Taking Control When Your World Feels Out of Control (Workshop)

Yeah, please record.

I am recording. So for those of you who don't know what General Assembly is, General Assembly is an education company. So we've got about 30+ campuses worldwide.

We—

our whole mission is to help people find the work that they love. How we do that is through full immersive courses, part-time courses, classes and workshops, and events. So our full-time courses are in software engineering, data science, user design, and then we have some part-time courses in product management, data analytics, digital marketing, Python. We have a few more as well. But right now we're offering everything online. So if you guys are interested, go ahead and check it out on our website. Just Something to think about as well. If you guys are ever bored on Fridays, we're about to launch a Free Fridays campaign this Friday. So keep that in mind. I'll throw that link in the chat as well. But I'm really excited about today. I think this is a really great event to kind of be thinking about with everything going on in the world. There's like just a lot of craziness. So I think being able to take back your control when the world's out of control is really, really important. So with that in mind, Theresa, do you want to take it, take it over?

I do. So thank you for joining us. The topic is taking control of your world when your world is out of control. And the whole piece of control is really like, what are we in charge of? So control— I am a 4th degree black belt master instructor in martial arts and in self-defense, and I'm also an adrenal stress training Educator. So I'm going to share my screen and let's see what that looks like. And oopsies, hold on, I have to share. So taking control is all about what can you control? What are you in charge of? And the truth of the matter is, right now we're in charge of so little, and it feels like everything out and going on in the world is really kind of crazy. And when that happens, we can develop a feeling Of what's called learned helplessness. It's almost as if, without being able to figure out what you're able to do, you can't do anything because all of the things you defined yourself by, they are gone. So I want to just cover real quickly what we will be talking about today, and I'm going to keep moving in and out of sharing. So what we'll cover today— We're going to talk about your brain. On change and uncertainty. Huge uncertainty in the world right now. And if you're affected by it, I mean, who isn't affected by it? We don't do well when change is afoot, when things are happening, when we can't— we don't feel like we're out of— we're in control or we're in charge of anything. We're going to talk about fight, flight, or freeze, triple F. And we're also going to talk about stress and really what is distress, because there's 2 kinds of stress. There's the kind that helps you grow, and there's the kind that does not help you grow, and that's distress. We're gonna talk about needs and choices. And finally, we're gonna talk about unleashing your inner warrior. And that's really, for me, one of the most important parts about what we're talking about today is how do we take back our power? What can we take back in this situation? And I don't know if you guys know this or not, but we are in this really weird situation right now Globally, I mean, you all know the global situation, but did you know spiritually that this was predetermined, that all these things were happening and we kind of are in this place where we have— let's see if I can share my screen. Sorry, I keep moving in and out of the screen share. 2020 is a really unique leap year. It's got 29 days in February. 300 days in March and 5 years in April. Hit me up in the chat if you can relate.

Ah!

Thank you. And when we have this kind of crazy going on, it's really difficult to know when it's gonna get better. H.P. Lovecraft said that the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown. Well, that's what we're facing right now. So the other piece is that we all used to have days of the week and we knew what they were. What day is it? Is it Monday? Is it Unday? Is it Unday? So we are also moving in and out of emotions. And depending on the news that you're watching or what pieces of data are being released, you might have different feelings. And that's OK. So we're minute by minute, day by day. And I kind of just love that because I think it's hilarious when you think about, wow, I used to go to work on this day and I used to get up at this time and now it's all kinds of crazy. It's Blurs Day! I love Jesse Altman said it's Blurs Day and I am so owning that. So I wanna talk a little bit about your, da da da, my ability to share my screen. I want to talk a little bit about your fight, flight, or freeze response. So these things happen in our bodies. And for the majority of us, we've actually been kind of in a stressed out position. We've been very busy focusing on goal orientation and moving forward and pushing. And there's always this like hustle and grind. And my, my laugh is hustle is a dance from the '70s and grind is what you do to copy. Anyway, we all have a flight or A flight or fight response, and it affects our brain, our eyes, what we hear, our lungs. In fact, we stop breathing deeply. We'll start breathing really shallowly. On Facebook, I'm doing videos, and part of what I'm doing is helping people expand their lungs. Heart— you might start feeling heart palpitations, or your heart might get sped up. Your muscles might get tense, and you may not even know why. So all of these things are happening on a cellular and physiological level when we deal with fight or flight. Our liver is also converting glycogen to glucose, which might mean you might crave fast sugar. Anybody going to comfort food? Anybody looking for fast sugar or unhealthy foods?

