Why Your Nervous System Might Be Sabotaging Your Success (And What To Do About It

Is Your Nervous System Sabotaging Your Success? How to Regulate Stress, Stop Self-Sabotage & Perform at Your Best

In this Dream Nation Breakfast Club episode of The Journey Podcast, host Josh Valentin explains how common entrepreneurial struggles like procrastination, perfectionism, burnout, overthinking, fear of rejection, and even fear of success may be driven by nervous system survival responses rather than character flaws. He breaks down how the brain prioritizes safety over success, how the amygdala and neuroception can interpret visibility and risk as threats, and why the body can override logic even when you know what to do. Josh shares regulation and healing approaches including box breathing, EMDR, tapping, vagal toning, and somatic experiencing, along with practical “life hacks” like posture shifts, humming/singing to stimulate the vagus nerve, movement and walking to discharge stress, and avoiding checking your phone first thing in the morning to prevent cortisol spikes. He connects chronic stress to reduced focus and performance, emphasizes holistic wellbeing for entrepreneurship, and encourages viewers to teach their nervous system that growth is safe. Josh also offers complimentary coaching sessions via a Calendly link (or DM “coach”) and invites questions about his five-day one-on-one challenge (DM “challenge”), then closes with a community challenge to protect emotional wellbeing and manage stress intentionally.

00:00 Welcome and Topic Setup
01:10 Mindset vs Nervous System
01:55 Survival Brain Explained
03:31 Trauma and Amygdala Alarms
05:48 Safety Questions and Rejection
08:55 Logic vs Instinct Responses
10:26 Perfectionism and Justifications
12:52 Somatics and Healing Tools
13:34 Coaching Offer and Resources
15:17 Breathwork and EMDR Basics
18:47 Vagus Nerve and Stress Health
24:39 Somatic Experiencing and Triad
28:49 Stop Self Fulfilling Labels
29:16 Posture Shifts Your State
30:33 Stress Brain and Gut Link
33:20 Trauma and Stuck Energy
35:09 Teach Safety for Growth
39:49 Humming and Vagus Calm
41:46 Regulation Beats Hustle
47:40 Move to Discharge Stress
49:47 Phone Free Mornings
51:48 Protect Your Emotional Home
56:40 Final Blessing and Coaching

Transcript

0:00

Welcome to the Dream Nation Breakfast Club, brought to you by The Journey Podcast. I'm your host, Josh Valentine. And today we have a super value packed session for you guys, and today's topic is going to be why your nervous system might be sabotaging your success. What to do about it. I definitely know a thing or two about this specifically. And, when it comes to just success and, and you know, how we tend to self-sabotage, there's a lot that I've personally gone through on my entrepreneurial journey that I can most certainly, uh, share with you guys that I did a lot of research, for this specific. Breakfast club session, uh, this morning. So make sure you guys, if you don't mind, uh, drop a like, comment, share, tag someone who can get value from this morning's session, especially for, uh, those of you who know people. Who, uh, you know, they're on their entrepreneurial journeys. Maybe they're, pursuing, some type of path. And, uh, you know, we could all relate to different moments in our lives where we go through self-sabotage. And, um, I think that today's session is definitely gonna hit home for a lot of people. And, uh, let's. Get this thing going. So. All right, here we go. Most of us in the entrepreneurial space have been taught to interpret our internal struggles as character flaws. Uh, we say things like, I'm procrastinating, I lack discipline. I just need to be more confident. I keep self-sabotaging. Right? I can relate to all of these, but what if what you're experiencing isn't a mindset issue? What if it's actually a nervous system issue? Right. When was the last time you really thought about that? I mean, how many of us can relate to different moments in our lives where we've struggled with. Procrastination or just consistency or the fear of rejection, or even the fear of success. As crazy as that sound, a lot of people, uh, fear, success and, uh, many times it's a nervous system issue. It's not necessarily your character per se. So from a scientific standpoint, your nervous system's primary job is not necessarily to make you successful. It's designed to keep you alive. That's the one thing you have to understand about your brain, right? Your brain and your body is not necessarily designed to make you successful. It's not designed to make you happy. It is simply designed to keep you alive. And the more you know about it, the more, the more you know how to kind of navigate through your, your body, your mind, your emotions, all of that stuff, the better you're gonna be able to navigate on your journey. So. Make sure you guys take notes. We're gonna be sharing a lot of value here today. Lot of information, and let's keep this thing going. All right. So, uh, remember when it comes to becoming successful and, you know, just your brain designed to keep you alive, they're not necessarily the same thing, right? Uh, your brain isn't trying to make you more happy than you already are. You have survival mechanisms that you're designed with, uh, throughout. Generations and, and that's really what we're up against when you're going through that, that inner me, right? When you're going through that, that self-sabotage, when you're going through those battles, oftentimes they're within, they're the six inches between our ears. They're not necessarily on the outside, and that's why I love the African proverb. You guys hear me say it all the time. If there is no enemy within, the enemy, outside can do us no harm. So it is essential to learn how to navigate through your body and mind and again. The more you know about it, the better you can move. So next we have, when you've gone through stressful or overwhelming life experiences, especially ones where you felt unsafe. Powerless, rejected or out of control, your brain learns from those experiences. So for example, your amygdala, the, the part of your brain that's like your emotional alarm system, uh, is responsible for threat detection, and it starts updating its internal model of the world whenever you go through something traumatic. Okay. Now you have to remember that the way we're designed as human beings for thousands and thousands of years,, we were living under certain, conditions, right? We didn't live how we live today with modern technology, with even having, a nine to five for most people who work. Nine to fives, right? Like. Our ancestors did not work nine to fives. They were outside, they were outdoors, and they had different ways of regulating their emotions, regulating their survival mechanisms, if you will. And in today's modern day and age, we simply don't know how to regulate our emotions, and this is a big reason why. A lot of people go through the trauma that they go through, right? Just not really having an understanding of how to properly