 Here we are for episode 41 of Recovery Monday. Let's wait for people to roll in. If you are popping in, just let me know that you can hear me and see me and everything is working. Let me know where you're from. Let me know what's going on today. We'll wait for some folks to arrive. Just a quick reminder today. This is, uh, we're doing another lesson out of this book. Reflections. Here we go. This book, 7% slower. Uh, today we're doing chapter. I don't know what chapter this is. It doesn't matter. We're doing another chapter out of 7% slower. So, uh, we've been doing these every Monday. We still have a few more chapters left to go in this book. So today we're going to talk about the idea that the first practical step in learning how to slow down, which is what this book is all about, is learning to become aware and acknowledging certain things. So we're going to talk about that. Um, we're going to do a little, maybe a little less lecture and a little bit more just discussion and Q and A today. Cause I think this subject kind of bears it out a little bit more. So let's see. We have six people. Here we go. Caught you. What's up? I guess everything is working. So we have some folks from YouTube. I always like to see that. Everybody is here from Facebook, the Facebook group. Uh, just a quick reminder from you in the Facebook group and you comment, I won't see your name, unfortunately, because that's how restream works, but that's okay. And while we're waiting for everybody to sort of, uh, file in, I'm going to do a little bit of a, a bit of a sales pitch here that I rarely do. First of all, get the book if you don't have 7% slower. But on August 16th, Joanna Hardis and I, she is an anxiety therapist, an anxiety and OCD specialist practicing in Cleveland. We are doing a webinar together, um, about how to learning, how to tolerate fear and here it is. There you go. Learning how to tolerate fear and discomfort. Joanna and I are doing that for the first time on August 16th of this month. So we have got that together. We are taking signups now for that. I'm going to put a link on the page here. If you want to leave that up there for a second. So I do not know why. Oh, I see why that's up there. Okay. Um, sorry about that. That, that graphic is wrong. So I'll take that off. Um, I forgot to delete something, but that's what we're doing on August 16th. If you want to check that out and the link to that is right here on the bottom, that bit Lee link. I'm going to check it out. I'll leave it there. So go check out the page to see if you're interested in that. It should be pretty good. So that is my little sales pitch to promote that because I told Joanna that I would get better at marketing and really it should twitches are here. Hey, Twitch. Oh, I think we have multiple twitches today. I'm so happy when we have more than one person from Twitch. It doesn't take a lot to really make me happy sometimes. Hey, Laura, what up? Kids started school today. My emotions are different and healthy emotions are turning into anxiety. Good job, Laura. Let me just acknowledge that for a second and we're going to be a little more informal today. There's a little less lecture. Like I said, school is starting again for those of us sort of in the Northern Hemisphere. That's sort of if you're watching now, you're probably in the Northern Hemisphere over in the Southern Hemisphere, you're sleeping and watching on a replay. But we're at that point now school is starting again. And let me just acknowledge that for a lot of people, that is a high anxiety time, right? So the kids are going back to school, you might be alone. So if you're struggling a little bit with the fact that school is starting again, and you have to go back to your old routine, or you're going to be home alone in the house because the kids aren't there. I see you. It's a thing. It's a then you're not alone in that. So I just want to acknowledge that start of school anxiety end of vacation anxiety is a thing. In fact, for me, to be honest with you, the first day of school was traditionally one of the hardest days of the year for me when my kids were little. There are no more first days of school anymore, because my kids are not grown. But that's okay. So I just wanted to acknowledge that. Hey, everybody, okay, we got about 40 people in the room. Let's get cooking. We're going to talk about the need to kind of be aware. So I'll put the caption back up for learning to be slow down becoming aware. Okay, so let's get through a couple of things. I made a couple of notes. The first thing that I wanted to talk about is the silly title of the book, right? So first thing we're going to acknowledge or be aware of here is that you can't actually go 7% slower. Some people, it's a little bit of a joke that title, because it was a joke to me. It was a little tool I came up just for me. But I have had some people get confused by that. Like, how do I know if I'm going 7% slower? You don't you can't actually go 7% slower. There's no way to measure that. Just to make everybody aware. The only reason can I put the chat on the screen. Thank you. Yes, I can totally do that. I can sometimes forget to put the chat up. Thanks for the reminder. So you can't actually go 7% slower. There's no way to really measure that. The 7% slower was just a little mental trick I came up with for me while I was going through my recovery journey. It was just a way to keep the awareness of my speeding up habit in the front of my mind. So I would, you know, often wind up speeding up running around and then I'd have to remind myself, slow down, slow down, slow down. And I just came up with this stupid little mental trick to say, oh, I should just I just to go 7% slower. And I used it and it helped me maintain an awareness of my sort of rushing level or my speed level. And then I didn't have to use it for many, many years. And I started telling it to people a couple of years ago, I would start using that with other people and it resonated with them. So it became a book. So first, I just want to acknowledge and we're talking about acknowledgement and awareness today is we're just trying to maintain an awareness of our speed level, our rushing level, that portion of our response to anxiety and fear and stress and 7% slower trying to go 7% slower is just a little mental trick that can help you maintain that awareness of the rushing around and the speeding up kind of thing. Right. So