Definitely.

It is part of your fight or flight response. I wish somebody else was teaching about that, right? And then our adrenal glands produce all kinds of cortisol, norepinephrine, different levels of chemicals. And also our bodies might start feeling— your hands might feel cold or they might feel hot. It's like a temperature change. It's all part of the adrenal response. And so the next question that I want to ask you— oh wait, hold on. I want to ask you is, are you feeling any of these things? Are you noticing any of these things now? The thing about fight or flight is it's built for us to survive. It's built for us to make it through danger, you know, like a tiger jumping out of us or a bear or something. But what's happening right now is our fight or flight response or freeze is triggered based on everything that's happening in the world. So we might be fighting and getting angry. We might be running away or hiding or I'll talk a little bit about what that can look like, or we might be freezing, and that can look like depression. It can look like curling up in a little ball. Now, I also want to say, if you are someone who is facing actual danger at this point— some of us are stuck at home shelter-in-place with people who are not safe— and if that is the case, I want to give you a resource. eBodyguard is a downloadable app. It's voice activated. And if you're in danger, please, please, please download this app to your phone. It's brand new. We're in beta testing right now. It is fantastic. And what I want to say about that is you can voice activate it if you actually are in danger. But the truth of the matter is our fight or flight system might be activated even if we're not in danger. So I'm going to ask you in the chat, and Hannah is being my, my wonderful Hannah. What is your adrenaline profile? What is your adrenal profile?

That's it.

Do you tend to go to fight or flight? Do you tend to go to flee? And I'm gonna tell you a couple of ways that that looks. Fight might be you get mad at everything. You're upset, you're angry, you're taking it out on people. You might be, yeah, like upset at the world, or you might be beating yourself up. I should have been— I should have known this was gonna happen. I should have done this differently. You might be doing kind of like self-hate things. If you are a flight person, you want to flee or run away. Sometimes external drama, getting into gossip, that can create like an interesting piece. So you're fleeing from your feelings, or you might be fleeing from your feelings by like running away, shutting down, withdrawing. We can distract ourselves using shopping or TV, social media, binging, food. Anything you can use to distract yourself, that is one of the ways. And the most common way, so if y'all are freezers, that is the most common reaction is freezing. And here's what freezing looks like. We get stuck. We don't know what to do. We feel paralyzed. We might not do anything. And even I had a response the other day In on my TEDx talk, I did a TEDx on the inner bully and adrenaline, and she said, I have developed a mini depression. Well, that's a way of freezing. Depression is like freezing all of your, your emotions, all of your feelings. And so you can freeze in so many different ways, even numbing out with food. You guys have heard the word comfort food. Well, comfort food is your adrenaline is high, you're spiked, you have stress. And you use food to calm yourself down. That is an adrenal response. So freezing is very, very common. You might numb yourself. We might feed our feelings. There's a lot of different ways. And getting freaked out, feeling scared or nervous, that can be a way of freezing. And I also want to say, so we're doing a poll right now, and it looks like we have a lot of freezers in this group. So high five to the freeze response. Yeah.

It's like the team, team flight over there.

We have team flight. And also, I want to say that your body will go between these. Like, sometimes you might be frozen and feel uncomfortable and nervous, and sometimes you might be like, I'm out of here, I can't take it anymore, I've got to numb out. And that's flight. The other part about all of this adrenaline response is that right now We have— we can't fight the system. Like, we can't fight the actual coronavirus. We can't fight shelter in place. We can't run away. So we're sort of forced into dealing with our own emotions in the— at this time. And I can't see the chat. Did you say there was Team Freeze? Go Team Freeze. But recognizing these particular pieces will help you.

Yes.