regulate. So that's what we're gonna be talking about today. It's crazy to think that we even live in a world where we have to manage our stress, right? Like stress management has become a thing in our day and age. Simply because a lot of people, you know, find themselves going through burnout. A lot of people find themselves being triggered by certain things and just simply don't know how to kind of get through it. So one thing that I've noticed from just mentoring thousands of people around the world, a lot of people typically are their biggest, uh, they're their, they're their, uh, biggest enemy, if you will. They're their biggest, uh, form of self-sabotage in a sense. Right. A lot of the times it's not necessarily that people aren't capable, that they don't have the talent, that they don't have the capacity. It's just they kind of get in their own way. So today we're gonna be talking a lot about that and possibly how your, your nervous simp system simply has been the thing that's been sabotaging you all along, right? And how to kind of navigate through it Now. Moving forward, uh, when it comes to your amygdala, right? And remember, it's like your emotional alarm system. Your amygdala is asking questions, or your brain is asking questions like, is it safe to be seen? Is it safe to speak up? Is it safe to fail publicly? Is it safe to take risk? Is it safe to outgrow the people around me? So it's constantly just analyzing. It's environment because think about it. If you are out in the wilderness, let's just say. 5,000 years ago, then you had to look out for all of the potential dangers. Your brain is designed to look for all of the possible threats, and the, the downside to that is oftentimes you find yourself focusing on the negative as opposed to the possibility of what can be, because that's the way our brains are, are naturally designed. So it's actually counterintuitive the way we go about success. In the modern day age, you're going against your very nature to keep you alive. Okay. Now, at any point in your life, the answer to those questions was no. Right? think about when you were growing up, oftentimes the fear of rejection, right? If, if you were 5,000 years ago, rejected from your tribe, you probably weren't going to survive. Right. So this is naturally embedded in, in our genome. When you think about even as a, as a child, like you were so dependent on your, your parents, you were so dependent on, on your community, right? Whoever raised you. But think about how many kids grow up, grow up with trauma simply because they've gone through abandonment, they've gone through neglect, abuse, and so on and so forth, right? So throughout the course of your life. If the answer was no, your nervous system may still be operating from that same conclusion today. So when you find yourself just struggling with navigating through rejection, right, or not feeling like you're enough, it may simply be because the way you processed these emotions. Was in a way where you were suppressing a lot of of that built up energy. Now your nervous system may still be operating from that conclusion, and that's why it is good to kind of do the healing work because the more you heal, the better you're going to be able to just take your life to the next level, even if logically you know better. Oftentimes your body, it doesn't necessarily feel the same, right? You may know logically, okay, why is this so hard? This is a simple thing that I have to do. It's like if, if you're in a business that requires you reaching out to potential customers, right, and, and you're afraid of making cold calls, you're afraid of reaching out to family and friends for support, logically, you know that it's pretty simple to do. For some reason, you just can't get yourself around to doing it right or things that you procrastinate on. You know that they're easy to do, but they're actually easier not to do because your, your brain, again, is constantly designed to keep you safe. Okay, so now let's say you want to launch a new offer. Your business, right? You may want to raise your prices, speak on a bigger stage. You may wanna post more consistently, invest in your growth. Logically, you know that this is what it takes to grow, but physiologically, your nervous system may interpret that visibility as a threat. That's the biggest idea. That, that, that I want you guys to leave with is these things are very logical. So your prefrontal cortex, the part of your brain that's, that's designed for rational thinking, for lo logic, right? That that prefrontal cortex is, is designed for us to make decisions and, and think rationally, however. You have other parts of your brain that simply operate off of instincts, you know that that reptilian brain, that that lizard brain that is fight or flight or freeze. And oftentimes when we're navigating through life, really what's responding is our nervous system as opposed to our logic. Okay? So, uh, think about these moments when. You're, you're on your journey and maybe you're up against rejection. Maybe you're up against doing something that you really are a little bit nervous to do. You start to feel anxious, overwhelmed, distracted, fatigued, avoidant, right? And you might overthink the post delay launching the offer. Scroll instead of execute. Convince yourself you need more preparation. How many of us can relate to the, you know, just perfectionism, right? Think about perfectionism. Oftentimes, perfectionism really is a survival mechanism to, to put off what you know you should be doing. Put off the fact that you gotta go through rejection and you have to wear your heart on your sleeve, and you have to put yourself out there, right? That's, that's usually what perfectionism is for most people. It's like a lot of people have this high standard because they're so afraid of being judged that they wanna make it like super, super perfect, right? But perfectionism is oftentimes the enemy to execution. So you have to be mindful of that, okay? And here's the wild part. Your prefrontal cortex, the logical part of your brain will then create a story to justify the behavior. Like, oh, well, you know what? I had a long day today. I'll just get around to it tomorrow. Oh, you know, I just, I, I deserve this, right? I deserve how many of us can relate to that, right? Things like, I'm not ready yet. Now isn't the right time. I need to learn more first. That was a big one for me. Just all the personal development. I would, I would always kind of self-sabotage by just drowning myself in personal development. And I always share the story how my, my first life coach that I worked with, she had mentioned to me how I was hiding behind the personal development. And boy was she right. It wasn't until she called it out that I realized like, wow, I, I really have been hiding behind the personal development. And we'll sit there and justify not putting in the work because we're learning or preparing. So this is something that you have to be mindful of, or what about Let me wait until things calm down. Right. All of