Quiet Your Noise...

Why are your noise? So you can be what matters. This is a real skills workshop and our intention is to help us be able to experience these emotions that help us thrive, the ones that nourish us, the ones that give us strength, the ones that enhance our resilience, the ones that bring forth our hardest tree. And you know what, we're human and as soon as we move in the direction of emotion that we want, an emotional experience that we want, but we haven't really, you know, experienced it as much as we'd like, chances are like we covered in the last workshop, there's some things that suppress us and one of those things that can suppress us is all the noise, all the emotional noise, all the external noises, all the internal noises. And today I'm here with Kathy Vartooli from the Intimacy Dojo and Thriving Now. I'm Rick from Thriving now and we're going to help you quiet that noise and tune in to something that really will make a difference to you. And this is work that you sort of do in your engineering work too, isn't it, Kat?

Yeah. Make sure the signals boost it compared to the noise. So. So I do think this topic is so crucial and I love that you chose that it was one of the ones that you came up with, Rick, because for me, it's actually been a really good barometer for me to. As I've healed. So we often use the analogy with trauma, that there's each old unresolved trauma, each trauma bubble that's in our system is echoing in our subconscious, present tense, like a TV blaring on a TV station. Maybe there's some radio stations too. The more traumas that we have unresolved, it's like we go into a TV store and they're all. The TVs are on different channels and they're all blaring. And our poor subconscious thinks all of that's happening now. It doesn't understand past tense. So our subconscious is like, oh my God, inundated with all these different signals coming in that for many of us happen decades before and are no longer relevant. So for myself, as I've done more and more healing, the background noise got quieter and quieter. And I also noticed that the times I get a little off balance or I'm not taking as good a care of myself, they get louder again. So for me noticing, the more you can discern this and we'll talk more about it, but it's a way for me to go, oh, wait, I need to do some more self care because that noise, that noisy background is coming back and also the baseline. Okay. It's still going in generally the good direction. Clearing out old traumas. I'm letting the old. The TVs get quieter and quieter until we turn off that station. That was an old trauma. Something that happened when I was a child, maybe. And it's no longer really relevant. And really, when we turn off that tv, we've incorporated the lesson. Anything we need to learn, we no longer need to have that subconsciously playing as real time. So I think this is a beautiful topic. And the more we can be conscious and aware of what we're doing and help ourselves quiet that background noise, the more we can actually hear our own guidance, our own learn our own path forward, not being steered by other people's noise too.

So if you're part of our Be what matters focus for these seven sessions in the chat, if you'd be willing to share, like, what is your. Your emotional focus? Because that would help Kathy and I tune as we go through this. It's optional. We believe in emotional freedom, including the ease of saying, no, I'm not going to do that without having to feel. Yeah, you can't make me. So that's an invitation. Mine is eager and boldness. Thank you.

Light is courageous.

Harmony.

Oh, I like harmony.

Ah. And one of the tools that we use for quieting the noise is eft tapping. If you're new to tapping, what is that? You'll see me tapping on parts of my body. If you're new, go to thrivingnow.com tapping. If you're watching the replay, I invite you to do that first and get our free guide. We even have a very straightforward Learn eft tapping course that you can go through for free. We're not going to be teaching tapping, but you'll be noticing that we're tapping on these natural comfort points. You could also call them natural quieting points. Each of these places are like little portals into our system, our energy. And by using our fingers and tapping with presence and comfort or anxiety. These are the collarbone points, we call them. They're used in Chinese acupuncture and acupressure. And many other cultures have also found these comfort points. So that's something to be aware of. Kathy, you want to read some of the others?

Yeah, there's some great ones here. Boldness. I think you might have said that. Harmony. Skillful Anger. Fearless soul. Flow. Resilience. Solid. Someone said my noise is not good enough. I seek self acceptance, caring for self and self acceptance. So I love those Those are like, I think that it shows the uniqueness each of us bring to this. And I'm sure even for two people choosing the same thing, it might look a little different. But what a lovely way to have like eight weeks of focus or nine weeks of focusing on something that's really beautiful and that can help us come out on the other side. Having anchored that and strengthened that.

We'Re going to be sharing some examples and stories and other things during this. I'd like to start with that. Not good enough. Because that I think is one of these perfect examples of noise. So, for example, let's say that I want to go see. Right?

Breaking up, just.

And she lives thousands of miles away.

I do love thousands.

So let's say I want to go see Kathy and she lives thousands of miles away. And I think, well, I'm just going to grab a glass of lemonade and go walk and go see my friend. Now you would think that some noise would be generated. And for people where not good enough is one of the things that their body mind has come up with, like, not good enough. Now that usually gets interpreted as, I, I, there's just something wrong with me. You know, there's, I'm just not good enough to go see my friend. I'm just like. And then that can cascade into other noise. Like, yeah, she probably doesn't even want to see me anyway. And you know, Right. But the truth doesn't matter to noise. You want to be more self accepting. Oh, no, I'm not good enough. I'm not good enough. I'm not good enough. It is a noise. But in the case of me walking to see Kathy, there's actually some signal there. I'm actually not good enough to walk unprepared thousands of miles.

It's just a cup of drink in hand.

Right? And it may be that if you want to go up on stage in front of a thousand people and get a standing ovation for your rendition of a song that you've been practicing on your keyboard, there may be some signal there. It may be that out of a thousand people, some people are not going to like the way you play the song. And this. So we get these things, these noises, especially the ones that are really repetitive in your life. Not good enough. If, if that comes up, a lot of times one of the things that you can say is, okay, that's my noise. Where's my signal? Where is, where is their guidance? Well, you're just gonna fall flat on your face. Oh, that sounds like my mother. That's noise. You haven't practiced enough. Okay, that's still. There's a little bit of truth in that. You know, I haven't walked thousands of miles. It's unsafe if it's said, it's an accusation. Is very different from the signal of, well, I hear you, you want to go see her. And walking is something that humans can do.

It takes a long time, most efficient way to get there.

There are probably some ways to either prepare for that or find other alternatives so that you get the experience of being with your friend, something that you are good enough to do, that you are welcomed. But the way the strategy that you're approaching it, you're either perhaps unprepared, which is true a lot of times physically or emotionally. And so the signal is going to be below or deeper. Or for me, there's a quality of depth signal for me as I tune into it, loses self criticism. That's a clue.