Yeah, Hannah.

Oh, I was just saying, yes, we got some teams— team fight, flight, and freeze. And so I love this. Thanks, guys, for participating.

Yes, thank you guys. And thank you for acknowledging it. Oftentimes we think of our fight or flight response as something that happens just when we are approached by danger or something that's scary. But right now is scary. So if you've ever heard of an inciting event, like people who've gone through traumatic events. There's oftentimes a thing that happens. This is like, this is an inciting event. We are all experiencing an inciting event together, and it's bringing out different responses. And if the people that you're with are fighters and you're a fleer, like if you're stuck at home with people who are angry and upset and panicked, and you're like, I want to run away, then, you know, that can be, that can be upsetting as well. So it's important to start learning your own different distinctions. Now I want to talk for another second about stress, and stress can be good. And that sounds really weird to say, but stress actually makes our muscles grow. It makes our bodies stronger. It, it's like what you do when you weightlift. I teach boxing and kickboxing. And so when we kickbox, we stress out the muscles so that we start growing. But too much stress can literally become like a poison to our system. And that stress is called distress. And that's what puts you into fight, flight, or freeze. Our bodies were not built to stay in fight, flight, or freeze for long periods of time. We have to find ways of calming our system and controlling our environment. That's why this class is so very important. So right now in the chat, I would really love it. What is stressing you out? So right now you might be feeling this big stress, everything, it's all stressing me out. That can be really overwhelming. And having a stress that's everything is really difficult for you to deal with, any of us to deal with, really. So what is stressing you out? Is it the economy? Is it your job or your company? Is it your, what am I doing in the world? What's my purpose?

Oh.

Is it an existential crisis? Like, what is the stress? Name it. Give it a name. Give it a name for yourself. Are you missing people? Are you missing— I've got friends that go to concerts as part of the way they connect every summer, and no concerts. There's a lot of difficulty in not being able to connect.

There's—

there also uncertainty is huge. That is one of the biggest fears we have. Anna, did you have a—

Oh, I just noticed some people are throwing some stuff in and not being able to go to events and used to enjoy that. So the isolation and then some uncertainty. Looking for work, plus like the family stress of e-learning, being unemployed. It's, it's a tough time for all of this. And job search, finances, overall well-being.

And I have to say, if one person was facing this at one time, it would be stressful. But there are millions, if not billions, of us facing very uncertain times. And, and thank you actually for all of your input, because that's really— it's important to know that, that what you're, what you're dealing with and what's stressing you out. And that way we can start to create little tiny action plans. Little tiny plans. And that's really how we deal with stress. And so I'm going to share again. By the end of this, I'm going to be like an awesome sharer because we learned everything we needed to do. So for those of you who are unfamiliar, this is Maslow's hierarchy of needs. And at this time, every single one of our needs is actually not Being met, or there's a fear that it's not being met. So I want to explain what that does in our system. So psychological needs— food, water, toilet paper is not listed in the psychological needs. But all of a sudden, all these things that were always available to us, like foods and— oh my God, beans! Every store I've gone to is totally out of beans. It's— I don't think it's hilarious, but it's hilarious. So there are all these things that we're used to having access to that create food, water, warmth. They're gone. Or they're, you know, we have to wait in line at the grocery store. Things we never thought we'd imagine. Safety and security. Are our jobs threatened? Is the economy threatened? How are our homes? Or if we're in self-isolation or isolation with people that we don't necessarily get along with, how are we dealing with that? Belongingness and love is also on the screen. How are we connecting? How are we creating feelings of intimacy and connecting with our friends? I mentioned that my friends and I are doing some song— a song a day, and that's one way for us to stay connected. You're stuck at home, basically in your pajamas. Okay, I don't know if you're wearing pajamas. I'm not today, but there's a good chance I might be any other day. On Blursday, might be pajamas. But how do we feel accomplished? How do we get things done? That's being challenged right now. And then self-actualization. What if part of what we— you were doing prior to being in shelter-in-place, that was giving you everything you needed to feel like you were moving forward in your dream and your life purpose, and now everything is stalled? And not only that, it's not stalled because of you. It's stalled because of what's going on in the environment.

