Stresscalation Paths

Life has a way of throwing curveballs, and in this episode, Jess and Lisa get real about the stressors piling up in their worlds—from illness and unpredictable weather to the pressures of work, family, and everything in between. With humor and honesty, they unpack the emotional weight of their responsibilities and explore how stress manifests in their lives.

What You’ll Hear in This Episode:

• It's been a day, a month, a week, a year....
• Jess unpacks some feedback from her daughter's teacher that caught her off-guard and made her think about (over-)achievement culture.
• Lisa unpacks her new stress escalation matrix to find ways to disrupt the stress cycle and get back to a place of good.
• From brain breaks to mindful walks, Jess and Lisa explore strategies for interrupting the stress spiral before it takes over.

Why You Should Listen

If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by the relentless demands of life, this episode is for you. Jess and Lisa’s raw, insightful conversation offers a mix of personal stories, hard-won wisdom, and practical strategies for navigating stress with self-awareness and resilience.

Tune in next week as we dive into the ideas of "before" and "after," resilience in action, and values—we can’t wait to unpack it with you!

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome and Introductions
• 9:00 Sharing Sickness Stories and Humor
• 20:00 Ice Days and Unexpected Joys
• 25:00 Reflections on Urgency and Productivity
• 45:00 Discussing Feedback on Parenting
• 1:00:00 Unpacking Stress: A Personal Journey
• 1:20:00 Escalation Matrix of Stress
• 1:35:00 Strategies to Manage Stress
• 1:55:00 Conclusion and Takeaways

Transcript

Jess: 0:56

Lisa, how's it going today?

Lisa: 0:59

It's okay. There's a lot of sickness happening. So it's been a long week. A long week of that Multiple flus, multiple doctor's visits, multiple strep throats it's all coming for me and it's one of those things I could feel like the train is bearing down on me and I'm standing on the tracks and there's no exit from the tracks. It's just coming for me and I have to just stand there and take it.

Jess: 1:26

I know exactly that feeling and I have to say, I myself have flirted with that feeling for probably about a week, because we've also had flu. We've also had well, we think it's flu and then whatever this mystery illness is that will be treated with antibiotics, maybe strepto. I don't know, it's all the same stuff.

Lisa: 1:48

Yeah, yeah, it's funny. We don't live terribly far apart in the grand scheme of things, but we live close enough far apart that it's funny that, like your illnesses are mild, even if we don't see each other. Like you guys are kind of experiencing the same thing down in your county is that we are in our county and it's just funny how things like that go.

Jess: 2:07

But right, it's almost like the weather patterns where we have. We'll both have a snow day, but yeah one of us will have more ice than the other, just depending on the thing, it's true, and that was another thing this week too.

Lisa: 2:19

That just sort of made it like an extra, an extra challenging week. In addition to everyone in my, in my family but me being sick, we also had a ice day, I guess not a snow day, there was no snow, but an ice day, which was pretty fun in its own sort of way. So the big kids you know went out and got to like you know, there's something, maybe this is something worth unpacking on its own. There's something. The tactile piece of like peeling off ice from things is very similar to like I used to play with my mom's candles growing up and I just wanted to, like, pick the wax off the candles.

Jess: 2:54

Yes, exact same, and my kids have that too. They could not wait to go outside and I was like it's not safe to walk, you will fall. But then I realized they're not geriatric patients, they're children. That's probably fine, you will fall. But then I realized they're not geriatric patients, they're children. That's probably fine, but still.

Lisa: 3:08

Who also fall all the time anyway for no ice reasons. Right, right, very true, yeah, I just I sent them packing. I was like you guys enjoy, like there was a, there was a big part of me that was totally like validated by their, their joy, and like picking the ice off the trees and the grill and the car and I was like you go, you guys just do it.

Jess: 3:28

I was very happy for them that is, I think, earlier this week. You said to me I've had a day, a month, a week and a year. This, yes, today today.

Lisa: 3:40

yes, it is I, and that's never been true for me in this. In that same way, I mean the friends theme song immediately comes up when I when I said that Because I never, but I didn't it didn't really mean anything to me when it was on friends, when I was a kid, and I was like, when it hasn't been your day, your week, your month or year, I'm like, okay, you know, when you're having a hard time like this, this month of month of January, this week, this, all of this has truly been like. It has felt like one test after another yeah, it really has.