let's let's start with that acknowledgement, which is a little bit of a housekeeper. Now, the second thing that I want to talk about is that becoming aware really just means noticing things. Right. We need to start to notice. We need to really start to see what's going on around us. We need to start to see what we're doing. That's really the first practical step in learning to go 7% slower or slower. Right. You may wind up going who knows what percentage slower. It doesn't matter just slower. So when I say becoming aware as part of learning to slow down learning slow down, I mean, we have to start to really pay attention, which is interesting because one of the things that happens when we slow down is we cultivate and we work on the ability to pay attention to what's going on around us as opposed to only our scary thoughts and sensations. And in order to pay attention and cultivate that we work on paying attention. So it all kind of works together in a way. So being aware just become just means starting to actually notice. Like I'm going to have to start to notice what I'm doing. I'm going to have to actually start to notice what's really going on around me. So that's the first thing that I mean when I say becoming aware. The other thing that we want to acknowledge and become aware of is we have to acknowledge that we have up to this point or up to a certain point seen your responses to anxiety, stress and fear, including rushing around speeding up and running around to try and escape as automatic and out of your control. Right. So we have to acknowledge and be aware of that. Like I've seen this as automatic something beyond my control. I can't help it. I must do these things. So once we could acknowledge that that like I've always seen it this way, then you can really take that next little baby step to say, well, I'm going to have to also acknowledge and become aware of the fact that I have been wrong about that. So at one point in my life and my anxiety journey, I would have 100% told you this is just automatic. Right. It's automatic. I can't help it. And I know almost everybody watching today has had those moments where they'll say, Well, I hear you. I hear what I'm supposed to do, but I can't help it. It's automatic. It just happens. So we could acknowledge that we perceive it as automatic. But then we also have to acknowledge and become aware of the fact that that's not really correct. Right. So some of it. It's true. Some of it is automatic. And I think the best way to visualize this is the Claire Weeks first fear, second fear thing. That's valid. Right. So first fear, the initial startle, the initial hit of fear, adrenaline dump, whatever you want to call it, that is automatic. That is 100% automatic. The part that isn't automatic, the part that is a choice and we have to become aware, becoming aware of our choice is what we do after that. Right. So we have to become aware that the first fear, the feeling of fear or stress or anxiety or panic is automatic. You don't get to control that, but we do have agency after that initial flash. So that's a level of awareness we need to cultivate. And sometimes that's a sticking point. People know that that's out of my control. OK, well, if you want to say that it's out of your control and then end the conversation, then there's not much else to talk about. OK. But we can acknowledge that, well, I'm either wrong or, geez, I might have to at least consider that maybe that's been wrong. So if you're at that point right now where you feel like this guy is crazy because clearly it's out of my control, it all goes out the window. I can't do anything about this. I must run around. I must run home. I must do all my safety behaviors and you look around you and see, hey, look at all these people who are getting better or look at these people who are sharing their victories, their wins and they're improving and getting better. What's the difference between them and you? Well, at some point they acknowledged, oh, I might be wrong about that. I can do something about this. All right. So that's a second acknowledgement point, a point of awareness. And that's kind of a big point. So then the next point of awareness that we need to cultivate here is the awareness that even though you may be impaired and I'm saying when you are in a state of high anxiety or you're panicking or you're super stressed, you're terribly afraid and uncomfortable, you are not optimal. That's 100% true. Nobody would argue with that. You're not operating perfectly at that moment, but you are still operating. So understand the difference between in an say an impaired state, if you will, what's the level of impairment? You know, you may say that when you are in a panic state, you are completely incapacitated, but again, you have to at least have an awareness that I might be wrong about that. Like I could be wrong about that. I can actually maybe slow down and do things a little bit differently. Why? Because being impaired doesn't mean being completely incapacitated. It means being less than optimal, which we all want to try and be optimal, but let's be realistic. But most people are unoptimal even on a non-anxious day where it's tired, where we're a little sick, we're under the weather, we're stressed, we're angry at our partners, where we hate our jobs. We rarely are operating at this optimal level, but anxious people seem to think I'm either anxious or I'm perfect. I'm operating perfectly. I feel great. I feel awesome. Like that's not really true. So you may be impaired and operating in a suboptimal level. But you know, you can go back to some of the old Claire Week stuff, like shaking hands are still good hands, like shaking legs are still good legs. She was right. She was 100 percent right. And you have to be willing to be aware of that. Oh, it always feels like I'm going to pass out, but I never do. It always feels like I'm going to my legs will collapse, but they don't. It feels like it feels like, but it never does. So I'm not perfect. I'm suboptimal. I'm not the way I want to feel, but I'm still capable. All right. So let's see here. The next thing we want to talk about here is the awareness of the actual situation that you're in. That's the next level of awareness that you want to cultivate. It's what is actually happening here. So the natural tendency is to immediately launch into this is a disaster. This is the worst thing that can happen. I