That's right.

That can create a real feeling of helplessness. And thank you. Yes, LOL, toilet paper. If somebody would have told me 6 months ago that toilet paper was going to be like gold, I would have laughed at them. But wow, right? And all paper products and Lysol and Clorox and disinfectants.

This is—

who saw this coming?

Nobody.

So I also want to talk about That right now our needs are in question. What we basically need is in question, and that can create a lot of traumatic responses. And I'm not saying anybody's response is good or bad. I just want you to understand that when you can name it, when you can claim it, then you get to take control of it. You get to know, I'm— oh, I am so in fight right now. I'm getting fired up. Or, you know what, I'm gonna flee for a while. Right now I just need to curl up into a little ball and I'm gonna freeze. And I want to ask you this question. Before now, what would you have said was grounding or defining you? Our brains seek safety. Our brains love feeling comfortable and safe and secure. It's one of Maslow's needs. It's one of the most important basic needs. And before now, how were you grounded? Was it your routine? Was it your connection to other people? Was it your, your job? Was it, you know, getting up at a certain time, going to work, coming home? Like, what was it that was grounding to you? What was it that made you feel centered? And for some of us, you're going to laugh, but it was a feeling of busyness. We defined ourselves based on feeling busy. We were used to it. It was one of the things that we felt about ourselves, and I kid you not, if you asked anybody, I'm going to get to that, but I'm just too busy. I can't take that on. I'm just too busy. A lot of the work that I teach with clients is boundaries, and I would have to teach people how to do boundaries around busyness and other people wanting your time and wanting your input. And now none of us are in I mean, you might be busy, but not anywhere near what you were before. So one person on the chat said that going to work in an office, a great office, and collaborating. Yes, collaborating with other people, creating belongingness, having a purpose. Thank you for these in the chat. Knowing that you were doing something every day. And if you have a creative purpose— my mission is really to help people feel safe and well in the world. I teach self-defense classes. I teach kickboxing classes. I teach All these classes that I can no longer teach because we're not allowed to gather. So for a minute, hot minute, I felt like, oh my, my purpose was being taken away and I had to really get back to center. And yes, thank you. Having a job and a home routine, and that has all changed. That is all different. So really want to acknowledge that. And know also who you are, like who you are inside hasn't changed. The essence of who you are. Has never changed. And I want to say that I talked about it in my TED Talk, but in 2014, I had a car accident with a brain injury. And I was forced into— I kid you not— 2 years of isolation. It's called low stimulus. No phone, no computer, no music, no movies, no TV, no interaction. And so I am uniquely familiar with this feeling. At this point, though, we have Netflix and We have streaming television and we have the internet. At that point, I was not allowed to literally having to have any kind of interaction. So I understand what people are feeling. I had to go through it for 2 years. We've been in it for a month almost. And it's frustrating. It's really, really hard. And so if you have a purpose, if you had things that you were responsible for doing and taking care of, That gave you a sense of purpose. We like to accomplish. Our brains love accomplishment, by the way. Our brains are goal-seeking missiles. Your brain wants to achieve goals. A lot of goals were externally set. Now we have to learn how to set them internally. And I laugh because there was always a big focus on how much we could accomplish and what we could get done. And all of a sudden in March 2020, Hustle and grind, your side hustle, your this hustle, your that hustle finally turned into ebb and flow. And that's really— we are now in an ebb and flow kind of situation. So a little bit about me is that I created a system called Empower, and that is me. That is the dork that you're seeing right now. And really, we have a choice. We can activate the power that's within us and control what we can control, be in charge of what we can be in charge of, or we can be in charge— we can let the world set our power. We can look to other people, our jobs, our— the deadlines that we have, our work, our bosses, our spouses, our partners. That is a choice. It's a choice that we all make. And when you make a choice to do it differently. Then you find your inner power. And that's really what it's all about. And let me go to the next slide. So I want to talk about activating your inner warrior. So your inner warrior is the part of you that feels good. We feel good when we accomplish something. We feel good when we get something done. We feel good when we connect with people. So if you think about Maslow's hierarchy of needs. When we activate any of those different needs, we feel good. And I believe internally there is a part of each of us that is— I call it the mama bear effect or the papa bear effect. But it is driven not just for our survival, but for our thriving. It's the part of us that wants to give, that wants to connect, that wants to be that best person. So our inner warrior, not only is it the protective instinct that we have for ourselves, it's also a way of protecting our livelihood, our ideas, our brains. And every single one of us has an inner warrior. We don't all just walk around without it. And activating your inner warrior might look like something different. So let's talk about control.