Yeah. The accusation, I think is a really good point that he made. If it sounds like an accusation, a negative, it's probably been inherited from somebody. So yesterday I was walking, I went to the stretch lab. I don't know if you have them out where you are, but I love them. They stretch you out and help you make sure you don't go too far. It's better than a massage in my opinion. But there was a nice restaurant right next door to it and I had worn sweatpants to go to the stretch lab because, you know, I'm. They're going to stretch me. And I was walking past and I'm a bigger person in my stretch pants and they're all dressed up nicely for this restaurant, eating outdoors. And in my head I'm like, nobody wants to see you. Like who are you to be out here like this? Like all these thoughts. And I was like, wow, I'm projecting these thoughts from my mom who likes to, you know, things to look a certain way onto these other people. And I stopped and I looked back and most of them like were busy with their things. They weren't even aware that I was there. Like they were just eating and talking with each other and I don't actually know what was going in their head if they, you know, maybe somebody was judging me for not being dressed up nicely in this, near this nice restaurant. But I, you know, I just like, wow, I do have the right to be here. So the accusation, the negativity, the put down part of it, that's a really good signal that that's noise. Because our inner self loves us. And it's going to send signal. And it might say, whoa, that's not safe. But it doesn't have to be like, what were you thinking? It's not safe. It could be just like, we shouldn't do that. It's not safe. We should find a different way. So if that helps with the discernment a little bit. I thought that was a really good point that you brought up, and I wanted to emphasize it. If it's an accusation or negativity, that's probably noise.

So the key components, signal noise and discernment, and we're going to be circulating around in those. So if anyone else wants to share what their noise is in the chat, that would be great. And what we'll do is Kathy and I are going to do a little bit of tapping here on inviting deeper attunement to the signal, to discern signal from. From noise. Even if it's noise that has just been so loud, so insistent, had so much pain associated with it, you know, would you like to lead that, or would you like me to.

Why don't I lead off and you can take over at some point if you feel like there's something else you want to say. Is that all right?

Yeah.

So I invite you first. Just let yourself come here and now. It's Sunday. Many of you have had lots busy things going on. Just take a breath and let yourself come here and now. See if you can feel the energy of the circle we're created, this group of people that all care about each other, and really, each of us is hoping to improve our lives and wants to be at least emotionally supportive for other people to support their lives. There's like a beautiful circle here of people creating that, and that's such a blessing. So let's see if you can come in here now. Let some of the outside noise, if you have Facebook open, I invite you to close it, minimize it. At least the cats will still be there. The memes will all still be there later. Just let yourself come here and now and take a breath and let yourself kind of settle into your body. Feel your butt on your seat, your feet on the floor, wiggle your toes, just breathe down. So like you're actually letting yourself feel in your body, if you can. That was a big forward step for me when I was wanting to quiet noise. Noise is generally up here in our heads or, you know, coming from above our heads, our bodies, if we can be with them and breathe quietly, there's a lot of wisdom in there, a lot of good signal Often, so karate chop. Even though there's been a lot of noise in my life, Even though there's.

Been a lot of noise in my.

Life, it's made it hard to understand what I should do next.

It's made it very hard to discern what I should do next.

It's made it really hard to know what is authentically me.

It's made it hard to know what's authentically me.

So much of that noise is from other people.

So much of that noise is from other people.

Yeah. Top of the head. I learned it when I was little.

Well, I definitely learned when I was little.

And later I wrote, and often I was too little to know the difference.

And often I was too little to know the difference.

Side of the eye, all kinds of shoulds and ought tos.

All kinds of shoulds and ought to.

Under the eye. Lots of you're not good enough.

Lots of you're not good enough.

Under the nose. And I'm really looking for that authentic signal from within me.

I'm really looking for that authentic signal within me. Chin, did you.

Yeah, no, it's good. Your voice is kind of slowing drawing.

Out a little bit, but it's okay.

Chin. I want to know what the universe is guiding me to do.

I'm wanting to know what the universe is guiding me to do.

Calibo. Not a bunch of judgmental and scared people.

Not a bunch of judgmental and noisy and scared people.

Under the arm that I've stored in my head.

That I've stored in my head.

Top of the head. I'd like to thank that and let it go.

Like, to thank that and let it.

Go and boost the signal from within.

Me and boost the true signal within.

Me and just take a breath. Notice what's coming up for you. There may be some nervousness. It was often unsafe to let go of those signals, especially when we were children. We're living at home. Our brain internalized the noise and those signals from the noise from parents or whatever so that we could stop ourselves from doing things that would get us in trouble before we did them. So instead of getting yelled at by mom or dad for doing something, we pre yell at ourselves in our heads. And it was a really good survival mechanism while we lived with them. But now that we don't, and we have a lot more freedom and choice, maybe it's okay to, like, thank the part of us that held onto those messages and just say, wow, thank you for keeping me safe all those years, and how about we give you a different job? How about you help me tune into me versus tuning into these people that really don't have that much influence on my life anymore.

So someone said the noise is, you can't do that. And their intention, how they'd like to be as a more in soul flow. So I'd like to use that as an example for how I would tap on that. Okay. And we'll just see. So thank you for offering that. We'll continue. Even though I really want to be in Soul Flow, Even though I really.

Want to be in Soul Flow and.

Explore what that really feels like.

And explore what that really feels like.

There's a noise in me. There's a noise in me says, you can't do that.

You can't do that.

That's not really my soul flow.

That's not really my soul flow.

I'm pretty sure my soul flow is not going to sound like that.

I'm pretty sure my soul flow is not going to sound like that.

Top of the head, you can't do that.

You can't do that.

Eyebrow, you can't do that.

You can't do that.

I am so bored of that.

I am so bored of that.

Yeah. I'm so tired of that.

I'm so tired of that.

Under the nose. Any signal there is long gone.

Any signal there is long gone.

It's there.

It's there.

Hold on. I invite my consciousness to turn down the volume.

I invite my consciousness to turn down the volume.

Being in Soul Flow matters to me.

Being in soul Flow matters to me.

That's my signal.

That's my signal.

That's what I want to discern.

That's what I want to discern.

I'm pretty sure it's not going to sound like you can't do that.

Pretty sure it's not going to sound like you can't do that.

I wonder what it will sound like.

I wonder what it will sound like.

