The Self-Awareness Advantage: The Essential Key to Unlocking Resilience and Well-being.

"If lessons are repeated until learned, and you can't learn them until you become aware of them, then cultivating awareness is absolutely necessary for any kind of progress on your path, especially towards resilience and well-being."

Unlock your inner potential by cultivating self-awareness to navigate life's challenges, embrace a positive mindset, and achieve true well-being. Discover actionable insights and practical tools to become more conscious of your thoughts, emotions, and behaviors.

Are you truly awake to your life, or are you operating on autopilot?

Key Takeaway Insights and Tools

• Awareness is the incredible process of becoming fully conscious; it's the very first step to making any change.(0:44)
• Feelings and emotions are like dashboard lights, signaling internal issues that need attention. (3:33)
• Practicing objective self-observation, like watching a movie of yourself, helps identify repeating behavioral patterns without judgment. (4:12)
• Journaling and meaningful reminders (e.g., a phrase or picture) are effective tools for externalizing thoughts and staying conscious. (5:07)
• Awareness is the foundation of choice, allowing you to choose how to respond rather than react, which is the core of resilience. (5:53)
• Body awareness (e.g., noticing tense shoulders, tight jaw) provides crucial signals about stress levels and emotions, aiding self-regulation. (7:51)
• Acknowledge emotional complexity by probing what lies beneath surface emotions for true emotional well-being. (8:38)

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Chapters

• 0:00 The Pitfalls of Constantly Striving for Perfection
• 0:41 Embracing Sufficing: Making Tough Trade-offs for Success
• 1:04 The Importance of Self-Awareness and Self-Compassion for Longevity