Control.

So what can you control right now? When I teach martial arts, I start at ages 3 on up, and I teach the kids this. So the— we work on a skill called control, and control is being in charge of. So what can you be in charge of? Well, right now it doesn't feel like you can be in charge of a lot, but there are 3 things that I teach children as young as 3 years old.

You can—

you're in charge of your thoughts. You're in charge of your actions and you're in charge of your words, the things that you say, the words that you speak. So right now, if you're in a position where you feel like your world is out of control, what can you do? One of my girlfriends is a professional organizer, Lee Dyer, Dyer in Dire Need, and she teaches her clients when their worlds feel out of control, make your bed. Clean an area, file your paperwork, take control of one thing. And it might be those very simple steps. Your, your ability— one, one of my great friends, Beth Tiger, is a life coach, and she talks about how her mom always told her, make your bed every day. And then make sure that you empty out your sink every night. So those are 2 things I always do. I am in control of my sink. I can't control the environment. I can't control what's happening in the world, but I can control if my bed is made or not. I can control my immediate surroundings. So I'm going to ask you, what can you control? What can you— what thoughts can you allow in and what thoughts work for you and what don't? And the important part of all this is some things are going to feel good and they're empowering and some things are going to feel bad or negative and they're taking your power away. Creating an adrenal response. They are disempowering you, and you get to choose. Yes, all of us are going to have emotion. We're going to have feelings and sadness and grief and anger, and let those things move through your body. Don't let them get stuck. That's one of the reasons that I've been teaching online little mini fitness warm-up and cardio, just so we can control our body. And if you're watching this right now, I invite you to stand up. I can't stand because I'll lose my camera, but stand up right now. Just stand up your body. That is one thing you can control. I just stood up. I took a stance for myself. And I also want to acknowledge you for being in this course because you are now taking control. You, you are saying, I want to be in control, and that's huge. It's so important. It's so important. So I'm going to look at the chat. I'm actually almost done. So, and we'll open this up to questions and comments and ideas and thoughts, and I will share some more. But I want you to think about your body. So for example, one thing that you can control, if you have adrenaline running through your body, tighten your fists. Right here, just tighten your fists and then let them go. So adrenaline stops us up. It actually is created to move in and out quickly so that we can fight or flee or freeze, because when we— when something's coming at us, we might need to freeze. If it's a bear, you have to decide, okay, am I— is the bear going to eat me or do I need to run? If you run, certain things chase you. So freeze is actually our first response. By the way, so team freeze out there, y'all are doing it right. Our first response from a biochemical reaction is to freeze because we need to decide, what am I gonna do? Am I going to fight back or am I gonna flee? The second response is typically fleeing, and then the last response is fighting, but we're all different, and I wanna acknowledge that. We all create— Huge differences based on how we grew up, what our reactions are. So you control your environment. And I love this. Stephen said immediate environment would also include things like what news are you watching, how much social media, what kind of podcasts, who are you conversing with, and what kind of information are you allowing into your mind. Those are really, really important. Other things include Setting— if you want to set an alarm, get up. I will say I have noticed during this time that a lot of people's bodies— so we were in kind of a low level of fight or flight for many years because we are pushing ourselves very hard to get things accomplished and to do things. And what I'm seeing now is people sleeping more than they ever thought possible. They're sleeping later, they're going to sleep earlier. And I see people's bodies actually starting to relax. So instead of a stressed-out system always based on timelines, deadlines, getting to the office, getting things done, the kids having all of these jobs or all of these activities, people's bodies are starting to decompress. But it's different. We're not, we're not used to that. And so it's almost as if accepting the feelings that are coming up, and that's really one of the keys to anxiety as well. Accepting it. So you can control your thoughts, which is your mind. You can control your actions and you can control your words. So when you're controlling your, your thoughts, we have a bidirectional relationship. If you are upset or angry, your body is going