Why You Need to Slow Down: Making Space for Miracles and Mistakes

When we are just going, going, going, and we don't leave any room for miracles. If we don't leave any space for something amazing to happen or an opportunity to come our way, we might not even be able to say yes to it in that moment. But we're not even leaving space for that opportunity or that miracle to present itself. Welcome to the let's Talk about it podcast where we are taking the fear and frustration out of asking for help when it your emotional and mental health and giving you what you need to think about things a bit differently. I'm Laurie Streeter, licensed therapist and certified hypnotherapist. And with each episode I'll bring you thoughts, techniques or a guest to help you find your breakthroughs and live a healthier, happier life. Are you ready? Let's Talk About It. Welcome back to another episode of let's Talk about it with Laurie Streeter. I am Laurie, licensed click Clinical therapist. And there's something coming up a lot in my personal life right now because there's a lot going on and I'm wondering if I have this brief conversation out loud if it might strike you as well. Like, I just think this is gonna resonate with more people than I realize because this is just a theme that just keeps coming up and I'm like, I gotta talk about this because there's no way I'm alone in these thoughts. And that's this idea that we're busy, right? I mean, we are really busy people. We have kids and spouses and friends and jobs and things to do and places to go and people to see. And we have like this endless list of tasks that needs to get done every day that usually doesn't always get done every day. And we just have a ton of stuff to do. So we're all often scheduled back to back or every weekend. Our free time is taken up by events or activities or trips or whatever it is, right? We have a lot of stuff going on in our lives and me especially right now. And you'll kind of see how that pans out in these next few months. But there's a lot of moving parts. I feel like one of those people that where they spin all the plates. I feel like I'm trying to keep one too many plates spinning in the air right now. And there's just a ton happening. But what I'm seeing is this idea that while so much has to get done, I have to really be intentional and almost force myself to leave some space. Like leave room for miracles, right? Leave room for good Things to happen. Because when I am back to back to back and somebody's like, oh my gosh, I had to tell you this one really great thing. Do you have five minutes? And I'm like, well, I don't have five minutes now, but I have five minutes tomorrow. And maybe they had something fun to tell me or whatever it is, right? Like when we are just going, going, going and we don't leave any room for miracles, if we don't leave any space for something amazing to happen or an opportunity to come our way, we might not even be able to say yes to it in that moment. But we're not even leaving space for that opportunity or that miracle to present itself. So I've had to get really intentional with leaving some time in my day to just chill, Even if it's 10 minutes or on the weekend, to have a couple hours over the weekend to myself or whatever it is, we have to learn to leave room for the good stuff, for those opportunities to come in. Or we're just going to be going, going, going. And then we get to the end of the week and the end of the month and we the end of the year and we're like, what happened? Right? How many times have you gotten to Friday? And you're like, geez, what did I do this week? Right? Like, because you're just so go, go, go. And it's back to back to back and we're on autopilot and we leave no space for things to happen. And it's not even a bad thing. We just leave no space for anything because we are like over scheduled doing on the go, constantly human beings. And I just have had to get really intentional with, with leaving some space in my schedule and it's not taking away from anything. I've just had to be really purposeful with my time and thinking about every day, every week, every month, leaving some space for something good to happen or hey, if we want to run to the park or we want to go fishing or we want to go do something that we can finagle and make it happen instead of, oh, we have to put that off or we can't do that at all because I'm back to back to back and then I have to go to sleep, right? Like, it's just not a fun way to live. So you have to leave room for those miracles. On the flip side of this, we also get caught. And I'm guilty of this and I know a lot of my clients are. We get caught in this cycle of perfection and being Paralyzed by always wanting things to be ideal or always wanting things to go well. This part of it is we have to leave room for error. You have to leave some space that you might make a mistake. You have to leave some room for error, you have to leave room for miracles, and you have to leave room for. For error. And I know it's kind of like it's not an easy concept to articulate and that's why I just wanted to bring this to your attention, to give you something to think about. Because again, it's something I'm seeing