129: Penney & Jenny Show—Why Do We Hesitate to Be Much More of Ourselves?

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Hello everybody. Welcome back to the Penny and Jenny Show. This is our third episode in our most recent series, but we actually have a whole album length of interviews and conversations that we've done together now. So a few link reminders before we jump into the meat of today's conversation, which is around why do we hesitate to be much more of ourselves? We are going to talk about fears and then how to overcome these limitations. Quick link reminders if you want to listen to all of the episodes that Penny and I have done together, visit pivotmethod.compjshow if you want the show notes from this episode, including another awesome free handout that goes with the convers, you can always visit pivotmethod.com podcast to get the show notes for each episode, including a transcript and any kind of handout or resource if there is one. I'm trying to do more and more of those these days, and for the next episode in our series, Penny and I want to hear from you. We would love to do a listener Q and A episode. So to submit a question for us on with this conversation or any of the other ones in our series, head on over to pivotmethod.com ask. You can le a very brief voice note for us and then we'll be sure to cover that in our next conversation. Without further ado, Penny, welcome back.

Hello. Hello.

I'm so happy that you suggested this topic for our next conversation. You said, why do we hesitate to be more of ourselves? It's as if we're afraid of our own self. And that's so true.

Isn't it crazy? But I wonder sometimes if I do hear people say occasionally that, you know, I don't know what myself is and may I won't like it, or there'll be stuff in there that I'll find out about that I don't want to know. Whereas to me, the self is like the good stuff. It's the magical, wonderful, fun, joyful part of us that we've kind of forgotten about.

But I suppose in order to get there, we do have to go through some of that little fear level obstruction.

And maybe that's what they're talking about. I don't know.

It feels like there's certain fear of when I think about, oh, my fullest expression, sometimes I'll have the fears, well, what if people don't like it? Or what if whatever I had built before or what got me here won't get me there? And then there's this other weird thing that comes up around hesitating to be more of ourselves, at least for me, which is sometimes I don't know what it is. It's so weird. It's like that saying that it's right underneath your feet. And I certainly talk about that in Pivot as well, that oftentimes we look back on choices and we think the answer is so obvious in hindsight. And sometimes for me it's. It's that aspect of myself that others can probably see it more clearly than me. Like, oh, well, Jenny, obviously your podcast is about X, Y and Z. And then I would know, okay, great, I'll do even more of that. But sometimes I don't. It's hard to see it when we're. We're the one running the show and trying to better understand ourselves and then overcome any fears to express that truest self.

Yes. And also there's part of that left brain way of being that wants to see it in the future already formed and, you know, settled. You know, like, it's like I'm not going to do it until I can totally see what the final form is going to be like. And then I have to do it all at once to get to that final form instead of taking just the next step. That feels just right, you know, and that's part of it, I think, is we sometimes project ahead too much to try to get a big vision that's, you know, safe and formed and secure. And, you know, it doesn't work like that often, you know, and that can block you from just taking the next step. But, yeah, I mean, we started thinking about, you know, as you start to think about what is much more of myself, you know, I think it goes a couple ways. One is internally, if I became more enlightened or more of my soul, how might my life change? But I don't think that many people think of that part as the first thing. I think more. They think of how much more will I have to do?

More will I have. Will I be richer? Will I solve the energy crisis or something.

And set these huge goals out there ahead of us and then think, well, am I ever going to be able to do that?

So I think when we think of what is more of ourselves, it's about setting goals for high achievement.

And that can be almost like an automatic block to the flow of energy.

It's so interesting that sometimes it's setting goals that are too big. And I can so relate to what you said, feeling that the whole vision has to be realized. In fact, Michael and I were just talking about this today, that perfectionism gets in the way of creating because we already think about the work to be sold or the work to build an audience, and it kind of cuts ahead or cuts out many of the steps in between that would be creating something for the joy of it, which is what would ultimately lead to better outcomes. So there's that too bigness, and then there's also a too smallness that comes in. So you brought up the notion that sometimes we worry that we're too big or too much for people and that we learned somewhere along the road not to Be too loud or. Or to be good or to fit in. And that out of that fear of rejection, we make ourselves smaller and stop using our imagination. Can you say more about that?

Well, yeah. I mean, I think maybe it's more true for women, I don't know or not, but.

That we were trained to be polite and not alienate others. You know, don't be selfish, don't take opportunities away from others, be generous. But also, if you're too big or too loud or you take up a lot of space and then people think you're dominating, that you're not just a colorful, expressive person, that it's not good to do that. And we have. This is a cultural thing, I think, you know, because I wonder who's the.

People think, you know, even in that statement, people think you're too loud. Who are these people?

Right. But then you get people who are like, I don't know why John Belushi comes into my mind. Or people who are like really big energies, and they let themselves do that, and they became wealthy because of it. And because their talent flowed on the amount of scope they allowed themselves to take up, you know, that they somehow allowed themselves to have that kind of intensity.

And their abilities flowed upon that level, you know, and often when you don't try to fit in and you allow yourself to be a little bit of a misfit, then you can be more individualistic and you can find your own talents and you can find your own way a little easier, and that allows you then to expand and grow. But when we're afraid to. Was it Marianne Williamson said we're playing too small or something?

