Episode 16: Go Back to Your Factory Default Settings

All of nature—even our bodies—have an innate intelligence that brings things back into harmony and balance. Wouldn't the same be true of our minds?
 
 Today, join Melissa and Barb for a discussion highlighting the inherent reset capabilities within all of us, focusing on the profound difference simply realizing this can make in our lives. 

Transcript

[00:00:00] SHOW INTRO
 
 [00:00:49] Barb Patterson: Hey, everybody. Welcome to the REAL WOMEN REAL LIVES podcast. We are so grateful to have you here today. I'm Barb.
 
 [00:00:57] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: And I'm Melissa.

[00:00:58] Barb Patterson: Yeah. So today, we're gonna talk about the wisdom of the design. The wisdom behind all life, the intelligence of our bodies and our minds, and how we can trust them more. And I'm gonna start by turning it right on over to you, Melissa.

[00:01:16] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: Thank you, Barb. Uh, the way you set that up, I feel like I better have something really good today.

[00:01:21] Barb Patterson: You better. Yeah. And wise, by the way. And brilliant.

[00:01:24] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: Better be wise.

[00:01:25] Barb Patterson: Yeah, exactly. Pressure's on.
 
 [00:01:28] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: The pressure's always on in my head. So that's okay.

Our family went to Montauk this weekend, which is a beautiful beach town on the very, very tip of Long Island.

And I hadn't been there in about 20 or so years, and there's a beautiful lighthouse at the end. And we went with about eight families, and each had a kid or two or three. And so my daughter, Maya, was with a lot of kids, and we got back the other night, and yesterday Maya woke up with 104 fever and, you know, she's my only kid. I really don't know a lot about this stuff at all. So of course, you know, I researched, I called people, I got all the information, and there wasn't much to do.

The thing that I was most thinking about was her experience. I didn't want her to be afraid because she was very, very lethargic. She couldn't even pick her head up off the pillow.

And, you know, as a person that loves another person, at least for me, I don't want them to feel pain, and I don't want them to worry. So I started thinking about how I could describe what her body was doing, as opposed to making up a story like I've done in the past about Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy.

I just really wanted to give her the real deal information so that she could understand what was going on. And, you know, I had this insight to share with her that this is what our bodies do. Our bodies get a fever and a temperature, and it's the body's way of fighting off an infection. And she was fascinated by this.

That her little, beautiful body has a design to heal itself. And she kept asking more and more questions about like, "Who made it do this?” or "How does that work?";

And the truth is I didn't have a lot of answers because it just happens. And I explained to her that when she gets a cut, her body heals, of course, we wanna take care of it and clean it.

But the body heals itself.

And so this became a fascinating conversation that she and I were having, and it was a rough day yesterday. You know, she was really uncomfortable, and I went into fear about, you know, what if it's COVID or what if it's this or that? And I just kept bringing myself back that her body is wise and it's taking care of itself.

And of course, I did all the things that you do. You reach out to a doctor; you make sure that she's hydrated.

I really was on this vibe about the body healing itself. And so after I put her to bed and gave myself huge props about being the best nurse in the entire world, I was very proud of myself, actually.

For whatever reason, I started thinking about everything that's wrong in the world. And you know, there's a long list, long list. I had one of those yellow legal pad lists actually of all the things. And I just wrote 'em all down. I just wanted. I found myself getting very afraid and very concerned. And I thought, "You know what? I'm just gonna go to sleep.";

I woke up, and my head was clear. Now I didn't do anything to get it that way. I even started poking around in my head, thinking like, "Why is my head clear? There's all these problems in the world."; And then I remembered, "Oh right. Maya. Let me check on her." So I went to check on her, and her fever was down, and I thought, isn't this interest.

The body had the fever to heal itself. I had the legal-size pad of problems in the world, and yet my mind was able to clear, and that is how we work. That is how we humans work. And it's not special to me or her or anyone. It's how we work as humans. And when I remember that, I'm able to be much more present and effective in solution-finding. It's the next thing that comes into my head to do.

And yesterday, you know,  there was a cold washcloth. There was buying her favorite juice. There was keeping myself sane—the way I know how to do by quieting down, by not reading the news, by coming back to home. Homeostasis.

What does that word mean? I think that might mean something like that, right? Just like the the center, the home, the the body, the homeostasis, the the center of coming back, and really, that's how we work. And I can easily take myself out, Barb, with all the things in the external world right now that are happening.

And there's a lot. And I do take myself out. And it reminds me of an episode we had a couple weeks ago with the terrible events that happened in Uvalde. And, and since frankly, we've had, you know, the Supreme Court Roe vs. Wade, and, and just some things that are just so hard for my mind to comprehend. And when I try to figure them out, I can't; I have to come back home to inside myself, then ask myself, 'okay. What is the solution here? What's the next thing to do with my daughter, with my work, with the world." And when I remember that we as humans go back to our homeostasis when we don't interfere, it is very helpful for me. And I can show up much more for the world, frankly.

So I'm grateful that she's feeling better, and I'm grateful that I can see today how we work because that wasn't always the case.