this sounds familiar, but the behavior wasn't driven by logic. It was driven by neuroception. Your nervous system subconsciously detecting risk. That's really what it comes down to. Remember, when it comes to your brain, the prefrontal cortex was the latest part of your brain to sort of evolve and adapt to what it's originally as human beings, we were a lot, a lot more instinctive, like we were reacting to circumstances as opposed to logically thinking things through. So oftentimes when we respond to circumstances. Many times it's, it's, it's your nervous system. It's, it's this idea of being driven by neuroception. Okay, now how do we fix this? This is where somatics come in, right? Somatic work. Uh, because if the issue is in the nervous system, the solution can't be purely cognitive. You're not gonna think your way out of these, uh, just ways of being. Okay, so there's a lot of different healing modalities, a lot of things, a lot of tools, a lot of strategies that you could actually use to kind of help you on this journey. And I'm gonna share some of them with you. So again, take notes as if you are going to teach this one day, take notes because, uh, as we oftentimes share, the weakest ink is stronger than the strongest memory. So the more you take notes, the more likely you are to retain this information. Okay. And before I jump into a few tools and modalities and things that you can do to kind of heal on this journey, um, I wanted to mention, uh, I, I offer to our community as a gift to you guys complimentary coaching sessions. Uh, and I've done this with hundreds of people over the years. And it's, it's always a great pleasure of connecting with a lot of you guys. Some of you have never had the opportunity to connect with me one-on-one. Some of you guys are working on specific things, whether it's launching a podcast, launching a book, or uh, speaking on, on stage as a public speaker, whatever it is. Um, if you're in a season where you need some guidance, you're in a season where. You just need some help or maybe just you need to pick someone's brain that has done it before. Uh, I am gonna drop my Calendly link in the comment thread. I'm, you guys may wanna double check in about an hour or so if you're live with us right now. But I'm gonna drop, uh, the, the link in the description, uh, that way you guys can book a one-on-one complimentary coaching session with me, uh, especially if you haven't done one in over six months for those of you who have done one in the past. But I. Always love connecting with you guys throughout the course of the week, and I have a five day challenge going on where I meet with you guys and work with you one-on-one as well. Uh, that's currently going on. We have a standby list for that. But, uh, if you have questions about that, you could always just DM me the word coach, and I'll send you over my Calendly link or answer any questions that you may have for me personally. Okay. So let's keep this thing going next. Uh, when it comes to modalities. Uh, there's a lot of different tools, a lot I've tried everything you could possibly think of over the years just on my healing journey personally and just to kind of help myself navigate through these things. Now, uh, some of the, the, the modalities that I'm gonna be covering, uh, are gonna be breath work, right? Breath work, EMDR, uh, vagal toning. Some of you are probably gonna be hearing about these things for the very first time, somatic experiencing. And, uh, a few more things. Okay. So, for example, uh, the very first thing, breath work. I'm a, I'm a huge proponent for breath work. I love box breathing specifically. It's usually the easiest to remember. And box breathing is essentially inhaling for four seconds. Holding your breath for four seconds, exhaling for four seconds, and holding your lungs. Empty for four seconds and doing it four times. It's a really great breathing exercise to really calm yourself down, and you'd be amazed at how much your breathing patterns actually affect your emotional state. Typically, the way you feel is linked to a specific breathing pattern, and a lot of people have no awareness that their shallow breathing is oftentimes dictating their emotional state. So being mindful of your breath work is absolutely essential. There's so many different. Types of breath work that you can do, but that's one of the simplest ones. And I know the military has used it for many years. Uh, box breathing and really, really great tool whenever you're experiencing a lot of anxiety, overwhelm. Take some time to just do a breathing exercise. I can guarantee you it'll help you. Just snap out of that and calm your nervous system. Now, EMDR, for those of you who don't know, it's eye movement, des sensi, desensitize desensitization and reprocessing. Try saying that fast five times. So eye movement, desensitization and reprocessing. MDR, that's usually just how I refer to it. Uh, but basically what it is, it's a structured, evidence-based psychotherapy designed to alleviate the stress from traumatic memories and PTSD by using bilateral stimulation such as eye movements, taps, or sounds to help the brain reprocess stuck. Negative memories. Okay. Really great tool. You guys can always go on YouTube. You can go online and just look up different ways that you can go about it. You guys oftentimes even, even hear me talk about tapping, right? Tapping is a very powerful way to just calm your nervous system. I'm actually doing a workshop this week. I had mentioned to you guys. The last week or two, I'm gonna be speaking, um, this week at the Innovation Summit in Tampa, Florida. Uh, if you want information on that, by the way, you could always DM me. I'll send you information on it, but, uh, Myron Golden is one of the speakers, but I'm going to be speaking on peak performance specifically. And one of the things that I'm going to be covering on my workshop is the tapping solution. Tapping really is really just tapping on specific meridians in the body for a few seconds is something that you can do literally in less than five minutes. You can just tap on a few of these, these points on your body. Uh, there are about nine of them that you can just tap on. And just the process of tapping on these, these meridians on your body, literally, uh, calm your nervous system. It helps get yourself back in a state of equanimity. Where on you're on even keel. You're not so emotionally, emotionally, uh, volatile. Okay. So a lot of different modalities. Okay. Whether it's EMDR or even vagal toning. So vagal toning is basically, it refers to the practice of improving. Your vagal tone, a measure of how effectively your vagus nerves or your vagus nerve, the 10th cranial nerve regulates your body's rest and digest. Digest state. Higher vagal tone is associated with greater adaptability to stress, lower heart rate, and better emotional regulation. Okay, so this is according to research done by the Massachusetts General Hospital. Really, really. Great. Part of the, the, the body and brain to understand is how the vagus