must get out of this. This is an untenable, unworkable situation because I'm too anxious, too afraid. I have too much panic. I have too much stress, whatever it is. And you have to cultivate an awareness of what is actually going on right here. And one of the things that you can really work on is like, OK, what's going on? What's actually happening? How can I be aware of what's actually happening? Well, I am afraid. I am afraid. I am unsure. I feel vulnerable. I feel uncertain. I feel like there's danger. I have feelings of doom. And my body and my brain are doing things that correlate with that feeling. So I am feeling afraid. I am feeling uncertain. I am feeling all of these really uncomfortable things. I don't like them. This is frightening. This feels like I can't handle it. But that's what's going on right now. So I can stick to the facts that say I'm afraid and I feel this way and I can recognize. And this is like our second point that attaches to this of awareness. I can become aware of the fact that all of the things I'm thinking and experiencing right now are completely explainable because in a state where I am afraid or I am feeling vulnerable or I am uncertain and I have to, I'm dealing with a challenge here, my body and brain are going to do afraid things. This is what they are designed to do. So you can try to move away from the subjective interpretation that I am in a crisis. This is a disaster. This is unhandleable. I have to find a way to get out of this or stop this from happening. And you can move on to an awareness that says I am afraid. I am uncomfortable. I am challenged right now. Yes, all of those things are true. Those are statements of fact. I'm not invalidating the experience. It is happening and it's difficult, but we can be a little bit more sensitive as to what is actually happening. And the adjunct to that, the next level of awareness is, oh, well, right now my fear center, my lizard brain, you know, I use the lizard through the whole book, my lizard brain is just trying to do its job. It's trying to keep me safe. It's trying to react the way it thinks it's supposed to react right now. Like, okay. So I can be aware of those things too and see the difference between those statements. I'm really afraid right now. And so my, the fear center in my brain is doing what it thinks it's supposed to do to keep me safe versus this is awful. This is the worst possible thing. I'm clearly going to go insane. Again, even though I never do, I clearly have a cancer that has not been diagnosed. Like see the difference. I'm afraid. Okay, that's a really powerful statement and it's a statement of fact. The other thing that we want to be aware of and really kind of the last point in this chapter of the book is you have to be aware of the fact that when your lizard brain is sending signals that say we have to be safe, take evasive action, get out of here. And in this case, speed up, speed up, speed up, get out, get out. You have to understand that the only way to communicate back down is behaviorally. So your fear center is sending signals up the chain and causing these things to happen in your body and changing your behavior to a certain extent. And now the only thing that I can do to interact with that is to send signals back down at it. I have to send it signals back down. It wants me to speed up. It wants me to run home. It wants me to call my partner. It wants me to do whatever I do to stay safe. I'm gonna have to send it a signal that says I don't have to do that, right? So that's the last level of awareness. Things that we have to be aware of and learn to be aware of and kind of accept or at least acknowledge, like, oh, my job now is to send new signals back down that chain. And the only way I can send them is not by chanting mantras, this too shall pass, I'm a warrior, I am safe, I am safe. It's literally what can I do because my amygdala, my lizard brain, my fear center only will understand the end result of the experience, which is I didn't do anything and I still wind up okay. So I just want a quick acknowledgement. Well, we're talking about acknowledgement awareness. Let's acknowledge for a second that that's not immediate relief, which I know a lot of people struggle with. Well, I did that, but I was still in a panic. Yes, that's true. You're gonna have to let it run its course. So I always want to acknowledge that. None of this is designed to bring you immediate relief because the signal you're sending down to your fear center, your lizard brain, and that slowing down is a signal. Oh, we're talking about, but we've talked about that as we've gone through this book. Unfortunately, that signal is received delayed. That's like a time delay. It's like we're communicating with the Voyager spacecraft. It's far away. We just can't help it. The speed of light is what it is. It takes a day and a half for the signals to get there. The same thing really happens here. So when you send that slowing down signal, it is true that you might find some measure of relief, but that relief is really comes from like, oh, it's ending faster. You hit that peak level and then all of a sudden you discover you're on the other side and it's subsiding. And that comes faster than you thought it would. And so it feels like, oh, I stopped it from happening. Well, not really. You just kind of ended it sooner or you begin to send it down. Yes, I could have called it Veager, but I didn't. Star Trek reference, but that was the worst. The Veager movie, that's a whole other video. That was the worst of all. Seriously it was. Fight me on that. But that signal that we're sending back down is a delayed response signal. So your lizard brain really only processes that. The amygdala only processes that after you come down, you're on the other side of that. Are you going to that anxiety valley? Even if it's undulating, there are valleys between the peaks. And then you realize, well, I got into a valley or it ended completely, which is certainly possible, without me doing anything, and even though I slowed down. So just be careful of expecting that. Oh, if I slowed down, I immediately stop panicking or I prevent it. As you go down the road, that stuff does start to short circuit the panic, but in the beginning, you're just going to feel it with full force. It will hit its peak. That's okay. You kind of needed to do that, right? So those little things, I'll just go through the points again