The Unknown Changes You: Why Growth Requires Courage”

Ep 148. Throughout life, we undertake journeys that challenge who we are and force us to grow beyond the limits of our current identity. Every meaningful endeavor—whether physical, emotional, intellectual, or spiritual—demands that we step into uncertainty and evolve through experience.

Growth changes us.

As we gain knowledge, endure hardship, and confront adversity, we become someone different from the person who first began the journey. Some experiences leave such a profound mark upon the mind, body, and spirit that we can never fully return to who we once were.

This is the nature of transformation.

But transformation is not always dramatic or heroic. Often, the greatest challenges are the quiet, repetitive struggles of everyday life: chronic stress, exhaustion, disappointment, uncertainty, financial pressure, emotional burden, and the relentless effort required simply to continue moving forward.

Over time, these pressures can slowly wear away at identity.

In the struggle to survive day by day, we risk losing connection to ourselves, our purpose, and the person we were meant to become.

When faced with challenge, human beings often respond in one of three ways:

• We retreat from the unknown
 • We confront the challenge directly
 • Or we engage it from fear, defensiveness, and self-preservation

The unknown is uncomfortable because it threatens certainty. It asks us to release attachment to what is familiar and predictable. Sometimes, the fear of anticipated loss becomes so powerful that we choose the safety of stagnation rather than the risk of transformation.

But growth has always required courage.

Every meaningful evolution of self begins the moment we step beyond what is known. The unknown contains risk—but it also contains possibility, wisdom, strength, and expansion.

This is where self-regulation, resilience, and deliberate action become essential.

When we learn to regulate fear and uncertainty, we gain the ability to move forward despite discomfort. We become capable of transforming stress into growth, adversity into wisdom, and challenge into identity development.

The path to becoming who you are meant to be is not found in avoiding difficulty.

It is found in walking through it consciously.

Embrace courage.
 Step into the unknown.
 Gain knowledge through experience.
 Become who you are capable of becoming.