to do this. And oftentimes in fear or freeze, our bodies will do this. So sometimes even just controlling our body, opening our chests. Stretching out our arms, sorry, I'm gonna hit my desk. That can help. It's allowing in that oxygen. And I control my environment. I can control my arms. That may be the only thing I can control today. But I can do that one thing. So it's, it's looking for little areas that you can control. So I am curious in the chat if you can tell me what areas can you control? What other things can you start doing? What are you going to start putting in your life? Are you going to make your bed every day? Are you going to start cooking? People are cooking. One of my girlfriends started cross-stitching. I don't even know what that is. Hannah is baking. And Hannah said— this should be a meme— it's a good time to be bread. People are baking. Can you take a bike ride? Can you take a walk? Are you able to do anything? And one of my, my professional organizer friend Lee helps people get their, their life organized. She personally is going through all of her emails. How many of us have more than 10,000 emails and could really afford a clean out? Talk about decluttering. All those things that maybe we put on the list of someday I'll get done. Is it a good time to do it? And I am not in any way belittling the idea of that we are stressed, that there are certain things out of our control. But when that happens, and when we get in that mindset, we create that fight or flight response, and it's not helpful. There's nothing powerful that you can do for yourself when you're in fear, when you're in anger, when you're in scarcity, and You might be the next person to develop this most amazing application or comic book, or you might write a book. Oh, there's a really funny Gwyneth Paltrow meme saying, now is a good time to write a book and learn a language. And the other person on the meme is like, I just dusted off the crumbs of my bra and was lucky to get up. So for some of us, we're, we're just being— I call it being soft. We've been really hard for a long time, and maybe this is a chance for us to be soft. And there's always a way to give back. There's always something you can do. This is a question for you. What is something that you could do right now to give back? This is a dorky picture, but I am kind of a dork. One of the things that I'm doing— I saw all this like heavy energy around people, this This constriction and difficulty. And so I wanted to give back. So every day, or mostly every day, I don't even do it on a timeline. It's not like by 10:30. I'm not doing that. I do these movement videos, light martial arts, light boxing, lots of stretching, lots of arm stretching. That is a way that I can give back right now because it's important for each of us to find a way to continue to feel like we matter. That is part of us belonging. That is part of what we can do. And I don't know what you can do. I don't know what your skills are, but maybe this is the time to figure that out. And instead of letting us team freeze, flee or fight or freeze, what if we could use that energy, that adrenaline, to create something? I don't know what you're going to create. I never liked live video. I was always very judgmental. I don't look like a martial arts Barbie or like a, you know, I am like built like an Amazon. And I don't, I didn't love doing live video. But you know what, doing this was much more important for me to help give back. I'm gonna get all emotional because it didn't matter what my little concerns didn't matter anymore. And I wanted to do something. So what is it that you can do? Can you draw cute pictures and deliver them to your neighbor? I mean, what can you do? Can we create neighborhood— people are doing jigsaw puzzles or anything that's possible. I feel like a lot of wonderful things are going to come out of this time that maybe we wouldn't have seen before, that maybe weren't possible before. So that's really everything that I had. Hannah, did you want to— I know you unmuted.

Popping back in. Yeah, so I think that's a really good time, like, to open up to Q&A. Does anybody kind of have questions right now? How's everyone kind of feeling? And feel free, you can email or message them to me directly in the chat, or you can just toss them in and we can just answer them, answer them as they come.

And I also want to just acknowledge you again for being here because there are so— there are many little steps along the way to create something big. And owning your power is really one little step. Choosing the music that you listen to at home, creating an environment that suits you. I started doing workouts in my office. My office was not built For workouts, but I flip it in half. I have a screen, but I started doing— I even have— oh, let me see. Oh, I even have workout equipment. You can't really see it in my office. It's not something I ever planned before, but it's, it's kind of just what's happening. And the more that we can learn how to roll with it, the easier things get on us. And Hannah, you said that you were baking bread.

