Landy Peek (00:00)
Welcome to the Landy Peak podcast. I'm your host and friend, Landy Peak, and I am thrilled to have you join me. In each episode, we will explore what makes life truly fulfilling. Happiness, deep connections, and self -discovery. Together we'll uncover that happiness is not a destination, but a way of living. Now, let's dive into today's episode.
Landy Peek (00:32)
Hello, my fabulous friends and welcome. This is Landy Peak and welcome back to the Landy Peak podcast. I am so excited that you're here and taking time out of your busy life to do something good for you. Have you ever replayed an embarrassing moment on repeat, like a bad song stuck in your head?
fringing at something you said or did, you know the drill. You come home from work or a date or a social interaction with a friend or a stranger and your brain rewinds to those awkward moments fixating on how you could have said something wittier or better in some way.
It's a vicious cycle of self-criticism over stuff that's already in the rear view mirror. Why do we do this to ourselves? This is exactly what we're talking about today. We're figuring out why we're doing all of that
hyper-focused self-criticism on all the little things that we say and do, and we're figuring out what we can do to change it. Because it doesn't help us in the long run. It actually tears us down. Why do we put ourselves through the mental torture when it doesn't have a positive outcome? We're going to talk about that. Well, it turns out there's some pretty interesting psychology.
behind why we beat ourselves up for past mistakes. Our brains are like overprotective parents wired to shield us from making the same goofy mistakes over and over and over again. We zero in on the negative stuff, making it way too easy to remember what went wrong rather than celebrating our victories. What went?
right. And here's the kicker, beating ourselves up over and over about our past blunders. It's not just unkind to ourselves. It's actually stepping on our own toes. It's keeping us from growing.
And a lot of times it's even keeping us from doing things that we want to be doing, that we could be doing, that maybe would help us in the long run. Those moments, they belong to yesterday. So let's take today and help leave them in the past. I dug through some research to figure out why we're doing this to ourselves.
more importantly, what we can do to stop it. So here's the first thing I found. Researchers have found that when we are not sure about a situation, like a social situation, we're more likely to focus in, dive deep, and try to figure out what happened.
And have you ever noticed that when you have that situation where say you say something and you're not quite sure how it lands or you know it landed wrong, but you're not quite sure how it's going to impact you socially that you start to get stuck in a loop of replaying that conversation over and over and over again? Well, here's what research says about why.
It says you're trying to find some hidden meaning or some way it could have had a different outcome. And when we're doing that over and over and over replay, that's called rumination. And it's basically dwelling on stuff in a negative way. It's not helping us.
It's just replaying our blunder again and again and again. And that constant mental rehashing research has found makes us feel even more anxious, filled with self-doubt, and even guilty. And if you've done this in your life, I'm sure you're like, yeah, I really feel that. I've experienced that. I know that in a deep way. And I do too. I've been in these situations.
I've said the wrong things.
It's like we're our own worst critics. And I think most of us really feel that. And this anxiety, it then plays into our next interactions. when we spent time rehashing what we've said, it can make us more hyper aware.
in those next interactions with those people. And it may actually add to our internal inner stories and our inner identity of who we are as people. Think of how many people, and maybe you're one of them, or you know someone who has experienced a blunder when you're giving a speech.
How many of us fear public speaking? And then you're up and you're actually giving a speech. Maybe it was in school and you said something wrong or you did something embarrassing. And all of a sudden, you now have that internal tie where you're telling yourself, I'm horrible at public speaking. And so then what do you do? You avoid public speaking
That one circumstance where you struggled with public speaking, and it could just be some small blunder that nobody even remembers, but it was big to you. And when it was big to you, you then took it internally and added it into who you think you are, your inner identity. And the stories around who you are and what you can do,
I'm bad at public speaking. we do things like this all the time without even realizing it. It's subconscious. We're not conscious of doing it, but it's changing how we interact with our world. Think about it. How many times have you been so caught up in worrying about a social situation?
Maybe you said the wrong thing to somebody or maybe you just think that you're awkward in social situations. And you've been so caught up in that worry that you missed out on opportunities to socialize, to put yourself out there in a way that can help you grow, your business grow, or whatever your passion is.