nerve just kind of flows through your entire body. And it's like a, it's like your body's brake pedal in a sense. It dictates a lot of how you process your emotions. So how vagal toning works is. Um, again, it acts like a brake pedal for your nervous system. Toning works by stimulating the nerve to increase its baseline activity, which helps your body shift from a fight or flight sympathetic state back to a calm, parasympathetic state. More quickly. Okay. So when your body's in a sympathetic state, it's essentially in fight or flight, right? Or freeze. And it's your, it's your body's survival mechanism kicking in. But a lot of people stay in that because their stress levels is like a leaky faucet. This faucet is just constantly leaking and they're never repairing the leak. You see the most, the, the reason why, um, a lot, you know, some people typically ask, well, why isn't there a, a cure for cancer? Right? There's a lot of, you know, chemotherapy, a lot of different things that you can do, but what people fail to realize. Cancer isn't something that you can just take a pill and have it go away. It's not something that you're just gonna inject something in your body and have it go away because the way the world has gone about it is, think of it like a, a leaky roof, right? You have a roof that's leaking, and the way most people go about this leaking roof is just by mopping the floor. And that's, that's unfortunately how the world goes about healing cancer. Mopping the floor, but never repairing the roof. And the roof is. A metaphor for your, your trauma. It's how you process your emotions. It's, it's eliminating that stuck energy in, in your body and allowing yourself to properly heal. And, and, and, uh, essentially go through your, your, your journey of healing, this trauma, of repairing those mental and emotional wounds in your life. Not just mopping the floor, right? Taking some kind of medication, putting a bandaid on a gaping wound. Oftentimes you'll hear about how people will remove tumors, for example, and they end up growing back. So an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure, as they oftentimes say in the medical world. But you, you have to know exactly what's the root cause of all of these, these diseases, this disease that's entering the body. Right. And a lot of it is due to childhood trauma, right? And, and not knowing how to properly process this. You, one thing that I can tell you guys is stress will take you out faster than almost anything because when your cortisol levels are high, your immune system is compromised. Your, your body goes into fight or flight. The epinephrine that that adrenaline flows in, the dopamine kicks in, and there's no need for your immune system when it's fight or flight. Your body needs all of that adrenaline to basically take action. Okay? So when you're going through prolonged periods of stress, what's happening is your immune system is compromised for prolonged periods of time. So that's why it's super important to know how to manage your stress, especially for those of of you who wanna thrive in entrepreneurship, because the reality is entrepreneurship is difficult. Entrepreneurship is scary. Entrepreneurship is going to require you to navigate through a lot of overwhelm and anxiety and stress. And if you are not at a, at a state of, of peak performance, and if your, your body and brain are not optimal and conducive for, for your peak performance, your business is going to suffer. The business can only scale as much as you scale as a human being. So if you're constantly overwhelmed, stressed, and you're in this, in this sympathetic state, it's going to be very, very difficult to operate at your best. So that's why it is important to manage your, your, your, your whole life, holistically speaking. A rising tide raises all ships, as I oftentimes say. So it's about the wellbeing of your whole being. So you take care of your body, you take care of your mind. It. Those, those things will naturally help you thrive in the, in the marketplace. They'll help you thrive in business. Okay, so if you guys are getting value so far, drop a v in the comments. I know today we're covering a lot of technical terms, a lot of medical stuff, but, um, I, I know for sure like this stuff, having a better understanding will help you take control of your life. And I always recommend, you know, connect with your doctor for medical advice and all of that stuff, because not everybody is the same. Not everybody's built the same. Some people, uh, for example, may go through clinical depression, and that's a completely different healing journey than somebody who's just stressed out, right? So you always wanna consul, consult with your physician or your doctor, uh, to make sure you find out what's best for you. Okay? Now. Uh, another thing, another, um, healing modality is somatic experiencing. Okay. Now, somatic experiencing, also known as SE, is a body oriented therapeutic approach developed by Dr. Peter Levine to resolve symptom symptoms of trauma and chronic stress. So, unlike traditional talk therapies that focus on cognitive or emotional processing, SE uses a bottom up approach, prioritizing. Bodily sensations, um, interoception and, uh, proprioception as the primary pathway to healing. And essentially you help the body do what it couldn't do in the original stressful experiencing or experience. Okay? So, uh. They allow these healing modalities. Modalities allow your system to feel safe in moments of visibility, regulate after stress, discharge, store attention, and update its internal safety model. Okay, so that growth no longer feels like danger. Because that's typically what happens. A lot of people fear success because you're navigating in an unchartered territory. You're, you're going to a place you've never been. Or sometimes people are like, man, I'm gonna fear having to go through rejection. I remember the Breakfast Club, for example, the Dream Nation Breakfast Club that I've been hosting now for years. I used to not wanna put it publicly, like for the whole internet to see, because I was super fearful of being trolled. Like I just was, I, I would see other people being trolled all the time and that was like a big fear of mine. And eventually, I must up the courage to put it on all platforms. Today you can catch the Dream Nation Breakfast Club pretty much anywhere, but it wasn't always the case. Sometimes we fear that success, sometimes we fear being ostracized or being rejected, right? It's a serious thing. So there, there are moments in on your journey where you're like, man, why can't I just get myself. To do the things that I know that, that I should, should do. Why am I not living up to my potential? And oftentimes it's because, again, you're operating from a place where your nervous system is call, call, calling the shots, right? And what, what typically helps is just getting yourself in a peak state. You guys hear me talk a lot about the triad when it comes to your emotional state, right? So you have this, this framework