If we're trying to fit in, a lot of times we'd fit in by feeling miserable with each other, you know, like complaining, oh, yeah, man, that was really bad, you know, and I don't feel good. Me neither.

And so we keep our frequency level pretty low. And I think a lot of that is that we're just afraid of rejection. But then, you know, the flip side of rejection is individuality.

Right. Well, that brings to mind even the notion of transparency, because those big people you described, you said John Belushi. I was thinking of Jim Carrey, even someone that's so outrageously bold, but they're also outrageously themselves. Although as the words are coming out of my mouth, even Jim Carrey said in a recent documentary on Netflix that he felt often that he was wearing a mask and that he was wearing a mask to society, and that actually this was a big Persona. But I think Somewhere in there is his innate joyful personality. And there's the quote from the Gospel of Thomas attributed to Jesus. If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you.

Yes.

And it seems like there's for so many of us, a push and pull of I feel not fully expressed or my lights dim or I'm yearning. We have this yearning, this urge to create and be more of ourselves and be more transparent, as your most recent book talks about. And then that transparency is what would differentiate us. It is what would make us unique, what would make us stand out, what almost makes people irresistible to others. I mean, why are the Kardashians so popular? In some way, they pioneered the transparency. Although of course, we all know reality TV is very constructed at the same time. Yeah.

But it's also a certain kind of audacious quality. And I think there's a fine line here between allowing yourself to be big and loud or and good even. That comes from a need for love out of feeling that I was deprived of it and nobody approved of me. So I'll show them. You know, I'm going to go out and do the outrageous thing and I'm going to get known for it and be successful because of it. And still that's not a real healing. Maybe it's a step in the right direction.

You know, it shows you that you could be more of who you are than other people thought you could be.

That seems like the difference between what you're saying is really the purpose behind the transparency. So if the purpose is attachment, attachment to approval, success, money, fame, that's where things do tend to fall apart. But if the goal in our transparency is my goal is to be more of myself every day, what would that look like? That that goal may come with some ancillary benefits and most likely would, but that you can't pursue it for those reasons.

Right. Yeah. And I think in order to find out what the self really is, of course, we have to go onto a bit of a spiritual path to stop our identification with the ego and the left brain or with other people's value systems or belief systems, you know, we have to start to separate from those things, to find out what we are without all the clutter and accoutrement around us, you know.

And like I said, rejection is more of an experience. If you go into it of first it feels like isolation, then it starts to feel like spaciousness. Where in that Spaciousness, you can find being, and in the beingness you find soul. And you feel the self there. And that kind of never ending loving observation of the world and an enjoyment of creativity and that childlike quality, actually that's at the core and compassion and wisdom. But you've got to kind of stop all the outside behaviors. And.

You know, and so I think that when we hesitate to be more of ourselves, a lot of times it's that we just forgot that we could be more of ourselves. You know, that we forgot that we had an imagination, that we could use it to pick more things to be, that we could think up other things that didn't necessarily make logical sense. You know, that's why I'm always fascinated by people who have lives where they jump from thing to thing or they become this and then they turn into that and then they go off to this way and then they do that. And there's not necessarily a logical thread that connects all the things, because to me, that feels like it's a very interesting kind of life pattern and freedom that they've granted themselves. Yes.

And then in a way, and I've seen this a lot with pivot, there's a certain personality type that not only do they always seek out something new and very, very different, but they, they kind of become known for that. So then the thing of being who they really are isn't actually attached to an activity or a job title. It's that who I am is someone who's not afraid to constantly change and try on new things.

Yeah.

I am curious, Penny, if you've ever had issues, I doubt you have as many of them now because I don't get this impression from you around people pleasing. Because I found this is something I've had to work on for a long time now, and I've gotten much better at it. But one thing that gets in the way of me being more fully myself is thinking about, well, what do others want me to be? And even in this moment, if someone asks me a favor, it's like, well, what do they want? What do they need? And it's my go to. My first response is, who is this person asking me to be? Or what are they asking me to do? And how can I please them? Give a pleasing response. And in small examples, I've gotten much better. You know, I'll. If I don't, if I'm not going to make the time for something, that's, it's no problem. But it, it gets more subtle among close friends or family or things Where I don't want to disrupt the balance here we're coming back to rejection. It's a long way of asking the question, but sometimes that gets in the way. If I'm really myself, if I'm really honest and I say no or I'm not interested, maybe it comes across as rude or there's a guilt that comes in.

Yeah.

I think that I have a little of that. It has to do a lot with not wanting to hurt people.

And then over the years, having learned that there are ways that I can say what works for me. Not that what you're saying is not any good, it's just that that's just not working right now for me. And thanks for offering, but I think that. That people pleasing or, I don't know, sensing others a lot like that is such a great skill for developing intuition. You know, I never thought about it that way.

That's the reframe I've heard yet.