Take care. Walk well.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:39

Welcome back, folks, to episode 148 of the Running Man Self-Regulation Skills Project Podcast with me, your host, Dr. Armando Dominguez, PhD in health psychology, licensed professional counselor, and an adjunct professor at a local community college. And what we're going to be discussing today is an aspect of the hero's journey whenever we're in the process of becoming the new me, of becoming the person that it is that I want to be, not reinvention of self in the truest sense, where you're a new person, but rather where you upgrade who it is that you become. And I will state this first, and that is that motivation precedes arrival. Motivation precedes arrival. Now, not necessarily arrival at a destination per se, but rather the state of becoming becoming who it is that I've become as far as the skilled one. That requires that we be motivated to get there. And we do know that motivation fluctuates, and then we're going to step into this next part. And that's this has to do with the fact that if we're going to get somewhere, discipline is what drives us whenever motivation wanes. What else do we get as a result of the search for knowledge and going into the unknown? And from that point, we'll launch the discussion. Now, if we're looking at the idea of arrival, once we have arrived, we have grown, and this is kind of an egoistic perspective, not necessarily egotistical, but one wherever it is that we've validated who it is that we think that we are, and by virtue of the tasks that we have undertaken, the skills that we've developed, and also how we may have survived situations that may have been really difficult or could have basically uh turned us into one a coward if we chose to run away from the challenge, so to speak, and also it may have also caused us to become either a villain or a hero in our own narrative, our own story. And yes, I am using some rather colorful terms here because metaphor tends to be what we're going to be using to make sense of the impact uh on not only self but character and individuals and how we interact. And I don't really lean heavily onto metaphor, but we're going to be using them a little bit today with the direction of self-regulatory development whenever we are under stress. So with the metaphor of the coward, the villain, and the hero, whenever we're on a journey, those aren't the only three ways we can deal with things. We can be severely disappointed if we can accomplish a goal, uh, but yet it's something that I didn't want to do or I did for someone else. It may not be fulfilling. Or I might do something that supersedes my own individual nature, but I feel good about it because it serves others and it's a positive thing. Then we may have goals that may only serve, I don't want to say the darkest part of ourselves, but our shadow self in that it may only be a self-serving, biased goal that we have, and it may be something that maybe only in the closet, so to speak, or whenever I'm by myself, I can appreciate the benefit of what I've gained by accomplishing said goal. And this doesn't make it a bad or evil thing, it just means that it may have just been for me and only me. And that would be, in a sense, selfish. Now, this doesn't mean anything like health development or anything like that. That is necessary. We must nurture ourselves, but a truly selfish thing, one that only benefits me in only a very material sense. And um I'm describing this very distinctly because these are the challenges often that when we are on a path of self-development and self-improvement, we do have to learn how to manage ourselves, as in our organism, our body, level of stress, but also have to learn how to self-regulate one, how I think about things, two, how I arrive if I'm interacting with people, and three, what my reactions are like if they get uh over the top intense. If things happen too suddenly or out of the ordinary or something that totally takes me by surprise, I didn't expect or predict, then we have to learn how to manage these things. So there's a whole lot of complexity going on to anything that we undertake as a journey, so to speak. And we can even get frightened to the point where we will run away and preserve self. And I didn't want to say that this is cowardice, but in essence, being able to go into fight-flight, and I'm not tying that to the neurological response, but just in concept, wherever the challenge is too much and I never go back, and I basically I've been whipped and I lose, and I pretty much identify with not being able to do that, and I'm not going to try this again, to where I quit, so to speak. So that's where I'm speaking from. So the next part, if we're thinking about motivation preceding arrival, arrival at becoming that new self, the new person, or uh the new version of myself, the 2.0 version of Armando, for instance, after I've gone through said trials, then when we arrive, we have to recognize that motivation must precede my arrival. There are some that like to think that they are already what it is that they're going to become, but that that's a delusion because if you've not gone through the experiences that will give you the requisite wherewithal that you can stand in those future shoes, so to speak, then that's all bunk. It's not true until you make it true. Until you make the picture real, it's just a picture. A picture in your mind, no less. And if that's a conception, then it doesn't mean it doesn't exist, but when you stop thinking it, where does it go? Away. And that's an important point to make here before we go to the next segment. And this is going to be talking about what our natural tendencies are when we are under challenge, when we're on the journey, and that is to the stress that we experience as a result of doing the physical things, doing the mental things, the