The Secret To Handle Any Circumstance with Ben Gibson

Welcome to Shrink for the Shy Guy. This is the show for you. If you are sick and tired of being held back by fear, self doubt, social anxiety, shyness, anything that's stopping you from you being you, I'm going to share the most powerful tools and resources that I've been discovering over the last 15 years on my journey to eradicate social anxiety and instill confidence, first in myself and then in every single person that I meet on my journey. You're going to learn these tools and how to apply them in your life now so that you can become the most free, powerful, bold, authentic version of you.

Welcome.

Today's episode of this show. I'm excited because not only are we going to talk about an aspect of confidence that can really open up really every area of your life, because whether it's your dating life, your career, your social confidence, day to day confidence, one of the biggest challenges we face is setbacks, hesitations, fluctuations in our own motivation, certainly big changes in the world around us that might seem like major obstacles. And, you know, you're going to learn. How do we roll with that? How do we navigate that? How do we stay consistent and motivated and energized in the face of anything that occurs in life? So not only is that exciting, what's even more exciting is it's not just you and me talking. It is you, me, and a dear friend and a coach on my team, Ben Gibson. Welcome, Ben.

Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Aziz. It is such a pleasure and joy to be here with you again. I love every conversation that we get to share.

Likewise, man. In fact, that's one of the impetuses for this episode, is there's many conversations that you and I have. And for those of you who don't know, Ben is someone I've known for many years, and he works with me. He's a coach on my team. He helps people with confidence, but he's also someone that I turn to when I'm experiencing a challenge in my own confidence. And I just get to experience Ben's gifts firsthand, which is something I'm extremely grateful for. But there's a certain place that we find ourselves when he's helping me with some challenge or issue I'm facing. And it's a place of high confidence that he'll help me get back to. But maybe in a different way than you might think. It's not necessarily like, yeah, Ziz, you're going to crush it and you're going to win and nothing's going to stop you. It's not that much of a battle rally cry. It's something much different. And that's not excluded, but it's part of it. It's part of it. But really what we find ourselves to is a greater place of surrender and of submission to the flow of life. So let's open up that conversation and maybe, Ben, I'll see what you think about that. If someone's like, surrender, submission, like, what does that mean? And how does that actually help me with my confidence? What are your thoughts about that?

To me, confidence has far less to do with my ability to control the environment or circumstances and everything to do with how I respond in whatever circumstances or environment I find myself in right now. No matter what happens to me, I can't always control what happens to me. I can have an influence on it, but the one thing that I can control is my response. How do I react? What do I do in this place? And from this perspective, confidence is confidence in my. My ability to respond, to, first of all, handle whatever is coming my way. And that stems from the belief that I can handle this. This nothing that comes my way is too much for me to handle. And when I have that belief instilled, and it's a. It's a safe belief to acquire, because up until now, I have been able to handle every single thing that has come my way.

Yeah, yeah. That's a powerful relieving source of confidence, if you can just let that in right now. And, you know, there's different ways to say it. One is, I can handle anything that comes my way or anything that happens. Another way that I'll get to that, that sort of bedrock of confidence is any problem that arises I can face and address. Because that's so much of our fear. It can be like some, quote, problem from the future is going to get me.

Yes.

And another place, a way that I get to that is also knowing. And this, you know, we learned from one of our mutual teachers, Christian Michaelson. His phrase was, all of our fears are fears of feelings. And I believe that to be true in my experience, what I've seen with others. And so then I say, okay, if all my fears are fears of feelings, I can handle any feeling. Yes, I can be with any feeling. And therefore, if I can be with any feeling, then I can handle any circumstance, any problem, any situation, any results. And I think that's an important thing to look at because I think most people, I certainly didn't have that confidence that I could handle any feeling for much of my life. It felt like, oh, my God, I hope there's certain feelings don't happen because I can't handle those. And let's explore that for a minute. Let's say someone's listening and they're like, handle any feeling. Well, I don't know about that. How do we increase our capacity to handle feelings?

I don't know. I can't relate to that at all. Sorry, I couldn't hold very long on that. Of course I'm being facetious. I lived most of my life in the same way. Aziz, that fear of feelings. Yes. And for me, that still crops up from time to time, too. How you know that? That question? Well, am I going to be able to handle this? This feels like it's too much. And sometimes it's even subconscious where I find myself averting or like avoiding a circumstance, a person, a conversation, whatever it may be. And I ask myself, why? Wait, why am I doing this? And it ultimately comes down to I'm trying to avoid an uncomfortable feeling. But. Feelings are great things, and it is. I don't know how to. The best. The most effective help that I have found is first recognizing that I have been able to survive every single circumstance that has come my way so far. And it's like, okay, yeah, but what about the ones that I can't survive? Well, I believe that even when my time of death comes, as it will come for all of us, I will be able to handle that, too.