Yeah. And then it's really then about the next step beyond that is realizing that each person's life pattern, they know what they're doing. They do. They will bring experiences into their life as they need them, and they'll notice them as they need them. And if they can't use them, they won't even hear you if you tell them anything. And so you have to trust that and then trust yourself. When you really feel like offering something, go ahead and offer it. It's not going to hurt anybody. If they don't like it, they won't take it. You know, But I've really learned not to try to jump in and change somebody or save them or anything because they, I think deep down souls know what they're doing. And. And yes, we can get stuck and stalled and all of that on various fixations and blocking behaviors, but even the most blocked person will find a way to get through to themselves some sort of shocking experience or whatever it is. Or somebody suddenly says something and they get it all a big aha, you know, so. And I've seen that happen. So I do sense that all is, you know, all is working. Eventually, you know, it's all working.

But what about comparison? So there's people pleasing, looking at another person and saying, how can I? How can I please you? How can I get you to like me? And then there's comparison where we're social animals. So especially with social media, it can be really easy to see what other people are doing and say, okay, well, forget this being myself path I was on. I should be more like this Or. Or there's a part of our. Even if it's our true nature or our soul that is magnetized by something or someone and in a way pulls us in a positive way, saying, hey, this is possible for you. And then there's another piece of it that gets added on, that's that we. We forget ourselves in that. The light of another person. What's been your experience or your journey on comparison?

Yes. And it goes the other way too, because there are things that I can't stand to be around and I don't want to be like this person, you know, and it can be a repulsion as well as an attraction. What I find with that is that this is a way actually as a strategy to become more of ourselves. A really strange one. But when you notice something in another person that you really like a lot or it. You think, gee, look at how they're doing that. I mean, you do that. I've thought of that about you. Like, how do you do so much? How do you, you know, like all this?

And it's kind of an envy almost comes in. But really what's happening is I'm trying to make myself aware that I have that within me. I'm showing it to myself by looking at it in you and then thinking, that is an interesting thing. I could use more of that in my reality and in the way I do things. That could be a leading edge of my growth. But I don't have to do it exactly in your way because I'll probably have my own way to do it. So when we admire others or are even jealous in a way, or envious of them, I think it's because we're trying to activate the quality that they're living in our own lives. And the same for repulsion. When you say, oh, I can't stand the way that person is, then it's something that we might have a fear that we have in ourselves that we could fall into, that could trap us, that we have to realize, you know, that's all part of life. It's okay if it comes. And it's not going to dictate who I am. I have choice, you know, And I don't have to try to get rid of those people to keep them out of my life, because I don't like the way they are, you know, so it's always about something in you that you are.

Allowing to be part of you, I guess, you know, integrated into who you are.

It's so funny. Oh, yeah. Thank you. I mean, I'm Very flattered. And it's. It's funny because just before we came onto this call, flattered in a way that I'm smiling because it's an honor that you could look to anything and think that. And then I was reading one of your handouts that you sent me that you had done recently for a course you taught, and I had the exact same feeling. I remember reading it, thinking, how does she do this? Just in awe of how you clarify and answer questions. And I just had that exact same moment, but about the content in this case, thinking, wow, she's so tuned in. She really gets it. You really have such original approaches to thinking about intuition and what it means and the art of noticing and how clearly you explain it to people and give them tools that they can do this. So I'm laughing because I do think, and wouldn't you say, back to our conversation a while back on soul groups, that our souls will attract people, that there's this mutual beneficial peeking at their paper. Let's call it like, you know, sometimes jealousy and envy get a bad. Have such a bad stigma attached. But I think that some of my best friend tours, friend mentors, where we have really mutually beneficial relationships, involve some amount of saying, what I can do that? Or we're magnetized to you precisely because it. There's this quality of wow of aspirationalness that inspires me. And.

Yeah, but the mistake is thinking that it's over there in the outside world, in the other person. But we're all connected. So if I notice it anywhere, I have it in myself. It's in me. It's the noticing, really, that allows you to have something. Right.

Yeah. And if you want to be more of yourself, just notice more ways of being. And then kind of, I don't know, what do I do there? That's like an intuitive skill. Notice it and then merge into it. Like, act as if you are that way.

You know, like we were joking before this, that I have this thing where I like to have a task or a thing I do, and then I like a little space in between where I finish it up consciously. I rest a little, I re. Prepare, I get ready and I get going into the new thing. And when I have a sort of a act on the fly where things have to come one after the other after the other. And I don't have that. That transitional time in the past, it has made me very anxious and kind of, you know, nervous. But the last few days, I've had a string of these things leading up to this podcast where I did not have a chance to do my habitual, comfortable thing. And as I just let it be, I found that if I could just drop into the flow of the events and that there was no time between that I didn't notice that there was no time between that I just was noticing, oh, now I'm doing this, and now I'm doing this, and now I'm doing this, and now I'm doing this. And it really changed it for me. So that was like the inkling of a new skill. Right. That if I can integrate that more, that will increase my ability to be more of myself.

Right. I can be able to do more. You know, in a way.

