Ep #59: Validating Your Emotions and Your Experience

Welcome to More Than Mindset, the only podcast that bridges the gap between spirituality and success. Go beyond the mind with clarity and confidence coach, Kim Guillory, and learn how to integrate your passion to serve with your skills and experience to create a business you love. Let’s get started.

Hey, guys, and welcome back to the show. I am recording this on the return from my Dallas trip. I was scheduled to attend a business workshop with my mentor, Brooke Castillo, from The Life Coach School and meet with my peers and other thought leaders, coaches. Actually, just amazing people who are getting things done in the world. I was 3.5 miles from the event when I got the message that it was canceled.

So, I decided to go ahead and go, and I did not turn around. I did debate on it. I stopped at the hotel, and I assessed the situation. There were quite a few coaches already there who had flown in, didn’t have access to return, some who were even from out of the country and couldn’t return home for a few days. We made executive decisions and decided what to do.

The decision I made was to go ahead and stay. The big debate was is this ethical, is it moral, is it legal? Where is this decision coming from? I think this is something that we all need to do more of, as our brain just goes into freak out, and then we just go into react, and we can’t assess the situation from a logical place. It was really interesting to watch so many of us who do thought work, and we just had this dazed look like you were trying to figure it out, and you were trying to acclimate, and you knew it wasn’t a big deal, but it was kind of a big deal.

There was this eerie feeling of just waiting around, and watching, and seeing what everyone else was going to do so that we could understand what to do. It was weird. It was almost like when you first find out of some tragic accident or something. You’re just kind of like, “What just happened here?” On the outside, plain old looked normal. People walking down the streets, and the hotel was open although people were leaving. So, it was very interesting.

We stayed until Saturday or Sunday, my days are so confused, and had some amazing masterminding group settings. I was able to meet a bunch of other coaches who are doing amazing things in the world. We were able to share, and collaborate, and connect. All of the good stuff. So, I returned home, and here we are in the middle of corona chaos or corona crisis.

This will be a time to remember, and how we choose to experience it, I think, is what is most important because we really don’t know. It’s a new strand, so we don’t have proof and evidence. We don’t have studies and reports. We really don’t know. We just know that there is a viral outbreak, and that it is worldwide. Those are the facts. Those are the circumstance. Everything else is what we make of it.

So, we know how to take precaution. We know about sanitation. We know the things that we need to do to protect ourselves and our families, and this is a time to do that. It is a time to take it serious, and yet really understand that there’s lots of stuff like this that happens in life. It’s like death. Death happens, sickness happens, accidents happen, delays happen, plans get changed.

We experience certain forms of crisis on a regular basis, but when we know how to manage our mind and regulate our emotions, it makes the experience so much better, even if we choose to be in the grief of it. I find so many coaches use coaching against themselves as if we were trying to feel good all of the time, and that’s not it. The goal is to experience better.

For sure, we want to feel better, but there are times where we just want to be in the unknowing, and some of that grief, some of that doubt, some of that fear because that is also part of the human experience. Businesses are closing. Some will not open their doors again. It will be permanent, but it doesn’t mean that they are out of business. It means that that business, the way it was, that system, is no longer functioning, ultimately, in the way that it can continue to produce, and evolve, and grow.

So, it’s an opportunity to do it differently. The whole experience is an opportunity to see what is working and what can be changed. It’s a time to assess. Let’s take a really good look at this. My online coaching business is amazing. My life did not change at all. My appointments were the same. My clients were the same. My going to work.

Obviously, I live under quarantine all of the time, so it wasn’t really a big deal. I didn’t realize how much time I spent by myself behind the computer. So, I did not have to change any of that up, but it did change for my family, and friends, and clients in the way that their offices are closed, or their children are not in school in anymore, or their husbands are coming home from offshore.

Like my son is working in Korea on a BP project, and the whole project has been shut down. They’re now in Houma, and now they’re in Houston. They don’t know. So, that kind of worry and stress, we don’t want to really be laughing and smiling about. We want to be experiencing the unknown. We don’t want to bypass this, but yet we don’t want to freak out about it and start experiencing the negativity from the freak out.