Transcript

0:00

Music. Well, welcome to It's an Inside Job Bite Size Fridays, your weekly dose of resilience, optimism, and well-being to get you ready for the weekend. Now, each week, I'll bring you insightful tips and uplifting stories to help you navigate life's challenges and embrace a more positive mindset. And so with that said, let's slip into the stream. Music. One of the themes that constantly comes up on this show is awareness. It's the ability and the capability to have self-awareness. Because if we want to live and lead from the inside out, well, that is one of the main ingredients. It is self-awareness, to be cognizant of our thoughts, our emotions, and our internal environment. When I think about awareness, a quote from Harry David Thoreau always comes to mind. And he said, only that day dawns to which we are awake. I think it perfectly encapsulates this idea that true living, true experiencing, really begins when we become conscious. For me, well, awareness is the incredible process of becoming fully conscious, fully cognizant. It's not always a dramatic, sudden revelation. though sometimes it can be like a light bulb switching on that illuminates the dark pockets of our unconscious mind. It can also be a slow gradual process like cleaning out cobwebs where you slowly start to see things with more clarity but however it arrives it always felt like the very first step to making any change I want to see in myself. I've certainly found that cultivating awareness is a lifelong process. You know, every moment it presents an opportunity, a possibility to either remain awake and engaged or to slip into unconscious automatic behavior. And honestly, I've spent a fair bit of my life on the automatic pilot. It's easy to go through the motions. I think we've all experienced that where the hours run into days and the days run into weeks. and before we know it, a season has passed. For me, one of the biggest catalysts for gaining awareness has been when I feel that nagging sense of discontent in my life. There's a sense of restlessness. You know that feeling, right? I'm sure you've experienced it. That subtle pull that something isn't quite right or that you want to shift in your path. I remember one time I kept feeling this low-level frustration at work. It wasn't about the tasks themselves, but something a little deeper, much deeper actually. I'd love working with my clients and helping them through their conundrums, their challenges, their roadblocks. But I wanted to do something else. And well, this podcast was something that came from that learning, from that realization. And it's in those kind of moments when I desire something different that I've learned to look within and ask myself, What is the truth of what I want? What change do I want to make? The answers that arise from those questions, at least for me, have always provided the awareness I needed to move forward in my process of change. And a big part of this has been really tuning into my feelings, into my emotions. Because feelings and emotions for me are the easiest way to get in touch with what truly is going on inside. They're like the lights on the dashboard of life. When one is illuminated, it's definitely a signal that there's some internal issue that needs to be addressed. It's helped me understand that the key to awareness often lies in tracing the root of my behaviors, to identify the beliefs that cause me to repeat the same patterns. Once I identify those patterns, then I can work on releasing them through willingness, and that willingness is crucial. Beyond just checking in with my feelings, I found some incredibly helpful tools. One powerful practice has been simply noticing my own behavior. Now it sounds simple, but when you observe your actions as an objective spectator. Well, you remove that filter of self-judgment and you allow yourself to see the patterns you're repeating. For example, last week, I caught myself interrupting someone in a conversation, something I often do when I'm excited, when I'm passionate about what I'm talking about. So instead of immediately judging myself, I simply noted, ah, there's that pattern again. My brain's going off. It's firing off a certain habitual way of doing something. This itself, it allows me to gently pivot and really listen. When I watch myself in different situations and notice similar actions and reactions, well, it helps me to bring to light the common thread attached to the necessary lesson. It's almost like watching a movie of myself, and suddenly, the plot becomes clear. All the pieces fall into place. One of the common tools people use is meditation. Now, that's something I don't do a lot of. actually very seldom. But one of the things that really helps me is journaling. It can really help me externalize my thoughts and to see them on paper. And on a simpler note, I'm a big believer in those meaningful reminders. For me, it's not necessarily a sticky note on the bathroom mirror, but perhaps a phrase I keep in my phone or a specific picture that reminds me to stay conscious, to stay cognizant. Now, what I'd like to do is just take a side tour and connect awareness to resilience and well-being. My insight here is that awareness is the foundation of choice. When you're on automatic pilot, you're reacting, often from old wounds or unconscious beliefs or old patterns. But when you become aware of those patterns, you create a space. And in that space, you can choose how to respond rather than just react. This, for me, it's the core of resilience. When you're aware of your stress triggers, you can proactively implement coping strategies before you feel overwhelmed. Now, this isn't about avoiding stress, but building your capacity to bounce back. If lessons are repeated until learned, and you can't learn them until you become aware of them, then cultivating awareness is absolutely necessary for any kind of progress on your path, especially towards resilience and well-being. For well-being, well, awareness brings a sense of peace. When I can objectively observe my behaviors, even the less than ideal ones, without harsh judgment or self-criticism, then there's a huge shift in me internally. It's about understanding, not just criticizing. This self-compassion is core, it's key, It's vital for well-being. Imagine being able to step back from an automatic negative thought and choosing a different perspective. That's what awareness offers. It's a greater sense of control over your inner landscape, leading to more inner peace, inner tranquility. It also allows me to connect with what I truly want. it allows me to align my actions with my values, which in turn, well, it creates a more authentic and satisfying life. And something I feel is often missing or under-emphasized in conversations about awareness for well-being, well, that's body awareness. You know, our bodies are incredible messengers. They hold so much information about our stress levels, our emotions, our deepest needs. Learning to listen to those subtle cues, a tense shoulder, for example, a tight jaw, a flutter in the stomach. These are all signals from the physiology to our psychology. They are, to me, another set of dashboard lights that tell us something needs attention. Perhaps even before our minds fully grasp it. This embodied awareness is a powerful tool for self-regulation and emotional resilience. Another insight I want to share is the importance of acknowledging emotional complexity. Awareness isn't just about identifying a problem feeling. It's about understanding the layers. Sometimes anger is really fear underneath. Sometimes sadness masks a deep longing for something. Being aware means not just naming the surface emotions. It's. But it means gently probing what lies beneath. And it's this depth of awareness which is crucial for true emotional well-being. Now, I'm not gonna kid you, I'm not gonna lie. Sometimes this inside job isn't easy. It can be uncomfortable to look at patterns you'd rather ignore, but that discomfort, that awkwardness is often a sign you're on the verge of a breakthrough. Of course, it's natural to feel a bit resistance when you start looking closely at our patterns, at your own patterns. Our unconscious mind often keeps things hidden for a reason. But approaching this with curiosity and kindness and compassion, rather than judgment, well, it can help you gently move past that resistance. And when we cultivate this deep inner awareness, it doesn't just benefit us, it spills over into our relationships, relationships, allowing us to respond more thoughtfully to others, creating deeper, more authentic connections. Cultivating awareness? Well, it's not about perfection. It's about progress. It's about choosing to stay awake. And so this week, as the weekend is approaching us, I challenge you to pick up one dashboard light, one feeling that frequently arises and simply notice it without judgment, without criticism. Don't try to fix it, just observe. Be that spectator, that bystander. What does it feel like in your body? What thoughts come with it? By simply noticing, folks, you're taking that first step towards greater awareness. Ask yourself, what patterns are you repeating? You might be surprised to see how evident they were all along. Pay attention to those feelings of discontent, those subtle whispers that something needs your attention. Notice your behavior, almost as an objective spectator. And consider incorporating tools like meditation if that works for you, journaling, which works for me, or simply those meaningful reminders that help you stay connected to your inner self. Because ultimately, awareness is an inside job and it's the key to truly progressing on your journey, on your sojourn. So make sure you hit that subscribe button and I'll be back next week with my long form conversational episodes on Monday and the latest Bite Sites episode on Friday and have yourself a relaxing and rejuvenating weekend. Music.