[00:06:23] Barb Patterson: Yeah.

[00:06:24] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: You know, metaphorically speaking, I would've had a fever and then, you know, I, would've tried to figure out that fever—thought and thought and thought and thought about it and created a much worse situation for myself. But now I know that the fever will heal itself with some help, some tender, loving care.

[00:06:40] Barb Patterson: Yeah. I love that. When I started to really understand how our minds work, how fluid our internal experience is, which means even our psychology is fluid. Our moment-to-moment experience of life is fluid. And I started to realize how much I thought it was on me to manage my thoughts, my attitudes, my solutions, getting it right. How to be good, how to know what to do. I thought, even as we've talked about, my own learning was on me. My own evolution was somehow all up to me.
 
 And yet when I started to consider based on what we were learning about how the mind works, that oh yeah. In the same way that you're talking about the intelligence of the body, that a fever is  intelligence at work.
 
 We cut ourselves, and the body is immediately going towards healing and finding that center, that place of balance again.
 
 When I started to realize, oh yeah, that has to be true for our minds as well. Right. There's an intelligence behind the constriction, perhaps. I don't always understand it.
 
 There's intelligence, but that the mind is designed to come back to balance. It's designed to find its way back to home. It's designed to level set, and our default setting is one of more clarity and perspective and openness.
 
 You know, that was transformative for me because I realized, oh, if I don't get in there and try and help it, you know, and try and get it to happen faster, you know, that actually left to its own devices, our minds get more clear and perspective. And in that perspective, like you said, we get wise and helpful thinking,
 
 [00:08:26] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: Right.

[00:08:26] Barb Patterson: We get guided on the washcloth or the juice, or turn off the news or speak out, you know, whatever it might be.

[00:08:35] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: There was this show that I used to watch growing up; it was called The Double Whammy.

This is very scientific. In the past, I would double whammy myself. I would have the whammy, which would be like a really scary thought. And then I would think to myself, well, I know better. I shouldn't have that thought. I would double whammy myself. I would judge my thought. And what that would do is it would create more thought and more swirl and more cycle.

What you're talking about, the intelligence here of the way we work, is that I don't need to do that. I don't have to engage with it to fix it, to make it better in my own mind; I can just gently leave the room.

[00:09:13] Barb Patterson: Yeah.

[00:09:14] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: In my mind, that particular room and enter another room and see what's going on in there.

[00:09:19] Barb Patterson: Yeah, no, it's so true. I mean, I really did think and have this illusion of control and that somehow I could manage it all my internal state, my thinking, my moods, my. Change and getting over things and getting, you know, it all looked like it was on me to manage.

I had no knowledge that there is an intelligence to our minds.

Like I had never looked at it from that perspective. It was new information for me. And yet, of course, of course, if there's an intelligence behind nature and seasons, and there's an intelligence behind our body, that includes our minds as well.

And so it allowed me to take my hands off the wheel a little more to get more curious to say, well, what if I didn't rush to feel better? Would I find my way there naturally, you know, to really experiment and trust that natural intelligence of our minds to come back to equilibrium, to have more perspective, to realize that I'm okay. No matter what's happening right now, inside of me that it's not pointing to major disease. It's just pointing me to a temporary internal experience, and that is fluid.

And so what happens when I let the fluid nature of it do what it's meant to do, which is move on. What do we begin to experience?

[00:10:41] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: As you're sharing that. I'm thinking that I mean, I started getting angry a little bit. Not at you...
 
 [00:10:47] Barb Patterson: Oh, good.

[00:10:48] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: ...but in my own mind, cuz I started thinking about some political things in my mind right now, and I noticed myself starting to get angry.

And then I asked myself, "Is this helpful right now?" And I just thought, "I'm gonna bring myself back to Barb. I'm gonna bring myself back to presence."

And for me, that's such a good lesson because I am the one who always wants to know the how. I'm thinking to myself, "It's great, Barb, that there's an intelligence behind life, but how do I access it?"

I need to access it now. Connect my wifi connected. For me, it's bringing me back to this moment, presence. And from this moment, my wifi signal's pretty good, cuz I'm connected to you in this moment.

[00:11:27] Barb Patterson: Yeah.

[00:11:28] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: And whatever that next moment is. So that's how I remember that there's an intelligence behind life in this moment.
 
 There's no intelligence behind life from yesterday. When I was with my daughter or tomorrow, in other words, I can't connect to either of those moments because they don't exist. I can only connect to this moment.
 
 [00:11:46] Barb Patterson: Yeah. That righteous anger, I think, is relevant and important. And we aren't saying don't feel those feelings. Absolutely. There is a time and a place for all of it.

I think what we're really speaking to when we need it; we wanna know how to move forward, whether we're dealing with the fever, our own internal upset, or a human rights issue that matters to us, right. The full gamut of life. It's how do I trust and know that I'll be informed, I'll get information and helpful thinking in the moment that will allow me to know how to address those situations.