So if you're the person that offered that feel into your body and for all of us, one of the cool things about doing this as a workshop is that soul flow, whatever that means to you, and if that means nothing to you, you can go back to again what matters to you. But just doing a tapping on the discernment quality, you know, I'll be not going to sound like that. That's not going to be the signal that guides me toward what I want.

Yeah.

Okay.

And I think one of the reasons it's so hard to let go of the messages, the noisy messages, is because they're fear Based. And our survival brain is always looking for danger. So if that noise, like some people shared, they won't like me. I would be rejected and hated. Not believing I can be successful in this case in having a difficult conversation with their son. I'll never get it right. Those are all really fearful messages. And our survival brain is looking for danger all the time. It's looking for ways, threats. So it doesn't want to let go of these fearful messages. What if they're right? What if there's actually signal in them and the problem is you get so much noise that you can never actually find the good signal in them. They're just spinning around and making us feel less confident. Like if I just let myself keep harping on walking past that restaurant, who am I to be out on the sidewalk and, you know, wearing kind of grubby. They weren't grubby. They're just older sweatpants. Like, oh my goodness. I could have really gotten myself in a low space going home and never wanting to go to the stretch lab again. And I love the stretch lab. So there we're really. It's really easy to get caught up in that because our brain is looking for danger. How do we fit in society? How do we. How do other people judge us, how safe we are? So I'd love to do, if it's okay with you, Rick, just do a little tapping on the letting go of some of the noise so we can actually be truly safer because we can hear the real signal. So karate chat. Even though there's a lot of messages about fear in here, I think, okay.

Even though there are a lot of messages of fear in here and I'm.

Afraid to let them down.

And I'm afraid to let them go.

What if they're necessary?

What if they're necessary?

What if they're real?

What if they're real?

How can I let these go?

How can I let these go?

Don't you try to take them away from me.

Don't you try to take them away from me.

I might do something really awful.

I might do something really awful.

Or be really unprepared.

Or be really unprepared.

All these noisy messages.

All these noisy messages.

Eyebrows. Sometimes there's grains of truth in them.

And sometimes there are grains of truth in them.

Side of the eye. Maybe I'm not quite prepared yet.

Maybe I'm not quite prepared yet.

Under the eye. Maybe somebody will reject me if I speak my truth.

Maybe someone will reject me if I.

Speak my truth under the nose. But I'M keeping all the judgment with the signal.

Say that again.

I'm keeping all the judgment in the messages with the signal, with the reality.

I want to keep all the. No, I'm blanking.

Well, the thought is that when we keep the noisy messages, we're keeping the judgment that's in the messages rather than just keeping the information we need to have.

Yeah, I want to keep the information I need to have.

Yeah. Trying to let go of the judgment that's in the messages.

And let go of the judgment that's in the messages.

Collarbone. Why can't I let go of this judgment?

Why can't I let go of this judgment?

Anuya. It's not actually helping me.

It's not actually helping me.

Top of the head. Not everyone's going to always like me.

Not everyone's always going to like me.

And I don't have to be afraid of that.

And I don't have to be afraid of that.

So just take a breath and see if you can notice where you feel fearful about something and just notice. See if you can notice the tone. Sometimes we've been hearing it so much as that fish and water feeling where we don't even notice the tone anymore. So if you think of one particular thing that you often notice noise about, like how you dress, how big your body is, how many wrinkles you have, whatever it is, like, oh, how. What is the tone I'm hearing in my head? Is it pretty judgmental? Is it trying to scare me? What if I could get the juice of that? Like, oh, okay, so maybe I do want to be more prepared or maybe I do want to be may realize that some people are going to leave if I'm. When I first started doing tapping, I had a number of people leave my life because our relationship wasn't as. It was pretty one dimensional. And as I started speaking my truth, we realized we didn't really like each other that much. We'd just been kind of out of habit, kind of coexisting with each other. And when I started saying, you know, I really don't like when that happens. We're like, oh wait, we're not a good fit. And they drifted away. So there was, there's some truth in that sometimes. But then there was also room for some really amazing people. It wasn't this horrible. It was sad about a couple of them. Like I had did some tapping on Jennifer's not in my life anymore. Oh my goodness. I don't know where she went. But there was also room for some really Amazing people to come in. So my survival brain was thinking it was the end of the world if these people left. And it was really oh well, it was sad and I wish them well. And I'm going to hang out with these people that are much more fulfilling and rich and alive for me. So I think if we can start noticing the tone, that can be a big deal.

So more animals that don't have our capacities, they're always in reaction, instinctual reaction. We have this amazing capacity to take something that is hitting our primitive brain and go to signal the actual signal. So for example, I'll never get it right. Something awful is going to happen. And that's really vague. The first thing for me is there's a signal there. When it sounds like that I'm in a state of fear around this and I have one job is to get out of that state of fear so that I have a more expanded set of signals. That's the one job when I, when I realize that if I'm in my primitive really strongly in my primitive brain around it that I need to get into my, my body like breathing, movement, touch, tapping works for me because it's a body centered activity of soothing these comfort points with an intention to go for the signal. So the person that said something really awful will happen. Their intention is skillful anger. So how many people here imagine that if you were not skillful with anger management that something really awful could happen just from a primitive brain standpoint?

Yeah, pretty.

You're walking along the street. I'm practicing skillful anger. That guy just cut in front of me. I'm going to very unskillfully use this complete stranger who I don't know whether they're armed and dangerous or not. And I'm going to practice my anger mana, you know, my anger release with them. Now if I'm wanting to practice skillful anger, I want my primitive brain to say, okay, that's like playing with fire. You haven't given the lighter, you know, the fire starter to Adira yet. She's two. But you can guide Emerald in doing that. But not. But lighting things that are meant to be lit. And so you notice I used kind of a primal example. Those work for me in quieting the noise. It's like, of course I've got fear here because I'm needing to bring it into context. I would say for example, that I know Kathy, you've worked with professionals who are just amazing even if you're angry at them, being able to process that. So there are people that are on the planet that actually can help people develop a skill with anger. And we probably also can point in our family trees and others where if we were angry at them, it would be something. I would want my primitive brain to go, oh, no, no, no. Something. If, if you value that relationship at all. Bringing skillful anger. No, no, no. Skillful anger for them is probably something else. And that's where my heart might say, yeah, if I'm going to be with them, the signal is I process the anger that I feel righteously and rightfully with those that can hold that space for me so that if I bring something into the space, the we space with that person, it's not anger anymore. In the same way that, you know, the cauldron of fire can melt steel, but you can bring someone a beautiful burnished steel pan, you know, or some gift like you can take and skillfully take fire energy and use it in the right context, but not with everyone and not all the time. Do you notice that there's a tremendous intelligence in the grain of truth about the fear that we have? The not good enough. Anytime I've really gone deeper with somebody on not good enough. Not good enough in what for what? Oh, well, I'm not good enough to get what I want. And what are you wanting? Well, I, I, I want to take care of myself and appreciate myself. Okay. And you're not good enough to do. Oh, could you, could you come up with something that you appreciate about yourself? Well, yeah, I'm not a total asshole. Any like, that's a beautiful little increment in the self care, self appreciation.