emotional weightlifting, the mental weightlifting, uh, whenever we're trying to figure out, well, where are we going to go? What are we going to do next? Or I don't know what I'm doing, I don't know where I'm at, and I'm completely lost. And the only space I occupy is where I'm standing, just that space under my feet, and where my mind is at at that moment, then I have no direction. And that can be a scary place for some. And sometimes we maybe live in a regular life and have these moments of I don't know what to do next. And that's fair. It happens, but also it can be a very paralyzing thing if there's a sense of measured stress that we're expected to do or I expect of myself, and for some reason there's a lack of preparation or maybe even a lack of information available, not due to a lack of myself not trying, but rather just not having availability of info, and that can be enough to stop progress or stop one from trying to look because I don't see what I was supposed to do. In cases like this, if you don't know where you're at and where you're going, sitting still may not serve you. Especially if it's a dynamic situation where there are people and things moving around out in the forest, you don't want to sit still for too long. Movement keeps you safe. In war, you don't want to stay in one place too long because you'll be found out and they'll target you. You have to be a moving um target, so to speak, so it's harder for them to target you. And in life it can be that way as well. But whenever we get to the point where we cannot figure, sometimes if we have people available, we seek resource, information, knowledge to understand what to do next if there is a next to do, or maybe it's time to abandon, and there's nothing cowardly about that. Sometimes maybe it's not a worthwhile goal. And many years ago, there was a book that I read, uh Journey to Islan, uh by Carlos Castaneda. It's an esoteric book written in the 1960s, and his teacher, Don Juan Matuz, he was a Mexican sorcerer and was teaching out in the desert uh the Yaqui Indian ways to a young Carlos Castaneda, and he'd spend his summers out there when he was off of college. And he spoke of him having a path with heart. What does that mean? Something that's worthy, a worthy goal, in more modern terms. But a path with heart with heart was what he he spoke of. But a path with heart is one that will be filled with challenge, but also will be filled with self in the sense that I may inject myself into situations and things to learn more, to have experience. And it is by my internal intuitive direction, my heart, that I will continue to go through or stop or overcome and whatever that permutation is that may determine how well I do in the journeying, so to speak. Now, the next part of this has to do with whenever I'm moving forward, often we struggle in the moment, the moment when we have stress, when we have fear, when there's that sense of I don't know if I'm in danger or not, or maybe I am. Um maybe not in the physical sense, but rather danger of losing something, such as a relationship, a job, a thing, or maybe my own way, not knowing what to do, or feeling like maybe I betrayed myself, I let myself down. What am I losing whenever I have gone against me and it makes me feel bad? I have lost respect for myself and maybe did something that did not feel good. And this is may have felt good in the moment, or may have alleviated pain, or maybe I did something that I know that reset me back to zero, or at least that feels like I did whenever um, let's say I use drugs or I drank or use something that is a behavioral addiction that maybe I I can't afford to do because I feel terrible and it's not healthy for me, or maybe it costs me money. But whenever we get to that point, the fear is real. Uh there are some things that could objectively in the in the world that you live in be lost, such as a relationship, a home, a family, your health, a really big one, but also peace of mind or maybe even that self-respect. Respectful self is a really hard thing because it's not something we can measure in a cup and weigh it and objectively say you have this much respect for yourself. It's not quite like that. But whenever we respect ourselves, we feel so much better. But when we betray that trust of self and that respect of self, often that is hard to regain. And many people that struggle with addictions in particular, not just addictions, but addictions in particular is particularly pronounced. And it it's always going to be a balancing act between am I going to choose to pursue the hedonic pleasurable effects or the numbing effects, or am I going to continue doing life, even though it's hard, even though the payoff is nowhere near as pleasurable as what using is, it's not nearly as easy because being able to pick up uh a substance only requires the effort that you know my hand requires to get it to my mouth or to to light it on fire, this sort of thing, or for that matter, uh in comparison. If I were to get satisfaction from finishing certain types of jobs around the house that need to be done, the amount of effort required to that is very disparate compared to just popping a pill, among other things. So we have to look at that. The body, when it stresses, it will weigh things out in a very subtle sense, and we may not even look at it the way I just spoke it. But in that sense, there is a fear of loss because we know that once that easy path is taken, the easiest path isn't always the best. Sometimes it's efficient in its result in that I feel better, but it's also short-lived. It's also something that won't not only last long, but will also leave a scar, a mark, and also an indelible impression in our mind, on our heart, and our our spirit or soul, if you believe in that, that feels like a blemish or dirt. And uh we we don't want that, but at the same time, the pain