really quick. Becoming aware, which is the first practical step in learning to slow down means noticing things. We have to actually start to notice what we do, what we're thinking, the conclusions we're drawing and what's actually happening around us. We have to become aware of a little bit of our maybe faulty conclusions that this is completely out of my control and I can't do anything about it. That's a big one. You're going to have to get your head around the fact that that might be the wrong conclusion. You might be wrong about that. You have to become aware that even though you are impaired and suboptimal, does not mean that you are completely incapacitated, even though that you swear that you are, you've never been. You have to be aware of the actual objective situation you're in with statements like, I am afraid, I feel vulnerable, I feel uncertain. My body is responding to that as opposed to, this is the worst, the worst thing that could ever happen to somebody, nobody understands, I have to go home, I can't help it. See the difference there? We have to be aware that all of these sensations and stuff that is happening are just, that's your brain trying to keep you safe. All explainable, right? And then you have to be aware of the fact that your lizard brain is sending you signals, you have to send it back, you have to send signals back down the chain. And slowing things down, when it is demanding that you run and get the hell out of dodge to be safe, is one such way to send those signals, right? So that is the level of awareness that I was talking about in chapter, whatever, chapter eight, chapter eight or seven percent slower. That's chapter eight in a nutshell. Again, for those of you who do not have this book and ever reading it, it's a short book. See, it's not super thick. And it's a good bit of a friendly read. So that's why these chapters are pretty short. I think the lessons are there. They're valuable, I hope, but they're pretty short. So let's go through the comments as usual. I always appreciate when I get to catch them as we're coming through. Let's see here. Let's scroll up to the top and see what we got going on. I saw that everybody popped in. Here we go. What up, Jason? Jason's here. Bethany's here. Nikki is here. Hey, everybody. Oh, Raina, haven't seen you in a long time. How are you? Let's see. Sat on the beach today. We'll throw some stuff up on the screen. Let's do it. Nikki had a win today, I see. Sat on the beach today. Close my eyes and listen to all the sounds and it helped calm my mind. Awesome. That's a thing that would be really hard to do, right? In the past, you've been working on that. So that's a total win. The fact that you could do that. Go, Nikki. Okay, this is good. This becomes a thing. Somebody brought it up in one of the previous Recovery Monday videos, too. People get annoyed with me at the grocery store because I walk so slowly through the aisles. Sorry, y'all, I'm going 7% slower. So that's a good comment from Aurora. That can happen sometimes. I address this, I think, in one of the later chapters of the book. When you're in a situation where you don't always have to be slow in life, that's true. Depending on where you live, life could be a little bit faster paced. So there's accommodations that happen, but I do get that, like when you're intentionally trying to slow your shit down. And when we talk about the practical practice of slowing down, I talk about really exaggerating it to get the hang of it. That can be a little bit comical, but that's okay. So I did the same thing. I was at a snail's pace through the frozen food section a couple of times just to practice that and drive the point home so I get better at it. And I know that I was pissing off a few people with grocery carts behind me, but oh well. It's the way it is, right? Let's see what Katya has to say. At first I would use whatever could help me to slow down when I do my exposures or take pictures. You know, that's pretty good. I dig this because you can use whatever. There's literally nothing wrong with this. So what Katya is saying is pretty cool. I would take pictures, I would use, you know, use, that's cool, like a botany app, you could identify flowers or trees or birds. That is a great exercise in saying, well, I'm gonna just pay attention to what's going on around me rather than what's going on inside me. Like my brain is screaming that I'm going to die again or go crazy or I'm unsafe. I'm going to take pictures. You know, now Katya's an artist, she takes great pictures. But that maybe that's a hobby of yours. Maybe it's something you like. So it's okay to use tools like that. I wouldn't even say that's a starting tool. That's not a bad habit to get into. So I like that. I actually like that. If that's the thing that you do that helps you slow down and become more, I'm gonna hate to use the word, we talked about it last week, present, right, become paying attention, just being attentive to what's going on around it. There's really nothing wrong with that. Because in the end, it might start off as a tool, but then it becomes a habit and that's a good habit. When I'm not taking a walk, I will be attentive to the world around me. Like it's really cool. And you never know. You start to appreciate the world a little bit more, you practice your photography, there's benefits in that. So that's a great comment. Thank you, I appreciate it. Okay, let's see here. That first adrenaline drop says Amber is the devil. Yeah, kinda, I can't argue with that 100% true. That first hit, that first flash of fear that always comes with a startle or uh-oh, like uh-oh, you know, oh my God, like it sucks, like we can just say it, it just sucks, it flat out sucks, it always sucks. I don't know anybody in the world more recovered than me and I will tell you that when it happens to me, it still sucks. I would tell you that it sucks too, totally the devil. But it's okay, like it's really, you get better at knowing that like, oh, I have that first uh-oh, and that's automatic. So that part is automatic, but like for somebody like me, I'm just so good at it that the uh-oh never gets beyond 30 seconds, 60 seconds maybe. So it never spirals into like an hour and a half of oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, it never does that anymore. So I know I don't have to do that. So I don't disagree with it, that first adrenaline hit is tough. Let's see here. I'm not