It happens to the best of us, but recognizing it is the first step towards breaking the cycle. It's getting curious. That awareness is key. It's when we get curious about our thoughts and our behaviors that we can actually change them. because until we're aware of them,
We can't do anything about them. And we're all seeking those authentic heartfelt connections. And a lot of times our inner stories and our inner fears are keeping us from connecting with people on that deep authentic level. How many times, and maybe this is just me, that you have stopped yourself from doing something silly, like,
dancing or singing or doing something just silly in the presence of others because you're worried about what they're going to think instead of just being you. And I know for me personally that there are people in my life who I am completely open with and will do all of those silly things without even thinking about it. It just comes out.
And then there's people that I don't know as well. And I act similar, but there still is a filter. There still is that little bit of filter that comes in to say, don't quite go there because you don't know what people are gonna say. You don't know what people are gonna think. How are they gonna respond? And so we all have this filter. And that filter, that filter is keeping us from those authentic connections
I know so many of us, we crave just being ourselves and being accepted. And if I'm craving it and you're craving it, couldn't we just be our authentic selves together and know that neither one of us are gonna judge the other one? I would love, love, love to live in that world. How many times do you watch other people
and we'll use social media as an example. And you see those people that can make fun of themselves in a really positive way, right?
There are those people like Jennifer Garner. I absolutely love Jennifer Garner. I love going on Instagram and watching her videos. And it's because she doesn't take herself seriously. It's because she's silly and she's fun. And I'm like, I want to be friends with her. It's those people in a way that we idolize. We want to be like those people. We want to be that free.
we want to have that ability to just play and be ourselves without that fear that we're going to be judged. And that fear, that fear is internal. That fear is not out there. Cause I can guarantee you, Jennifer Garner is being judged. So are you. And so am I. And total side note here, this is what I think about judgment. As humans, we judge each other. It's human nature. We also judge everything else in our life.
I mean, do you like brownies? You're judging right now. Yes or no? my gosh, they're so good or ugh, they're disgusting. That's a judgment. Do you like broccoli? Love it or hate it, you're making a judgment. The clothes that you pick out, judgments, right? Judgment doesn't mean good or bad. We're making judgments all the time.
And honestly, if we all fell in line and were exactly the same, it would be a really boring world. So when you're putting yourself out there, like Jennifer Garner does, she is being judged. But allowing that fear of being judged to stop her from doing what she wants to do, to stop her from just being fun. And that's the key.
That judgment is internal. That's our inner talk. That's our inner beliefs. And I heard a stat somewhere. I don't know if it's a stat. I think a coach told me. So I don't know exactly who to give credit to. But this is something that I live by. with judgment, when you put something out in the world,
10 % of people are going to love it. 10 % of people are going to hate it. and 80 % don't give a crap. I think I've quoted that in another episode, but I love it because As I put something out in the world, I count on there's going to be people out there that's gonna hate it.
And that helps me, so I'm not afraid of it. I also know there are people out there that are gonna love what I put out in the world. And most of the people, they don't care.
it is so scary for a lot of us to put ourselves out there because our brains are keeping us in a little safe box. Because if we know that the behaviors that we do and the things that we say are accepted, we don't have to worry about rejection.
So swinging back to the original thought of why do we rehash those conversations? Well, number one, research has found our brains are looking for closure. And this makes sense. It's those situations that we're left feeling awkward, not quite complete.
Our brains want everything wrapped up in a nice little bow. We want to understand it. We want to know what to expect. Remember our brains love rhythmic predictable. If we can't predict what's happening, then we don't know how to react. We want to be prepared. And so when that doesn't happen, we're left with that really yucky feeling.
And that's when our brains are really searching for a way to tie it all up and make us feel good. So we're looking for that closure and searching for that closure can really mess with us because our brains want answers. But sometimes our brains are searching for those answers and it takes us
on a wild ride through all sorts of what ifs and maybes that have nothing to do with what actually happened. Ever find yourself spiraling, picking apart every little detail until you're feeling more confused and stressed out than when you started? I know I have.
It's like our brains get stuck in this endless loop. And instead of finding clarity, we're just digging ourselves deeper and deeper into a pit of overthinking. It's a really slippery slope. What starts as a quest to understand can turn into an exhausting cycle of rumination.
The next thing that our brains are designed for is that our brains are wired to learn from our past experiences. It's a survival thing. Think back caveman days, right? So back in the caveman days, if you made a mistake like eating a poisonous berry that made you sick to your stomach, your brain wants to remember that, and that could be life saving.
