Changeology Clinic: F*ck the Shoulds--The Psychology Behind How Small Acts of Rebellion Change Everything

Changeology Clinic:

When you’re stuck in “I can’t,” you’re not broken—you’re obeying invisible rules you never agreed to. Those rules usually start with a “should.” In this episode of Changeology Clinic, Meg unpacks how those subtle, inherited scripts quietly dictate your behavior, shape your identity, and block your ability to change. 

Drawing from her background in developmental psychology and years of coaching women through identity-level change, Meg introduces one of her most practical tools: Small Acts of Rebellion. 

These are the tiny, intentional choices that challenge the “insidious shoulds” and rebuild two essential ingredients for real transformation—self-efficacy (trusting yourself to follow through) and psychological safety (feeling safe enough to try). 

If you’re exhausted by perfectionism, stuck in people-pleasing, or constantly negotiating between what you want and what’s expected, this one’s for you. You’ll learn how to stop asking for permission and start taking small, deliberate steps that return you to your own authority. 

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN IN THIS EPISODE

-How “insidious shoulds” unconsciously shape your behavior and identity--without your consent
-Why rebellion (done right) is a powerful psychological tool—not just an act of defiance
-The two building blocks of meaningful change: self-efficacy and psychological safety
-How small, low-stakes acts of rebellion rebuild self-trust and confidence over time
-Real examples of small rebellions that disrupt overwork, guilt, and perfectionism

The REAL Change Kickstart is a 45-day 1:1 coaching intensive designed to help you:

• Identify the behaviors keeping you stuck
• Unlearn what is no longer serving you
• Create new patterns that align with what you truly want

Click here to get started.

Interested in longer-term support for making a significant change? Send me a message at meg@megtrucano.com to get started.

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Transcript

Welcome to this episode of Change Ology Clinic. Today I'm going to be sharing with you one of the most powerful tools in my toolbox. Small acts of rebellion. Small acts of rebellion is the tool that I recommend for you when you feel stuck in making the change you want to make. And when your response to yourself is, I can't, now.

I can't is a reaction and it could be due to a dozen different objections or factors. Right? So I can't right now, maybe once the kids are in college or maybe it's, I can't start over now because I've spent half my lifetime developing this career. I can't. People are counting on me, my team, my employees, my family.

I can't, what if I fail? I can't put myself out there. I can't disappoint people. I can't handle disapproval, et cetera, et cetera. But if you were my client. We'd start the process by outlining what it is that you want for yourself in great detail, as well as what you don't want. We'd also get really super specific about which elements of your life as it is now. Your status quo, as I call it, no longer fits your vision for what you want for yourself or for your life, and this is how we identify what needs to change and how this process is.

The first step in a really foundational change practice, and it is really important because it helps you get clear on what you actually want, right? Sometimes this process is really easy and clients know right away what they want and how to get it, but other times it gets kind of fuzzy. They know that this sure as hell, isn't it, that they can't quite articulate what it is that they do want instead.

This is my first clue usually that the insidious shoulds are playing a huge role in obscuring my client's vision of what they want for themselves. And let me explain. The insidious shoulds are the scripts, the narratives that we've inherited from external sources that have solidified into ways of existing in the world.

So. These are heavily influenced by things like gender norms, cultural expectations, professional expectations. You name it. If a human being can belong or not belong in a category, there's a should attached to it. So maybe a mother believes that a good mom should stay at home with her kids. An employee believes that they should always arrive on time to work.

Be happy to do their job and do it superbly every day. A high achiever believes that they should make every work product perfect and should stay at work for as long as it takes to do that. Right? So you can see how each should is really attached to some kind of identity. And these shoulds are operating in the background and they're guiding our behavior and our thought patterns.

And the problem with the insidious shoulds is that they are unconscious and they very often guide our behavior without our awareness or consent. And that's no good. Okay, so you can try this little experiment to. Identify some of these insidious shoulds. So pick a day and I want you to make a mental note of any time you think, oh, I should, okay.

Oh, I should swing by the grocery store. Oh, I should put those socks away. Oh, I should empty the dishwasher. Oh, I should email that person back. Then I want you to ask yourself for each of these shoulds. What is it telling you about how you're expected to think or behave? And most importantly, did you intentionally decide that you wanted to assume that role?