gonna address specific medical things. I'm not ever gonna do that. You know, the operation of your heart is between you and your doctor, your cardiologist. If you've been told that it is normal, then I am not gonna be here to soothe you and tell you that, yes, you're a cardiologist, right? I'm not a cardiologist. So if you have been given a clean bin of health, bill of health and your cardiologist says that your heart is actually fine, then you're gonna have to go with that. Yes, then what I'm talking about makes sense here. Like you're gonna have to use that. I'm afraid, because I don't believe that he's right. But yes, you can apply that. Me is here talking about the coins. They never did get around to the coins. Slow down and give me that coin after those coins. Anyway, so yeah, that's fair. So yes, you can use these tools. And if you're afraid that your cardiologist is wrong and you don't believe that your heart is okay, while you're slowing down to allow your heart to not be okay to learn that nothing actually bad happens, nothing actually bad does happen, then you're kinda good to go. In the end, that's where you learn. Oh, this is so good. Thank you, Katya. I appreciate these comments. I managed to remember the conversations, the music, the smell of the coffee, like where it helped me to realize, let's put up the next cause the two-part comment here that I can panic and even be mindful during those moments. These are rock star comments right here. You guys should be screenshotting these as I have them up if you can. Even in a panic, like Katya was able to learn through experience that like, oh, I can actually be engaged in the conversation and take something out of it. I can enjoy the smell of the coffee or the artwork on the walls or whatever. Like it is possible. That is possible. It is 100% possible for that to be true. Even though you don't believe. It can't possibly be true. This is somewhat disturbing but funny. I need to slow down on the phone. My mom just called and I accidentally said later, babe, as I hung up. That's a tough one. I'm sure your mom understands. You gotta slow down, dude. Yeah, that's gonna happen. That's awkward. Awkward. Okay, Jim has a comment here about anticipatory anxiety. It's not so much activity that is a problem. It is the time leading up to it. And that is so true for so many of us. I know for me, the anticipation of the challenges that I had to me was always worse than the challenges themselves. Now, in some instances, the challenges were tough too. I'm not minimizing the challenges, but the anticipation is often worse. Many times it is worse. But these tools that we're talking about, including the idea that you can slow things down and try to become a little bit more, especially in the case of anticipatory anxiety, where you're living in the future and you're trying to predict the future, learning to slow down is a really great way to come back to the present. So it's especially applicable in the case of that anticipatory anxiety. Or how did the Brits say it? And anticipatory, they don't say it, they say it differently. Anticipatory, I don't know, anyway. Anyway, but it counts. Yeah, so that's a good point. Let's see here. Da-da-da, am I going back down? It's going down, this is true too. Slowing down probably triggers others' anxiety. That could be, that's possible. People want you to speed up. I know on the flip side, sometimes for those of us that are in the habit of being speed demons all the time, rush, rush, rush, rush, rush. When other people are going slow, and by show of hands, how many people have had this? I think somebody brought this up on a video a few weeks back, where it is when you wanna rush around because the sky is falling and you gotta get back to the save zone or you gotta escape this danger. When the people around you are moving at a normal speed, sometimes that can ramp your level of agitation up. One person even mentioned like, oh, I really get angry because they don't they understand? I mean, clearly you don't expect them to understand because they're not experiencing your panic, but you think you're in mortal danger and so you are running, going like the hammers of hell to try and get out of danger and everybody around you is kind of moseying around at their normal pace and that can ramp up our own level of agitation. So be aware of that too. You can even get angry. That person who brought it up said, oh, it makes me angry because I wanna rush around and get safe and everybody else is just like, nothing's wrong, but cause nothing is wrong. There's nothing is wrong. So there you go. I'll throw this up. It's not necessarily related, but it's a good question. This is, if you are on my YouTube channel, which clearly JJ you are, the videos that I do with Lauren Rosen, there's a playlist for those. I think we call it fire and ice just cause we're ridiculous. But one of them I think is called to ERP or not to ERP. We specifically talked about that. You don't, it's a little bit of both. Sometimes it's a refocus. Sometimes it's a going toward. So it really is contextual. What I, the general rule of thumb here and I do not claim to be an OCD expert here, but when you're dealing with intrusive thoughts and OCD, if it is recurring and recurring and recurring and that refocus and reframe isn't helping you, then an exposure in the form of ERP is generally what you're looking for. In fact, I think the last, the last one that Lauren and I recorded, I don't think it's out yet. It's called, can I offer you a reframe? And we talked about that. Sometimes it is refocus and sometimes it is go toward it. So that's really depends. It depends, but both can be effective. Both can be effective, but there's no hard and fast answer to that. Extremely good idea on the photo is very good. Oh, it's Speed Week or Bestie Liz, okay. They are racing vehicles to set land speed records on the salt flats, except they had to slow down and rain. Salt is mushy. Yeah, but you know what? Here's an exercise in ridiculousness. You could go and watch the speed trials, the speed trials and you can slowly watch them. Like I can go to the salt flats slowly and mindfully and watch these guys like break the speed records. Let's see what Patty has to say. What about Patty? Took a road trip on the fly over three hours and stayed away for two days. It felt good. Excellent. Good job, Patty. I know that this is a very big deal for you. So, well