of expectation tends to be exaggerated, very hyperbolic. Often how we entertain things in our mind, it's much bigger than what it actually is, versus when we put our hands on things and actually start doing. So that motivation preceding arrival, no kidding. The arrival at what? Relief, the arrival at being the better person, maybe. But the fact of the matter is the motivation always happens first, even if it's fleeting. Sometimes those motivations are driven from a darker place that don't serve us. Sometimes they are driven from a better place that drive us into levels of endurance and make us push through and move forward. And the way is forward. The way is through in the direction of the goal that you seek that's most important to you, whether it be self-developmental, the person I'd like to become, and maybe the certifications and licenses I might want to achieve to be able to make a living, or maybe finish in school so I can do better than than what my poor parents had. This sort of thing. And and that's okay. Those are important things. But we have to look at the fear of loss. Sometimes it's fleeting, but the power of the hedonic response to override even those things that I know I could potentially lose, like my home, my job, that sort of thing. The distance from what we would call the hedonic point that we're experiencing at that moment is very, very far compared to the promise of what the hedonic power of, let's say, a substance or a behavior that's not good for you is, especially if it's at hand in hand or just a couple of steps, versus something that's more protracted and longitudinal, like uh, if I work for several years, I can get this versus I can do this right now and feel better right now. And there are things that um tend to be confounds to our best attempts at becoming successful, to becoming more, to becoming the better me that I want to be. Not that we don't love ourselves, but and we should along the way. And it is a practice, mind you, and sometimes it's hard, depending on our background, to be able to be compassionate and kind to ourselves and loving uh to ourselves as much as someone else. Sometimes it's harder to do towards self. But these are the things that help us maintain a level of resilience and also a chance of maintaining calm so we can predict more effectively, not perfectly, and not like in a psychic sense, but rather where we can expect certain things based on us reading the environment much more accurately, much more effectively. This is an important thing. Now, fear of loss, what is it that might I might fear losing? Well, the thing is it can be many things, uh, but uh the fear of loss is one of the things that might motivate us into fear, into anger, also into uh behaviors that may or may not be uh numbing because I don't want to feel the feelings I'm expecting to feel. Notice I said expecting, so maybe I'm exaggerating what things may be like, and that's kind of what we're wired to do. We're wired to seek the negative. But if we exaggerate it a little bit, if we've had that negative experience before, we are going to hyper respond, over-respond to what potentially the situation may be. So we're trying to predict it as worse, and the idea is to arrive with more and not need it than to arrive with nothing and not have it. And it's not a conscious decision, but rather one where our body responds because it doesn't like hurt, it doesn't like uh pain, and it tries to keep us from getting there. And sometimes if we let our most basic brain drive us and our all our internal drivers that tell us make safe, make safe, because it's dangerous and we we could get hurt out there, uh, those are the things that keep us from accomplishing the things or becoming the people that we want to be, especially if there are positive goals, because fear is there. Whether it's good or bad, there's always going to be a fear of not knowing. Ambiguity, our nervous system doesn't like. Ambiguity is something our minds don't like, and we're always seeking to create a narrative to tell us a story about that. There's a measure of certainty here, and sometimes saying things in a way that's compelling or one that's interpreted that makes sense at that moment, no matter how inaccurate or how much evidence I'm lacking, I may pursue that. I may do something with that because our nervous system does not like no answers or ambiguousness, and we have to seek some sort of knowledge somewhere, and sometimes we have to drive into ambiguity, we have to drive into the unknown when we strike out for knowledge on a journey, on a life journey in particular, we will be faced with the unknown. And the unknown sometimes can be scary because of the way we exaggerate it, and we may realize that in the movie Star Wars, wherever Luke is talking to Yoda, and he's planning to go into the darkness of the cave under the tree, and Yoda says, You won't need the lightsaber, and then he straps it on even tighter, and therefore he gets a a more challenging challenge, so to speak, whenever he goes in there as a result of the attitude and the way he went in. Nothing wrong with being prepared. But a lot of times how we prepare and how we arrive will determine how well we do with the challenge that the unknown provides us. But after that, we get knowledge. It doesn't have to be damaging to you to acquire that knowledge, it doesn't have to be that. It can be. It can be hurtful, it can be darned educational, and it might have hurt a little bit, but those are valuable things too. Those are valuable lessons that we gain as we grow from young adulthood to adolescence into uh later middle adulthood when we get older as well. We continue in similar veins, hopefully more wisely and more efficiently and much more effectively. That's the goal. And hopefully with many successful arrivals, there are some that don't. There's some that don't get that. But