Trusting that we're designed as humans to have moments of insight, to have clarity come through, to have our full myriad of emotions, and to move forward in action that can support us.

[00:12:42] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: Yeah. I'm really glad that you said that because I have been allowing myself to have really big feelings, you know, making time to have those, because they're really important for me to let out, and they are really powerful.

Also, knowing that there for me is a time and a place. And, you know, in this moment, I don't think it would be appropriate if I had all my rage. I may, when I, you know, hang up with you, that's important for me too. There's appropriate places for all of our feelings, and it's in, for me in the, allowing that I can get back again to home and that clarity.

[00:13:12] Barb Patterson: Well, and also, I'm coming back to your conversation with Maya. When we understand, there is intelligence, or there are things that are gonna support us, right? There are innate capabilities within us that can support us and help us when we need it most, especially. Right?

When she got sick and a virus, the fever was helping. In that moment, when you saw her fear, the wisdom to share with her what was going on with her body came forward to you all in service. Right? And that's it. It's like, I think it's just knowing that that wisdom, that intelligence behind life, is there supporting us and can help us just in a moment, find our balance again.

In a moment can help us take a deep breath. In a moment will help us when we need to do the thing or say the thing, whatever that thing is.

[00:14:08] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: Yeah. And I just had an insight when you were saying that. In the past, when she would get sick, I would get very fearful. I didn't explain to her exactly what was going on. I just let her know that she needed to take some medicine.
 
 And for whatever reason, yesterday, it was different. I trusted her wisdom at eight and a half years old by allowing her to know the truth of what was going on in her body and in her seeing the design, I mean the beautiful design of her body. She was much more relaxed, too, in knowing that she was being taken care.
 
 She didn't fight me on the care that she needed to do for herself. And when I took her to the doctor for the first time, she's terrified in the past of going to the doctor, and today, for the first time, she went in, and she explained to the doctor everything that was going on in her body. And I just looked at her in effing awe. Right? That this beautiful, young creature is understanding how it works.
 
 And in retrospect, I actually was much more peaceful. And because of that, she must have picked up that it was okay. That is okay.
 
 And we had actually a beautiful day yesterday, amidst her not feeling well.
 
 That, for me, is how the intelligence behind life shows up. When I allow it when I don't buy into the fear that I need to make it better for her. Or anyone else, frankly.
 
 [00:15:37] Barb Patterson: Yeah. And that's beautiful. And to me, that's, it's like, Oh yeah. That's why we remember. It's like, okay, that intelligence of the design of who we are, we're designed to be creative. We're designed to be problem solvers.

We're designed to heal. We're designed to find our equilibrium, all of those things. When we understand that it allows us to put our certainty in that place, you know, our certainty can't be put in the place of a guarantee that everything's gonna work out the way we want.

[00:16:12] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: Yeah.

[00:16:12] Barb Patterson: Or that bad things don't happen. Right. We all know that.
 
 [00:16:15] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: Yeah.

[00:16:16] Barb Patterson: Right? Sickness happens, things happen, but it's knowing that we will find our way I can trust. Just like you said a moment ago, that moment to moment, I can be guided, helpful thinking will come through. I can find my balance, a missed chaos. I can find the calm in the middle of the storm and how helpful it will be to me.
 
 But also to your point, everyone around us.
 
 [00:16:41] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: Yes. I love that. And that is the way it works. That is the way it works. That's how we are designed. That's the design of humans, and there is an intelligence that we can tap into when we don't get in the way.

[00:16:53] Barb Patterson: And it's there all the time that creative impulse, the creative life force behind everything, is animating all of life and animating us, including our minds, including all of life.
 
 That may sound big. I don't know, but it was really me considering it, looking at it that if it's natural, it's actually natural. It's innate. It's the way we're made. That was the thing that made me start to get more willing, to feel less controlling inside myself about having to control all the variables so that I could do life well, you know, and now to realize, "Oh yeah, no, no, I can."
 
 Control is an illusion, but also, it's so not needed.
 
 [00:17:38] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: Yeah, it's not needed. And I love to remember that.

[00:17:41] Barb Patterson: We hope in this conversation today that you walk away just considering and sitting with what, if, you know, we are designed to level set, designed, to heal, designed to find our balance and that in any moment.

There is a deeper intelligence and wisdom available to us. That's gonna give us helpful thinking and how to address whatever is on our plate.

[00:18:08] Melissa Palazzo-Hart: Yes. Thank you so much for being with us today. We so appreciate you being with us and engaging with us. If you feel like this is going to help someone, please share it with them.

We'd love for you to rate and review our podcast. And please let us know. Is there something that you would like us to talk about? Something that you'd like to hear more from? So please reach out to us, and we’re sending you so much love.

[00:18:31] Barb Patterson: Yeah, I just to add, if you want, you can email us at realwomenreallivespodcast@gmail.com and tell us, tell us if there's a topic you wanna explore questions you have for us. We'll take 'em and, and we'll use 'em. Yes. Echoing what Melissa said.

Thank you so much, everybody.

[00:18:50] Melissa Palazzo-Hart:  See soon.