And since we're on that subject, for myself, I see that as a responsibility, just like I would see showing up, you know, with awareness and an open heart and love with my kids or my family or other people. It's a responsibility. And, you know, we might fall short or it might be a challenge or might be hard at times, but that's what I. That's a healthy standard that I hold myself to, not from a place of perfectionism, but just from a place of wanting to be the person that I'm. That I know I can be and who I'm here to be.

Yeah.

And I think one aspect of that is death. And I know this might be taking a left turn for some folks. Like, I thought we were talking about social anxiety.

Wait a minute.

Let's talk about your death. But I do think that how we handle that sort of ultimate fear or can be an ultimate fear, certainly the end of what we know in this plane, in the shape and form that it takes, that can be the highest level of uncertainty for people and a much smaller uncertainty is what's going to happen if I speak up in this meeting or what's going to happen if I approach that person, or what's going to happen if I let someone know me in this moment and be seen without some facade. Those are all smaller risks, smaller steps into uncertainty. And I think that we can be so resistant to any sort of loss, any sort of pain, and ultimately, the idea of death and death, not just for ourselves, but those around us, like, it's all bad, it's all wrong, shouldn't be happening, even though it's inevitable. It's kind of this strange insanity. And I really believe that there's. And I know a lot of cultures, actually there is more of a focus on preparation for your own death and not just like, you know, monetarily and with your estate and all that. I mean, emotionally. And how do you approach this transition so that you can step into it and ultimately say yes to it? Which I think is the theme that we're talking about here, of surrender and submission and say yes, yes, yes to everything. And you brought it all the way out to, like, the end, right? To death or the end of this chapter, in any case. And it's like, okay, so we can say yes to that. You know, can we say yes to someone not liking you?

Exactly. Because this is. It's. I find it useful at times to test beliefs against the extremes. It may seem like a left turn real quick, but ultimately it's just taking this to the very extreme. If it is true that I can handle whatever feeling arises, does that apply to the most extreme circumstances? And I choose to believe yes. And ultimately, one way that I see these extreme or intense feelings that we experience throughout life. Why is there a part of us that resists or runs away from or fight? You know, where does fight or flight or freeze response come from? It comes from a desire to avoid or at least prolong my encounter with death. Mm. And so all of our fears, in one sense, it's like, why do I not. Why do I avoid rejection? Why do I not want to speak up? Why do I not want to speak out? Why do I not want to interact with somebody or be vulnerable? It's because maybe I'll be rejected. And if I'm rejected, then I will be ostracized from society. And if I'm an outcast, then I'm going to die a lonely death. Ultimately, all of these fears kind of lead back to. Because I'm going to die.

Yeah. You know, that's really fascinating. I remember I was in a training program with Christian, and there was this I had so much fear about doing any sort of sales for business and putting my services out there and offering coaching and offering groups and offering programs and all this stuff that I put out there that I know can help.

People benefit massively from.

Yeah. And I was like, that is bad.

That's right.

Because I'm afraid of rejection. I'm afraid of not just the rejection of them saying no, it was also, and even more so the rejection of them saying no. And I don't like you. I don't like you because you are offering me something. I don't like you because you want to charge money. I don't. Whatever it is. And I remember I was doing this in depth exploration with it with Sarah Amna, who's amazing, by the way. She was a guest on the show a while back and we basically were going into the Feeling. And for those of you who are unsure of, like, how do you be with the feeling? You know, there's many different names for it. Christian called it the peace process. Other people call it somatic tracking. But basically you, when the feeling is arising, you bring your attention and your awareness towards it, as opposed to trying to run away into your head, to distractions, to substances, to anything. You say, I'm going to turn towards it. You say yes to it being there. And then you get really curious, like, what is it? Where do I feel it? And this sounds so simple, but it's so. I mean, just not that long ago, I was doing an impromptu coaching session with Ben, which is basically me messaging Ben in some way, being like, help. And then we have a conversation, and in it, you know, I'm feeling a lot of fear. And sure enough, Ben's like, let's, like, where is that fear in your body? Let's feel it. And I know this tool, and yet I didn't fully turn and use it without the support of someone else. So I think that's so key. This isn't about being perfect or being able to do this totally on our own. I believe that the support of others helps. And the same thing with Sarah helping me with my fear of sales. And we spent like 45 minutes straight. What if someone says no to you? What do you feel in your body? And it's like, oh, God, my chest, my stomach, I'm dying. And then I kept going further and further.