There’s a difference in the negativity from a freak out of something that has not happened compared to experiencing sensation of what actually is happening. So, in this moment, right now, as you are listening to this, what is the actual circumstance? What are the facts in your life right now? Take note. Get present. Write all of that down and to be willing to experience the sensations, the feelings that come from that.

What are your thoughts of those facts? Be very careful not to start dreaming about the worst-case scenario and make those your facts. Can you see what I’m saying? I’ll give you an example. Say your husband is coming in from offshore, and he doesn’t know when he’s going to return. He doesn’t know if he has a job. You would assess the situation right now. My office is closed, my husband’s office is closed, the kids are out of school. Those are the facts.

What are your thoughts about that right now? Not predicting doomsday, not taking yourself into the worst-case scenario, but right now. Write it all down, and I really believe you should be writing this and not just toying it in your head because if you really want to get the clarity, to get the relief, it’s going to be about unpacking all of the stories that are in your mind.

So, do an assessment. My husband, myself, my children are off for two weeks. How do you feel about that? Let it be that, and try to stay present, and list all of the things that are amazing about that. This has shaken us up to really realize how fast we’ve been zooming through life, and how we have been spending so much time not being present, not making conscious decisions, not fully experiencing life as it is.

Just being on the run, hurrying up, trying to prevent, or avoid, or create, make something in the future happen, and we’re not experiencing what’s happening right here, right now, in the present moment. So, just take yourself there and notice where your brain wants to take you to. “Well, but, or we don’t know, or it’s costing this, or we’re not sure what’s going to be covered, we’re not sure.” Don’t take yourself there. Stay right here, right now with what you do know. That’s all that matters in this moment.

Listen, it may not be a good feeling that your three children and your husband are home. Maybe there’s been some intense stuff going on in the home, and maybe this is the worst-case scenario. Maybe you’ve been fighting. Maybe the kids are driving you crazy. Maybe this is the worst-case scenario. Experienced that also. I’m not telling you to just pretend, and bypass, and come up with positive affirmations. I’m asking you to experience the situation as it is because if you can experience it right now, and then you can start unpacking what is not working, then you can change the trajectory.

You can change the direction. You can reset. You can navigate instead of continuing the old pattern. This could be a beautiful opportunity for you to change it here, today, right now. It’s going to require some vulnerability because it’s going to require you to stop long enough to feel the discomfort. You cannot create something new without releasing what was. You can’t take this version of yourself into the future version of yourself. I’ve tried it a million times, so have my clients. It doesn’t work.

I’m telling you, you have to come back to presence, and you have to take note. You have to be aware first. Until you are aware, and until you consciously unpack the story so that you can see it, you can be in full awareness of it, then change the trajectory, then create the future version. It’s very simple, and it’s very hard. It’s sounds like, “Oh, it’s just three easy steps,” but you have to experience it. Three easy steps being experienced in the here and now.

So, what that feels like is you will have the sensation in your body, and you will feel antsy, feel like some ants are crawling through your body because you’re not going to want to sit in the discomfort to do the assessment. You’re not going to want to sit in the discomfort to feel the fear, and you’re not going to want to sit in the discomfort to resist jumping ahead, doubting, fearing, and creating problems that have not happened yet.

That is going to be the most uncomfortable part of this process, is staying right here and having this experience before going into a future or a past experience because that is where your brain is going to want to go. It goes to the past to gather information so that it can problem solve today. But we don’t want to do that because we don’t want to do things in the past, and the past is not here, and the past can’t be recreated. It can only be re-experienced because of the way you think about it.

So, that’s very important. The brain is automatically going to go to the past. It’s going to look at 1980, or 2008, or 2012, or whatever year the thing happened that was so terrible. It always does this. I’ve talked about this with hurricanes. We always go back to all of the other hurricanes, and we try to predict this one. It doesn’t work that way. You cannot predict what hasn’t happened yet. We are experiencing it now, but just be willing to experience it.