Yes, I'm baking some bread. And like you said, it's just kind of owning the things that you can. Like for me, like I've never been a great baker. And so I'm like kind of trying to use this time to just be like, okay, that's something that I can do that's like fairly low cost and is kind of fun and you get to like slowly improve on. So that's kind of something that I've been doing.

And it gets something out too, right?

Yeah.

The other thing I didn't talk about was fight, flight, And freeze builds cortisol in your system, and cortisol has a long-term effect. It's not good. So you want to be able to move the cortisol out, and that's usually through breathing. If you've ever heard of breathwork, I think baking bread— you're moving, you're doing stuff. I think that's great action. Action really helps us move adrenaline through our body. This is me baking bread. Is this how baking bread looks?

Sort of. Why not? Like, if you're making 2 breads at once, let's say that's That's baking bread. You just double kneading, right?

Do you get to punch the dough?

Yes. Oh, if you're really feeling it.

Oh, so into that.

Did I just turn you on to baking bread?

I'm gluten-free, so I'd have to find some good, good gluten-free flour, but I miss punching things. Teaching martial arts and teaching kickboxing, I gotta punch a bag, and now I'm like, Air punching.

Love it.

Not as much fun. Now I can—

Also, I'm going to shoot into our chat too, if everyone has this open. If you could just— I have like a little survey. So if anybody feels like taking the survey to let us know how they felt about the event, feel free to do so. But yeah, I think maybe any, any last questions, anybody?

Any random fears that are showing up or any ways that you're dealing with something that you wish you did differently? Happy to take those kinds of questions too. One attendee, Heather, said that for her, setting— getting out of bed and walking the dog is helping her take back her control, take back her power. So I salute you. Anything you can do. Any of those pieces. Listening to positive.

Oh, any tips for avoiding spending hours on the internet?

And I'm assuming that you mean avoid hours on the internet and also not Netflixing. Well, it would be to get in action. So one of the— your brain likes goals. We said that earlier. It's the neuroscience of goal setting. So set an easy goal or set an internet goal. And set a goal for something you want to accomplish. I don't know what that is. If you want to organize a space, if you want to take a walk, get yourself away from whatever that is. So here's how our brains work. We pick— we have pictures in our head, and spending time on the internet sounds comforting and numbing and easy. Your job would be to find something else that Sounds interesting. So start with something that seems interesting because then that creates a motivation. There's a lot of books out there about willpower, but really we avoid pain and we seek pleasure. So if you can find something that sounds pleasurable, like I think I'm going to learn how to skateboard—not me, that's not me—but something that sounds interesting and get creative about that. Come up with ideas that involve you not being near. A computer or not being near your phone. That is one suggestion. Hannah, do you have any other suggestions?

Maybe like a podcast, because then you aren't looking directly at a screen and maybe you're still spending some time on the internet, but it's in a way that is still kind of like relaxing in its own way, because I know sometimes I spend a lot of time on the internet or like watching Netflix when I feel like I'm just trying to check out a little bit. So podcasts are a really fun thing. I think that is another alternative, or reading.

Yes, and reading, doing something, cleaning your— this sounds so weird— cleaning your kitchen. Whenever I'm stressed out or I feel like my life is out of control, I clean something. It sounds— but it's— it is actually a very Zen proverb.

I've definitely been like organizing and cleaning up the walls.

Before enlightenment. Chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. So part of the rote movement of cleaning something gets our body in motion, gets us out of our head or out of our adrenaline state, and we're doing something with it. And you can control it. I've cleaned out my sock drawer. I'm not saying everybody has to clean out their sock drawer, but I've been cleaning out my— I had more t-shirts than I think a human being needs to have. Let me just say that. All of these little things that you would never normally do. And there's some things coming up in the chat. LOL, a clear kitchen top. Yes. Organizing the kitchen. Like, I don't want any of this clutter, or cleaning the kitchen top. I clean my sink every night and that feels really good. Cleaning out a refrigerator. When would you ever sign up to clean out your refrigerator? And there are all these different areas that we collect clutter, we collect And Hannah, you were saying you are doing cleaning?