Jess: 4:14

I, for myself, I was reflecting that. I think we talked about how I was giving myself maybe a little bit of a slower start into January because we had so many people visiting in December and I just wanted to give myself space against this constant pressure, this constant barrage of get it done, productivity, all of those things that are happening. And when I stopped and I just didn't work for a little while, I felt all of that settle and I realized that I had created the sense of urgency and therefore I was also able to moderate that sense of urgency a little bit more. And so I have been using January as all of the things that I promised to do in December, that was, we'll circle back after the new year. There was a lot of circling back in January and then this first week of February.

Jess: 5:07

So for those who have not caught on or have, who we did not explain it to, we're recording this month before we release it. So it's still currently February for end of the first week of February, and we uh it all of the things that I promised to do in January have been crammed into this week. So it has just been an incredibly busy week. And then on top of that we've had snow days and half days and the end of the marking period and illness, and so it's just one curveball kind of after the other curveball. And I'm trying to maintain that sense of you are in charge of your sense of urgency. So you could turn it down if you need to and also, but I'm really itching to get stuff done. I can't put stuff on pause for forever. I've made commitments.

Lisa: 5:58

Well, exactly, that's been kind of like a fun thing for me too, because there are certain things that, regardless of the week you're having, they don't. They don't disappear Like just because you're having a hard week. For example, my daughter's third birthday, my youngest third birthday is tomorrow. That's not going to change, regardless of what else is going on in my life. So there still has to be all of the things you know that that happen around, that which, luckily for us, is not that extreme, because we don't usually celebrate birthdays in big, enormous fashion, but you know the gifts and the getting the stuff to send to school and all of that. So it's just, and I had to make a cake, like in between meetings today, which was fun. I'm like, well, it has to happen. Like someone has to make a cake. So so, yeah, I, I completely feel it, I am, I am one of my special gifts. I think on this planet is creating a false sense of urgency about things. So I completely feel that.

Jess: 6:55

Yeah, yeah. It's hard to stay aware of it in the moment and and then make intentional choices based on that. I'm sure that something else will come up and kind of take its place, because I volunteered as cookie mom.

Lisa: 7:10

So for our Girl Scout troops. I still can't believe you did that. I mean, I have to imagine there was just not a world where you understood what the undertaking was there.

Jess: 7:20

Yeah, I was thinking the beginning of the year is going to be the time when I can definitely do that. It's a lot of work. So, you know, props to all of the Girl Scout cookie volunteers who have really made it a pretty seamless process, and also, yikes, is it a big commitment.

Lisa: 7:41

I just assume that, like every year, it changes because they're betting on one person who doesn't understand the full scope of work that is required and they go. Oh, I can do that.

Jess: 7:52

Right, that person was me. I was that person this year and, to be fair, I can do it. I can, I am super, I am capable, I am organized. I am probably a great person to do this.

Lisa: 8:06

You're a fantastic person, absolutely. I have no doubt of that. I just it's so much to take on, it's so much, it's just a lot. As a former Girl Scout actually kind of current Girl Scout, because I have a lifetime Girl Scout whatever membership Sounds weird, it sounds like a Costco thing. As a lifetime Girl Scout and you know 13 years doing it, I can tell you I fully can empathize with the amount of work that you're currently up to. So, yeah, that's life. It is Bless you for doing it. I'm sure everyone in your entire county is very glad that Jess Yoakum is alive.

Jess: 8:46

Just my service unit. It's not even my whole county, I know, I know it's just like the layers that you don't. I didn't realize how many layers there were to to unpack and to understand which system talks to which system.

Lisa: 9:01

To truly unpack, as in like thousands and thousands of boxes. Yes, to truly unpack.

Jess: 9:06

I, I didn't have quite thousands of boxes, but I had many.

Lisa: 9:11

Yeah, many, many, many absolutely almost a thousand, I think I'm, I'm very, I'm very hopeful um anticipating a much better week next week, a much smoother week next week, although it is meant to snow, I think. Almost better week next week, a much smoother week next week, although it is meant to snow, I think, almost every day next week. So, you know, we might still need the same level of extreme patience and care with ourselves that we were going to, that we had to deploy this week. You know, we might even need more. I don't know. I guess we'll find out if we have the reserves or not.