With different people. There's certain, like you said, there's certain people, you, they're just not really equipped to handle anger. Or if you're doing difficult conversations with them, you may have to start very small with little baby things, baby steps. And we'll talk more about baby steps later. But we don't have to, like, if we say I want to be more courageous. That's one of my things. I want to experience being more courageous and doing more things that I'm afraid of. But I don't have to go skydiving tomorrow. I can practice with smaller things like, oh, I've been putting off these papers and I need to scan it and send to my insurance company for a week. And it's been taking up a lot of energy. How about if I just be courageous and face that and get it done and we can build up the muscles and then we're working with other people. I think there's actually a skill and a savviness with like I don't know if I'll ever be able to be angry with this person. I can, you know, I can tap with someone, I can yell at a chair, I can hit a pillow. But going directly to that person may not be safe. And that may be true. Someone said they were talking about things, not feeling safe. Like what if someone leaves them if they're not there around help if they need help, their family for instance. I think that some families are able to handle gradually over time being more authentic, more truthful, like oh, I feel a little angry that you said that and I'd like to talk about that. Can we, you know, without actually having the tone versus I have coaches that I've worked with and workshops where I've gone to where people were just like I am so fucking mad at you. Like really? And everyone was okay. Everyone was like, like we, we built up a trust where we're like, we're going to really feel our feelings with each other and express them and there's no physical violence. But that's not something I would do with my family. My family would not be able to handle that. This is a skill that people have learned. So I think discernment.

And there's a container there where you have people that are holding the safety so that if someone dysregulates and that there are people that are savvy enough to hold the container. So one of the things that someone wants self care and the concern is around this, you know, no, that's not safe. What if, what will happen to me if they aren't there when I need them? So that's survival, right? And ask yourself if where's the grain of truth in that? You know, these people, maybe they're very self oriented and so like if you aren't there always to be of service to them. There's a lot of ways that families are constellated, right? We've got bears and we've got Orion and we have big dippers and things like that. Families are the same way. But even in really great relationships, like the grain of truth there for me is I wanted to start going on a morning mile that's self care. The signal strong inside me was that if I, if, if I, my whole being, cellular, lymphatic blood, bones, muscle, brain, every part of me was saying, you are wanting to move more. It was in the quiet times of my day and other times that's self care. Now when we're in relationship and we want people to tend to us. There's signal there, too. Those relationships matter to me. They matter for my survival. Sometimes it's physical, sometimes it's financial, sometimes it's emotional. Like, if these people really turned on me for taking care of myself, well, I have, like, I'm not sure that I'm ready for that. I don't have that resilience yet. Or maybe ever, in my case. What I. By quieting the noise. The noise was. There's no time for that. The noise was, well, you need to be here to take care of Adira. The noise was your partner's doing all this other stuff. And can you feel like there's a suppression going on? Because it's critical and kind of mean my discernment circuits kick in and go, yeah, there's some truth in all of that. Where's the signal? Why don't you share and just ask? Say, I'm really feeling like being out in nature just for 20 to 40 minutes a day would give me a lot more physical and emotional energy to be of service to the family. Is that something that you can support? And if so, what would make it easier? That's the conversation I had. Did I. Did I have to prepare myself for that? Yes. And it was. It's meant that I've had 789 morning miles since I got that signal. Clarity quieted the noise that rose as soon as I moved toward that. At this point, I actually expect noise around anything new, if that makes sense. It's just part of the way that I'm wired. Go ahead.

Oh, I just. I love that you asked, you talked. It does take courage. But a lot of times we'll decide in our head, oh, that person will be mad or that person will be burdened versus, like, hey, this is something I'd like. Is there a way to fix it? Is there a way to create this? And often when you get several different brains working on something, there's really good solutions. And so you speaking up about something you wanted, I think that's really valuable. Great role modeling. And something that I still catch myself deciding, oh, Rick won't like to do this. And then like, sometimes, like, hey, my hot tub died the other day. I was really upset. I didn't want to, like, I love my hot tub. I was like, oh, no. And I didn't want to bother Rick about it. He helped me find the first one. And I mentioned it to him. I brought it up that I was frustrated about it and he just on his own, went and found A link. And I have a hot tub coming on Tuesday. So sometimes we just. When we're willing to share and it takes courage, like, he might have just like, oh, my God. You know, in my mind, he's like, you're always asking me for stuff. Like, I have to find hot tubs for you all the time or whatever. And he just naturally did that. And it was such a gift for me. So I encourage you with safe people, start practicing asking for what you want. And, like, maybe the morning mile wouldn't work. Maybe his partner would be like, oh, my God, I really can't do this. Let's find something else. Let's try to brainstorm something else. But he brought it up, and that creates intimacy, that creates a connection because he's sharing who he really is.

And when we're connected to what matters to us, the signal that we feel, there's also more resilience. And sometimes the noise is all we're hearing. And again, in order to be what matters, the emotional skill is, I'm in a noisy place, I'm in fear, I'm in flood, I'm triggered. I'm in doubt, I'm scared. And it doesn't feel like, oh, pooh, pooh. You shouldn't be scared about that. Is actually what I can do, that there's something in here I need to tend to. And I believe with all of these things that you all have shared, Let me look at, see if I can find this other person's. So resilience. My noise is. You never do anything right. You mess up. So here's. Here's to experience resilience, emotional resilience in particular. This noise actually is a great big hairy thing that if you play with it, play with this monster, you can end up on the other side of it with a lot of resistance. I mean, with a lot of resilience. Okay. Yeah. Side of the hand. Even though I have this really big loud noise.