So what our brains do is it pauses. Like, pretend we have this video that's constant video going on that is everything that we're experiencing in our day-to-day life. Well, our brains hit pause and blow up a view. And we'll go with the berry. Blow up a view of that berry so it can remember and identify it. And it's going to analyze it in detail. It wants to know the shape.
the color, what the leaves on the plant are like, because if it can identify all of those things, it can keep us safe in the future.
but, fast forward to today. And while we're not worried about poisonous berries or dodging saber-toothed our brains are still using the same exact mechanisms. When we mess up, our brains want to make sure that we remember it so we don't do it again. But here's the thing.
Sometimes our brains get a little too enthusiastic about the whole learning from our mistakes thing, and we end up dwelling on them, replaying those awkward moments over and over. And it's different. We're not trying to identify a berry and a plant. It's words that we said. It's a different existence.
And it's like our brains are thinking, hey, if I keep reminding you about this, because number one, it doesn't have closure. And so if it keeps reminding you about it, maybe, just maybe, you're not gonna do it again. But that's not helpful.
And then we layer on that fear of being socially rejected. And those are one of the biggest, deepest fears we have as humans. Again, comes back to those caveman days. If we're rejected from the tribe, it's a lot harder to survive. And so we lay on that fear of being socially rejected into
our brains trying to remind us never to do it again, into our brains haven't figured out or had a closure on the story of that incident, and it messes with our minds. So we end up worrying about whether we said the right thing or if someone misunderstood us. It's like our need for approval makes us hyper aware, almost like we're little detectives looking for clues.
that someone might not like us. And let's be honest, that fear of disapproval can make us super vigilant during conversations. And then we spend more time in the conversation thinking about what we're going to say, and we no longer are connecting, and we're not truly listening. And we start to pick apart every little detail.
waiting for signs that someone might be upset or might be judging us. And that's when those social interactions become exhausting.
another reason that we keep beating ourselves up over something we said or did is because we're wired to be our own worst critic. And that sucks. You know that saying you're your toughest critic. It's totally true. We hold ourselves to an incredibly high standard.
Sometimes, I'll say most of the time, higher than we ever would hold someone else. Think about it. If a friend or your child made the same mistakes, you probably would be quick to forgive and forget. But when it's us, we're relentless. It's also a control thing. So this is cool in the research. Our brains want control. I think we already knew that.
Didn't really need research to find that out, but if your brain's like my brain, it wants control. And we think that if we just analyze every little detail, maybe we could change what happens. Have you ever noticed that when you're extra stressed that you start wanting more control over things? Like, this is when I get more
hypercritical about like, my gosh, my house is a mess. I need to clean it. I have to do this, that, or the other. I start having to have control over things where my husband knows, okay, she's stressed, I'm backing off and not even trying to help with dinner because I'll come in and fix whatever he did anyway. So he identifies she's extra stressed today.
I'm gonna let her just control it all and take a step back. That's what our brains are designed to do. We want that sense of control because in a way it's comforting. It's giving us a sense of power, especially in social situations that felt unpredictable and scary or yucky. We want to come back with power. And here's the thing.
The more that we obsess over those conversations, the more that we're tricking ourselves into believing that understanding will give us some kind of power. Spoiler alert, it doesn't work like that. No matter how much we dig into the past, it stays stubbornly the same, refusing to bend to our will.
and then feeding into our insecurities, we scroll social media. And social media is like a highlight reel of everyone's best moments. It's easy to compare our behind the scenes crap with everyone else's highlight reel. And we feel like we're falling short because their lives look perfect. And ours, well, it's kind of fallen apart.
And we focus on our own mistakes even more. And it just amplifies that feeling that we're not enough, that we're not good enough.
So our brains are wired in that way to keep us safe, to have that false sense of control. We have that fear of being rejected. And we also have a lot of what we see as other people's success in life. And it increases all of our own internal doubts. now we know a lot about our brain.
and why we're on this continual rehash cycle. We like control. We wanna find closure. We wanna be seen in a positive light. We really do. We're trying to fix it. So what can you do when you find yourself in this rehash?
cycle.
well, the obvious thing is practicing self-compassion, right? Being kind to ourselves. But that is so much easier said than done. So what I would invite you to do is when you find yourself rehashing, instead of beating yourself up,
or telling yourself, stop, just stop, because that doesn't help you. Don't tell yourself to stop. Just gently bring your awareness to it. and you can kindly point out to yourself that you're in that rehash cycle. I'll often tell myself in kind of a sing-songy voice, you're doing it again.