done. Well, well done. Slow down and give me that coin. Seniors and, oh dude, I know I put a lot of Reese Bailey garage comments up, but he's a funny dude. Don't follow seniors in grocery store in Florida. Frankly, at the risk of infuriating my Florida audience, I wouldn't follow anybody in Florida. I have family down there. I've been down there in a while, but everybody is slow. I mean, all the northerners go down there and I think we experienced that. Like, why is everybody driving on 60 mile an hour roads at 40 miles an hour? So, that could be really annoying. Let's keep going. Am I clean if I'm trying to slow myself? Oh, okay, this is cool. Oh, let's throw this up here. Hey, Nikki, what up? I'm a cleaner for a living. I'm trying to slow myself down, helping my clients will not notice. I'm sure I was getting so much done on my frantic panic wave cleaning. Okay, so this is pretty common and here's an interesting thing that I learned in my own experience and I have heard other people echo this, right? So I can only pass my experience and the experience of others. We think when we are frantic, frantic doesn't mean productive, right? So in our own minds, we build this narrative that says, oh, if I'm always going, going, going, going, going, I get so much done. I can tell you with 100% certainty that when I allow myself to be more attentive to every task I'm doing and just stay focused moment by moment on what's going on, I am literally more productive in those days. There is, it's not even a question and I've heard quite a few people echo this sentiment. So while I would have told you that like, oh, I'm so fast and I admittedly I wore that as a bit of a badge of honor incorrectly, like I do everything so fast. I'm always multitasking. I always have something going on. I have 62 tabs open and I thought that was a good thing. When I actually slow things down, I do a better job at everything. So that could be a perceptible thing. Now I understand that in the business that you're in, the speed you're moving in does kind of matter, but you can still move quickly without being frantic. We talked about this a few weeks before. That is one of the things I've talked about in this book. There is a difference between speed and a state of being frantic. You can be fast without being frantic. So we're really addressing the frantic nature of speeding up, not necessarily speed itself. There are times when you gotta be fast. Sometimes you gotta work fast, that's okay. So just be careful of those two, the perceptual thing and also understand the difference between working quickly and frantically working, two different things. So this is a good question. I have a bunch of success story. I don't have, in particularly this, have intense anxiety while playing for a sports team. The question I would ask about that, I can't know. So FBI, I'm sorry, I can't know your particular situation. It's an interesting question. No, I've not ever talked to somebody who was playing on a sports team professionally or otherwise, I don't know, which is fine. But in the end, I think there could be a couple of things going on there. So I'm guessing there's the pressure of the competition. There's the pressure to perform. That could be a driver. Or there could be the physical symptoms. Like if you're playing sports, clearly you're gonna experience symptoms that feel like anxiety and panic. So I'm not really sure what you're getting at in that situation. It would be an interesting conversation. I know that there have been instances here in North America where professional athletes have come out and talked about crippling anxiety problems that they have had while they were playing. So maybe one day I will be able to talk to one of them. Good suggestion. Let's see. Awkward. Let's see here. I'm gonna just scroll here. Oh, very good. Thank you, Mia. Mia's always got good things to say. It's so completely counterintuitive, slow down to get more focused. Damn it. And this is, so Mia's my friend. And also I produce Mia's podcast, Shit We Don't Talk About. If you, I'm often on Shit We Don't Talk About. So if you guys wanna hear me rant about things that are not necessarily anxiety related, but sometimes are mental health related, then you can go to Shit We Don't Talk About podcast.com or miavoss.live. And you'll see me on some of her episodes because I'm also her podcast producer. But Mia is low-key aggravated almost all the time by the fact that she has to slow down. So when 7% slow first came out, we had many very funny discussions where she just loves the book and Effing hates it at the same time. Damn it, why are you gonna make me slow down but it works? So thank you, Mia. Appreciate that. Okay, this is good. Sign you a good comment here. I'm the most put together person and my rushing has made me do the stupidest things. I just laughed now. Forget key, shoes, paper, been there, been there. Like for a pretty bright guy, when I was running around like a speed demon, I did all kinds of silly stuff that I will never explain, but that's okay. It happens. Let's see here. I'm never gonna address specific is this normal? I can tell you this now, but when I tell you now in an hour after this video is over, you'll forget that I told you or you'll think that I could be wrong. So what you'll know, I'm sure what you know about me is I'm never gonna be that guy that says, oh, yeah, it's normal. Let me soothe your fear. Let's see here. Okay, this is one of the reasons why we do speed up, right? So Sonya is kind of nailing this. If I get to the end of everything quick, then if I feel anxious, I can just step out. That's one of the reasons, right? One of the reasons in a big way is that if I don't have any constraints on me, I can escape. If you have to complete a task, like being in a work meeting or a conversation or on a phone call or in the supermarket and you're still shopping, for instance, you are trapped if you panic. If you can complete those things, then you can go back to a free space where you can run if you need to. So Sonya, that's really good. That's sort of an indirect link as to why we speed up, but it's 100% valid. All right, let me throw this up on the screen here. So Sarah, I'm having a raging panic attack and you are saving my life. I promise I am 100% not saving anything. You are doing that. Like I cannot stress this enough, like I am not soothing you. My voice is not saving you. Nothing we're talking about here is saving you. You've never needed to be saved and now you're learning that. So give yourself the credit for when this panic attack is over because it's gonna be over and you're still gonna be okay. Give yourself the credit for having moved through that without needing to be saved. Do not, I don't want you to even remotely think that I'm saving you. I'm not. You don't ever need to be saved. Really important. I do hope you feel better soon and it's gonna end. I promise you're gonna be okay. But I'm not saving you. Don't think that. So let's see. I'm gonna scroll down to the bottom a little bit. How are we doing? 