Even though I have this really big loud noise.

You never do anything right.

You never do anything right.

You always mess up.

You always mess up.

That's really ridiculous.

It's really ridiculous.

Hop of the head. I made it to the call.

I made it to the call.

Eyebrow. I didn't mess that up.

I didn't mess that up.

Out of the eye. I got out of bed this morning.

I got out of bed this morning.

Yeah. I didn't mess that up.

I didn't mess that up.

There are a lot of things that I've already done today.

There's a lot of Things that I've.

Already done today that I didn't mess up.

That I didn't mess up.

Collabone. This is really noisy.

This is really noisy with the arm.

This is the noise that hurts my resilience.

This is a noise that hurts my resilience.

The good news is it's just noise.

The good news is it's just noise.

Liar, liar, pants on fire.

Pants on fire.

So if you have something that. On a very primal basis now, I sometimes go really primal, like, well, I brush my teeth, I wiped my own. You know, I made my coffee and I didn't mess that up. Oh, you know what? I did drop a little bit of yogurt when I was feeding Adira. And I cleaned it up. So, you know, even when there's a mess, I've got capacity to clean things up, you know, I spilled something. I had gotten dressed for the call. I spilled something on me. Guess what I did. I. The noise was, you know, I gotta. There's no time, you know, like, that's noise. And what I dropped in is like, what is right for me. I went and changed my whole outfit. So when. When this is your noise, it is. Look for the signal in it. Right. And how a resilient person. Like, if you wanted to be courageous, the approach might be. Yeah, even though I might mess it up. I decided to be courageous anyway. Because I'll get that experience. Yeah. Even though it's not going to be done right according to them. May not even be done right according to me, actually. I just want the courage of doing it. So fuck it. So, like, that's the tapping that I might do. Go ahead, Kathy.

I think it's important to remember too, our brains tend to give 10 times the emphasis to anything that goes wrong versus anything we do right. So if we can kind of step back and look it over. So, like, dropping yogurt on the floor, like, it. There's been times in my life when I was much less resilient where that would be the end of my day. I just like, I can't do anything right. I would stab myself with that phrase so many times that I would creep off to bed and curl up with a book and some food because just like, it couldn't, it was too painful to be there. So I think if we can step back and see overall, like, how many things did I do right today? Like what Rick was pointing out during the tapping. And just also remember that we will give 10 times the emphasis. It's a survival brain thing. Because one fail could could, you know, if we're out in the wild trying to do something that could be the end of us versus 10 successes might be good, but they're not going to be, they're not life saving necessarily. So if we can't, you know, just remembering that in your head, oh, I'm putting 10 times the power behind this one because it's negative. I don't necessarily need to do that. It's not, we're not, we don't live out in the wilds anymore. There's not hyenas and lions behind every bush.

Right. And what we've elevated into the we, I, I didn't realize how much noise I was treating as if it's signal, the, the perspective, the reframe of. I'm not the type of person that wants to mess things up and, but I don't. I also, when it comes in through my primitive brain, it's not very useful. So it might be like, oh, that was, that's a mess and I'll feel the blood of it. And again, I'm not immune to things hitting my primitive brain. I have, I practice this skill of discernment of is it hitting my primitive brain? And if so, I'm going to calm myself, quiet myself enough so that I feel for what an adaptation I want to make. Is there an adaptation I want to make. And you know, I, I really appreciate and I'm eager to see like what happens in our community and what happens in the world when, when we start recognizing that. Yeah, that sounds, you know, really primitive, brainy. Does it feel that way to you? Yeah, it feels so harsh and cruel. Oh, okay. Well, where's the signal in it for you, huh? Well, you know, if, if you're walking along and your cell phone is breaking up, you try to get to some place where the signal is better and what's the signal in it for you? If that is noise, is there signal, where in your body would you find a signal? What matters to you here more than what's coming up for you?

Yeah, I think that's really useful. Should we take a break now and talk about one of the other fears that can come up when we come back?

Let's do that. We're going to take a seven minute break and we'll be back. Welcome back. And if you're watching the replay, we invite you to pause if you didn't and let yourself integrate a bit because what we're going to go to next is. Is that right? Afraid of what you'll hear? Is that what you Wanted.

Yeah. I think it's important to talk about as we're quieting the noise, as we're healing old traumas and learning to listen better, to hear the signal that we're getting. There can be a time, or there may be many times where there's a resistance to quieting the noise because there's a fear of what you might hear. So it might be that you're with a partner that's toxic or in a job that's toxic, or you have old things to heal that you haven't really wanted to acknowledge or look at. And as we quiet the noise, those things become more prominent. They become more. You become more aware of them. And our system may be like, oh, I don't know if I want to quiet that noise because I don't want to hear what's beneath it. The signal that may have been swamped out by all those negative messages and all the. The burr around, and I have to listen to the neighbor and worry about that person and keep this person happy. As we quiet that down, we may find things that maybe we knew they were there, maybe we didn't, or we don't want to acknowledge, or we're not quite sure how to face. And I want to emphasize it's so useful and valuable to process these things that are hidden. Those hidden things are often what's keeping us from living the life we want to live. And maybe that noise was protective for a long time. It kept us from hearing these things. But if we can take baby steps, we don't have to, like, get rid of a toxic job immediately or get rid of a toxic partner or whatever it is that's come burbling to the surface. But if we can start taking baby steps to acknowledge it and heal the emotions we have around it, start learning some skills, then we can start healing these things. And I know for myself a lot of times when I felt I just don't understand why I can't get myself to do this thing, or I don't understand why my life is a certain way. As I quieted some other noises, I ran into things like, oh, I'm really afraid of people. People scare me. No wonder I don't want to be close to people. That was really tough to look at. It didn't want to really acknowledge that I was so afraid of people. And it took a while to heal it. But as I've healed it, I've had much closer friendships with people. I've had, you know, better relationships with people in general. It's been really worth it. But I think it's important to acknowledge that sometimes the noise is there as a protective mask, and then as we heal it, we may run into things. So if there's things in your life that you're not sure you want to look at or you don't know that you have the capacity to process through quieting the noise may be. If you run into resistance, that's something to look at to like, kind of acknowledge. Is there something that I don't want to hear or see that's under this. That could be under this noise? That could be part of why I'm. I'm keeping this extra noise around me. And I. For what? For myself, I don't want to live my life. And the end of my life go, I wish I had, like, I wish I'd cleared that noise. I wish I had healed those things. And everybody gets to choose for themselves at what pace they go and how fast they clear things. So there's nothing wrong with taking things slow or choosing not to dive into certain things. And I think it's really useful to know that there can be that fear. Do you have thoughts on that, Rick?