And it's just a nice little reminder of I'm getting stuck and my brain's on repeat.
Landy Peek (23:43)
And so when we just bring that awareness and something as simple as you're doing it again can break that cycle, it stops that repeat pattern. It's like, I don't know if you have kids, but I've got a kiddo that is constantly on the move. so it's like when he's banging the spoon on the table, just bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, even like aware.
It's when that little drum is going on, bump, bump, bump, bump, bump, and I just reach over and I put my hand on his or put my hand on the spoon and it's just a pause. It's just bringing awareness to an unconscious movements on his part and an unconscious pattern in our brains. It's that subtle. It's that soft. It's not stop it.
It's just, hey, do you realize you're even doing this? That awareness, that momentary pause helps us come out of that little trance. It's like, okay, what are we doing, brain? And we're just momentarily pausing and then saying, okay, we've got that pause in, now we can shift attention. We're breaking that cycle and that's huge.
Because sometimes we're so stuck in it, we don't even realize we're doing it to the degree that we're doing it. And that's another little thing that you can do is just pause and bring awareness. I'm doing it again. And then you can either focus on what you're doing or shift your attention, just like you would with a kid.
and you know they're doing something and instead of reprimanding, you direct them to something else, we're shifting their attention. We do this all the time with our kiddos because it's an easy way to change the behavior. Have you ever done that? Where you're like, your kid's doing something and instead of just going in and harping on what they're doing,
You, what's your sister doing? What's your dad doing? You want to read a book? You want to do this? You want to do that? Right, we shift that focus. That's what we're doing inside of our brain. We're on a repeat pattern, an annoying behavior, and we shift that focus. That's one tactic that works.
So just shifting your attention to something different gets you out of that cycle. But what if you want to be aware of those thoughts? What if you want to be aware of the pattern? One of the things I mentioned before was rumination.
That's that negative replaying over and over without a constructive outcome. We're just berating ourselves. What if instead you got curious about the replaying thoughts and instead of ruminating, you shifted to reflecting? Now ruminating is where you're just going over, my gosh, I can't believe I did this. I can't believe I said this.
and you're feeling so down and yucky. Now reflecting is when you look at something and you're like, I blew it there. What could have I done different? We're looking for something different. We're looking for more of a completion of that thought pattern than just the repetition of the thought pattern. So were you looking at that mistake?
Our brains do both. And sometimes reflection is easy in certain circumstances where rumination is just something we're unconsciously doing in other circumstances. when you're in that rehash pattern, and you pause, think about,
Am I looking back at the mistake, looking for an understanding of what went wrong? So then I can learn from it or am I just on repeat? Because sometimes we do have social blunders. Sometimes we make mistakes. We're human. And making those mistakes, instead of just playing it on repeat, what if we looked at it and said, well,
What if I did this differently? What if I said this differently? Not in a mean way to ourselves, not in a condescending way, but what if we looked at how we could have shifted what we said or did? What if we looked at it more of a curious way of how can we learn from this? We would do this with our kids, or I do this with my kids, is we have something and I want them to learn and grow from it. And so we're going to talk it out. We're going to say,
How could we do this different? What could you do next time? We're learning from that mistake. And it's when we catch ourselves spiraling. and get curious that the magic can happen. Because we can ask ourselves, am I just playing this over and over?
Or am I reflecting and open to learning from it?
Am I saying that this is what happens and this is what could change? Those are questions that are helping you tap into that reflective mode. Because there is a difference in how our brains are playing it.
I want to put out there, it's okay to laugh at ourselves. We are all human and we all mess up. Embracing our imperfections can actually be really freeing. And sometimes those awkward moments make the best stories later on. It just might take a while to get that comfort level back.
where you can actually laugh at it. going back to one of my stories, and there have been many social blunder stories in my life, but the one that came up as I'm recording is way back to high school. Don't you love those high school memories? I mean, middle school, high school is like the prime time of embarrassment, and it doesn't take much.