34 minutes? Not too bad. Again, have our heart anxiety. We're not gonna address those things specifically. Very new to this, had my first panic attack. I'm learning how to stay focused throughout the day and night the moment I go to sleep. All right, so it's a big comment so I'm not gonna, it'll fill the screen. A lot of people talk about the fact that panic at night is somehow different. Now, okay, I could say that the experience is different but I'm also fond of saying things like, you know the difference between panic during the day and panic at night is that it's dark. Like, and I'm intentionally dismissing that because many people will say, well, I'm good during the day but if I panic at night, all bets are off. And I would have to challenge that. Like, why? Because you're more afraid then. It jolts you, you were sleeping and you were sleeping and now you're in a panic. Yeah, that's a jolting, jarring, disturbing experience. There's no doubt about that. But for every person that claims that a nighttime panic attack is the worst thing ever, there are 10 people having panic attacks at noon that would like to have a word with you. So I'm not dismissing it but I'm just trying to put a little objectivity in there. It's really important to not hang on to that narrative. Like, no, no, no, nighttime panic or panic if I'm sleeping is a whole different thing. How are you supposed to handle that? The same exact way. Now, the automatic response because you are jolted at a sleep, it might be a little longer. I'm not saying that it's different, right? I'm not denying that but so that initial jolt might be a little bit longer, lasting a little bit longer but in the end, you're still gonna handle it the same way you're gonna handle it during the day. So that narrative that's somehow a nighttime panic attack is special and needs a special technique of some kind is not really true. Let's see. JJ says, correct for me if you remember, your recovery has been more based on an inhibitory learning model and habituation. Yes, now here's an interesting thing. So don't get me started because I can nerd out about this stuff for hours and hours. When I was doing my recovery work, so like 2008 back then it's been a while, it's been a couple of years, right? When I was in the thick of that, I would have put all my eggs in habituation. I would have 100% put my eggs in that. I'm habituating to these situations but really and truly in retrospect, I look and say, well, really, it was more the inhibition of the response. Inhibitory learning just means we inhibit the safety responses. I would refuse to run home when I panicked. I would refuse to call for help when I panicked. I would inhibit those normal responses and I would learn from that inhibition. So that's the inhibitory learning model. It's not just doing the things and pushing through them and trying to get used to them. That's what I would have told you on a technical level in 2008, but in reality it was inhibiting those responses, the RP and ERP that actually got the job done. That's where the lessons are learned. And as we go further down the road and we refine these techniques and gather more data in the field, actual clinical data, we know that inhibitory learning habituation does play a role. There's no doubt about that humans habituate, but it's really inhibiting those responses, the RP part of ERP and then learning from that. It would be an interesting podcast. See for me, that's a super interesting podcast. So when I get together with like my therapist friends or I'm in my master's program, I'm a super nerd on that. We could talk, I get in discussions about that stuff all the time. But it does matter because the difference between, but I also don't wanna bore people with technical shit that they don't care about. But it does matter because people that get stuck with it, I'm doing the things and I'm not getting better. I'm doing the things. They're relying almost entirely on habituation. If I do it enough, I'll get used to it, but you never get used to doing a thing that you think is the worst thing to do in the entire world, right? So it's so important to have that deeper understanding of why I'm doing this. So that's where inhibitory learning really starts to come into play. If you know why you're doing it, I'm intentionally trying to be scared. I'm trying to be scared so that I can react to it a new way and I can learn from that. That's very different than I drive every day, but if you get home every day and tell the story about a nightmare, that's the worst thing that ever happened and you don't know why you're doing this and this is crazy and why isn't changing, that's why it's not changing. Because we're not designed to habituate to torture and you don't wanna put yourself in a torture cycle. Like you have to have a willingness to experience these unpleasant things, react to them in a different way and learn from that. That's the inhibitory learning model. So that every master in Norwegian language, I could tell you that a year straight of Norwegian on the Duolingo app taught me a lot of words, but if you dropped me an Oslo right now, I would drown. There was no way I would make it a Norway right now. To learn a language, you really have to speak it and listen to it all the time and I just didn't do that. So there you go. Let's see, what is so darn hard, she's gonna get the rush. Okay, well, this is fair. Waitressing is a thing. This is interesting, I'll offer that topic too. The difference between habituation, you guys wanna really hear that? I could talk about that. That's fine, just let me know. So I have two people that wanna hear that. If you wanna hear a podcast topic on the difference between habituation, getting used to it and inhibitory learning, which is actively changing a response, let me know