the era of overstimulation: why you can't hear yourself anymore

we've normalized constant noise- but what is it actually taking away from us?

when everything is loud, it gets harder to hear yourself. this episode explores overstimulation, disconnection, + ways to come back to yourself and start listening

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Transcript

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I realized the other day that we don't do anything without something playing in the background. That we don't do anything without also doing something else while we're eating breakfast, we're scrolling on our phone while we're walking outside. We're listening to a podcast. While we're in the car, we're listening to music. We are always multitasking. When was the last time you just existed in silence. When's the last time you ate breakfast without scrolling on your phone or listening to something? You just ate breakfast. When's the last time you drove without turning on the radio or turning on a podcast? When's the last time you just existed? In silence. We live in such an overstimulated world. Always doing something, always multitasking, always participating. Always, always, always. That's exactly what we're gonna be talking about today in this podcast episode. So let's get into it. Welcome back to the Self-Love Archives podcast. I'm your host, Julia Salvia, also known as your self-love bestie. Thank you so much for being here. I'm so glad that you're here. Whether you're back or you're here for the first time, welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome. So, yeah, I'm overstimulated. How about you? I am overstimulated. All the time. All the time. And I can't even, I can't even tell you that I'm not, I can't, I can't even tell you that throughout this episode, even though I know exactly why I'm overstimulated, why you are overstimulated, why we're all overstimulated, and the deeper reason, and my theory as to. More so like the deeper reason why we're overs, simulated, not the the surface level.'cause like, you know, you're multitasking, right? You're probably listening to this podcast while you're in the car, or you are doing something else while listening. You're not just listening. And if you are, kudos to you. Hi, we're really, you're really here with me. So the question is, okay. I'm overstimulated. How do I fix this? Where, how did this happen? Why are we all, why does it feel like we're all overstimulated? What is going on? We have stacked our stimulation, and what this means is, is that we have gotten so used to doing everything all at the same time that. We don't even know what it's like to sit in stillness anymore. We don't even know what it's like to sit in silence, to listen to our thoughts, to just be, to just exist even when you're on vacation. I feel like we don't even do it on vacation. We don't just like lay there to exist. We're reading a book, listening to a podcast, like listening to music, talking, doing something else other than just sitting. And I can't blame you. We can't even really blame ourselves to some extent because we live in a world that is designed to overstimulate us, that is designed to keep us busy all the time. And because we're in this world that is designed to keep us engaged, we can't expect that our brains wouldn't crave the input, wouldn't crave the music, wouldn't crave the attention. But our attention span is being pulled away in a million different directions rather than sitting right here with you right now. Silence feels uncomfortable because we are just not used to it anymore. And it's not that we're broken, right? You're not broken. I'm not broken like we we're not broken. But it's that we have gotten our brains, our minds, so used to the. To so used to noise to expected that that's just our norm. I didn't realize how overstimulated I was until I took psychic classes. I basically became a psychic for a year. I can read for you. I can't read your mind, but I can read for you. And that's a really cool thing to say. And I went into taking these psychic courses because first of all, I felt aligned, but most especially because I wanted to connect with my intuition more. And there is a part of that where in order to connect with your intuition and trust your intuition more, you need to listen to yourself. You need to hear yourself, and that means quieting the noise around you. But something I didn't expect to get out of this is that as I started to get further and further into these courses that I was taking throughout the year, I would become, I would become so overstimulated. I'm talking like the world was so loud, so loud, like abnormally loud all of a sudden. I could hear this person talking and that person talking. And it's, it's kind of like in those TV shows, like in a TV show where someone can actually read your mind and they're, they're hearing like 50,000 people talking all at the same time. Or you're outside. Oh, actually, no. Hold on. I have a perfect example. Every time I go and get my nails done, you guys know how I am with my nails. I love, I love my nail artist. Like they are great. My nails always look good, but it's so overstimulating. There's just so much going on. At the same time, there's me looking at my phone trying to get inspired, right? And then there's the noise that's happening outside. There's the noise that's happening to my my left with the other nail artist doing the other, you know, all the other stimulation that's happening there. Then there's music playing, then there's other conversations happening. Then the TV is on, and then. My nail artist is asking me questions and talking to me, and it is just the most overstimulating situation in the entire world. And I always bring my noise canceling headphones. Shout out to Bose. They are the best thing ever. They are constantly the quiet comfort headphones. I'm linking them below.'cause you actually need them. If you're feeling overstimulated, you need these, I have linked them and put them into almost, I think every single. The video of the things that have changed my life. Every time we do a podcast about the things that have changed my life and just like an update of the things that are changing my life, they always make it into it because they have helped me live a non-stimulating world. They have helped me live in a non-stimulating world, so. The thing is, is that after I took these psychic classes, I came into the world. I was born, I was, I was reborn into the world, seeing and feeling and listening to the world at like max volume. It was so loud. It was so overstimulating I had to bring myself back down like I had to. I have to leave rooms now. I was at a wedding a couple of months ago. I had to leave the room and go outside, not just like outside of the room, outside to just like breathe for a second because it's just so overstimulating. And I think sometimes we don't even realize that. We don't even realize how loud everything is. It's like so many people telling us, go this way, go that way. Or this simple example that I know you're gonna relate to having the devil and the angel one on each shoulder and one's telling you this and the other's telling you that, and the other's telling you this, and the other's telling you that except add like 10 more. Because there are so many nuances in life. There has to be 10 more angels and devils and things in between telling you what to do, where to go, how to speak, how to act. We're overstimulated. I'm overstimulated. I'm