Jess: 9:41

Yeah. So it's interesting you said that. You said it that way because that's actually kind of what I want to unpack today. Let's do it if that's okay. So my word this year is patience, and I have been kind of trying to lean into that where I can. And another thing that I we've already kind of touched on in today's episode is the sense of urgency and where it comes from. I know I was a super overachiever. I can still see those tendencies, even as I deal with this Girl Scout cookie stuff, of really trying to go the extra mile to make sure that it's a smooth process for the parents. And then I caught myself and I said wait a second, why am I making this more complicated? That is more work for me to do if I have shifts and now I need to make sure that every shift in the cookie booth is filled, you know, as an example. So that's that's kind of some background of where this unpacking comes from.

Jess: 10:43

My daughters had their, we had their parent-teacher conferences this past week and the feedback for one of my daughters was kind of along the lines of going above and beyond or going the extra mile, and the feedback was I would like to see her work, to check her writing or to check her math work after she's done, and she just really doesn't want to. She gets done with her work and then she sits very politely, attentively, she pulls out her book, she does whatever. She's not a disruption in the class. But her teacher would like to see her go more, to do more, even just revisiting story details in a story that she's writing. She wants more sensory details and I so I recognize that this is first. I think she has an amazing teacher. I mean, one of the best teachers I've ever seen in my life is her teacher.

Jess: 11:50

But I just I felt when I heard that feedback, I had such a visceral reaction from the overachiever inside me that has just been working so hard to not overachieve on everything because of the stress that it places and for her, I don't want her. I think if she works her hardest, it is going to be way more than enough. I want her to know what enough is, because so much of the work I do with my clients, with myself, is finding enough. It ties into even what the expectations are, because I think if we went to her and said you are expected to check your work after you do it, then she would do it, but she's. It's like she's getting this. The goalpost is moving and that's what she's reacting to and she's like, nope, not going to do it. She thinks in her heels reacting to and she's like, nope, not going to do it. She thinks in her heels.

Lisa: 13:05

So, yeah, I think a very human reaction to that is to say like I did the thing, I achieved the thing, and now you're saying that I need to achieve more because I'm capable of more. I remember this. I remember this from my childhood too, because I am, I think. I think you can divide. I think at least common knowledge is you divide people up into kind of like overachievers and then gifted, and they're totally different skill sets. One is like intellectually deep down, they are just like the intelligence level and the capabilities in terms of thought process and memory, and all of that is just higher. And then the high achievers that would be my category are the people who truly have something to prove and they really want to like go out of their way to be those things. And I think you are probably both. It sounds like.

Jess: 13:54

Right. That was maybe something we can unpack another time of what it means to be gifted, because I always I kind of shirked that label because I thought it was me saying, oh, I'm so much smarter than other people. But that's not what it is. It's about the intensity that you experience the world and events, the way that you can connect information and dots, and I know that that is a strength of mine and I think for me.

Jess: 14:19

Growing up, I was pushed to be to my potential, which was wonderful in and of itself, though a very lonely experience in other ways, and then I didn't know when to slow down or when to stop or when to not take on more, because it was just a way to learn more things and just have more novelty and and all of that. So, uh, it's, it's really tough. And I see in my daughter I think she is also gifted, gifted learner in a different way than I experienced learning growing up. But she, I just don't want her to have that same baggage. And then I'm wondering am I overreacting because I have this kind of visceral experience, or do I just need to like let it play out and give her the feedback and let her find out what enough, what her level of effort needs to be to meet the expectation, while also empowering her to say it seems like the goalpost is moving.

Lisa: 15:34

Yeah, and and I I mean truly, you know there's so there's so many layers to this, but do you think, because you were pushed in that way, it made you better? Or do you think it made you anxious or have some other sort of like maybe not so positive reaction to it? And that's what you're you're trying to avoid for your daughter is like having a negative reaction. You want so like this is the trick right, because we want to, you know, bring our kids to points where they can develop grit and resilience and all of those types of things. But we don't want to have those negative outcomes and we're more, we're just more keenly aware of all of those circumstances than any generation before us has ever been. And so my question to you is when those additional pressures were put on you because you were capable of so much more, do you think you rose to that and therefore did expand your capabilities, or did you rise to that and develop kind of maybe not so healthy coping mechanisms on top of it?