It's one of the reasons why I felt that having something that really matters to us as a guide, a guidepost, an energy to come back to. Like, I could tell and we talked about it early on, like, what you wanted was connection, the kind of connection that would be nourishing. You're. You're such amazing co creator. And you know, I remember when we started talking about co creating, there was a lot of oomph behind that. You wanted to have that experience. And the things that would come up, the noise would be something like, I'm not good enough. The, the signal is I actually am afraid of people. And that to me, the signal has a different quality to. One of the things is if you have someone who can reflect with you, you can hear like someone's frustration and someone's resentment and someone's anger and, and, and someone's fear and scaredness and things like that. But oftentimes someone who is, who knows us deeply enough and has a sense of what signal is, has some skill in that, can say something. Well, as I'm listening to you, I'm picking up on, on grief, the grief of this, you know, the, the being forced to. But there's a letting go of what has been true for you for a long time that you've really valued. It's been a, a situation that means a lot to you. And like, that's when the tears can start flowing, where it's like, oh, yeah, that's really tender. It's a very tender signal. It may be one where I believe that in the case of a lot of the deeper signals, for us, they're meant. They're designed in our psyche to be in the presence of safe people. And I really, I believe in our workshops, we're cultivating people that can hold a much safer space for people being in their dysregulation or not being capable of having a difficult conversation. You know, we, we were less likely to run roughshod and more likely because we're listening to what matters to us, to pick up the signal, even amidst the noise. Like, well, I'm sensing that what matters to you is taking care of yourself and that there's a lot of concerns. For example, like, that's the signal, the signal of self care mattering and not just for survival. The survival part of it is like, well, part of self care is not having everyone turn on me. But the bigger part of thriving. Anyone who's going to listen to Kathy and I for more than three seconds is probably more interested in thriving than just surviving. So, like, when I hear someone say self care, you know, I feel that, like, oh, cultivate my energy so that I can really be alive with my vitality. Same with, you know, why Skillful anger. Like, I do not handle anger the way my father did. Yay.

We're all very grateful for that.

Right? And like, in a thriving world, you know, in experience, there are going to be things that come into our body that could hit all those dysfunctional patterns from our ancestors and maybe from our youth and maybe from yesterday. And if we want to be skillful and savvy with them, what do I do with that energy? Because the person who can't feel their fire, there's a lot of their qi that's going to be a little wetter, a little damper. It's hard to have strong steel without using fire. And I don't think it's possible. You have to have some fire to have steel in you. Like. No, this matters to me. That's one of the channels for anger, is that I am very clear in the core of me, the strongest part of me, that this matters to me. Not talking about anyone else or how anyone else is going to be with that, but, like, knowing that. Go ahead.

No, I love that someone asked, is skittering to another thought, another form of avoiding discomfort. And it can actually. Yes, absolutely. It may be that there's a lot of noise sort of bouncing back and forth. And it may be that we don't want to be present with a certain thought and we're bouncing around. And one of the best ways I know to deal with that is just tolerating it for a few like take like 10 seconds, 20 seconds and you can build up for it. That's. I've been doing the cold showers and it's the same thing. I never thought I could do a two minute cold shower. I really thought I would die. But I started with 10 seconds and that was not very comfortable. But for a week I did 10 second cold showers and then it was 20 seconds and then it was 30 seconds and eventually I was up to two minutes. And I actually, the days I miss it, the days I skip it, I miss it. Like there's part of me going, oh, where's my cold shower? It's at the end of my shower. So. But I just. We can tolerate more than we can. We think we can. And I think teaching ourselves that we don't need to run away from these feelings can be very powerful. And if there's a lot of trauma, getting a coach or someone to hold space for you and help you kind of baby step it forward can be really important because a lot of us will die. I don't know about how many of you. I have fingers pointing back at me. I'm like, I can do 20 minutes of this and then I can't. It's too much for my system. And then I've taught myself again that I can't do it. I've just added more data to the fact I can't do it. So you want to start with some sections that you can. Maybe they feel like it's a little bit of effort but that you can accomplish it. So you can teach your, your, your system that, oh, well, that didn't feel great, but I was able to do it like, oh, wow, maybe that wasn't so bad as I thought. So you want to make sure you take small baby steps at first to build your confidence, to build your, your, you know, strengthen your ligaments and muscles so that you're not hurting yourself and then convincing yourself that you can't do it. And I think that's one of the things with baby steps is I run into a lot is I don't take small enough baby steps at first. It's kind of an exponential growth. You start off and it feels like you're not getting anywhere. The 10 minute to 20 or 20, 10 seconds to 20 seconds to 30 seconds, I'm like, I'm nowhere near two minutes. What is this? But then I guess it was six weeks I was there and it wasn't so hard. But we have to, if we can, just really listening to our body and having someone to guide us so that we don't go too fast. And if we notice ourselves bouncing around a lot or having a lot of noise certain times of the day, certain situations that can be something not in that situation, maybe take a little bit of time afterwards or before, like, oh, I notice every time I go to visit my mother, there's a lot of noise. Is there a feeling I'm not acknowledging? It may be that I don't have to talk to her about. Might be that I just have to, oh, I have some grief that I'm not able to be more authentic with her. I have some anger and I can do some tapping with Rick or with myself or with another coach to kind of clear it. And then I might find when I go to see her, I can just like, oh, yeah, I feel sad that she can't hear all of me and I can still be here with her and still be quiet. I don't have to bombard myself with meteorites of messages and noise so that I don't have to feel the feeling. I don't know if that makes sense.