So here's a good example. Okay. Oh, I'm done a little early with my work today. I should go to the grocery store on my way home and run a few errands before daycare pickup. Okay. As a person who is responsible for running a household, this should is saying that you should maximize your free time to be as efficient as possible.

Harmless, right? Who doesn't love a little efficiency in their life, but here's how it's actually not harmless at all. Did you intentionally decide that you wanted to prioritize efficiency with groceries before daycare pickup, or was it the default? Did you feel like you had another choice in the matter?

Like maybe taking that time before daycare pickup to read a book or take a walk or do something else for yourself? That is the harm of the insidious shoulds. They become automatic and they become subconscious. So you're not aware that you are performing a behavior in accordance with this should you just don't realize it.

And collectively, these little buggers create walls around what we can and cannot do with our time and ultimately with our lives. And the problem isn't the action itself. It's that you're disconnected from your intention. Okay. It's the accumulation of these little pockets of can't, right? I can't read a book after work because I should go get those groceries.

That's what creates our cages. Pretty soon those little things can turn into, I want to live a slower pace of life, but I can't because my life is so full. Do you see that connection there? So. We build these little cages based on information that we are taking from sources that we do not agree to participate in.

So how do you make change when you're working through these insidious shoulds? And here's where small acts of rebellion come in. Small acts of rebellion are small, intentional actions that move you incrementally toward the change you wanna make, and they're so named acts of rebellion because you are going to be rebelling against these insidious shoulds, against those rules, against those rules, against those expectations that you've been unconsciously following and that are shaping your life without your knowledge or your consent.

Small acts of rebellion are little fuck you to those insidious shoulds. Now, before I get into some examples of small acts of rebellion and how you can enact them to break down those insidious shoulds, there are two things you need in order to actually affect change. You need self-efficacy, the belief in your ability to enact a behavior or do what you say you're gonna do.

Two psychological safety, which is the belief that you won't get penalized for showing up as yourself in all your, I don't have this quite figured out yet. Messy glory, right? Mistakes and all small acts of rebellion will help you on both accounts. Small acts of rebellion will help you with self-efficacy and with developing psychological safety.

When you perform a small act of rebellion, you are demonstrating by that action that you trust yourself to show up for yourself. This is what builds self-efficacy over time, consistent enactment. Of those small acts of rebellion will show you that you can do what you say you're gonna do. That self-efficacy over time builds trust and self-trust is what builds self-confidence.

So if you are lacking in self-confidence, think about what you can do to build up your self-efficacy. First. Are you showing up for yourself? Are you doing what you say you're gonna do, even if you are the only person you're accountable to? Small acts of rebellion also help create psychological safety.

And remember, we need self-efficacy and psychological safety, both to make a big change. So when you want to make a big change, especially if it requires identity level work or creating new habits, basically anytime you are choosing to show up differently than you have in the past, that can feel very, very risky.

And your brain will resist that change because it feels unsafe. Doesn't mean it's actually unsafe, but it's gonna put up a bunch of fuss. But every time you perform a small act of rebellion. And the outcome is either neutral, so literally nothing happens at all po not positive, not negative, just literally nothing happens or whether it's a positive outcome.

When something really good happens, as a result of enacting a small act of rebellion, you increase the sense. Of psychological safety to try more aligned actions, to do more small acts of rebellion. That gets you closer to your goal, okay? Get you closer to the change that you want to make. And as a bonus, if you perform a small act of rebellion and something negative happens, which actually is very rare.

In my experience working with clients, this doesn't happen a lot. More often than not, it's neutral that there is just no reaction at all. But if something negative does happen, small acts of rebellion give you the opportunity, opportunity to develop resiliency, and that is absolutely crucial in making any kind of big change.

You have to be resilient 'cause it's not gonna be a perfect upward trend, linear process, right? You're gonna have setbacks, and that's a whole other podcast. But this is a kind of silver lining bonus of small acts of rebellion in the off chance that something negative does happen. Okay? But pretty soon.

You're going to start to realize and then deeply internalize that the rules, those insidious shoulds you've been playing by for so long are actually very optional. You get to choose. You get to be intentional, and that is so powerful and so freeing. Okay, so what are some little examples of small acts of rebellion to kind of give you an idea, a good sense of some little tiny things?

