When Life Just Keeps Happening (Jo Moment)

We challenge the myth that life will settle and explore how to build steadiness, set boundaries, and choose yourself even when everything stays messy. Practical tools help your nervous system stand down so you can find focus and joy in small, real patches of time.

• the illusion of the clear runway
• how constant bracing exhausts your nervous system
• boundaries around time, emotion and care
• practical micro-rest and micro-focus anchors
• acceptance as a path to faster adaptation
• choosing yourself without perfect conditions
• reframing this season as the real season

Thank you for joining us today on the Balance and Beyond Podcast. We're so glad you carved out this time for yourself!

If you’re keen to dive deeper into our world, here are our socials where you can discover more about the toolkit that has helped thousands of women create a life of balance.

Website: www.balanceinstitute.com
Podcast Website: https://www.balanceinstitute.com/podcast
Email: jo@balanceinstitute.com
LinkedIn: https://au.linkedin.com/in/stonejoanne
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/betterbalanceinstitute/
Instagram: @betterbalanceinstitute

Thanks again for tuning in, and we'll see you next time on the Balance & Beyond Podcast!

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome And Intent For Reflection
• 1:11 The Illusion Of A Clear Runway
• 2:59 Hyper‑Vigilance And Time Drains
• 5:23 Boundaries Around Care And Emotion
• 6:26 Accepting The Mess As Part Of Life
• 7:57 Choosing Joy And Self In Small Patches

Transcript

Jo Stone (Host): 0:25

Welcome to Balance and Beyond Moments, your weekly dose of insight, wisdom, and mindset shifts, all in 10 minutes or less. Whether it's a powerful truth, a fresh perspective, or a spark of inspiration, this is your space to pause, reflect, and reset. Let's dive in. A friend said something to me recently that felt obvious and confronting at the same time. Life just keeps happening to you, Joe. And in that moment, I'd realized how much energy I'd been wasting waiting for things to settle. Because the truth is, they don't. My business has been going through an online evolution, as is, it seems like everyone's these days, and has and has still needed a lot of creative energy from me as the founder. But that requires space. And I have had so many instances over the last 12 months that seem to have chewed up any possible space I could eke out of my calendar. Whether it was my husband breaking his foot and he couldn't drive for months, my dad's been battling cancer, more recently, strokes. And that's just the last year. Looking forward, Stella's transitioning into high school, Nikita's starting year 11. I've spent hours contacting so many bloody textbooks. I broke my finger at soccer, which has put a hold on some of my activity goals. And while I didn't think I was fighting things, I was always searching for this clear runway where I could invest the time and effort and focus I really wanted to in my business. But as I realized as this comment smacked me in the face, that clear runway is just an illusion. Life is going to keep happening to you. And especially when you have a full life, a rich life, one involving other humans, it's going to keep happening to you. The illusion I am very easily sucked into is once this settles, then after this happens, once the kids are settled into school, after the project, after the foot has healed, after the diagnosis, after dad gets through his rehab. But it never settles. It just changes shape. And I could literally get a pack of cards and one thing has then transitioned to another and transitioned to another. It's meant it's so easy to live your life in this persistent holding pattern of bracing for the next thing to happen. What is the thing that I'm currently having to deal with? And I know my habit can be to push rest into the future. To the temptation to work longer hours or to push through something is hardwired in me. And it takes so much for me to say, no, I'm going to be present here. I'm not going to wait until such and such happens. I'm not going to wait for the perfect time. That time and headspace I need isn't going to come. I'm trying to control the how, the when, the shape of how it looks. I would love a week of unencumbered time, of not having to make lunch for anyone, to cook, to focus on my business, to really get into deep thought, but that's just not my reality because life keeps fucking happening. And I am learning more and more that this can be so exhausting because your nervous system never stands down. It's always hyper-vigilant for the next thing to happen, whether it's you, someone you love, something with a client. There is something that constantly demands of you. And you're always anticipating what that next hit is going to be. Which left field is that right hook gonna come that is going to suck your time. And for me, that's one of my biggest triggers when life happens is it always demands more of my time. And as somebody with a deep-seated pattern of over-responsibility, it also means that I inevitably end up picking up that thing and holding it and carrying it and nurturing it. When my biggest lesson over the last few years has been, I don't need to hold it. It might take my calendar, but I'm gonna boundary the rest. I'm gonna boundary the emotions, I'm gonna boundary the worry, I'm gonna boundary carrying and prompting you and making sure that you're okay. I can care, of course, but care has a boundary. And it's so important that we learn what those are for ourselves. What I've learned is the work isn't to wait for the calm or the space or the time. It's to build that steadiness inside yourself so that when life happens, you've still got an anchor that's going to walk with you. And the challenge I find when life happens is it gets messy. What you had planned has to change. What where your thoughts were going has to shift. There's now this new variable come in. And when life is on such a nice edge, adding a new variable like a sick dog or a broken foot can be enough to go, oh my god, I just I can't handle it all, I can't hold all of this. But but let me say that again. But when I stopped resisting the mess, when I stopped resisting that this is never planned, it's never wanted, it never happens in a good time. Life is going to continue to happen. If I accept that this life happening, this shit happening is just part of being human, then it becomes much easier to tolerate. I'm not saying you have to be happy about a family member getting sick or love having a broken bone. But if you embrace that this is part of this beautiful, messy, one life that we get to live, then that gives you permission to not put off the joy or the rest or the expansion just because something else feels in the way in that moment. Because there will always be something in the way. It may mean you have to change how you operate. It may mean you have to find joy or focus or freedom in little patches because you do have obligations. But this episode is a reminder to choose you. Because what if this is the season? Not the pre-season or the warm-up. This life you're living, the one that keeps happening, is it? The question is whether you keep postponing yourself or learn to live inside it.