First thing is your brain is going to want to go backwards. Second thing is your brain is going to want to go forward. It’s going to want to tell you the worst-case scenario. It’s going to want to predict doomsday. I’m going to ask you to resist that and come right here into the presence. I know I keep saying this, but I’m telling you, I know your brain is jumping ahead, and it’s trying to do it. Be right here now.

How does it feel in your body? Do you feel it in your chest? Do you feel it in your stomach? Do you feel it in your throat? What does it feel like? How would you describe it? If you could give it a color, what would the color be? If you could give it a number, what would the number be? Have you felt this experience before that you could relate a story to it? Like, “It felt like when,” and then just let that come from you.

Another way you can process this is you can say, “I feel really afraid. I am freaking out. I am so scared,” and then add because. “I am so scared because we may lose our home. We may not be able to pay our bills. Our children may not be able to go back to private school. My kids may not graduate this year.” Whatever it is, it is all valid. Let it be valid.

Even though it seems like a teeny tiny, unimportant thing, but it is something important to you, allow it to be valid. It could be as simple as my child is going to miss her pre-K graduation that she has been looking forward to, and she has been practicing for, whatever. Allow all of it to be valid, even though it doesn’t make sense, because it’s such a teeny tiny thing because what matters is that it makes sense to you, to your child. It is important to you. It is your experience, and your experience is a 100% valid.

Resist the temptation to judge and compare, someone else has it worse off than you. Someone else has it better off than you. Resist that temptation. Try to stay only in your story. Dissect the facts from fiction. That just means that if it’s in the past, it does not belong in the fact line, and if it’s in the future, it does not belong in the fact line. Your facts go on that first line. These are the facts, and these are my thoughts about those facts. If your thoughts are about the future, and it’s not about the actual fact, you have to take them out, you have to scratch them.

This is a work in progress. I’m teaching you how to unpack it, and how to be with it, and to allow it to be valid so that it can process because if he can process now, then you don’t have to re-experience it later. It will not get triggered later. All of this stuff is coming from the way we have been taught to respond at a very young age.

What I want to teach you here today is to do it in a different way so that you don’t bury it alive because you know the body keeps the score. The body keeps the score. There is a book called that, by the way. It is a very good book, and it’s about trauma, and crisis, and unprocessed emotions in the body. So, well, I guess you can’t answer me. I’ve been doing so many Facebook lives and coaching calls, that I’m like, “Oh, give me some feedback on that.”

But you know what? You guys can’t give me feedback. Not right now anyway. So, I have a meditation on the website. You can try doing just silent meditation, and just sitting there feeling the breath. Maybe just use a mantra, which is just a word, for your mind to focus on so that it could anchor, and you could anchor the breath in your body. It could be something simple like, “I am here now,” and what you’re doing is with each breath,” you’re silently saying one of the words.

So, it would be inhale, I, exhale, am, inhale, here, exhale, now. You would just keep repeating that. What happens is it gives the brain a chew toy. It gives it something to hold onto, something to concentrate on, so that you can release the thoughts and get present in your body. Because what’s happening is the busy mind, it’s like a bunch of puppies just going crazy, or trying to gather marbles that just been spilled on the floor.

Your thoughts, we can’t stop them, but what we can do is tame and manage the brain, and get present, and centered, and anchored in our body so that we have a present experience. So, we’re not in fear, and doubt, and worry, so we’re not going back to the past and trying to recreate it, and we’re not trying to predict the future that hasn’t happened yet. We have no idea.

So, let’s just be here. Let’s be here where we do have an idea, where we know what’s happening today. This is a great opportunity to really practice mindset, mindfulness, presence practice, great opportunity. To also notice what’s not working, what can you change? For some of you, it’ll be financial. What things are you paying for that are not important? Start making a list. Those kinds of things you can do now, and you can receive clarity, and if you receive clarity, you can receive relief, and relief is what we’re seeking.