called the triad. And the triad are the three main things that dictate. Your emotional state at any any given moment, it's typically your body or your physiology, right? Your body or physiology. And this is why a lot of this is very visceral. A lot of it is the way you operate with your body. So if you're stressed, for example, you ever notice that you feel better after a walk or you feel better after a run, you feel better when you dress yourself up or you get yourself going, you, you're in motion. A body in motion stays in motion. You hear this all the time. You change your posture, oftentimes you're depressed and your physiology is also, it's, it's, it's mirroring that, that way that you're feeling, okay, so the fastest way to, to snap out of that negative emotional state is by getting your body moving. You have to know how to move your body. This is why a lot of exercises are so powerful, whether it's Pilates or yoga, or just stretching. Yourself out just getting a good stretch. All of these things help release that uns that, that, that stuck energy in your body. Now, when it comes to the triad, you also have your focus. What are you focusing on in that moment? Oftentimes, if you're focusing on all the danger, all of the potential threats, it's going to affect the way that you feel and your body and brain are interconnected. So your, your body and physiology is oftentimes influencing your brain and its thoughts, and then your thoughts are influencing your body, so they go hand in hand. And then third is your language. The language or meaning you give to a specific circumstance. Okay? So if you, if your language is, well, I, I struggle with procrastination. I always struggle with procrastination. Yeah, that's gonna be a self-fulfilling prophecy for you because you're speaking it into existence. What you vocalize, you ultimately internalize. So it's, it's super important to make sure that you never say something about yourself that you don't want to be true. Now, remember this. Here's a few, uh, fun facts and life hacks. Change your posture to change your state. Change your posture to change your state. So slouch posture can reinforce a threat based physiological state. Remember the triad your body, so sitting upright with your feet planted and shoulders relaxed, can literally improve your breathing, reduces perceived stress. And can even influence confidence levels just by rolling back or, you know, prevent yourself from being slouched or leaning over. Roll them shoulders back, put your head, help keep your head held high. When you oftentimes hear, you'll hear parents tell their kids, you know, put, keep your head up. You know, pick your chin up because just the process of you putting your head up, keeping your head up. It ultimately affects the way that you feel. So remember, your body feeds information back to your brain just as much as your brain feeds information to your body, okay? Oftentimes you'll hear that, for example, the, the gut. The gut is your second brain, right? You, you have, you have neurons also in your gut, and that's why you get that gut instinct. Your vagus nerve even flows through your gut. Okay, so chronic stress has been shown to shrink the hippocampus, the hip, the hippocampus is the part of your brain that's responsible for like memories, right? And, and learning, uh, which may explain why it's harder to focus or think clearly when you're under pressure, you ever have a lot of stress going on and you just can't think straight just because. There, there are studies that show literally that the hippocampus shrinking during moments of high stress or, or chronic stress. Now, remember the vagus nerve, the main nerve responsible for calming your nervous system, connects your brain to your heart, your lungs, and your gut, which is why stress can show up as digestive issues or a racing heart. I remember when I used to wrestle back in the day, um, I was on the wrestling team in high school. And before every match, for whatever reason, I had the bubble guts before every match. I was always, it didn't matter who I was wrestling, it didn't matter if it was one of the most elite wrestlers in the city or just a newbie like I would always have to use the bathroom. And it was just because I was super nervous and really what I was nervous. About was losing. I was nervous about being humiliated. I was nervous about just people seeing me lose. And it created all of this anxiety. And I remember when I would step on the mat and shake my opponent's hand before starting the match, all of it would just go away. Now my, my, my nervous system is heightened right? And I'm in the moment. There's no, there's no opportunity when you're in the moment to be worried because you've gotta take action. But it's interesting that leading into that match, I would have the sweaty palms. I'd be, my heart would be just racing super fast and it was just a lot of stress and I wish I knew these things. Back in those days because I would've been able to navigate through the, uh, all of this a lot better, right? But that's really, that's the reason why I had the bubble gut simply is because, again, the nervous system also runs through your gut, okay? And your gut is your second brain. Now, um, sometimes the reason you are not executing at the level you, you know, you are capable of isn't because you lack motivation. Remember? It's because your nervous system is trying to protect you from a version of success that at one point in your life may have come with risk, and the risk may simply have been judgment. It may have been rejection, it may have been abandonment, pressure, or failure. It's like think about kids who go through bullying. Think about kids who probably went up to share their book report and they bombed or froze, and then that affected them throughout their entire lives, or years later, they get triggered because they never healed that internal wound. You see the word trauma comes from the Greek word, uh, the definition wound or wounding. That's, that's the, the origin of the word trauma. So when it comes to those wounds, those are mental and emotional wounds that, that really need healing. They need to be stitched up. They need to be removed from the body. In the Sanskrit traditions, in the yogic traditions, they refer to these, these energy blocks as samskara, and you have Shakti, which is the energy flow, right? In many traditions, like in in Chinese traditions, you may hear it as Qi energy, right? Or the Holy Spirit. It's, it's that, that energy flow that allows the sun scars to, to ultimately be removed from your body. So, um, it is, it is super, super important to know, again, how to remove this, this stuck energy. And there's a lot of different ways to go about it, but it's crazy how people will live, uh, their entire lives and not really have an understanding of, of how to navigate through it. So until your body learns that it's safe, now remember, it will continue to pull the emergency break on your progress. All, all, every single time you're ready to get to the next