Episode 61: Mr Brightside

Hey, I'm gonna need some grace from y'all today because, as you know, I record about 90% of these in my Jeep and it's really cold. I've got to have the heater going. I'm trying to keep it down low. I've got it going on in the floorboard. That way it's not picking up a lot of background noise, but you're just gonna have to give me a little, a little bit of grace, y'all. Because it is freezing outside. Hey, before I jump into this one, I want to do a quick pre-frame with you. At the end of this call or at the end of this podcast, I'm going to make an offer for us to connect on a much deeper level. If what I talk about today resonates with you, let's talk. This is an area that, you know, there's not a lot of things I'll say I'm an expert on. But this is an area where I feel like I've experienced this. And my heart goes out to you if you've been going through this. And I know, I know the right way. I really, really know the right way to help run the coaching on this. And I want to be there. So, in this episode, I'm going to use the song Mr. Brightside as a mirror. For what the brain does under uncertainty, how it fills in missing information, how trauma patterns get reactivated, and why we sometimes end up replaying that old path of pain, even when we don't want to. I'm gonna give you some clear brain science explanations, a practical way to interrupt the spiral in real time, And in the end, you know, just, just have some hope. And again, at the end, I'm just going to make a simple invitation if you want to go deeper in this work. So let me explain this really quickly. This is why I know this topic so well, because this is a topic that's played out over and over and over again in my life. So something I'll share with you on a very personal level. Most of my romantic relationships have resulted in my partner cheating on me. And this goes all the way back to high school. And it just, it's something, and my brain is very vivid. It plays it like it's a movie. And the last time that this happened to me, I wound up in the hospital with a pulse between 170 and 185. I went and put myself into AFib because it took over that hard. And yet the thing is, there was nothing going on. You see, that song Mr. Brightside, it doesn't stay popular because of jealousy. It stays alive because it It captures what the brain does when it doesn't have something concrete, when it's not certain about things. You know, on the surface, the song sounds like it's suspicion, it's imagined scenes, it's looping thoughts, a mind that's just not going to let go. But under that is something that is Far more precise. And that's the brain trying to survive uncertainty. Now, by the way, this doesn't happen in just romantic relationships. It can happen with jobs. It can happen in friendships. It can happen in finances. When something feels unclear— silence, emotional distance, mixed signals— the brain doesn't wait patiently. It fills in the gaps. It reaches backward into, into memory and asks, hey, have I felt this before? And the brain's like, yeah, we have. And here's what's happening. If your past includes abandonment, betrayal, rejection, instability, those memories become the default blueprint. It's called predictive processing. The brain uses old experiences to predict what's about to happen next. It's a protective mechanism. So when you don't get that, you know, when you don't get a response to the text, you know, that unanswered text, it doesn't stay neutral. It becomes a story. A glance across the room, that becomes evidence, right? You have a romantic relationship with someone and you see them talking to somebody else, or maybe you've got a friend that they look at you while they're talking. It could be about nothing, right? And suddenly your nervous system reacts as if the past is happening all over again. And in, in the song, that line that goes, it was only a kiss, how did it end up like this? That's the exact moment prediction overrides reality. The body reacts first. Heart rate spikes, the chest tightens, thoughts accelerate, logic goes completely offline. And in my brain, and for a lot of y'all, It's like a movie. It's like a video. And you can see finances spiraling out of place, your boss chewing your ass out, your wife or your partner cheating on you. And it's not overthinking, it's survival. And here's where it gets even deeper. When uncertainty acts— when you've got uncertainty and it begins to activate those old emotional memories, the brain doesn't just remember them, it reopens them. That's memory reconsolidation. The past becomes emotionally present again and your body goes through the same reactions. And if there's nothing that interrupts that loop, something else happens. The begin— the brain begins what psychology calls repetition compulsion. And that's the tendency to unconsciously recreate familiar emotional pain. Not because we want it. And it's not as easy as just saying, hey, knock it off, or hey, you know, and, you know, think logically, right? Because in my case, I knew nothing was going on. But my brain and my body, my body was keeping the score of it, right? And it's not because we want it, because it happens because it's known. It's predictable. It's familiar. Hey, here we go again. That happened before. And you see, your brain would rather relive a story that it understands than face an ending it can't predict. I'm gonna say it one more time. Your brain would rather relive a story that it understands than face an ending it can't predict. So we replay those old dynamics. We assume the same outcomes. We step into narratives that confirm our old wounds, not because they're true, but it's because they feel recognizable. That's why people say things like, I always, you know, I always get left out. Nice guys finish last. I knew this was going to happen. It always ends the same. The brain is trying to finish an unfinished emotional story. I've got a couple of clients that I'm coaching them through this right now. And here's the most part, you know, here's the part that, that most people misunderstand. It doesn't mean you're broken. It just means that you learn to survive. But survival strategies don't always translate into healthy relationships. As a matter of fact, man, you can seem like that you're half-cocked or you're flying off the edge or you don't trust someone. You're insecure. And, and that's not good for a relationship. Because that's how you're seen. That's how you're labeled. And by the way, this is where the song quietly shifts and where hope lives. Because Mr. Brightside isn't about being consumed forever. It's about becoming aware in the middle of the spiral. I'm gonna say this a couple of times. In fact, I'm gonna say it 3 times. Awareness is the interruption. Awareness is the interruption. One last time, I want you to get this. Awareness is the interruption. The moment that you can say, this feels familiar, but it's not facts. That's my past speaking. It's not proof. You've got to become aware. You've got to speak against it. Hey, it feels like what it felt like before, but that's