More than anything else, we’re seeking relief so that we can feel safe. Our brain’s number one job is to keep us alive and keep us safe. The way we do that is by directing it, letting it know what direction we need it to move in for what we need to understand. It’s all about awareness. Awareness is the healer. It’s not the modality that you choose. You could do yoga, you could do breath work.

Another simple exercise is you can just count to four on the inhale. One, two, three, four, hold for four, three, two, one, and then exhale, one, two, three, four, and then hold four, three, two, one. So, it’s just four, four, four, four. Inhale, hold, exhale, hold, inhale, hold, exhale, hold, over and over.

Any of those very simple techniques. Set a timer. I’m telling you, you can do this for two minutes and find that relief that you’re looking for. Do it for five minutes. It’ll just be a little more solid. Do it for 10 minutes. It will change your life. Do it for 10 minutes two times a day. It’ll change your life even quicker. It’s really simple. Allow it to be simple.

Just like the process that we teach here at The Manual for Life is about these five simple steps. How can I gain power and control of my life? It’s by gaining it through your thoughts, through your emotions, through your physical experience, and through spirituality. How can you align your thought to the way that you want to feel, whatever you want to create physically, and embody that in a spiritual practice?

That’s the integrated life. The integrative life is an actual process. We say integrated when we have an experience that feels this sense of wholeness, this connection. We’re like, “Oh, my God. It must be integrated,” and then we embody that. What I like to say after sessions is, “Go and wrap yourself in a blanket,” and you could do that after this ends.

Just wrap yourself up in a soft blanket. Give yourself a hug. Wrap up like a burrito and rock. Just gently rock side to side or backwards and forwards. Just rock. Touch yourself. Touch your arms, your thighs. Give yourself a little squeeze maybe on the shoulders or the arms to yourself, so you have a sense of safety, so you feel connected in your own body.

Of course, you can do this with someone else. Of course, you can teach this to someone else, but everything you need is within you. I promise you, everything you need is within you right now. You don’t need a single soul to be in the room with you. You can create this safety, this clarity, this relief, this sense of ease for yourself, and then you can hold the space and teach it to someone else.

The whole thing that I want to really get across to you is to be in the experience. Feel the feelings, feel the sensation. You don’t have to feel happy. You don’t have to feel anything you don’t want to feel. You can just be in it raw, and vulnerable, and without escaping, and just allow it to be okay to be here.

It’s okay to be sad. I have grieving friends right now, and you know what? They don’t want to be happy. They don’t want to be happy. Their spirit cannot be happy in this moment, and that is valid. We have permission to grieve. It’s part of our experience. We need to stop pushing people around and telling them what they should and shouldn’t feel, and allow them to feel what is.

Most of our life, our emotions have been turned off. Someone has told us we shouldn’t feel a certain way. We need to go cry in the room, or we need to wipe up our tears, or clean it up, pick it up. Don’t be thinking that way. That has messed us up. Those are the emotions that have not been processed. That’s what’s buried alive in the body. That’s why so many of us are sick, and we have chronic pain, and illness, and undiagnosed ailments and disease.

This right here, this experience we’re having, could be the greatest opportunity for changing everything in your life and the way you help those around you, whether it’s your parents, or your children, or your siblings, or your friends, or your co-workers. Maybe you’re a leader in the industry. Maybe you have a team. How can you help and support them? Let it be okay that they feel afraid.

You know what else? Let it be okay that you feel positive because that’s something I had an issue with this week, is I recognize the danger, I recognize the chaos, the crisis, the financial stuff that’s going on. I am in business. My children have jobs. I recognize it.

I am not denying it when I say I think this is an opportunity for a great, great potentiality to come forward of what could be because all of the thought leaders putting their minds to work, we’re going to create new things that were never in existence before because of this, because we never had the opportunity before. So, we never had to think this way. Let’s set the whole picture.