level, you end up self-sabotaging or you get triggered by something and you just, you know, give up altogether. Right? And this, this happens time and time again. I mean, how many of us can relate to that? Okay. So true growth isn't just about changing your thoughts, it's about teaching your nervous system that where you are going is safe to arrive at. That's really what it comes down to. It's like, yes, I'm going into uncharted territory. I'm going into a version that I'm not necessarily familiar with. A version of my life, a version of myself that's gonna require more of me. But you have to remind your nervous system that you are going to be okay. You know, one of the best things that I had learned during difficult seasons, because entrepreneurship, I'm telling you, it gets crazy sometimes. And in my darkest days. I had learned to start my day with just reminding myself. I, I would ask myself, is today sufficiently supplied for like, am I gonna make it through the day? Just reminding my nervous system that, Hey, you are going to be okay. You are gonna get through today that your, your, your family's good. You got a roof over your head. You got food to eat. You will make it through the day because. Sometimes our, our nervous system isn't really processing it like that. It's processing danger. It's it's processing. Like you're, you're, you have a threat, right? Because you have all this stress and overwhelmed and you're anxious about all these things that you have going on. But when you really think of worst case scenarios, and this is actually an exercise I do with tons of clients when I work with them, I'll always have them think of worst case scenarios and typically worst case scenarios. It doesn't mean death. It doesn't mean anything that's like super devastating, right? But the nervous system doesn't process it like that. So it is important to remind yourself, like, you know what? Worst case scenario, okay, if I lose this contract, there's something else. Worst case scenario, or even if, let's just say you lose your, your home goes into foreclosure or whatever, your car gets repossessed. Listen, you could always bounce back from that. People always bounce back from these, these circumstances that they go go through most of the time. So it, you have to remind yourself of that. And if you've, if you're in a very dark season, start off your day with reminding yourself, is today's sufficiently supplied for Yes. Am I gonna make it through the day? Yes. And sometimes in life. You just gotta take it by the day. Don't overwhelm yourself thinking about whether or not you're gonna be able to pay the rent in two weeks or three weeks. You just do what you can. You do the best that you could possibly do for that day. Focus on winning the day, and if you focus on winning the day, you'll end up winning the week. You'll end up winning the month, but all you can control is the present moment. You, you, you, it. It's not worth worrying yourself to death. If you're constantly having anxiety and stress and overwhelm, what I've learned over the years is worrying was a waste of time. Worrying took me out of the present moment, worrying like rob me of the joy of life, and it's not very useful. What's useful is calming yourself down sometimes writing out. What you're up against. Writing down the obstacles gives you a sense of control over them. It makes it real. Sometimes putting together an actionable plan, putting together a step-by-step plan of how you're gonna navigate through it and get out of it. Sometimes that's all you need, just to write it down and, and read through the obstacles that you have, and then you start to realize these, I can get through this. Sometimes we have to remind ourselves of everything we've gone through in our lives and all the battles we've won because we tend to forget how powerful we really are. We tend to forget how much God has had our back for so many years. Like I don't know about y'all, but I most certainly, I've got a history with God, a long history with God, overcoming a lot of different battles, a lot of different obstacles. If you got some history with God, some of y'all know exactly what I'm talking about. You've gone through some valleys, you've gone through some winter seasons, you've gone through some, some insurmountable challenges. If, if that, if that's been the case for you throughout your life and you got history with your creator, drop a one in the comments. Put a one if that is the case for you. I know I have gone through so many different things and you know what we all have gotten through. We all have gotten through just like you're gonna get through this season as well if you're in a difficult season. So now moving forward, remember, it's about teaching your nervous system that where you are going is safe to arrive at. That's the big idea. Now, here's a really great life hack. Humming, humming, or singing in your car. It may sound random. But vocal cord vibration actually stimulates the vagus nerve and promotes parasympathetic activation. How cool is that? So whenever you hear like monks meditating and they're chanting, oh, that's a vibration that's stimulating that vagus nerve, that's bringing a sense of peace and calm. It's not like some deeply mystical concept. No, it's, it's quite practical, right? That vibration is what's stim stimulating that vagus nerve. So yes, singing your favorite song in traffic might actually be regulating your nervous system. Blast that music. Raise your vibration, if you will. And really what we're talking about here is heart rate variability. HRV, it's also known as, and it's a measure of nervous system flexibility. It is, uh, one of the strongest biological indicators of emotional resilience and peak performance under stress. So everyone's HRV levels are different. Okay. Your breath rate. Remember this also directly influences your heart rhythm, meaning how you breathe can literally change how your heart beats. So it's all about how you process your emotions, how you manage your emotion, emotions, when it's all said and done. Some people are better than others. Some people did not go through as many traumatic experiences growing up, right? Or they learned different ways on how to properly. Deal with their emotions, whether it's breathing right. I don't know about y'all, but I remember back in the day in school, they'll kind of teach you to, you know, just go and breathe for 10 seconds, something like that. And these days, uh, there's all kinds of tools that you can use to really just allow yourself to regulate those emotions. All right? So remember, as we get ready to close out, your nervous system sets the ceiling on your success. The greatest threat to your success. Remember Josh said it is always going to be you. It's always gonna be you. At the end of the day, your habits, your mindset, your confidence, and your consistency don't operate independently from your biology. They operate through your biology. Okay? Now, if your nervous system has learned based on past experiences that being visible isn't