You're death again, right?

Death, Right. And this is where made me think of this story is actually the focusing on that, focusing on, focusing on it. All of a sudden I just started to feel all these Feelings of vulnerability. I just had my. My Saeem. My first son was born and we were. Yeah, he was probably about a year old. We didn't even have my second son here with us yet. So he was a year old. Candace, my wife. And it was basically this intense feeling of vulnerability about if something were to happen to them, if they were to get sick and die, how I could not handle that, I could not feel. That was my story. And I was like, this is related to sales. Like, what? And I think it highlights what you're talking about, like all these kind of fears. It seems so far away, these things like death and vulnerability and painful feelings. But some part of us is aware that that stuff's potential. It's potential right now. The people that you love could not be here tonight. And we're like, oh my God, I don't want to think about that. And not that you need to spend, you know, all day, every day focusing on that, but speaking about death all the time, right? What you're thinking about lover, your death.

Right?

But we want to be able to go there when needed, as these feelings arise so that we truly can have that sense of I can handle. So let me.

Confidence, peace and surrender, Which is what you started this by asking about, that. That is the topic that you mentioned to begin with, this concept of surrender.

So what do you say when it comes to feelings or anything else? Like when I say surrender, what does that mean to you?

Great question. Surrender means I stop trying to control. When you are describing the process, peace, process, to feel the feelings, the fascinating thing about it is there is this element of surrender, like not trying to resist anymore, not trying to run away, just saying, okay, here we are. I'm just going to allow this feeling to be fully experienced within my body in this moment without trying to make it smaller, make it different, make it go away, or change it at all. I choose to experience it fully and allow it to move through me to whatever extent and in whatever manner it wants to. And that it is this strange juxtaposition of surrender where I'm giving up control. But in the same moment, in that manner, I am actually asserting the one kind of control that I actually have. I'm giving up trying to control something that I cannot control. But in doing so, I am asserting the one control that I do have, rather than trying to avoid what is inevitable, what is moving through me, what life is presenting to me right now. Instead of resisting that, I choose my response to what is here. Okay, it is here. And I'm just Going to live it fully, this moment, these feelings, this experience. I'm going to live it fully. And that surrender, in a strange way, it actually means that I am no longer being controlled by my feelings. Through surrender, I reassert control. It's this very interesting, seemingly dissonant pair of concepts. But ultimately, if a feeling is pushing me, if I'm running away from a feeling, it's pushing me around. And alternatively, if I'm running toward a feeling, if I'm pursuing something sort of mindlessly or habitually, or could be an addiction of some sort, because I'm ultimately addicted to a feeling, then a feeling is pulling me around. But when I just stop and allow a feeling to be experienced, then it is no longer manipulating me. I'm no longer living my life under the control of that feeling, being either pushed or pulled. And that is real control. So in a unintuitive way, this submission to the experience I'm having right now is the ultimate way to reassert the control that I do have. And that is choosing to say yes. I can choose to say no if I want to to an experience of life, and I can also choose to say yes. And in the choosing of yes, inevitably, I also experience. And I know that you do, too. I think that this is a universal truth. When I say yes to what life is presenting to me now, then I am also opening myself to the lesson that I am meant to learn by this experience. There is a lesson, a nugget of wisdom, this hidden pearl in the circumstances presented to me. And it's only uncovered on the other side of this potentially intense or tumultuous or uncomfortable feeling. Have you experienced this?

