What Happens When You Replace Autopilot with Appreciation?

Ever wondered why you keep getting stuck in the same mental patterns despite all your personal growth work? Your brain's hardwiring might be the culprit.

In this powerful episode, I share the deceptively simple practice that radically transformed my life when I was trapped in frustrating thought loops. After experiencing a spiritual awakening in my teens, followed by a period of disconnection from my authentic self, I discovered a method that not only broke my mental patterns but completely revolutionized my energy, income, and ability to attract opportunity.

The practice? Intentional gratitude—but not in the way you've likely heard before. This isn't about forcing positive feelings or denying challenges. Instead, it's a deliberate experiment in shifting your reticular activation system (the part of your brain that determines what you notice) through genuine curiosity and appreciation. When implemented correctly, this approach doesn't just momentarily lift your mood—it fundamentally rewires neural pathways and breaks the efficiency programming that keeps you stuck.

What makes this approach uniquely effective is how it creates an upward spiral. As you train your focus on what you can genuinely appreciate, you become increasingly magnetic to experiences worth appreciating. I witnessed this firsthand during a year of intensive practice, when extraordinary opportunities seemed to find me effortlessly. The reason wasn't mystical—it was neurological. By consistently interrupting my mental loops with moments of true appreciation, I changed my point of reference and, consequently, what my brain was programmed to notice and attract.

Ready to try this experiment yourself? Join me for a week-long gratitude challenge! Send me a DM on Instagram if you're participating, or book a consultation through my website if you're ready to go deeper with this work in the Magnetic Leadership Accelerator or one-on-one coaching.

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to Breaking Mental Loops
• 3:26 How Mental Loops Form
• 6:49 The Transformative Practice Revealed
• 8:54 Implementing a True Gratitude Practice
• 12:34 Shifting Your Point of Reference
• 15:48 The Abundance Challenge and Offer

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

uh. Tap into your inner power. You got this. Now go get it living up to your full potential. Your energy is magnetic. Big dreams believe in it. Wisdom, we seeking it, everything that you're looking for, brought to you by lisa jeffs, the magnetic leader. It's time to soar. Tap into your power of an entrepreneur. Level up. Step it up because Find your purpose. Time to be a magnetic leader.

Speaker 2: 0:33

Welcome to the show leaders. This is probably going to be one of the fastest podcasts I've ever done. I wanted to share a very potent method to help get you out of any mental loops, and I have to say that a lot of people, a lot of my clients, a lot of people in my groups they've already done a lot of healing work, they've already listened to a lot of podcasts, they've read a lot of books, they've gone to a therapist, they've done deeper work, but they get stuck in mental loops. The mind is one of the slowest things that can change when we're in transformation, because its job, its literal job is to be efficient. So if you have certain ways of being, certain ways of thinking, certain habits and they have served you well at some point in your life, that's why you have them in the first place, or they just you just simply learn them right. That's why you have them in the first place, or you just simply learn them right. Sometimes it's not about them serving us, we just learn them. And now it's time to change. Now you're ready for transformation. In fact, you're already on the transformation path, which you are, because you're listening to this, which is a podcast, and nobody that's not on the transformation path is going to be listening to this, which is a podcast. And anyone nobody that's not on the transformation path is going to be listening to a podcast, unless they just want entertainment. But this isn't an entertainment podcast. You're already on this road and what happens is the brain's job is to be efficient, so it crystallizes all these neural pathways, all these ways of being to help you be efficient with what is programmed. So, unprogramming all the loops and boops and all that stuff, it can be the last one to really shift your body and your mind right, your energetic. We can clean up our energetic field, we can clean up our wounding in our energetics, but the slower ones to go is the body and the mind. And this is a really simple practice you can start implementing.

Speaker 2: 3:02

If you have found yourself in a loop, you're kind of like why do I keep waking up and feeling like it's Groundhog Day? I know where I want to go, I know what's not working, but I feel like I'm just trapped in this loop. When I first started using this practice, it was literally life changing. One because I had never utilized it before and two because I was coming out of a. I'm going to call it a slumber.

Speaker 2: 3:35

I had my first real spiritual awakening which just blew my mind open, around 17, 18, 19, 20, somewhere around there, I think it was around 17. Around 17, 18, 19, 20, somewhere around there, I think it was around 17. And it just completely shifted my reality, shifted my perspective. But then I went to sleep again. I got involved in drugs, went down that path and it wasn't until a big shift around 30, 31, somewhere around there, where I literally just woke up one day and said to myself you know what I want? To get back into my spiritual roots.