safe. Taking risks leads to rejection, that success comes with pressure or failure leads to disconnection, then growth is not just going to feel challenging, it'll feel dangerous. It's, it's going to feel scary. Okay? So your nervous system will do exactly what is designed to do because it's designed to keep you alive and protect you. So even if that protection feels like procrastination, perfectionism. Burnout, overthinking, inconsistency. Can any of you relate to this? Drop a Y. If you can relate to at any point in your time you've had to deal with that. I know for me, procrastination stands out even at moments. I've had perfectionism. I've definitely gone through burnout. Overthinking 100%, right? Inconsistency. I just got better with that over time. But I've gone through all of these. And these are, these are different aspects of, again, your nervous system working to keep you alive and prevent you from, let's say, experiencing pain. Right? That's, that's really what's happening. When people get into a comfort zone, really what's happening is your brain, it, it loves the familiar. The familiar is safe. It's, it's designed again to keep you comfortable, keep you safe, and then the moment you embark on something that's going to, let's just say, be perceived of as a threat, like rejection, right? Or just putting in some, some serious work into your business, that that's when it starts to get uncomfortable. That's when you go through the resistance. But that is the way the obstacle is the way. So what this means is the real work of peak performance isn't just about becoming more motivated. It's about, it's about becoming more regulated. Because when your nervous system feels safe, you don't have to force discipline as much. You don't have to fight yourself to take action. You don't have to constantly override anxiety. Just to execute your baseline changes, your capacity for leadership, creativity, decision making, and resilience expands with it. So the question, the question isn't just, how do I push harder? It becomes, how do I create a nervous system that can safely hold the level of success I say I want. When was the last time you thought about it in that way? I know as I was going through these notes, I was like, wow, this is so profound. Because I don't think that we necessarily learn a lot about our nervous system. It's not something you, you spend a lot of time on. There's actually a lot of this research has been over the last 10 to 20 years. Some of y'all haven't been in school since the first Bush was in office. Right. It's been years and. All these, all these modern day discoveries, um, are, are really, uh, really helping us understand how our bodies and brains actually work, especially as it pertains to trauma. Because trauma isn't something you can necessarily quantify. You can't really measure it, right? You can do a lot of research and kind of see the parallels and the patterns, but it's not something that you can just measure. So, um, a lot of these studies are relatively new and, uh, and, and we're, we're starting to now have a better understanding of how this works. So remember, it's not about grinding harder. It's not about pushing harder or hustling. It's like, why? Why are you struggling with the hustle? Why are you struggling with being able to execute? How do you create a nervous system that can safely hold the level of success that you say that you ultimately want? That's what it comes down to. Okay. Now here's a really great fun fact. Your nervous system processes safety or danger cues before your conscious mind even knows what's happening. This is why you can feel anxious in situations that logically seem harmless. So first, it's in your body. Remember, it's, it's your lizard brain. It's the first part of your brain to react. That's typically how most people go about altercations. It's like when you find yourself snapping on somebody or just reacting in a way that you, that was out of character. Oftentimes it's just because, you know, it's that it's that fight or flight kicking in, right? Uh, but if you just take a few seconds to breathe and really process why you're feeling the way that you're feeling and process how you're gonna respond, you'll end up discovering that. You navigate through these emotions a lot better because you really give yourself some time again to get out of your lizard brain and allow your prefrontal cortex to kick in and think rationally. Okay? Again, if you're getting value so far, a drop of V four value. Appreciate you guys who engage with the content. Also, if you're just now jumping on, like comment, share, tag, hit the subscribe button if you're on YouTube. Thank you so much for all of you, uh, who support the Breakfast Club, um, every single week. Appreciate you guys. Alright, now as we get ready to wrap up. Uh, here's another life hack for, uh, just navigating through stress. You can use movement to discharge the stress. So after a long meeting, let's say stressful call, or in an intense work session, just go for a walk. You know the process of even going for a walk outside. You have serotonin benefits just from the sun, just getting sunlight. Serotonin is responsible for your overall mood. It's the mood stabilizer in your, in your body. So whenever you feel a sense of wellbeing, oftentimes that's serotonin, right? And even the process of walking, going for a nice walk, you get your dopamine levels up, your endorphins up, and it really helps even just the process of stretch. Stretching can help you so much. Release a lot of that stuck energy, A lot of that tension. So just getting a nice stretch. This is why yoga's so profound because when you think about it, yoga is really stretching yourself out. It's breathing exercise, it's mindfulness, it's all of it combined. One exercise routine right now. Sometimes even just shaking your arms and legs or just shake it off and, uh, that, that alone can absolutely just help you release a lot of that, that tension. This mimics the natural discharge response Your body was meant to complete after a threat. Remember, a thousand years ago if you were out in the wilderness and you perceived the threat and it was fight or flight. What would happen is at the immediately after it's done, you're still out, you're still moving, you're in motion. We were never living in cubicles. We were never living in offices that we stayed sitting down for hours on end. Humans were never wired like that, so this is a big reason why. We, we don't really regulate emotions properly because you'll go through stress and then you'll sit there at a desk just working yourself to death. Right? Or you're doom scrolling through social media. You're not really active in moving your, moving your body. Okay? Another thing is really great life hack that is absolutely changed my life is do not check your phone first thing in the morning when you wake up and immediately check emails or social media. You expose your nervous system to novelty and unpredictability. Okay? So it's, it's like you're giving away your dopamine in a