Absolutely. I love that. And the pearl can only be harvested or received through that. I love that it says pearl and tumultuous. Makes me think of like diving. You know, you're diving into the water and you know, we need to go into the water. We need to. And that's often a symbol for feelings in our dreams and other our subconscious, right as you're going into the water, and then only by doing that can you get a glimpse of and then receive the pearl. And I think so often we can habitually judge the feelings as wrong or bad because they're unpleasant or because we don't understand them. And then if it's like, well, I want to understand it or, okay, tell me what the pearl is. I don't want to feel it. I want to stay up on the shore. Just tell me. Maybe the ocean will spit the pearl up at me. And it's like, no, you got to go in and you got to be willing to swim around for a while. I think that's a big part of it. So I fall into this still more often than I think. There's another level of growth for me where it's like, okay, I'm going to dive in. I understand that Pearl's not going to come to me. I'm going to dive in and I'm going to get that pearl real fast. I'm going to get in and out. Come on. What am I feeling? Let's feel this shit so it goes away. And, you know, there's something about this idea of surrender, or I even love the word submission because it's. It's deferring or bowing, that there might be a higher intelligence than what my left brain knows right now and what I think I want. And it should have gone this way, and I should have had this result at this time. Why? Because those are the timelines I made up. And I gotta. I gotta hit those targets or I'm not worthy or whatever is pushing us and driving us. And maybe there's something much bigger at play. Bigger, however you want to think about that. Bigger forces of cause and effect in motion of interconnectivity of all the players involved and whatever your goals and schemes and desires are, as well as something even beyond all the individual humans, beyond the beings and just the embedded into the web or the fabric or the field that is connecting everything and perhaps being guided by something or finding, following something. And what if what you're feeling is exactly what you're meant to be feeling right now?

What if that.

Quote, horrible thing, whichever. We can use a thousand and one words to label something as wrong. Call it bad, horrible, terrible, inappropriate, awful, traumatic, bad, a million words.

Unpleasant, unpleasant, sinful, wrong. It should not. I don't deserve it. Unrighteous, unfair. All kinds of things.

Yeah, all stacked. All. Whether we say those exact words or you have different words. It's a stance. It's like I cross my arms, I furrow my brow, and I'm now in opposition.

My foot.

Yeah, I am in opposition to the. But I'm not like a little kid in opposition to a parent's choice. I am a grown adult in opposition to the dao and the divine will and the whole force of nature and the cosmos unfolding. And it was like, no, no, no, it was a mistake. I should have gotten the job. And then we'll do this strange pseudo form of control. Because I love that you're Talking about how surrender actually allows us to have more control of what we really have control over. But the pseudo control is we fantasize about controlling ourselves so that the outcomes would be different. Like, well, if I'd just been better in that interview, if I'd just been funnier in that date, if I just been more charming there, if I just wasn't so anxious, then I would have had X, Y and Z happen. And it's this whole fantasy you create.

Yeah.

And if I just had X, Y and Z happen, then I won't have to feel this. Now I'm going to focus on either attacking myself for not being that way or figuring out how I'm going to make sure I'm that way in the future.

Yeah. And it's this whole dance, not to mention attacking other people. That stupid guy who made me stop at the stoplight because he was going too slow and I missed my. What? You know, there's a period of. There's the self approbation where I'm just flagellating myself, but there's also the. The disgust or contempt or rejection of other people because they made me experience this unpleasant feeling.

And so much certainty that the feeling is because of X.

Yes.

Because I didn't get the job, because I got rejected because of this thing. And then we have this sort of strange amnesia that we do get the thing, we do get whatever it is we want. Small outcome, big outcome. And maybe we feel a quick burst of dopamine and pleasure or something. But then the next day we're anxious again, the next day we're angry again, we have the amazing date and we feel good for a day.

And then later that day, strangely, not all of my problems magically disappeared after all. Yes.

And it's because it's not about the circumstance, it's how we are relating to it. And more specifically, I think how much are we in alignment with it? And most of us are well versed in. It's kind of like a Western, especially American. Like you align, you and reality align. And the way that happens is you bend reality to your will. That's how you get those two things to align. And I think it's the opposite. I think you in reality align because you bend your will and you bow. This is my idea. So I'll say I believe that. I think the optimal way for me to align with reality, with the way things are, with the dao, with the divine will, is to bow and to submit to it and say, yes, thank you. Yes, thank you. Even if I Don't understand why. I don't understand why this needs to be happening. But you talked about cultivating a strong sense of, I can handle whatever comes my way. I believe there's such confidence benefit and life benefit and being who we're meant to be here, benefit by cultivating a strong sense of what I would call instant surrender or instant submission. Like, yes, thank you. Okay, that's what's happening. Let me align with that as quickly as possible. And only when we're aligned with it can we then see what action we want to take, if any, what might be done about whatever the thing is you want to create. So it's not about aligning and saying, well, I didn't get that job. I'll align with that. I guess I'm an unemployable loser. That's not we're saying at all. We're saying, okay, align that you didn't get that job. Now really say yes to that. And can you feel a sense that perhaps that that was not the right time or the right place or the right experience? How do you know? Well, because it didn't happen.

Can I make this really real and vulnerable right now?

Yeah, I would love it.