Speaker 2: 4:14

I was raised by a mom who was very much into spirituality and that was just a very natural part of who I was. From a very young age I had psychic realizations very young, so it wasn't anything that was abnormal. But at 31, I realized you know what I'm feeling like. I have lost my true authentic self a little bit, gone to sleep a little bit. My true authentic self a little bit Gone to sleep a little bit Gotten. Lost in the patterns, got lost in the doing, got lost in the achieving, and I had this epiphany that I wanna get back into it. And I remember taking a course that this was after I had worked with my first coach and she really helped me to shift my mindset, my perspective. A lot of the quote, unquote negative thoughts I don't really like to use the word negative because they're just thoughts. It's a meaning that gives it. It's whatever we see as being positive or negative, but they were lower vibrational thoughts because they were very self-critical. However, I don't know, this was the practice that really took me from like just chugging along to insane amount of joy and bliss and just on levels that were out of this world, and it really was the catalyst where my income just shot up, where I started attracting so many amazing people into my business. This was right at the cusp of me starting my business and it is just a really powerful practice to do anytime you feel like you're in a loop.

Speaker 2: 6:05

I haven't been saying what the name of the practice is because I know as soon as I say it, you're going to be like I tried that already. I've already tried that. Ah, you know what it's, whatever, and I want you to listen to how I'm going to explain it, because there's a lot of stuff that just really doesn't help you truly embody this practice, and there's a way of doing it that I know is supportive of people. That can be in their head a lot. They can overanalyze, they can over, try to figure things out, and for me, this was a really powerful way to do it. So the practice that I'm talking about is a gratitude practice. Now, I know I'm getting some people rolling their eyes already, but I want you to do it in this way.

Speaker 2: 6:58

Again, this is for, specifically, if you're feeling like you're in loops. To break up the loops, we have to. We cannot, we cannot break a loop without doing something differently, and we also need to replace the loop with something. So this is how I did it at first. This is how it was taught to me in this group program, or I don't even know if it was taught exactly like this, but this is how I understood it and how I started implementing it. So, having a goal, a almost like a scientific test for yourself, I'm going to practice this for a week. I'm just going to test it out for a week. See how this works. No expectations, no, nothing doesn't have to look a certain way, doesn't have to look like the people on YouTube channels are doing it, or how this book told you to do it, or how this journal told you to do it, nothing like that. Keep it really easy. So, everything in your day to day, right, we're doing this for a week.

Speaker 2: 8:04

I want you to acknowledge your gratitude for it in a way where you're not forcing yourself to feel a amount of gratitude for something, because that's where I think a lot of people go. It just goes wonky. Right, they're trying to force themselves to feel gratitude. Right, they're trying to force themselves to feel gratitude. They're in a funk or they're in a loop, and it's. We don't want to be forcing anything. It's a curiosity and a test for yourself, and when I say test, I mean you're practicing. It's just a practice. Let me see if I can really tune into the gratitude of something.

Speaker 2: 8:50

So when I first started doing this, I would set the intention that I'm just going to feel gratitude for everything. So I would go about my day in my normal loops and then, let's say, I saw a text message come up on my phone. I would stop myself and say how can I, what would it feel like to feel real gratitude for this person that just reached out to me through text message? They didn't have to, even if you know, their text message might be asking for something or sharing something. How can I cultivate gratitude for it in the moment? And then I would sit and I would just feel into it, nothing intense, and then I'd be going about my day and maybe I come across. I remember having real gratitude for a plant and I was just like, how can I have gratitude for this plant? And I would just stare at the beauty of the plant and the real magnificent nature of this plant that just grows and continues to grow, even though it's not watered all the time, or we have a funky lighting in the house, it doesn't get all the light it needs, but you know what? It keeps chugging on, it keeps growing. How can I have gratitude for that right now?

Speaker 2: 10:11

And then going about your day, going to bed, waking up the next morning, even when your alarm clock goes off a little bit earlier. How can I have gratitude for getting up early? What would that look like for me? And it's a practice of bringing your attention to gratitude, to have gratitude and to try to cultivate this incredible feeling of gratitude, but a practice where you're shifting your mind. So, instead of going about the day in a loop, which is really just like a groundhog day experience, where your brain is just on autopilot. You are shifting it to truly see what can you appreciate in that moment. It to truly see what can you appreciate in that moment, what can I appreciate in this moment, and allowing those feelings of appreciation to expand into your thought patterns. Because once you set that intention and you ask that question, the part of your brain, the RAS, the reticular activation system is going to start to seek out the things to be grateful for. And then it expands. This expands throughout your day, it expands throughout your week and you're shifting your point of reference. You're shifting your point of reference. You're shifting your point of view and the autopilot thoughts that are keeping you in this loop. So I, my challenge for you this week is to test this out for yourself Again, not in a state of pressure, not in the state of, oh God, I'm not feeling green, I have gratitude for everything right now.