not the facts of what's happening now. All that stuff behind me, that's what happened in the past. It's not proof that it's happening right now. You engage a different part of the brain, which is the prefrontal cortex, the thinking center. You see, before, what was happening is we were getting hijacked, right? Those memories start playing in your brain. You start seeing the video. You're seeing your romantic partner doing things that you don't ever want to think about. Your boss coming in and firing you or chewing your ass or finances, you know, falling out of control. And when your chest tightens, the heart rate gets going, you become really narrowly focused, that's an amygdala hijack. But when you say, this feels familiar, it's not factual, this is my past speaking, it's not proof, and you go through that, you fire up a different part of the brain. The thinking center, the prefrontal cortex, the regulator, the part that creates choice. That pause matters because once you notice the pattern, you stop reenacting it automatically. Because they can't travel on the same— those 2 neural pathways cannot travel at the same moment. You stop the reenacting. You stop feeding the loop. You stop confusing emotional memory with present reality. And over time, something changes. Now, by the way, the first time this happens, you're going to have to fight it. You're going to have to fight. And by the way, with a couple of clients that I've got on this, when that happens, they reach out to me. And it may not be like an immediate thing. I may have to— maybe a little bit of time before I can get back to them. And it might just be through text. But what I've found, not just With them, but also within myself, over time, something changes. The first thing is that the spirals, you know, that spiraling out of control, it doesn't disappear, but that spiraling shortens. The stories lose intensity. The pause between the trigger and the reaction, it gets a lot longer. And you work at it day by day by day by day. And what happens is that you learn that you can experience uncertainty without self-destructing. You can actually stay present even when your mind just wants to run away and run with the story, right? That is emotional resilience. And the real bright side isn't pretending everything is fine. It's knowing that when your brain reaches for that old pain, You can choose not to live there anymore. Healing doesn't mean the thoughts never come back. It means they no longer decide who you are. And I got to tell you, that's not just growth, that's freedom. Let me give you another practical way To apply the next time you feel that Mr. Bright Side spiral starting. Because insight without a next step is going to leave you stuck. So I'm going to break this down into 3— into like a 3-part interruption that you can do in under 1 minute. First, name the pattern. Say it out loud. Say it in your head. This is a prediction. This is a prediction. Or, this is a familiar story. You know, labeling it, that's not cheesy. Labeling recruits the thinking brain and reduces emotional intensity. So name the pattern. Step away for a moment. Take a deep breath and say, oh man, this is a familiar story. Catch yourself in it. Number 2. Locate it in the body. Where do you feel it? Is it your heart racing? Is it pounding in the head? Is it your chest? Is it your throat? Does it feel like you're going to throw up? Your jaw clenching? Now, this sounds cheesy but I want you to do it and I tell you firsthand it works. Put your hand there, right there on that spot. For me, it starts in the chest. I put— I take— actually take both hands, put it on my chest. I breathe a little. I intentionally breathe slower and do it for 5 breaths. I have my clients do this. It's not about calming down. It's about telling your nervous system, we're not in danger. It's also telling your nervous system, I am in control of this. Number 3. Ask a much better question than your fear is asking. You see, fear asks, what if I'm being betrayed? What if they're cheating on me? What if my friends are talking about me? What if— all the what-ifs, right? A much better question is, what do I actually know right now? And what am I assuming? The other thing is, hey, if this is the past talking, what does the present-day me choose? So for me, this happened when my girlfriend at the time, now my wife, was running a dive trip. And I knew that the place that she was at was a place— now, by the way, she was with all married women that were just scuba diving. That was it, right? But I also knew that that place had a reputation. I also knew factually that my wife was faithful and everybody else in that group was faithful. And the minute that Some coyote comes sneaking around, as in a man, they blow them off and they go away. And they focus on just what they're doing. They're not there to attract guys. They don't wear, you know, the slinky clothing to thirst trap anybody, right? Factually, I know that. But in my brain, because things had happened in the past, that's what I went to. So for me, when fear was saying, "Hey, you're being betrayed." You know what? What's gonna? What are you gonna do if you're being betrayed? And my mind started cycling all out of control, like, "Oh man, that's it. She's got to pack up, move out. I'm done." What I learned later when this would happen is okay. If that was something that happened in the past and happened with other people. Because it never happened with her. What am I choosing? And I got to tell you that, that shift from assumption to choice, it's the doorway out of reenactment. And in both my clients, it's working. And if you're listening to this and you're thinking, yeah, but it still feels real. You're absolutely right. It does feel real because your brain is using emotional memory just like— it's like a live broadcast. And in the beginning, the goal isn't to stop feeling. It's to stop letting the feeling write the verdict. Because you can have a triggered moment without turning it into a triggered life. Hey, here's what I want to offer out to you. It's real simple, it's real clear. If you want help breaking those loops— jealousy, abandonment, self-sabotage— that's the kind of work that I do in my coaching. It's not therapy, it's not counseling. I don't diagnose, I don't treat. Coaching is about awareness, it's about tools, it's about accountability, and it's about building a new response. When the old wiring wants to take over. If you want to go deeper with this, let you and I have deeper conversations, you can check me out on Patreon, patreon.com/stanshercoaching.com, or go to stanshercoaching.com. And even better yet, go to Book Now. Let's book a discovery call. Let's walk this path together. Hey, thank you so much for joining me. I shared a lot of my own personal story in this, and I'm happy to do that. I understand that if you and I take this walk together, I'm going to do it confidentially with you. I want to walk this walk with you because it sucks so bad to feel that trigger light. All right, that's all I've got for this episode. Thank you so much. Thank you.