While we were talking here, I recalled a conversation that you and I had just recently around the same topic of surrender and submission. And it was a beautiful conversation. And while we are sitting here talking, I remember nothing about it except that it was on that topic. And I noticed a bit of anxiety arising within me, like, okay, what was that? What was that? I'd love to. There was a desire burgeoning within me to recreate that experience. It was so beautiful, so deep, so real and applicable. I wanted to bring that back. And all I could tell was, I have no recollection of what we spoke about. I don't know how to approach it, man. What was it? What was it? What do we talk about? And it was just bound up with a sense of anxiety. And so this gave me an opportunity right now to just say, okay, this is what is. It is not coming to me, what we spoke about. And maybe this is optimal. Maybe this experience will be different from that beautiful one that we had. But this experience is the right one for now. And as I have been practicing this during our conversation, to just let go of the attachment, the desire to control myself, control my memory, bend reality to my will. I'm finding myself just opening up to, okay, what is moving through in this moment? Where is our conversation being guided right now? Can I tune in to this present moment and Go with the flow of this conversation and hear what is my part now to contribute and hear more deeply and clearly what you are saying. Instead of trying to recreate a wonderful experience, am I willing to experience the beauty and perfection of this messy moment? I love that this is a recurring experience. It's not like I don't think that I'm ever going to stop having the need to submit. I hope, however, that I will continue to be more adept and quick to surrender and submit so that this can happen, so that I can be aligned with the needs or the opportunities of this moment and step into this moment more fully, more authentically, more genuinely, more deeply and learn the lessons that are available to me here.

I love that. And that could very well be, you know, guidance for any moment, all moments. How can I more fully. In fact, let's actually turn that into our action step for today's episode. Time for action. Action, action. Your action step for today is going to be to apply what Ben was just sharing there and just even asking yourself that question. How can I more fully step into this moment? Whatever today brings, whatever time of day, you're listening to this, and maybe there's something up right now, maybe there's something in your emotional experience or something that just happened or something that's going to happen soon that you're anticipating, and maybe you're just going to see what occurs today. So whatever it's present now or you're going to experience something later each moment. What if you ask yourself, how can I bring more of myself to this moment, all of myself to this moment? How can I say yes to this moment? That's the essence of surrender and submission is just saying yes, yes to it. And the more you can bring a quality first. It might be begrudging, like, all right, fine, yes. But the more you can bring curiosity to it, huh? Remember that. That pearl analogy Ben was sharing? Like, I wonder, wonder what this is about. I wonder what the lessons are. I wonder what the message is. And then even more freedom and more liberation opens up when we can fully embrace. And even if we don't know the pearl yet, even if we hadn't gotten it yet, we know there's not just one pearl, there are thousands. And whichever one we're going to grab or which ones are going to come to us are the right ones. And so that not only is there an infinite number of beneficial gems from each moment, we don't even need to strive to grab them, just by being willing to be in that water and to align ourselves with how life is unfolding. We will receive all that we need. Thank you so much, Ben, for sharing your insights and wisdoms. Wisdoms, Multiple wisdoms, Wisdoms all over the place. Many wisdoms. I'm glad to catch them all on this topic. Always a pleasure.

Thank you so much, Dr. Z. I so glad and honored to be a part of your life, be a part of this community and all of the learning that I get from here and from every moment that life brings. Thank you so much.

Thanks for listening to Shrink for the shy guy with Dr. Aziz. If you know anyone who can benefit from what you've just heard, please let them know and send them a link to shrinkforthshyguy.com for free blogs, ebooks, and training videos related to overcoming shyness and increasing confidence, go to social confidencecenter.com.

And we will dive right in.

I will keep track of time and all that.

Well, aren't we going to do a pump up?

Oh, my gosh.

What are we doing?

All right, all right, hold on.

We're doing a pump up.

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

I'm second best or vice versa? Both.

The best. Yes, yes, yes. Together, combined is the best.

Together.

This moment is the best.

That is the truth. This moment is the best.

That is truth.

Every moment up until now has been the best.

I thought you were gonna say it was terrible compared to this moment right now.

If we were doing comparisons. No, this moment is the best for this moment. That's what I know.

The best.

The best. Just like us.

Now that's confidence. All right, here we go.

Vocal warm up. Oh, yeah.

Those sound like what the. In the old Looney Tunes cartoon when. When the wolf was, like, turned on by some singer or something. Those are the sound effects he would make. I'll send you a clip. It's legit. It's real. All right, all right, here we go. Here we go.

You ready? Drink of water. I'm ready.