much of that has to do with uh sometimes exaggerated fear responses. Exaggerated fear responses based on beliefs without evidence that sometimes we have a catch-22. I have to believe this because I will fear of loss, uh, lose love because my parents will disown me. Um if I don't vote a certain party, then I'm out of the house. If I don't believe a certain religion, I'm out of a house. And we don't want to lose those things that we've had for so long that were our core stability. Sometimes we have to be able to walk away from that and realize that it's our own attachment to the way we believe things to be. And the ghosts of the past, another metaphor. The ghosts of the past are the things that we remember of how things used to be or believe them to be. We may actively be believing in ghosts, things that aren't real or solid, but we just kind of talk about them and believe in them, but there's nothing to support it. Often those are the things that will hamstring us and keep us from moving forward, from doing well, because of the compelling nature of things, and it's not so much that the belief is compelling, but rather the underlying presupposition, fear of loss, I'm not gonna have a family, they're gonna walk away from me, they'll disown me, they'll criticize me because I choose to think differently. And one of the things that we do, one of the most powerful things we do on our way to becoming who it is we're supposed to be, is to differentiate ourselves from our family, from our parents, and even in some cases the beliefs they shared with us, and we may be fine with the beliefs, but you will realize that you practice what you've been preached to and taught when we're very young in your own way. So you filter through your experience and you may get some good guidelines and principles, but you may not practice exactly your parent the your parents' religion, so to speak, or your parents' way of living a life philosophically, that sort of thing. And you express it through the uniqueness of yourself, and that's a very important thing. But attachment is huge. It's not only to material things, but sometimes to beliefs, sometimes to expectations and things that we were taught that we're afraid of not thinking and believing them, because even if our parents are gone, we have that guilt shame factor that's very subconscious that might create apprehension and keep us from moving forward or stepping forward whenever the step forward into the unknown may be the only choice, but also it's going to be the one that's most empowering because we're going to choose to do different or choose to seek information, regardless of what happens. I know what happens where everything is known and accounted for, but what about moving forward? Not every unknown is dangerous, not every ambiguous situation is going to hurt you. But what will hurt you in the long run is not seeking whenever maybe you should have. And you may actually accomplish things as a result of going the route of wonder, curiosity, and doing what you gotta do, just to see what's out there. Even if nothing comes of it, you'll always have what you had, but you'll never know what you could have if you don't go and seek it. So knowledge is power, but the journey of knowledge, the journey into self, the new self and courage, despite what it is that we came from, is going to bear fruit regardless. Even if it's well, I didn't get anything new, but it'll be wisdom and experience in many cases. And it doesn't have to be damaging, mind you, but it certainly can be awakening and enlightening. And it can also give you information that you may be able to help people with. You might actually find something not only worthwhile, but something new. And that's gonna be it for today. I appreciate you sharing this lovely Sunday morning with me. And uh I just want to let y'all know that uh I did get my little book uh Poco Chico, which means in Spanish, just a little small. Uh it's a children's uh little picture book. Uh it's on Amazon. I'll probably be putting the link on the show notes. Um something I hope that you'd be willing to to support because it actually is a very high-minded idea that it doesn't just have to be for kids. Uh an adult can read it and get the idea of the loving kindness and compassion and recognizing that we all start just a little small, and we all start from a perspective of innocence, and we don't want to lose that. So there's some fun recollection of what it is that I used to be whenever I was small, and also how I used to enjoy things, and it doesn't always have to be working the trauma to the inner child, but rather recognizing that that part that they call the inner child, it's always with us, it never goes away. And we should never neglect that because that's a part of our creativity and our loving of nature and and each other that is probably the most authentic that we can be. And this is the self before we had a name or a face that we could recognize in the mirror, and also that part of me that's been observing me having this experience that will always forever be the unblemished self. It can't be touched by what the world does to us. It's always going to just be, and that's the closest part of us, if you believe in the divine, that will always be close to that. And um not unlike when we look into the eyes of children where they have universal eyes, we still have that. We haven't lost it. Seek that, nurture, take care of it. And on top of that, what I'd like to say is don't be afraid of seeking, because in the seeking is where knowledge abides. And I want to tell you thank you once again. Take care. You have any feedback for me, send it to the Gmail, and that's gonna be running man git skills project at Gmail. I'd love to hear from you. Take care. Seek the knowledge. The unknown's okay, it's not always scary, but it is challenging. Walk well, I'm gonna go.