Speaker 2: 11:56

No, this is a shift of consciousness, a practice where you're practicing shifting your awareness, your point of view, what you're deciding to focus in on. There's always duality to everything. There was always the good of something and the not so good of something. Again, we are putting labels on it. There really is no good or not good right. Everything is neutral. It's our point of view that makes it good or not good. It's our perspective. But we are intentionally shifting to what is going to serve us, what we can appreciate about something, because truly everything is a gift. Now I'm not talking about hardships and real traumatic events. Okay, that's always a point of concern.

Speaker 2: 12:56

When we have these conversations, someone will bring up how am I going to have gratitude for this? You don't have to go down that road right now. That's a different conversation, different levels of consciousness, different point of view that we can talk about in another time. But I'm talking about your day to day. But even if it does include things that may be challenging, such as bills that are coming in and you don't have the money for them right now, how can you shift into a state of gratitude for having the? At some point you had the money to pay that bill? How can we have the appreciation that we received something from that bill, still Knowing that appreciation and gratitude opens the door to receiving? We cannot be in a state of abundance and receiving when we are focused in on lack and scarcity. Okay, so this is really about shifting our focus throughout the week. Let me know, send me a DM if you're up for the challenge.

Speaker 2: 14:09

I love this practice. I love it. Every time I do it intentionally, it skyrockets my energy. It skyrockets my energy. It skyrockets my existence. I remember one time I was doing it for about a year, very intentional, very intentional about it, and I started becoming just this magnet to things, all things amazing. I remember I even won this contest. I never beforehand was one of those people that typically win things and I remember I won. Was it a grand prize? I don't know, I can't remember. It might have been the grand prize and I was just so happy and excited. But also I was in the state of of course I won. Of course I won Because I'm just in this energy of appreciation and gratitude. So all these things kept coming into my life that were a sign of things to be more appreciated and grateful for.

Speaker 2: 15:15

That's the kind of the cool thing about this is at the beginning, if you're in a loop, it can be very frustrating, because every day frustrated, your focus is on the things that aren't working or that aren't the here yet, and the more you can really challenge yourself to be intentional. Right, get out of the loop, get into your heart space, be intentional, focus on. You have to be very considerate of your point of focus throughout the day. I don't want this to sound like it's hard or it has to be challenging, because it's really not about being hard or challenging. The most challenging thing is just bringing your focus back, because it's so easy to get lost in the day to day. But when you do that, then you just start attracting so much more to be appreciative for, to be thankful for, and then you're just in this like amazing space of receiving. So that's my challenge for you. Okay, send me a message on Instagram If you're up for the challenge. Okay, keep yourself accountable.

Speaker 2: 16:32

If you would like some more specific podcasts on these type of what am I calling it? More of the energy, more of the manifestation. I know I don't talk a lot about this on the podcast. It's intertwined between everything. It is a huge part of the work that I do in the Magnetic Leadership Accelerator and part of my one-on-one. If you work with me one-on-one, these are aspects that I always talk about, because everything is energy, whether you believe it or not, whether you understand it or not, it doesn't matter, it is what it is and it's affecting your life. So if you're curious about this or you like this topic, let me know, send me a DM or send me a text message about a specific question and I'll answer it on the podcast, as always. If you want to go deeper into this work right now, my current offerings are the Magnetic Leadership Accelerator, which is again still in the beta soon to be out of the beta, so the beta bonuses are leaving or Deep One-on-One, and then One-on-One is always limited because of the time that goes into it. So if you're interested in either of those, send me a DM or you can book a test drive console on my website, lisajeffscom.

Speaker 2: 18:06

I love you, leader, I appreciate you. I thank you for your time. Thank you so much for joining me. I've had so many more listeners on the podcast and it makes my heart so happy because that's why I do this work to help, to inspire, to guide, and when I know people are enjoying it and people keep coming back and they're listening, it inspires me to continue to do more because I know you're enjoying it. So I love you, I appreciate you and, as always, let's stay connected.