sense. And, and this also can spike cortisol within minutes. So cortisol is the big C, it's the stress hormone, right? And literally just scrolling through social media. You ever find yourself going through social media and doom scrolling, and then after a while you just kind of get sick of it. And you don't even have much energy because you've given it all away. It, it actually affects your baseline of dopamine, so you have to be very mindful of how much you're, you're giving away your dopamine by social media alone. So try giving yourself at least 10 to 15 minutes before taking an external input, before letting the world come in. Right? Just spend time with yourself. Take time for your spirituality. Take time to get your body primed for the day. Get yourself hydrated, stretch it out. Go for a walk before letting the world just kind of come in. One of the things that I do, and I oftentimes shared on the Breakfast Club here is that, that right before I go to sleep, I'll oftentimes delete my social media apps. That way in the morning, I'm forced. To have to download the app. If I really wanna just doom scroll, right, and it helps a lot. So sometimes you just have to take back control over your attention. Because we're in an attention economy, a lot of these companies are ultimately fighting for your attention. So you have to be mindful at what and who you give your attention to at all moments. Okay, so, um, if today was valuable for you, drop a comment. It's always greatly appreciated. I read through all the comments. Um, thank you for all of you who tuned in. And really the biggest takeaway is this, guys, with whatever it is that you're embarking on, understand that anything worth having is gonna be worth fighting for. And that fight is ultimately there to help you grow as a person. That fight that you go through and maybe fight isn't necessarily the right word, because again, words have power and really what you're going through is, is just navigating through obstacles, navigating through challenges. Sometimes it's not a fight, sometimes it's literally just calming yourself down and really process what you're up against. And when you really think it through, these things aren't the hardest things in the world. But imagine how much more powerful you'll be if you just learn how to properly manage the way that you feel. One of, one of the most powerful things you'll ever develop in this lifetime is your ability at any point in time to put yourself in a beautiful state. Your ability to navigate through your emotions and and create whatever emotional experience you're looking for. You definitely can because your emotions are not happening out outside of you. They're happening inside of you. Okay? So the better you can navigate through your emotions, the more successful you can become in this lifetime. And my challenge to you is over the next week, I wanna challenge our community to really be intentional about just protecting your emotional home, right? Keeping your emotional home a, an emotional home of content. An emotional home of clarity, of certainty, of passion, of joy, of peace. Imagine if that's how you felt most of the time, right? Because oftentimes you're, you're stressed, you're anxious, you're having overwhelmed because you're thinking about the future. You're not really living in the present moment. But what if you can calm your body and you can go for a stretch? You can go for a walk. You can get your body in motion. You can have these positive affirmations speaking life into your situation, and every single day you set your intention for the way that you feel. Because one, if there's anything that I learned from my mentor that has been super valuable is the understanding that the quality of your life is dependent on the quality of emotions you consistently feel. Isn't it true? Everything we do is a means to an endy motion. Why do we pursue the career? Why do we pursue love? Why do we pursue novelty and and variety? It's because of the way that we feel, and there are four predominant hormones in our body that dictate that those feelings of happiness from the dopamine to the oxytocin, the serotonin and endorphins. That's it. That's what's dictating the way that you feel. So if you understand how to live in such a way where you promote these happy chemicals, you'll be a lot happier. And how you reduce the big C, the cortisol, the stress hormone. How do you keep it low? It sucks that we're in a world where we have to manage stress, but listen, this is what we inherited being born in this day and age. There's a lot of beautiful things about the world. There's a lot of beautiful things about living in these times. However, one of the things that these times brought is a lot of things to be stressed about, right? And the better you can navigate through that, the higher you can go in this life lifetime. Remember, your attitude does determine your altitude, so having the right attitude and, and knowing how to properly just. Take back control over your body and mind. These are the things that will help you the most throughout your life. It'll help you be a better parent, a, a better community leader. It'll help you be a better business person. A, a, a, you know, a better employee for those of you who have jobs, right? And just an overall better human being. Think about how much more powerful you'll be if you truly just understood how to calm yourself down, how to manage your emotions in the very best way possible. You can truly make the most out of your life. And if there's anything that I represent, it's helping people live their very best life. That's what I've always been about. That's been my, my common message for all of these years is really giving you the tools, the strategies, the modalities and, and things that you can ultimately implement into your life to really make the most of it. Because to be alive today is very rare. Right. To be alive today is truly a miracle. And the fact that we're here sharing this human experience, we all have a moral obligation to help each other on this journey to be able to live the very best life possible. If there's any philosophy I believe in, it's the philosophy of I got one life to live and I wanna make the most out of this life. And I'm sure that a lot of you guys can relate to that. That's why you're here on this breakfast club every single week. So take care. God bless. Breakfast is officially served. I'll be seeing you guys next week. Again, if you got value, drop a comment. For those of you who are long overdue for a coaching session, or maybe you've always wanted to do a complimentary session with me, uh, just hit me up. Shoot me the word, uh, in my, uh, dms. Just write me the word coach. I'll send you over my Calendly link or if you have any questions about my five day challenge. One-on-one, uh, coaching challenge with me. Uh, just dm me the word challenge and I'll be more than happy to answer any questions that you may have. Other than that breakfast is served. Take care. God bless, and I'll be seeing you all next week. I.