and I will put that on the docket and I will do that. Waitressing is one of those jobs where 100%, I would say you are kind of required to move fast. But understand that there is a difference between again, speed and being frantic and the difference between like being super fat or there's really not as big a difference as you probably think. You don't wanna be a mushy waitress because that's not a good waitress. I get that as people in the hospitality business, you do have to have a spring in your step, there's no doubt about that. You can't just be moseying along and do that job well, I understand. But you can have a spring in your step without being frantic. But again, we're always looking for frantic. So let's see here. Let me keep going, keep going, keep going. It's fascinating, brains are amazing. Brains are amazing, it's just completely ridiculous. Like we really need brain 2.0, I say that all the time. We absolutely need brain 2.0. Habituation, okay, we'll do habituation versus inhibitory learning, you got it. So sometime in the next four to six weeks I will have one of those, maybe I'll bring a couple other people. We have, it's been a while since we did a little bit of a round table discussion. Maybe I'll get Josh and Kim together, we'll talk about it. Maybe I'll get Lauren involved, like there's just a ton of, there's so much geeky nerdy stuff that I love about that, so I'll do it. Thanks guys, we'll do it. And then the last thing that I kind of want to go through would be somebody talked about and then we'll end it at about 40 minutes. Can you talk about intrusive thoughts and feelings might are hard constantly if I'm gonna pass out because I think it. One of the core, like I know you would hope that me or somebody will specifically address the thought about passing out, but you don't actually need somebody to talk about passing out thoughts. You understand, what you just said there Amanda is really gold, I think I'm afraid of it because I think it, you kind of answered your own question right there. So one of the core principles here in the recovery process is that thinking a thing or fearing a thing doesn't mean it comes true but you only learn that through experience. So the worst part about that intrusive thought is that you have to learn to allow it, either allow it and just get on with your day just allowing the possibility that you might for you is passing out, just get on with your day and allow the possibility that you may pass out and learn that you don't because it's not a real, it's a real fear but an unfounded fear or you go toward that and start doing exposures designed to kind of bring that thought up. Most of the time you're gonna just refocus away. You will be afraid and uncomfortable and you won't wanna do that, you will think it's not right and you will beg and plead for somebody to assure you that you will not pass out but that doesn't help you. So you're not alone in that, incredibly common and whether or not people are dealing with OCD or it's panic disorder, it's agoraphobia, it's health anxiety, it is resisting the idea that like just because I think a thing it is true, not true. Oh, don't even get me started. That guy don't even put his name on the screen. I have huge problem with that guy. So I have and he's worthless to me. I have no problem saying that and Sean if you're watching you're a reprehensible human being. Like mental health is not life coaching or business coaching and people that are suffering are not warm prospects for your high-end closers. Horrible, horrible, horrible example of somebody who is trying to be a helper. Like anxious people are not coaching business life development clients and there's far too much of that going on and he's the worst example that I know of in the US. I have no problem saying that. If you're watching, come on down, we'll get you on the podcast and we'll talk about that. So there you go. All right guys, I am done. Thanks for coming by. You got me riled up with that last one. So I just have a problem with that in a huge way, in a huge way. So whatever, be careful, be a critical consumer of information and I'll end with this then, fine. Anybody who, anybody who needs you to be a testimonial for them, anybody who asks you to record a video for them about your recovery, anybody that uses you as a marketing tool, anybody who puts you in touch with a team of sales closers to get you to become a client is a problem. Like I would be immediately lose my license as a therapist when I finish my program and get licensed. Any licensed therapist would be sanctioned for that. It is unethical, it is not okay. You cannot do that. So it's not cool. And there are people out there that will use your recovery as their social media marketing and it is not in any way okay ever. Don't ever let anybody do that to you. Like if I help you, that is between me and you. Unfortunately, I don't get to hold you up as proof that I am amazing. This is the business that I am in and that's part of the ethical restraint that I have to work under. Then just because he doesn't have a license and he calls himself a coach or anybody calls themselves a coach doesn't absolve them of the responsibility to act ethically and in your best interest. It is so not okay, I can't even tell you. A huge problem with the coaching thing in general. So there you go. All right, enough for hinting. Thanks for the comments guys. This will stay on my Facebook page and the Facebook group, even though it's hard on YouTube, subscribe to the YouTube channel because these all stay in a playlist. I'm going to put up the URL for the Distress Tolerance 7R2. For those of you who are struggling with, I know what I have to do, but I just can't seem to do it. Learning this concept of Distress Tolerance and this isn't free, full disclosure. This is not a free thing. We're going to do it once every month. The first time is on August 16th, so go check that out. I think you might find it useful. We will do them at least once a month. So if you missed this one, it's okay. But you can go to that webpage right here on the bottom and check that out. Great. And in the end, just keep commenting. I will answer them the best I can. We'll be back here next week. We'll do chapter nine. I'm not sure what's in chapter nine, but we'll be here anyway. I appreciate you guys coming by and listening to me be long-winded and fast and ranting. And I'll see you guys next week.