So noise is a part of every ecosystem inside and outside of us. And going again through that, there's the signal, the noise and the discernment. And Kathy just took us through a discernment. If I've got all this noise and I'm able to at least discern its noise. Noise impacts us most when there's something in it that could be true or points to a trauma. But it's noise. It's not the signal. And as we practice quieting ourselves and you know, the chat is open, if you have things that you do to quiet your noise. A walk, talking to myself. Sometimes on the walk, not usually just on a busy street corner with people passing. Oh, I write, I meditate, I will clean like I'm a. I'm someone that cleaning is a strategy of actually. That actually takes me out of my primitive brain. It can put me into it if I try to get too far ahead. But if it's like I'm going to just put these bowls away, like there's a Pull an oracle card, prayer, call a friend, text a friend, I will pick up a word processor and start typing into it in a dialogue form. I believe in the power of potent questions. I Believe it's one of the concepts for thriving is that there are questions. And so someone asked m is skittering to another thought, another form of avoiding that discomfort. If you're wise enough to come up with that from your signal, that would be one of the questions I would write down. Am I avoiding discomfort here? Okay. Can I be with the discomfort? That was Kathy's, you know, invit. Can I be with the discomfort for 10 seconds? Okay. And one of the ones is, is there signal here for me or what is the signal here for me? I don't. My experience is I am never unguided. I just may be too noisy. That there is an intelligence in the universe, there's a love inside of me, there's. And not that embraces my. My desire to survive for all the reasons and my desires to thrive and to. And to be and walk in the world with integrity and to experience emotions and. And people and that matter to me. And noise is a discernment for me that, oh, I'm feeling really noisy. You will even hear me say that to my partner. Hey, I'm feeling really noisy. I'm going to go do a horizontal reset. Horizontal reset is. Looks to everyone else like a nap. But it's actually me rebooting my system and it takes about 20 minutes, not much longer, you know, then you log in and yeah, and I'm reset. So those are journal. Someone says. So that's that. The real skill here is in the quieting. I tap and I will tap on the noise. Like, even though there's this noise and it's driving me cuckoo brains. Even though there's this noise and it's driving me cuckoo brains.

Even though there's this noise that is driving me cuckoo brains.

Yeah, at least I know it's noise.

At least I know it's noise.

And I appreciate myself for that.

And I appreciate myself for that.

Oh, that's noisy.

That is noisy.

Eyebrow. That is so noisy.

That is so noisy.

Under the eye. That energy is so noisy to my system.

That energy is so noisy to my.

System under the eye. And I'm sensitive enough to pick up on a lot of signals.

And I'm sensitive enough to pick up on a lot of signals.

It doesn't mean they're not noise for me.

It doesn't mean they're not noise for me.

Chen. One person's signal is another person's noise.

One person signal is another person's noise.

One person's signal is another person's noise.

100 person signals. One other person's noise.

And I like the skill of discernment.

And I like the skill of discernment.

That really can help quiet the noise.

That really can help quiet the noise.

So I want to do a discernment little exercise. You're cooking, and you've got something on the stove, okay. And the heat is set too high, and it starts to smoke. What's the noise that comes? You really want to cook something, but it's smoking, right? Is there any noise that crops up for you? Mine's initially a profanity, right. Or maybe a judgment of myself as a chef. I'm the simpleton chef in our family. That's my name that I gave myself. It actually makes me smile, takes the pressure off. But let's say now the smoke detector starts screaming, smoke. I have one right over there. It's a really useful device. But if I know where the smoke is coming from and it's not actually a fire, the signal I'm getting from that smoke detector doesn't have to hit the parts of me that are like, oh, my gosh, what if there's a fire? Like, that's discernment. Oh, okay. And now you're tending to that. You're tending to turning the heat off. You're trying to. You're. You're doing everything that you need to do. And downstream, you can look at, hey, when I'm cooking, you know what? How do I want to be when I'm cooking? The times where things have started smoking, I was being not with the act of service. I wasn't being with the appreciation for the food that I. I had procured that was being prepared for my family. I was maybe on my phone doing something that wasn't as important. And so the be what matters is downstream. It's like, you know, I really want to be more present while I'm preparing food. If I snap about something that's. That's very noisy, but there's probably signal in it, like a fear of Adira getting, you know, getting into a knife or someplace that she doesn't belong. Well, what matters to me, Presence with my family. Oh, if I'm being more present, I can actually be cutting up beats and present with her. But I can't necessarily have music on too. That's the music that I love may be too much noise. And this is. This is. I'm sharing this as a story of discernment, of, hey, how do I navigate my own noisiness in a way that I actively quiet it down? I actively discern, well, the smoke Detector is going off because, you know, the smoke that's coming from the food or the oven, I'm going to tend to that in the same way that trauma will kick off our smoke detectors. I don't know whether some of the smoke detectors that are tied to trauma, the trauma events themselves don't feel particularly strong for me, even if I've gone into them with other people. But there's a smoke detector around a man's energy, for example, that it will go off if that energy is present now for me. And what do I do with that? Well, the alarm has gone off. Usually there's a jolt. If I get a jolt from a trigger, it's very noisy for my biochemistry. It'll probably take a few minutes for my heart rate and other things to come down. Ah, what did I just pick up on? The signal is there's the presence of somebody who's radiating a particular energy. And I can look and go, oh, okay, that's sort of a harm. You know, that's. I get why it triggered me. Right. But it's not actually that there's no teenage boy that's at risk here. They're not actually radiating an energy. It was just one that sets off my fire alarm. Does that make sense? It's a vulnerable thing to share that. But it's true, and I see this with my clients, that there are things that you can sort of expect in the presence of, let's say, a really hypercritical person, that it may set you off. You tend to yourself. You look at the situation, you quiet the noise enough that you can discern. Is this actually what's playing out here? If you lose yourself, obviously, with a flashback or like, I'm actually in a frozen state, that signal is, this energy is still alive enough in me that instead of it being an alert, it's a shutdown. I'm shutting down from a past trauma. Professional help has been extremely useful for me in making it so that I'm not lost in those signals that come in.