overstimulated right now. Something that I took from these psychic classes though is setting energetic boundaries and protection from. Other people's energies because that can be something that's just really overstimulating when you know how to connect with it. So the easiest thing you can always do if you're feeling overstimulated, whether from a mental aspect or just in general, is to remove yourself from the situation if you can. If you cannot. Create a boundary, a physical boundary, a either a physical boun, like an actual physical boundary or a mental boundary around you. I like to close my eyes. I, I don't know why, but I always picture myself at the beach and there's just like a nice soft wave crashing and nice little breeze. It's like that perfect 70 degree weather. Maybe a little bit like. 65, but like not with a wind chill. You know what I mean? And I just picture this very soft, colorful aura. Go over me. Sometimes it's blue, sometimes it's pink, sometimes it's green. And I just picture that. Completely immerse me. Um, or you can immerse yourself in a bubble. Or if you're not physically removing yourself from a situation or physically removing yourself from a room or the place that you're in that's stimulating, um, maybe you're just stimulated, you can push away. And this goes for pushing away energy. Protecting yourself and creating a boundary. It makes a world of a difference. Even though pushing like away from yourself literally sounds like, what the heck is that going to do? I promise you, if you just are with yourself for two seconds, like you really just need two seconds, and you do that, it brings you back to center and it brings you calm. So I say give it a shot with how overstimulating being overstimulated can be. I'll try anything and look, if, if you don't relate to the whole psychic energy sort of thing, I totally get it. But the truth is, is that we are absorbing a million things all at the same time. Like we are taking in more than we even realize. And that's that that is the truth. That is the truth. When you're constantly consuming, you're constantly scrolling, you're constantly working, you're doing this, you're doing that. Like you aren't giving yourself the time to hear your thoughts. You aren't giving yourself the space to think, to be creative, to exist. You're not. You're not. And we are disconnected. We are indecisive. Our creativity is like at an all time low. You are restless 24 7 and. You feel like you're doing a million things, but you're not moving forward. It's like you're in a circle round and round and round and round and round and you're not getting out of it. And I have a theory, and my theory is that when we are overstimulated, that is our bodies and our minds screaming at us to pay attention, to listen, to sit in silence. We are overstimulated because we need to listen. That is my truest theory. I know that every single time I have ever been so overwhelmed and like overstimulated and there's just so much happening, so much going on, like all I just need to do is be in quiet. The way that meditating has changed my life because you're forcing yourself. It's not even that if you're doing this meditation correctly, like there's no perfect way to do a meditation, just sitting in silence and doing nothing. Is such an immense, wonderful practice to get more connected with yourself so that you can recognize more quickly that, oh, hey, I'm overstimulated. I should just take a breath. I should just take a 20 minute break. I'll come back to this later. And if you aren't a meditation kind of person, there's another thing that I want you to try. I started going on self-love walks, and I call them self-love walks because they are for our self-love. Listening to ourselves is a sign of respect, it's a self-respect, it's a sign of self-love. So when I go on a walk, I don't listen to anything. I don't listen to music. I, I don't listen to a podcast. And don't get me wrong, sometimes I do, sometimes there's something I'm really excited to listen to. Um, and, and sometimes I wanna journal on my walk, so I'll listen to nothing or I'll listen to like. Jazz in my ear and I will just write, or I'll listen to nothing and I will just write, or I will talk into my phone if there's a lot on my mind. It's such a good way to just get it all out, but something I discovered walking, going on these self-love walks when I'm not listening to anything and I'm not doing anything with my hands, is that I am so creative. I'm so creative. Everything becomes so clear. Like clear as day. If you went for a walk every single day and just listened to your own thoughts, just walked in silence, I bet you by the end of the week you would have clarity on whatever is going on in your brain. Whatever you have been struggling with, have anxiety around whatever you're overstimulated about, like it will all become clear to you. Because you allowed yourself to process it without constantly trying to consume and take all of these inputs around you and feed your body with all of these things that are just unnecessary, that push you to not listen to yourself. Look, it's uncomfortable. It's uncomfortable to sit in silence. It's uncomfortable to go on a walk and, and not listen to anything or do anything with your hands. It's uncomfortable, but I promise you that if you just get through those few minutes of being in discomfort, all of your thoughts will come back. Clarity will start to find you. You'll gain new perspectives and you will finally listen, not just hear things. You will listen. To yourself, to your body, to your mind, to your heart, and you will get to know yourself better. I have a couple questions here just to reflect on this topic of being overstimulated. What are you always pairing together and can you unpair them? Can you eat breakfast without scrolling on your phone? Can you work without walking on your walking pad? Can you go on a walk without listening to a podcast? Can you drive to work without listening to the radio? Can you do things without pairing it with something else? And I want you to notice too, what feels uncomfortable as you're sitting in this silence. What. What comes up for you? Are there things that you are pushing back down, things that you are avoiding that are coming up? Is that why you keep consuming and taking everything in that then again, leads you to being overstimulated because you're not dealing with those things? Or are you uncomfortable because it's just new? Lastly, when was the last time you actually heard your own thoughts? Clearly, maybe the goal here isn't to do less. It is to do more of what you are already doing. It's to do more of the things that give you life, that get, that allow you to get to know yourself more. Maybe it's about loving yourself more, hearing yourself more listening more. Not about doing it all, extending yourself in a million different directions. Maybe it's just about focusing on what is now. Thank you so much for tuning into this weekend's episode of the Self-Love Archives podcast. I hope you enjoyed, and if you did, I would absolutely love it if you left a review. If you go to the description or the show notes down below, there's a link that you can click to leave us any of your feedback, any thoughts that you had on the episode, or you can leave a comment below so that everyone can join in the conversation. I love you guys so much. I hope you have the best week ever and I hope you're not too overstimulated this week. I love you to the moon and back. Bye.