I remember I once cracked a joke in a sea of unfamiliar faces. This wasn't my typical group. And I wanted to fit in. And so I threw out the joke and it landed flat. I meant it to be funny. I really did. But then I got all those puzzled looks and they're like,
my gosh, did she really say that? You know, the face, the thought that's like,
Talk about cringe-worthy. I can still feel in my body that moment. Like, I just wanted the earth to open up and swallow me whole. I wanted to vanish in thin air. And no one else in that group can probably remember what I said.
remember it. I still have a physiological response, response in my body to that moment. And I continually beat myself up over that moment. It was a moment. It was a faux pas. It happens. But I took that moment and I continued to play it in my head over and over. I wasn't trying to reflect and say,
How could I have done that different? I was ruminating. And that moment made me more hesitant in new situations to throw things out there. It made me more aware of what I said to people.
I was beating myself up when everyone else went on with their lives. And that's one of the biggest ah-has I'd love you to take away, is we are causing ourselves so much pain, so much turmoil, and for the most part, those little faux pas, nobody else is thinking about them. They went on with their life.
And all of that rumination, all of that berating of myself, all of the cringe worthy feelings that I had in my body, it didn't help me. It didn't do anything for me. And I'm guessing you felt something similar where you've just felt that, my gosh, can I please just disappear?
And every time I repeated it in my head, I had the physiological UGH again. And I only felt worse.
And honestly, it kept me from making jokes and it kept me from stepping out in a way that might've been a lot more fun. I was so hyper aware in social settings. And yes, this is the high school brain and we're all a little bit more hyper aware in that social setting. But what if, what if we got to go back?
to those times, to those moments, to those things in our lives that were cringe-worthy, that are still bothering us. And what if we got to change it?
What if we got to re-write it?
Because we want to be able to be in social settings and feel comfortable. We want to be able to notice what's going on with others and how others are reacting. There are some real benefits about being aware of the words that we're using and the way that our body is reacting and our body language and our nonverbal cues. Those are important social cues. I don't want us to erase those.
And so when I'm talking about we don't want to be hyper-focused, but we do still want to be socially engaged and socially aware because those are important. But if we're so hyper-focused, we lose the ability to connect.
When I'm looking someone in the eye, I'm watching their facial expressions, I'm watching their body language. You can tell when somebody is not with you, when somebody is disengaging. You can also tell when somebody is loving it and when they're engaging. Watch how people lean their bodies. One of the cool things I read was people point their toes at the thing that is most important in the room.
like the person that's most important in room, their toes are pointed in that direction. Our bodies are telling stories all of the time. And subconsciously, we're reading those stories from other people. But when we become so hyper-focused on what we're saying, on thinking through what we're going to say next, we're no longer in that space that we can connect. We're not really reading the other person. We are just so worried about what we're going to say.
and remember that connection, that feeling understood is so key to our mental and physical well-being. So you made a blunder. It's really bothering you. What do you do about it? Well, here's the thing. Our brains know the difference between past and present. You're like, yeah.
I got it. I'm very aware. Well, hold on. Just go with me for a little bit. So I'm sure that you know that what happened in the past is something that you can't change. Cognitively, you know this. You have probably grasped this concept. You can't go back to yesterday and change what you did. We've got that.
You can change what is happening right now in the present. We have the ability to fix or change things that are happening in the present right now. Right? That makes complete sense. This is not like new news to you.
And here's the crazy thing. when we get in that rumination, repeating and repeating and rehashing and going over and over whatever it is that is bothering us, it's like, I talked about the video going through in our life, like pretend there's that video.
going through everything that's happening.
It's like our brains paused on that moment of embarrassment and blew it up really big.
So now it's really big, front and center. There's no way you're gonna miss it. Remember like I talked about with the berry? And our brains paused and it blew up the berry so it could get every detail because that's what's gonna help us stay safe and alive. So our brains just did this for this really embarrassing moment. And we know that our brains know the difference between past and present.
Now what should happen in our brains with this video that's going through is that information is then taken in, it's then analyzed and it's sent back to wherever it's going in the brain. Storage, short-term memory, long-term memory, wherever it's headed, it's gone through the tube and it's now, it's like we have little information tubes that come through our brain. It should go all the way through and it should be gone. And it should pass through
So our brains know that moment has happened. It is in the past. It is in the rear view mirror. But when our brains blow up that picture, it's like the picture gets stuck. And now it's giant and the rest of our life video is going through and this giant picture is still up. And our brains, our brains get confused. It's like a computer that has a glitch.