Yeah, I love you shared that. Thank you for the vulnerability. I think there's also. We can also sometimes be getting signal. When you were sharing that, I had the thought of the fire alarm. That's an important signal we have. Sometimes it will go off for me when I'm cooking bacon and just. I like my bacon crispy. And I'm like, oh, my friends joke. The bacon's ready when the fire alarm goes off. But my neighbors are. They're from Mexico, so they get the Spanish channel on their HBO they get those and they're not useful. Like, I don't speak Spanish well enough to like get more than como seama, like a little bit. So me getting that signal in on my tv, it would be noise to me. It's not helpful signal. So the thought was like, sometimes my mother will give me advice, she means, and sometimes, sometimes it's useful. But there's times when she gives me advice that's useful for her world and not useful for my world. It's useful for her experiences and not for mine. And so like if we're getting information from other people or we're getting some things that we're not sure if there's signal or not. There may be signal for someone else, but they're like, oh, is it a good. Is this what I want to receive on my TV station? Is it useful for me? Is it the message? My mother tends to be more cheerful. She's worried about things happening and I'm like, oh, I want to be aware of that, but I don't want to go into a panic of the world is ending kind of thing. So I think it can be useful sometimes to say, hey, is this a signal that I find useful for my life, my ecosystem, or does it really belong to a neighbor or someone else, someone else's world? So just kind of that thought going through, like I, you know, she, my mother was very worried about the balloons from China and I was like, oh, I know about them. I don't think China is about to invade. I don't think I need to let that be part play so loudly in my ecosystem. That makes sense. So I think it's okay to like pick and choose. We're even if we get rid of just noise and we're looking for valuable signal things that are informative, we're surrounded by more than we could ever absorb. So, you know, like there's. I would love to learn Spanish and Chinese and I would love to. There's always things I have always have classes that I haven't taken yet that are floating around. So we, we get to choose and we get to like decide. Do I want to filter that out now or is that something. I really want? Something that will add a lot of joy to my life and a lot of energy, whatever your word is, your, your concept, your eagerness or courage or whatever. I love having that filter for a little while because it's like, oh yeah, that might be good for another, another three month period when I'm trying to focus on that. But for right now, I'm focusing on this and that's not part of that. I'm going to filter it out and let it go with gratitude. So yeah, it can be helpful.

Awesome. Because I just realized what I've been doing with emails and filtering and who I follow on social media and things like that. Eagerness is a focus. And so one of the questions that I've energetically been asking is, is could I be eager? Am I eager to get this email? Am I eager to, to see what this person posts? Not everything, but is this, Am I eager for the relationship that I have? Even if it's a relationship, they don't even know who I am or that I, I'm consuming their signal. If it's useful to me, if it nourishes me in some way, if it provides whatever matters to me, then wow. Yes. And I, I, the arc of my mother's giving me something, there's a little signal, there's, there's that grain of signal in it and I'm letting go of the rest so that I can put it within my own framework. That's one that's useful to me, that is more embodied for me, that can help us quiet so much noise when we ask the question, where's the signal in this? For me, I saw something the other day on social media, clearly had some signal in it, but there was so much noise to it, it's like ah, ah, ah. And when I quieted the noise, what it was is like freedom in the continent of Africa really matters to me. But the way that this person who is African asserts themselves around the things that matter to me, there's signal there, it's powerful signal, but it includes a kind of judgmental noise that floods my system. So while this lawyer and all that they do, I appreciate their existence, their signal, I can't actually assimilate without activating a lot of noise. It's if we look at our inbox, if we look at our social media feed, if we look at relationships and what we talk about and what we choose not to, you can look at, is there something regularly that isn't just noise? Maybe that really matters to me, but it comes into my system in a way that, you know, I, I, I, I cannot assimilate. There's some wonderful teachers in the world that I've learned something from. And today, like the way I've tuned my energy field, their signal is perhaps what was right for me when I was 29, but not right for me now, even though they're still speaking to a lot of People that. That signal that they put out is right for them. Part of me, I say that for acceptance that we have a lot of people that filter us out. And I used to get all the unsubscribes. I used to even ask people, well, is there something that you were looking for? And what I discovered was that our signal, the way that we do it, the way that we craft our energy, the way that you and I relate the things that matter to us, us, for a lot of people is noise. It could be going too deep. Even as. As gently as we try to be, we sometimes can go too deep, too fast for them, where they are. It could be that their. Their whole framework, their spiritual framework or other things. I'm actually eager now to feel that people are making choices that are right for them, and I'm encouraging that.

I love one person shared about losing a place they really loved and having to find something new. And I just want to. I've had that kind of. I've had grief about leaving places before too. And one of the things I found that helped me a bit was to go. I don't know if you're still in the space or you could do it imagine in your. In your mind. I went around and I touched every wall and every place place that had fond memories for me. And I thanked the building in the space for holding that for me and being there for me and just kind of put some love into that. And that helped me a lot with my grief about it. And I also mentally kind of categorized what I loved about it so that I could look for that, a new place to kind of be specific and invite it into the new place. So I don't know if that's helpful or not, but I did want to share that because that was something I found made a huge difference for me when I was leaving a place that I had safety and delight in, just thanking it for all the different things that had been for me and hoping that it would be amazing for someone else. So I just wanted to share that because that grief can be hard, especially when we're losing our safe, amazing space. I hope you find something really wonderful.

So thank you all for being here so much and for participating energetically and in your emails. We'd like to continue this thriving now center is our community center and it's open. We'd love for you to come and join us if that's your yes, if that would be signal for you. And I had an. I. I had an imagining this morning of me, you know, Sitting across from each of us, actually sitting across from our future self. And, you know, we're in a cafe and you're sitting across from your future self and you're like, wow, they look good. What's the secret? You know, with a kind of eagerness, because that's my thing. And, you know, around that time somebody dropped a mug of coffee and it smashes to the ground and, you know, and there's a car alarm way off in the distance. And, you know, a couple of friends who haven't seen each other for 10 years are coming into the cafe and.

They'Re like.

You know, there's all this loudness. And I thought, well, you know, there's a lot of noise. Some of it is things that have to be cleaned up. And some of it's love that's just being expressed. And there's a me in the future that has the guidance my future self. What I am doing today, what we've all done today in this workshop is set our future self up for more thriving. And I believe with all my own experience and heart that if we spite whatever is going on out there, we. We sit down and tune to our guidance system and our future self. There is guidance available for how to navigate even big life changes. It's not ignoring or saying or trying to even quiet all the noise that's out of our control. It's going toward what matters to us, the deeper connection with ourselves and with those that we love. Even if things are loud in the cafe.

I hope you all enjoy. Get lots of really good clear living bean signal.

And in our next workshop, we'll be boosting our energy. Yeah. Bye for now. Thank you, Kathy.

Bye, everyone.