Yeah. That's a great example of not just what you said. If we. If we admire something in other people, it's still out there. I think a big piece of this is acknowledging, how am I already. That. So how do I already go flow in the moment and go, you know, so we think we have an idea or a description about ourselves and how we are. And I find it helpful in part of that acting as if to say, well, how am I already doing this thing that I'm noticing in another person? And even if I find a small example, I can see, oh, yeah, it is there as well, even if I haven't put as much attention onto it or merged into it, as you said.

Yes. And that ties into another point, I think, which is that we tend to, through cultural, you know, programming, to need to define ourselves as having an identity. And, oh, I'm a woman, I'm this, I'm that. I've done this. My bio is this. You know, my childhood was like this.

And then we develop habits and things that we do that are normal to us that go along with that definition of identity. And then we just stay in that little sandbox and play in that sandbox, because that's familiar. It's in our comfort zone, it's defined, it's safe, have a little minor revisions every now and then and grow. But basically, that kind of what captivity in identity really creates a kind of complacency, and it can resign you to just being with what's known, and then people get depressed after that, you know. But that is one way, I think, that we hesitate to be more of ourselves because we just what we get programmed.

Absolutely. And as you wrote in a piece on Soul Blockers, sometimes that identity is inherited. It can be cultural, it can be societal. So identity as a woman or as a man or as a non. Non binary. But These identities and habits. There's so many shoulds that come with the buckets and categorizations that we, you know, sometimes are asked to put ourselves in. I think that takes a lot of work.

Yeah. You know that you, you, you won't allow yourself to do something that isn't what you think you're able to do. You know, like I was saying to you, I think before, like, what if you had amnesia and you had to start all over again just coming from core values to discover who you are?

I love this question. This is. So this now takes us into a little bit of what do we do about it if we're not fully ourselves? Or we. And I would encourage listeners, maybe, maybe give yourself a quick rating on a scale of 1 to 10. If 10 is you are fully yourself, fully expressed and authentic to your soul, where would you put on a 1 to 10 scale? And then this question from Penny is so good that, like, what would you do if you had amnesia and you were just starting out again from core urges? Who would you be? What types of activities would you be doing?

Yeah, you know, it might start with, like, for me, I was just trying to imagine that because I'm so used to writing and sitting at the computer, and I've become more. A little more sedentary through those kinds of activities. But if I didn't know that about myself, I think I'd be really physical.

I think I would be much more involved with that kind of stimulation.

So that's like a latent part of me that might come to the fore. And I'm sure we all have those parts that we didn't allow to be exercised that would be fun to let come through.

And part of that is that not just having this locked in identity, but we also were programmed to think in a very linear fashion. You know, that's the left brain again, is logical progression from A to B to C. And, you know, if I did this in my early life, well, then I could do it more better, differently, and, you know, get a different job, but it still has the same feel. And we don't allow surprise developments or even surprise desires to pop in.

And we kind of stay with one job, or we think we're just supposed to. Like, people ask me in readings, okay, what's, what's my purpose in life or what's my destiny? And it's like, what will I be when I grow up? You know, And I like, you know, it's not like that. You're not just going to be just one thing.

But people, the left brain wants that. I don't know, people don't want that necessarily, but the. That part of the left brain that wants finite answers really craves form.

Well, I get that question a lot as well. And I think there's another one that comes partly out of aspiration and partly out of fear that. Well, I. If I can define my purpose, then I can get clear on where I'm heading and I can be more fully expressed. Because if I know my purpose, if I have a mission statement, I can be more of myself. The topic of this, the conversation, and there's a fear that, oh, no, if I don't know my purpose and nail it down, I'm going to be stuck in the wrong job or I'm not going to follow my path. I'm going to miss out. And I think ultimately in terms of career, it rolls out as well to money and fear of not being provided for. So if I don't know my purpose or I get it wrong, I'm going to be out. I'm not going to be able to.

Provide for myself and not be successful. Quote, unquote, you. That, that.

Yeah, a loose man.

And that relates back to what we were saying before about feeling loved by being successful, you know, so there's. There's their fears. There's. There's very basic fears about not having enough and, you know, being a bag lady. And then there's the other part that wants to achieve this kind of success we hear on TV all the time.

In order to feel that people love us and respect us.

So I think that it really helps to understand the soul in this regard that I think souls design lifetimes very wisely. I've seen so many life patterns doing sessions for people for so many years and then seeing what the sanity is in, why they designed their life that way, what their lessons were, what they had karma from, what they were really trying to balance out in themselves by having different kinds of experiences. And what that did for me was made me really trust the core motivation that comes from the soul. Whether the conscious mind realizes it or not. We end up doing what we need to do somehow or other.

Because we do get through to ourselves, you know, and yet to know to try to project ahead and get away from the present moment. When you do that, of course you lose direct connection with the soul and the kind of guidance that comes through the present moment and through the body. You know, that's. Your present moment in body is like your white hole where the spirit, your spiritual truth pours through there. But if your mind is projected somewhere else into the future or the past or somebody else's reality that you're envying, well, then you can't get your own guidance.

And then you stall yourself, basically.