And that glitch, that glitch is where our brains now think what happened is now happening because it's blown up in front of the rest of the video. So we're now really confused and glitchy inside of our brains. And this is why we keep ruminating because our brains think it's happening in the now. And since we know that what is happening in the now can be changed,
Our brains are trying to change it. Remember our brains research showed that our brains want that closure? Our brains want to finish the story. our brains also want us to fix what happened. So we no longer have that discomfort. Our brains want to know that we will not do this again. Right?
And so if it's big and upfront and in your face, our brains are thinking, well, we can change it. And if we can change it, then we need to do something about it. So here's an example for looking at the past and the present, right? So if I stepped on your foot yesterday and you didn't say anything to me,
But today you come to me you're like, I am so mad at you. You stepped on my foot yesterday. I can say, my gosh, I'm sorry, but I can't take my foot off. But if I'm standing next to you and I stand on your foot and you're tapping me on the shoulder and you're like, hey, Landy, you're standing on my foot. I will move my foot right away. Right? That's past and present. brains so get this, but when it's blown up,
It's confused. It's glitchy.
the reason we're ruminating is
because our brains have that embarrassing moment blown up and it feels like it's present, it's one of the reasons why we can still feel it. Like physiologically, I still have the response in my body. My brain can take me to that moment as it is happening now.
And as long as our brains think they can change it, they're going to try. So one of the things we have to do, because our brains want closure, our brains want to avoid redoing the same mistakes, our brains are really going to pick through the details that feel like we're being a really tough critic to ourselves. And we want to shift it to a positive spin on the story. So we can do all of the things that our brain wants us to do.
It takes first that awareness, that little pause, hey, I'm stuck in this cycle, because you can't fix what you can't see.
And then when you're giving yourself that hard time over ancient history, that's the time that you get to say, I'm doing it again. But pause, because you can't rewind our lives, even though sometimes we wish we could. What we can do, and it's a strategy that I personally use, is that we can rewrite the story.
Our brains love a happy ending. And this is something that you can do for yourself because we are really creative writers. We're really creative storytellers. This is human nature. And when we are given the chance, we can rewrite our own stories. And so here I am. I'm giving you the magic wand.
so that you can go back and rewrite your past story, something that you need to feel good and feel complete. I use this tool with my clients as well.
If you do have big stories like traumatic stories or really emotional stories that are on repeat, I would suggest getting someone to help you. Because for the little things, this works well for yourself. But for some of the big things, it's important to have someone that can help you see the blind spots and support to walk through the emotions. So if this is really big, get someone to support you through it.
If there's a little story, let's try it. So what you're going to do is you're going to give yourself positive closure. We're going to rewrite your embarrassing moment.
So either you made the mistake and you can react in a different way. Maybe you don't even make the mistake. Or maybe you see yourself doing whatever you did, but it was successful. Now why do we want to do this?
because it hits all of the different things that our brain wants.
It gives our brain positive spin and it works wonders for all those minor flubs that you have experienced.
I'm going to walk you through how I take myself through it when I find myself ruminating over an embarrassing moment. So we'll use my high school experience as an example. I'm in that situation, and I can rewrite it in a couple of different ways.
ways.
could rewrite that story where I said the same joke and it still landed flat. But this time, instead of having that whole body feeling of embarrassment, instead of feeling like I wanted the earth to just swallow me up whole, this time, this time I see in my mind's eye that I laugh and I say, whoops, that fell flat.
and other people chuckle. Or maybe I write it and I say something completely different. Or maybe I rewrite it and I say the joke and it lands better. It really doesn't matter. It's what feels right for your brain. What feels best inside your body that gives you that sense of closure that allows your brain to reprocess what happened.
and change the story so you, you feel good about it. Because that's the most important thing. Your brain wants the closure. Your brain wants to know you learned the lesson. And your brain loves a happy ending. But the story doesn't always have to be happy.