Oh, I'm cleaning a lot too. But we had a couple other cool ones come in through the chat too. Any tips to avoid comparing themselves to others, especially spending time on social media and thinking I should be doing more than sitting on the couch? I've definitely experienced that too. Theresa, what do you have to say on that?

So by comparison, we are, we are comparing The worst of our lives to the best of others. This is what I always say about social media. So when you see somebody out helping the homeless or doing a thing, that is the best of their life. But don't make— don't, don't even think that that is the everyday of their life. If you've seen any celebrities right now, you see them in their houses, they're unshowered, they're doing stuff. We're so real right now. Um, yes, other people might be doing a thing, but that's one piece of their day. Don't compare the worst of yourself to the best of someone else. There's a common term. I'm going to try to think of it. My brain's like compare and despair. So when we are in comparison with ourselves, we're not looking at it from an objective place. We have a picture in our head, and we might have a picture in our head of oh my god, this person's so happy, and they're so successful, and they're. So, no, they're not. I have known many, many very successful people who are miserable. And it's not that— And I've also known millionaires, billionaires who are also, they struggle in different ways. So don't compare what you see, or what's being shown, I should say that, right? Social media is media, people. It's still someone's media. It's branding. So your branding might be, yo, me on the couch and Netflix and Hulu. And has anyone else watched The Tiger King? I haven't watched The Tiger King, but—

I have. Very entertaining.

Interesting. So that's one way, is it's a mental boundary. Notice when you start comparing yourself to someone else, how do you feel? You feel kind of crappy, right? You feel kind of bad. And if that's happening, note to self, boundary. I can control this. I can control this. You can.

Randy made a good point too. Any tips for changing habits to fit the current situation? I usually listen to podcasts and read on my commute, but it feels uncomfortable doing it in the discomfort of my room.

Discomfort. Randy, you're funny. I like that. So we have to do things in a different manner now, correct? So you might feel more comfortable taking a walk and listening to a podcast on your ears. So think about it this way. Our brains are geared toward, I usually do this thing at this time. So if you're commuting and you're usually listening to a podcast or reading a book. You're commuting. So that external thing has changed. So now you change your external thing. I would not recommend walking and reading. I just don't. I just don't think that's safe for anyone. But you could listen to a podcast as you walk if you want to. You could do things around your house as you listen to a podcast. So change things up. Look at— and if your room is Discomfortable, uncomfortable. What can you change? Can you move things around? I now have exercise mats and exercise equipment in my office that was already crowded to begin with. It was not comfortable, but I had to re-change the space. So how could you change the space to suit your needs? And if you do like to read, maybe there's a chair that you can designate as your reading chair. And I'm making these things up. If anyone has ideas, please share them. These are just ideas that are, that are popping out. Oh, one idea that came from Lee, thank you, is Audible books. So if you typically read on your commute, what about doing an Audible book? How does that feel? One thing I started doing, and you can if you want, you don't have to, I watch Udemy or information on an iPad as I work out. So I have a little rebounder and I jump up and down every morning and it's like my 20-minute routine and I watch something that is educational for me. That is a way that I get— I feel like my brain gets stimulated and I feel like I'm learning something instead of just being a big old blob of nothing. So I've started incorporating that.

I love that. Cool. Well, I think maybe we can wrap up. And for those who joined us today, thank you so much for being here. We will be sending out some resources after this as well with some of Theresa— some with some of the things that she mentioned during this. We'll send over her website as well. So if you have any interest in chatting with her and connecting with her after this, you absolutely can. But just wanted to say a big thank you to everyone, and I hope you have a great afternoon. And like we said, try and find that, that control where you can. I'm going to go clean out my kitchen sink right after this.

Oh, so good. I was trying to type thank you, but it's so good cleaning out your sink and your countertop. So good.

Awesome. Well, thanks everyone. I'm going to pause the recording and we'll send this over to everyone and have a great afternoon.

Thank you.