So when you allow yourself to stay in the moment and make choices one by one by one by one based on what feels most real, what feels just right, what feels like, it allows me to stay joyful or fascinated, curious, childlike, enthusiastic. Not what I should do to make please other people or make sure I have enough money for that. Because I've seen it over and over that when people choose what they really love, they end up making more money. They end up often, or at least that's often the case going toward a life work.

You know, Absolutely. I love what you said about the soul intelligently designing lifetimes, or souls plural, designing their lifetimes. And I think the way I think about it is your soul's talking to you, your intuition is talking to you by what you're noticing, what's happening in your life, even challenges that occur and that, that desire for integration as you mentioned, and you can't really miss the boat like you said. I agree that will just keep coming back, but the soul will start talking more loudly if you're not quite paying attention to the subtle signals. Bigger and bigger, wacky things will start happening to kind of wake you up, shake you up. And to what you said about even, even from childhood and looking back at things you've always been interested in. I. I used to think this was just a cliche of the career development space, like look at what you like to do as a kid. But the more I study it in myself and others, there is gold in looking at what we did for play as children. And I'll give you an example as it relates to an identity story as well, which is that when I was at Google about halfway through and and working on my blog, Life After College on the side and turning it into a book, I had a story. For some reason I had this identity that I'm not a risk taker, I'm a good follower, I'm a good student, I'm a good employee, good. It revolved around being good and following directions. And I just thought in no way would my risk profile match up to be a good entrepreneur or a good solopreneur. I didn't have that word, but I just thought for sure that's not me. That's other people who are braver than I am and more courageous. And when I ended up leaving Google. And I finally, finally mustered the courage and I gave myself six months of savings. I kind of got into the groove and I looked back a year later, not having to dip into my savings even one time for $1. And I thought I was completely wrong about my shortcomings. I was just completely wrong about who I thought I was and what I was gonna be good at and what I was gonna miss. There were things that started going haywire that I didn't predict, but there was so much that worked. And when I look back now at my childhood now I just passed my eight year anniversary of self employment and it was a big milestone just to get past five years because I just thought, well, fine, you could do one year, but can you do five? You know? And as I look back, I was always starting little businesses. I started a library, I started a newspaper, I started a carnival for the neighborhood kids. I started a babysitting business where we had binders and filled out worksheets for each child. Handouts we did. I gave the parents a handout to fill out for me about their kid. And then after we'd give the kids back to their parents, I'd fill out a handout for myself on what we did for play, what this child liked to do. I had business cards, magnets, flyers. This was when I was in seventh grade and I started babysitting when I was 11. Anyway, I look back and I think I would. I used to steal contact paper. What is it, carbon? Yeah, carbon paper from ski resorts. Yeah. Because I loved the feeling of. It was magic to me. You could fill out a form like to rent your skis, and then there were three copies and I used to steal them. Well, sorry, sorry, ski resorts. But yes, take them and play office. When I would get home, it's like, how can I not have had a story that I'd be. Have fun running my business? And as I've been like working into this new direction and rethinking the strategy and all the systems and trying to take things up even another level to create more ease and joy, I'm realizing I love building the business almost more than any of the actual activities that bring in income. I just love building the business itself. It's so delightful.

It's so funny because, you know, we do start with the life purpose or whatever these things are, these interests that allow us to learn the lessons that are the life purpose and fairly early, you know. And then you train yourself. You're basically training yourself through having fun, you know, through the childhood. I did, you Know what I used when I was like, God, seven or eight, I think I became fascinated with.

Assembly lines.

And I decided to make an assembly line in my bedroom in order to manufacture ornaments. And I talked my mother into so letting me bring this big tree branch in from the woods and set it up in my, My dad helped me set it up as a tree in my room. And then I made ornaments for this tree for every holiday of the year. And I would had one station where I drew the thing and then the next station I moved over and I cut it out and then I colored it and then I, you know, put a hole in and then I put a string through it, you know. And I had this whole deal. I would stay up there for hours.

Making these ornaments for this for the whole year. And then later I became a corporate art director and I had, you know, projects that were just like that. They were all in various stages of completion for different departments and so forth. And it was all, you know, sort of practice and then writing a book, boy, it's the same way, you know, you're, you know, do this, do that, do this, you know. And so, you know, it was training yourself in ways of thinking and doing.

But I think going back to some of those things, you had original joy in a lot of it, you know. And I started keeping journals when I was like 6 or 7 years old and writing, you know, so those things stay with you. But, you know, a lot of that becoming more of yourself is just the entitlement for joy.

I always say self entertainment is a very high spiritual state.

Absolutely. That's, that's something I.

You know, I always, when I was leaving Google, would think, well, what if I end up in a van down by the river? Which of course was not going to happen. I would just go get another job. But my mind was telling me that story and then I made myself say, you know what, Jenny? You know, if you're going to ask that question, you might as well also ask how can you earn twice as as much in half the time? So then that became my, my, my vision that that's what would make leaving worth it was if I could figure out how to earn twice as much in half the time. And then in the last few years, I've added on with ease and joy because I actually believe not only could I earn more and spend less time, which I just think is kinder to my body overall and my ability to sustain all of this, but with ease and joy. What's that like? What if it wasn't Work hard, you have to work hard, you have to grind, you have to hustle. What if it was easeful and joyful and still abundant? What would that look like? That's really not a message that our society tends to give.