Let’s imagine we’re looking from far away, and we’re looking down on earth. If you think all the way back to our cave people, they figured it out without all this stuff, and we’re so much smarter. We know so much more. We’re so much wiser. There’s so much more opportunity. So many things have been created since then. So, we can actually go on the courage of how did they figure it out? Let’s just ride on their backbones.

We’re smart people. We have a brain that’s here to help us. We’ve got the best equipment. The best asset is between your ears. We just have to put it to work and tell it what to do, and you do not have to feel bad if you do not feel devastated, if you did not feel afraid, if you don’t feel like grieving, and you’re just like, “I’m actually fine.”

I was talking to one of my coaches today, and we were saying this. We’ve lived in a state of crisis for so much of our life, that we actually feel more comfortable because we know exactly what to do. It sounds a bit morbid, but I was like, “Guys, am I a little too happy? What’s happening here? I don’t know why I’m not afraid.” I think it’s because I have that confidence, and have the reassurance, and the clarity, and I have so much faith and grace, and I know things happen exactly the way they were meant to happen.

We are fine. We know what to do. We know how to have experience. We know how to be present. The worst thing that can happen, we will have a feeling or a sensation that is uncomfortable. That is the worst thing. Even if it means we lose everything, we’re just going to have a feeling, but we’re still going to have a brain.

We’re still going to have opportunity. We’re still going to have possibility. We’re still going to be able to create something else because we are creators. It’s who we are. It’s who we are as soul beings. It’s who we are as human beings. All of it. We got this. I believe in us. I believe we’re going to come out stronger. We’re okay, but be in the experience that you are having.

So, if you do not feel like it’s going to be okay, and that’s where you want to be, there is no judgment, no labels, no conditioning. All of it is valid. Every single person’s experience. My daughter picked up my granddaughter at school who was devastated, crying, freaking out. She was afraid, and she didn’t know why.

She could feel the panic and the fear in the room from the teacher, from the announcements on the microphone, and she was just freaking out, and her mom is like, “What’s the matter?” She’s like, “I don’t know,” and she’s just crying. That is feeling emotion and sensation in your body, and then not having the mental capacity to understand it.

So, it is an unintegrated process. That’s that part that I’m talking about. It happened when we were a five, or when we were six, and something freaky happened that we didn’t have the mental capacity to relate to the emotional processing. So, we were not able to get the awareness. Those feelings will be buried in the body. But now, I was able to sit with her and process it with her, and explain it, and ask her how she felt exactly like I just asked you.

Like, “What came up for you? What does it feel like in your body? What sensations are you experiencing?” We know how to do that now. So, do this with your little children. Do this with your clients. Allow them the space to feel what’s coming up and to mentally process it as they emotionally integrate it, all of it. Then we went to embody it spiritually. That means your soul essence in your body because we’re going to want to eject.

We’re going to want to get out of this. This doesn’t feel good. I don’t like being afraid. I don’t like feeling antsy. Something weird is going on, and we’re going to want to eject out of that, and we’re going to want to go buffer. We’re going to want to pay attention to something else so that we don’t have to feel it. It’s just what the brain does. You just call yourself home. Remember, presence is the first step. Presence is the last step.

I wish you all an amazing week. I will be back next week as usual. Head on over to the More Than Mindset group. If you want support on this, we are doing daily calls. We’re doing Facebook lives. We’re doing community meetups. I have an amazing support there of 25 coaches in the group, mentors. We’re all helping and supporting each other. We’re teaching the how to process emotions, how to manage our mind, how to fill sensation, how to integrate and embody it.

We’ve got some amazing stuff going on in that community, and for you health and wellness practitioners, if you’re interested in doing this work, and you want to become one of the practitioners of the work, the Mind Body Business Mastermind is open for registration. I invite you to reach out. You can send me an email and ask for an application. That is what I have for you this week, guys. Go and feel the feels and be okay with that. Until next week.

Thanks for listening to this episode of More Than Mindset.