I think about a lot is my. What old school psychologists would call like my defense mechanisms. When do I feel defensive? When do I shut down? When do I close off? When do I shut out others? When do I seek to protect my heart? When do I get in my ego and get in defensive arguments just because? When am I defending myself so that I can feel safe or welcome or that I can feel smart or superior? When do I feel defensive? Throughout the day, I'm constantly thinking about that. When I'm doing my self reflection and my journal. Last part is I think about where I have, I guess, for lack of a better word, the ability to persist. Meaning I think about the times when I could have quit, the times when I could have stopped, the times I could have drowned in my own pools of pessimism. And I try to go, okay, what were those moments that I kept going when I could have stopped? And I try to label those as positive. I try to keep my good attitude when I want to stop. I try to not be too defensive and fail to recognize the learnings so I can keep proceeding. For me, it's about that willingness to keep going. And I always try to. When I'm thinking about my life, I try to think, where did I luckily choose to keep going when I could have stopped? Because in that time I probably demonstrated some commitment, some resilience, maybe even some courage. And I try to give myself credit. I try to pat myself on the back, just not out of an ego play, but a little bit out of just honoring those difficult times when you keep going. Because sometimes the people around you might not see it, they might not understand it, they might not know how many days you've shown up, how hard you've worked, what your good intentions have been. And if we don't recognize and honor ourselves during those times we demonstrated strength or commitment or the wherewithal to get back up, stand strong and go at it again, then we never get stronger in our own identity. Because you know what all these things do, the labels you apply to things, your attitude, how you defend yourself, how you keep going or honor or recognize yourself when you do, those all do start to shape your identity. How you perceive yourself, how you perceive yourself in this world, how you perceive others, how you perceive your future, and being aware of these things is just helping you pass through that first gate of personal development, which, as you know, is awareness. Just being more aware to your attitudes and your labels, your defenses and those times that you carried on, you persisted. Be more aware of those, journal about those, capture those. Often I just start journaling on anything, what happened during that day, how I'm feeling, what I need, capturing some ideas about life or quote I heard. And I just use my journal as my catch all for thoughts about life or things I like. And I don't know how you're using them, but I hope once in a while you do spend a few moments going within and thinking about how you've been living your life. Because it's about capturing those things. It's about thinking about the topics we talked about today that you become more introspective. And I think if we had more people who just took a beat to think about how they were living and thinking, thinking and operating in the world, we'd have more conscious people. And we know when you're more conscious, more aware of your own thoughts, more aware and in touch with your authentic self and feelings, you tend to be more empathetic and more compassionate to others. You tend to be a better leader. You tend to be happier. And I think that's an absolutely critical thing. I think that at the end of the day, if each of us can help someone around us grow and grow in whatever way is important for them in their lives. Not the way we label it, not because we think they should change, but rather we want to give them the opportunity to grow. We want to open up that gate for them to walk through on their own into higher levels of self awareness and self mastery. Because when they do that, we know their lives could change. We know they can learn what we talk about every day here. Every day is a great day to grow.