Yes. And then often there is that feeling that if you let yourself really do that, other people are going to be jealous and they're going to judge you and what's. Why can she do that and we can't do that. And that takes us back to some of that early programming. And I think that there's a choice we make at a certain point that let them think what they think. I'm just going to be. I'm just going to show people the way. I'm just going to be an example and if they want to use it, fine, I'll help. You know, I'll be a leader or a way shower. But I'm not going to not do what I want to do just because other people don't think they can do it.

Well, that's what I'm often, you know, I don't push my beliefs on anybody. But the more that I've even learned about, let's say, call it the game of money or finding, finding joy in the creativity of earning money without attaching to it, that people can talk smack if they want, they can shoot it down, they can say I'm not being realistic, that I'm Pollyanna or anything that they want. And at the end of the day I know it works and I know it works for me. I can't say it's going to work for anyone else. But I know when I'm contracted and closed and fearful, I'm less creative. And when I'm easeful and joyful and I don't accept linear thinking as a solution and I look for my friend Christine. Ariello calls it a sacred third solution. Sometimes we think we're in a tug of war between A and B. What is C?

Yeah, it's the third point in the triangle, really. And that that allows perspective on the polarity you were stuck in previously. No.

Yes. So instead of oh no, how am I going to pay the rent? It's how can I cover the monthly mortgage with ease and joy so it's no longer just even about.

I guess for me it's like that. Including ease and joy and delight and self entertainment into the driving aims of how I work on something is as important as what the end result.

And the reason is that that promotes flow, basically. And that made me think that there's A certain other thing that happens to block the flow and that is that we've been trained to think in this really linear way where you have, I always call it, you have stuff and then you have space and then you have stuff and you have space and you think of creating a result. But then at the end of that result there is a transition phase where you go from form into no form, or form into the experiential, non physical inner realms. Do you know most people hate that. They do not like this idea of the void at the end of achieving something. And they basically will avoid that. Avoid the void, right. And they fear that liminal space which we talked about in our last couple of talks, but that in betweenness, the threshold space between the old and the new. And you know, so there's something here to be said for at the end of a cycle of form, don't just use your willpower to try to jump over that empty space into the next form.

Because it won't come until you've rejuvenated yourself, allowed yourself to ripen like a fruit, to noodle around, to relax and release definitions and get re patterned. And after you've softened like that, then the new items that you're motivated by, they sort of surface out of the deep water, you know, they pop up and then you're all turned on again and off you go with true motivation. But I think what often blocks us from moving into more of ourselves is that we, we're afraid of the unknown.

Yes. And that's, that's where that fear comes back.

You have another great strategy which is let your imagination think of things beyond the comfort zone. Activities that are a bit scary. People you never thought you could meet, skills and abilities you never thought you had. And I have to jump in here with two examples. In recent years, I always ask people, you know, what's your sliding door career? Or what would you be doing if time, money and judgment from others weren't an issue? I even play a fun game sometimes, mostly with Michael, because I'm around him most frequently. But where I'm saying, if I couldn't do any of the activities I do now, how would I earn a living? And it can be as off the wall as possible. And it could be like, I think I'd have a lot of fun packing groceries at Whole Foods. It'd be like Tetris every day. You know, it doesn't matter. Doesn't just, I like identifying and I thought, all right, if I couldn't run my business anymore, I would organize Bookshelves for a living. I would just make them beautiful. I love it. It gets me in the most joyful state of life. I feel like I might as well be on drugs and I don't even do drugs. But this is what it must feel like. And then the other day I read an article, I'll put it in the show Notes of a guy in London getting paid to organize bookshelves. That as, as books and Instagram become more popular, this guy is getting hired by restaurants and hotels and even wealthy people to organize their bookshelves. Penny Pierce. It is possible someone is doing this.

I remember thinking that I. That you could have a business. This was way back before recycling. That somebody could come around and pick up all the wasted office paper from offices that gets thrown away and recycle that. And then it, you know, it became a thing. But yeah, you know, either it's something that you really love doing. It might seem like a little thing around the house or something.

You never know how that could grow into a bigger thing.