Right? So to illustrate each of these examples, I want to start with, you know, an insidious should, and then offer a small act of rebellion as sort of a counterpoint. And this is, again, not prescriptive. It's meant to inspire a little bit of riffing. So let's say your desired change is to become more self-assured and apologize less.

You apologize all the time for shit, that's not your fault. Look, we've all been there. So no, no shade, no judgment on this one. So that's your desired change. So this could be a thought that you have. My house is a mess. I should clean the house before my friend comes over. Again, on the surface, this does not seem that weird.

It does not seem insidious at all. But the small act of rebellion here is don't clean the house before your friend comes over. Trust that she loves you for you and for the friendship, and not for the level of cleanliness of your home. Right as a bonus, you could maybe even stretch it a little further and don't even say anything or acknowledge or point out that you didn't clean.

Just let the visit happen. So this small act of rebellion is really socking, one to the should, that you should live a perfect state of neatness and no one can see the truth, right? So that's bullshit. Cleanliness means less than you think it does. Sometimes people enjoy cleanliness for the mental reprieve that it gives them.

That's fine. You get to choose. But if you want to become more self-assured and apologize less, you have to start apologizing less. So that's one option. Let's say your desired change is that you want to be more intentional with how you spend your energy. This is a big one for clients of mine. Let's say.

You want what you attend or what you show up to, to be energy giving instead of energy depleting. Maybe that should, sounds like I am so tired and I don't wanna go to this stupid happy hour, but I really should pop in and put in some FaceTime. So the small act of rebellion here could be to decline the invitation, deciding instead to honor your energy levels instead of adhering to the narrative that you have to put in some FaceTime at every happy hour because it might.

Maybe potentially result in some kind of, you know, work social capital, right? We're challenging it and as a bonus, as like the next level up, you could decline without saying anything. You could just not go. Right. An alternative could be drop in for 10 minutes, then leave without making a. Big production about it without offering apologies, without whatever, just go.

And this is challenging the narrative that your professional success depends only on how on and involved you are at all times. Even off the clock, right? You like, that's bullshit. That's not how it works. But for. Some people and introverts like me especially, this is a really dangerous and depleting game to play, right?

The better strategy is to honor your energy instead. So that is a good small act of rebellion to. Put into practice if you want to be more intentional with how you spend your energy. And again, I'm not trying to vilify happy hours here. I'm not trying to say that putting in FaceTime isn't good for your career.

What I'm saying is that the small act of rebellion aligns with the desired change with the intentional expenditure of energy in this case. So I hope that makes sense. Okay. One more example here. Let's say your desired change is that you want more space and more time for your family, including your new baby, without so many freaking social obligations and expectations, right?

Like you're just fucking tired. And the should might sound like I should host Thanksgiving dinner this year. It's our turn and people will wanna see the new baby. Ugh. But I don't wanna. Okay, small act of rebellion here. Send an email or a text stating that you will not be hosting Thanksgiving this year.

Instead, you are going to have a quiet day at home with your own small family and enjoy it. And you can't wait to hear what everyone else's holiday plans are. You're not being mean, you are just stating a boundary here. And again, it aligns with the desired change to create more space and time for your family.

So this one may feel kind of big for you and it is, right? Family obligations are some of the, and family dynamics are some of the biggest barriers and some of the hardest shoulds that we have to get through, right, to work through. But it's only big if you want it to be. Okay. This one is challenging the narrative that you must always put other people's comfort and convenience, even family members above your own.

Okay. So I hope that this discussion has lent a bit of clarity and that it's a little bit easier for you to see the connection between small acts of rebellion and breaking through those insidious shoulds to make the kind of change that you want to make. Right, and as a reminder, change is the vehicle, change is the mechanism, right?

If there is some space between where you are right now and where you want to be, the change is the vehicle that kind of bridges that gap and travel set distance. So these small intentional acts of rebellion are what build your self-efficacy, right? You demonstrate to yourself that you have your own back.

This will then develop into self-trust and then into self-confidence, and that's when you can start enacting progressively more impactful steps to enact the change that you want to make to bridge that gap to get there. Right? Small acts of rebellion will also help you to develop the psychological safety you need to feel in order to put yourself out there and take those risks and do the scary thing because you'll have shown yourself that you actually can do it.

So thank you so much for listening to this episode of Change Ology Clinic, and I will see you in the next one.