And we tapped into one of the things that we're looking for, our brain is looking for, is we want that sense of control. When you have the imaginary pen, you are giving yourself permission to have that control. You're taking control of the story. You're taking control of your experience. You're taking control of your life. And if you need it, I'm giving you the permission.
to rewrite those stories. Because sometimes we have to hear it from someone else. But you don't need my permission. You've got it inside you. And rewriting the stories, that's power. And the really cool thing is our brains, our brains will accept the new story. It's incredible. It's not like we're tricking our brains here. It's not like we're erasing the old memories. No, our brains still remember.
It's that you're giving your brain like a choose your own adventure. And you now gave option A, which happens in real life, and you gave your brain option B. And while your brain remembers option A, it's like giving option B deactivates the emotional punch and your brain chooses the most positive story.
almost every time. I've been using this technique with myself and with clients for over five years. And it works. And it's incredible. By rewriting the narrative, you just gave your brain the closure it craves. Your story doesn't have to keep playing on loop. You get to change the ending. Your brain realized you understood and can change so you don't make the same mistake.
and you have control. All those things your brain's craving.
if it doesn't work as you're playing with it, what I'd suggest you do if you find yourself stuck in that same old tale, grab an outside perspective because sometimes we miss things in our own blind spots. We're too deep in our own story and finding someone to take a little flashlight and shine a light and illuminate those dark corners can be key in shifting the story because sometimes we're just too wrapped in it.
And those are often those big, deep, heavy stories. So get the professional support if you need it, but walk yourself through a little story. Because often we need to process and resolve those pesky little issues to be able to find those fresh outcomes, to be able to step forward, to do something new, to try something new, to have a different story, to write a different future and have a different outcome.
So take a moment and just reflect. What are you still punishing yourself for that is in the past, that's no longer happening, and it isn't helping you? Let's flip the script. Our brains are incredible at adapting. Neuroplasticity is amazing. But we can get bogged down.
It's all about responding in the now. It's all about giving your brain that finished story.
and sometimes our brains just need to slow down. This is something I do with my trauma clients. We slow down what happens because we live in such a fast paced world And things that happen to us often happen so quickly.
And then we bounce to the next thing and the next thing and we never give ourselves the opportunity to pause, to slow down, to let all of the sensory information come in. Your brain picked it all up, I guarantee it.
but to allow your brain to really process through what happened.
Sometimes we're so hyper-focused on the detail, we miss the rest of the picture. And so in rewriting that story, and you can do this verbally, out loud, just talking to yourself, or with pen and paper,
It really doesn't matter. But it's giving yourself the opportunity to pause, to change the ending, give yourself closure, allow your brain to see that you've learned from your mistake and rewrite it in a way where you come out in a positive light, feeling good about yourself. And once you find that closure, the most incredible thing happens. That rumination, that repeat story, it stops. And you can look back.
at it right we're not erasing the memory but you no longer have that emotional trigger
It's almost like it just happened to somebody else. And then you move on. And that story is no longer something that you're beating yourself up for over and over. So let yourself and your brain create the new story. Let yourself be empowered. Be flexible. Allow yourself to transform into a different perspective. Allow yourself to become the hero in your own story.
So give it a try. Find something that's not too sticky because it's harder to start with those really sticky, heavy stories. But find a little story or a little moment that caused a little bit of angst, just a little bit. And when you find that little bit of angst, try rewriting the story and notice what happens.
I'd love to hear what happens, so share it with me. I'd encourage you to notice what happens inside your own body when you've given your brain that sense of closure.
What happens with that repeat? What happens with how you feel about yourself? Let me know. until next time, I'm reminding you to treat yourself gently and embrace the power of your own story. Become your own hero because I think it's so important for you to hear. And as adults,
We don't hear it often enough. You are strong and creative and talented and fun and funny. And I am so lucky to have you in my life. I love you and I like you. And I wish you all the happiness throughout today. We'll talk to you on the next episode.
Landy Peek (51:45)
Hey, before you go, just a little bit of legal. This podcast is designed for educational purposes only. It is not to replace any expert advice from your doctors, therapists, coaches, or any other professional that you would work with. It's just a chat with a friend, me, where we get curious about ideas, thoughts, and things that are going on in our lives. And as we're talking about friends, if you know someone who would benefit from the conversation today, please share.
Because I think the more that we open up these conversations, the more benefit we all get. So until next time, give yourself a big hug from me and stay curious because that's the fun in this world.