One of my side hustles. I wrote about this in life after college. I called it Craigslist as extra income dartboard. So I was in my early 20s, I was working at Google and I wanted some extra money and I posted three ads on Craigslist for personal home organizing, babysitting and HTML and CSS tutoring for small business owners. Well, the. It was called Dreamweaver was the software at the time that one took off like gangbusters. I was getting calls from all over the country. No one really took me up on babysitting. And two people hired me to organize their kitchen or their home. And now I think about Marie Kondo and the life changing magic of tidying up and it's like, like at that time I wouldn't have thought, oh yeah, I could have a mega bestselling book and career if I. Of course it wasn't my calling to be a home organizer. But then you look yes, and man, I love the spark joy question. And the other example that I just have to insert here is you asked people you never thought you could meet. And I know I told this story on one of our other episodes in the Penny and Jenny Show. In fact, I probably tell it on every single one because it still blows my mind. But I was reading the intuitive way and you have an exercise in there. Write down someone you'd love to talk to. And so I wrote down your name and I just thought, this is so silly. Everyone who reads Penny's book is going to write her name down because they're reading her book and they're loving it. And I think I would have emoji, laugh, cry emoji. Like tears streaming. If you had told me at that time that I laughed at myself for writing your name down, we'd have the Penny and Jenny show, you know, I just simply would not have believed it. There would be no planet under which we'd be jamming on these episodes. You know, nine, eight or nine episodes in no way, no freaking way. I didn't think I could write you an email. And so sometimes I'll think of this, something like this and our friendship now. And I think, what on earth else am I holding myself back from out of some limitation or conception, I guess. With the caveat that it needs to be soul aligned as well. Because if I just said like, oh yeah, I want to be besties with Brad Pitt, I doubt that that would happen.

But that we probably count ourselves.

Out of a lot. Yeah. You know, and I have had that too. I didn't thought of the people ahead of time that I, you know, would be impressed to be around. But life just took me into people's lives that were famous. Like I was in Japan and the woman who was sponsoring me on that trip said, we would like you to come to our house for dinner and please bring your numerology forms along. Okay. And I came over and it was quite a big hubbub. Every little people running around in the kitchen making this special dinner and then get the knock on the do and it is Prince Mikasa from the royal family in Japan, who was an Egyptologist. And they wanted me to do his numerology forms for his birth date. And I'm okay. And I told him the thing and he goes, oh, this is very accurate. It was amazing. I'm sitting there with this and you know, the royal family in Japan can't talk to regular people. They have to hold themselves kind of above and aloof from things. And here I was having this intimate dinner sitting right next to him, and I didn't even know that that could have possibly happened, you know, and those things, they come about, you know, if you like, allow surprises, I think in your life, you know, it's. But yet just to think of it, you know, to give yourself the exercise, you know, what kind of activity would be a little bit scary for you that's a little beyond what you are. Used to.

Travel to a different kind of place or.

Meet somebody that would really inspire you or. The other thing is sometimes I think about going into the imaginal realm.

And in the imaginal realm, I think of it like all the variables exist and you could combine any of them and create a reality out of it, or you could remove one and put another one in and then that reality would change a little bit. So what things do we think cannot fit together to make a successful life, you know, because of your upbringing or whatever. But what if you could just put any variables together and it would make a career? It's like organizing and bookshelves, you know, just take a few variables, stick them together and then imagine a career. What is kind of career would that be? And I think today especially, people are inventing new kinds of work for themselves, that they are not as limited, they're much more innovative in many ways of, you know, we're not a counselors, we're life coaches. Oh no, we're these specialty kinds of coaches, you know, and it just keeps evolving and innovating and, or becoming more specific. And, you know, it's a function of imagination really, I think imagination.

And then if, if we could even start to leave listeners with anything, it's that choosing to be more of yourself will inherently attract. It's that transparency, which again, you have a whole book on this, but that being more will attract those opportunities. So also that I think there's something here around we don't have to do all the work, the heavy lifting that like, if we just focus on doing what we do best, which is ultimately to be ourselves, there's only one of us in the world at this moment of time, at our cultural context, in our unique location on the planet with our life experiences. Nobody has your parents, your upbringing, any of it at this moment in time. And the more we can do that and strip away the layers, then such interesting opportunities can, can come in. And I do think there, there's something about putting yourself out there. I do think that this requires some amount of public, original thinking or public original being like be yourself out loud, not just in your home, in your head. And. And then because of the Internet, then you can so much more easily find your people. And these micro communities, or Chris Anderson would call the long tail, exists for all of us.

Yeah. And I think it does relate to transparency in that a key element of transparency is to be exposed, to allow yourself to be exposed. And that what people are going to see about you, if they see something that looks, you know, negative or limited, they have it too. We all have it. That's human. But when they look through that and you really can See the whole thing, they find the soul, which is just like their soul, you know, the souls are so alike in the way they function, basically based on compassion and creativity and.

Joy. When you find that, you find unity, you find.

Friends.

And so you've got to let yourself be exposed in order to become more of yourself.

The word exposed reminds me of the concept of a vulnerability hangover that sometimes, and I'll put this out there, because I think a good challenge for all of us is do one thing that has you feeling a little more exposed than usual this week and know that you might have a vulnerability hangover about it. So sometimes I'll say something in a podcast and I'll wonder, oh no, should I have said that? Or I do a whole episode and then I feel really vulnerable or it comes out and I just wonder if I did the right thing. And so that vulnerability hangover is normal because we're not used to it, but it's okay and it passes. And myself and others, when I ask them, well, how do you feel about sharing that news so openly? They say, I, I can't imagine I didn't get any negative response. That even if they did, it would still be okay because living in hiding was. Was even worse. But that actually I find that people are so often surprised at the positive feedback and reaction that they get, when in fact they're big and biggest fear was telling them it would be the opposite. And it's just always the.