in my life and. But so often I am doing something and I expect it to go a certain way. I leave zero room for error. And then what happens is it doesn't go perfectly or it doesn't go as I planned and then I'm frazzled or I just can't get into problem solving mode as quickly as I need to because I left zero room for that thing to not work out as perfectly as I planned it in my head. And how many times when we plan something, does, does it go perfectly, right? Like, things happen, life happens. It's not perfect, right? Like, nothing is perfect. We're not about chasing perfection here. But I think when we get so caught up in this idea of that project at work or that conversation or that trip or whatever it is that you're working, you have this idea in your head of how it's going to go, and that's totally fine. I'm all for visualizing and having a plan and a strategy, that's great. But when we don't leave room for error, then when something happens or something goes wrong or there's a mistake, now we've left no room and no like, permission for ourselves to be like, ah, plan B or oh, now I need to figure this out, or come up with a different idea. And we're like, oh my God, what do you mean that didn't go as planned? Oh my, what do I do? What do I do? And we're like frantic because that thing didn't turn out as well as we had planned it in our minds. So we have to leave room for miracles in the busyness and this go, go, go life that we live. And we also have to leave room for error in this life and these goals and these tasks and these things that we're doing and planning in our minds that of course we would love for them to go as ideally as they do in our minds, but they're probably not going to. And I'm not trying to sound Like a defeatist. But that's just life. You have to leave room for error. And it's not a permission that, oh, I'm going to plan this thing and it's not going to turn out. I'm not saying that at all. But when we leave no room for error, we usually end up frantic on the back end of it if something goes awry. So leave room for miracles and leave room for error. And I think we'll set ourselves up for even more success because when things are just packed in so tightly, there's no breathing room and then we don't know what to do with ourselves on either end of it. So. So again, I know this is kind of like an out there kind of thought and it's just something that is starting to brew in my mind because I've had back to back clients and I've had just so much going on and I'm like, where am I leaving room? Like there's no space right now for anything extra. And I understand for a lot of people that's just life at times, but then we just have to be really intentional with our time and the space that we're leaving so that we don't set ourselves up for failure or for frustration if something were to happen or an opportunity presents itself, but you miss it because there's no space to be able to even consider that opportunity. So just something to think about. I'm wondering what your thoughts are on this. If you have a lot going on, what does that look like for you? You can text me, you can send me a DM on Instagram, but what does that look like? Are you just a go, go, go person and you're leaving no room for anything? Or are you always planning things in your mind, expecting them to go perfectly and then you're always ending up frantic on the back end of it because you haven't left room for. For error. I'm just curious. I'd love to know your thoughts on this. If you want other ideas or just my ongoing thoughts every day I always send in the morning a tip or a thought or a little concept like this just to keep you going. Just a little bit of inspiration. I send it out to my text list at 630-228-1002 because I just think a little oomph in the morning is. Can get us thinking and going on a really productive, positive mindset track. And little reminders of leaving room for errors and leaving room for miracles can just be what we need when we wake up and we get the day going and it's like, ah, yeah, here's what I need to think about today. Text daily, 263-022-81002 if you want to join me over there and get those daily texts. But again, I would love to hear your thoughts on this, especially as I start to unravel this in my own mind and figure out what this looks like with everything I have going on. I'm excited to continue to share that with you and continue, like I said, to just unravel this idea of leaving some space because I think we are just go, go, go kind of people. And it's like maybe we need to be a little more intentional with where we leave space and what we're leaving it for. I will talk to you in the next episode. Have a great week. Thank you so much for spending this time with me today. If you loved this episode, it would mean so much if you would share it with someone who you think would love it too. And don't forget to leave a review with your thoughts, what resonated or even what you'd like to hear more of. Because I promise you, if something's on your mind, if you it's on other people's minds too. I appreciate your help in getting these messages on mental health out into the world. And until next time, cheers to living a healthier, happier life.