It's kind of like people either don't notice it at all or they think it's cool, you know, or, you know, if you get any negativity, it just shows you that that person has the same worry that you have, you know, it's like not, not they're telling you who they are really.

So, Penny, any other.

Experiments that we could give listeners because this is a kind of a more abstract topic which we picked on purpose, you know, how do you be more of yourself? It's like a Zen Cohen. We could all live every single day. Or a David White style, beautiful question that we're. I do encourage you to just live into the answer. And I had a practice for a while of writing like yours, Penny, the direct writing. But I would write soul letters to self. So from my soul to myself. And that also helped me tap into a different part of myself.

What I like to do is.

Try to notice for a week the negative declarative statements that your left brain spins out. Oh, yeah, I don't do that, you know, or I don't, you know, I'm not. I don't have time for that. Or whatever that. Whatever it is. And notice that when you say that, you cut off half of the world and half the possibilities. So write those negative, declarative statements down in your journal and then leave a space and turn them around so that. But it's the opposite thing. I have plenty of time to do that. You know, it's easy for me to do that because then you are allowing energy to actually flow somewhere. But also when you praise it in the positive way, you can actually feel into it. And the body doesn't know any different, really. You know, if you can feel into it and sense that reality of being that you can do it. One guy once told me he was an owner of a company and he wanted all of his employees to pretend that they had 50% more energy and they were going to do 50% more with that energy in their jobs. And I thought, wow, if I had 50% more energy, more wisdom, and more capacity, my scope would probably double at least, you know, and it would be easy to do more. So that's another thing to maybe think about or imagine this next week or two.

It's funny, I had the same, such a similar brainstorm earlier this morning. I wrote down, as part of a recent conversation that I had had. I assigned this to someone as homework. But keep a list, a piece of paper, two columns, and write down every single thought that feels constraining or blocking. So it blocks you from creating or doing. It just blocks like, oh, I don't do that. Or, well, that never works. Okay, that goes in the constraining column. And then similarly write down, or as you said, find the opposite that goes in the freeing or generating column. What generates action, what generates creativity? And observe, because I think sometimes we assume. Not sometimes, a lot of the time we assume, assume that we know the capital T truth about something, and all it does is block us. All it does is get in the way and stop the flow. So I will put this in the resource for this episode. If you go to pivotmethod.com podcast, go to the Show Notes for this episode and I'll make sure that we have an observation chart for you to track your thoughts and then flip them into the opposite, because I love what you said, Penny, then it gives the energy somewhere to flow. Even if that oppositional statement doesn't end up being the way, it at least gives more creative impetus to the whole.

Do we have time for me to give them a list of nine things that. Yeah, I'll just I had this list about kind of fixed beliefs and how fixed beliefs can keep us from, you know, imagining and moving forward. And so here, the first one is ways you think things must work for you to be successful. You know your life rules. Then number two, things you never want to do. Number three, things you think you can't do. Number four, reasons you are the way you are, stories you tell about your identity. Number five, things you think can never change. Things you think are impossible. And number six, family traits you still carry as though you must. And number seven, typical viewpoints from your culture or gender. And eight, things you're proud of yourself for. See, even positive things can block us. And nine, things you think you haven't done well enough. So those are just some things to still prompt your thinking about. Get these blocks out of the way.

Those are so good. If you ever want to know the answer to Can I share nine things?

Yes.

I love helping people wrap their minds around this in any way that we can. And Penny, it goes back to one of your great gifts, which is putting questions and thought, thought provoking, clear context for people. I mean, you're just so good at it. Thank you for reading those. And again, everyone listening, you can go to pivotmethod.com podcast, find the show notes for this episode. I'll throw this all into a handy handout for you. And you can also check out the archives of the Penny and jenny show@pivotmethod.com pjshow and please don't be shy. We would love a question from you for our listener Q and A episode. If you don't want to leave it via voice note, that's okay too. But if you do, you can go to pivotmethod.com@ and that's where you'll leave a voice note. Or you can go to the contact form and leave it as a written question. Just make sure to say that it's for the Penny and Jenny show. I think that one's going to be a lot of fun. Penny, is there anything you want to say just to close out this episode or anywhere you would like to send people?

No, I think that this is going to be so much fun. I'm really looking forward to the questions.

And just getting into it more directly with, with. With people?

Yeah, it's funny. Like speaking of being more of yourself, don't worry if it's a stupid question. Like there's no doubt that whatever question you ask someone else who's going to listen to that episode, it's the exact one they would need to hear. So even if you think that it's if, if you feel confused by any of these Penny and Jenny episodes, it's okay. I can at least say even if Penny's not confused, I'm high. Especially in the early ones. I was like, how on earth can I Jenny, talk to Penny about intuition and frequency and transparency? And I just thought, well, she says do something that makes you uncomfortable. So I'm in the same boat with you. No questions too small, too quote simple. Those are some of the most interesting ones, and certainly I find them the most interesting to hear Penny's take on them. So pivotmethod.com ask and we'll be so excited to hear from you.

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