Jess: 16:37

Certainly the latter.

Jess: 16:40

And I would say most of that pressure was self-generated, probably because I wanted to outperform my brother, I wanted to earn my parents' love and affection.

Jess: 16:54

I thought that if I was really really good in this school because they told me I was so smart that I would you know, I don't know have that kind of there was kind of a conflation of worth and achievement, and I know that I am not unique in that experience.

Jess: 17:12

No, yeah, and so I'm trying to be really intentional with my daughter as not conflating worth and achievement and modeling that for her. And so when I hear that feedback, I don't know if I'm reacting to oh, there's still a lot of work to do in this way, or if maybe a little nudge in that direction would be good, because she has so much potential. But also, I just want her to do the things that I want her to do, enough of the things that are required and then pursue the things that bring her joy, because that is what I. She has so many interests, she's an artist, she's a writer, and so I want her to be able to pursue those things, knowing that she checked the box. It's like she did the thing and now she gets to go and have a little treat by doing something that engages that creative mind.

Lisa: 18:14

Yeah, I think there's two different paths here that you can take. You can take the path of sort of looking at your past as a basis and a platform on which you raise your kids. And also there's this question of do you want to raise children who are successful or do you want to raise children who are whole people and which is more important and which is, you know? Maybe, ideally, of course, you want all the things you know. Maybe, maybe that's the you know the real answer, but but I think generally we tend to fall down on one of those sides of like do we want the whole people who know that there's so much more than just success in a certain area, or do we want, do we want them to rise to that very, very high potential and your, your children are very, very, you know potential. You know, I don't know there's, there's so much that they can do because they are so gifted and so they have such great genes. I'll say that, you know, I think so, sure, sure.

Jess: 19:21

I think the answer to that question is I want to raise people who are confident in what success looks like for them and to have that self-confidence of knowing that they are enough and that they have done enough for whatever. That requirement is, and my daughter is probably not developed enough in her brain for me to start talking in these layers of abstraction with her.

Lisa: 19:53

Yes, I was just going to say that because I fall into the same trap with my kids. I will say, like oh, the perfect is the enemy of the good. And they're like what, what am I supposed to take from that? You know, it's a huge lesson that I learned as an adult, that took me years and that I wished I had known earlier. But could I have known it earlier?

Lisa: 20:14

And I think that's the real question is like, maybe there's some amount of this that, like in our own time and pace, we have to understand these concepts through the real learning of it and living it and application of it, rather than your parents, who are in your case. You know, you guys are brilliant people whom you know your kids adore, but you know there's certain amounts of this that's going to have to be figuring out themselves. And so I feel like there is definitely a bigger piece of this, that is, your personal story and wanting to make sure that the traps that were sort of unknowingly set for you, that you fell into because we do, we are and and we do that you don't lay those same traps unknowingly for your children and or at least, if the traps are there, that you give them the materials to build the walkway that goes across them, and it gives them the option to walk across rather than fall in right, it's.

Jess: 21:14

It's, I think, part recognizing that my daughter is a different person than me and so she's experiencing this a little bit differently, and my role in this way is not to protect her from all of the potential pitfalls, as you said, but to give her the tools to move on.

Jess: 21:34

And so maybe what I need to do with this as I'm delivering this feedback, because I have not given her the feedback yet is to help her see what the expectation is, so that she can feel really confident that she is meeting expectations, which I think builds her confidence and builds her self-confidence, because she does want to do well and she trusts the adults in her life. And then I mean we. When I was growing up, it was absolutely expected that we would go to college, that we would be successful in quotes people successful in quotes people and part of that is because my mom worked so hard to get to where she was. She did not. I think she didn't want any of that momentum to go to waste or to be squandered. I don't know if that's fair. I could be putting words in her mouth there.

Lisa: 22:34

But so If that makes sense, right, like that's part of the reason why we achieve if we have kids is to ensure a successful, you know path for them to follow. I mean that you're right. You would have to talk to her to know that for sure. But I mean, sounds, sounds like a decent guess.

Jess: 22:50

Yeah, and I think when we were, when I and my siblings were coming up, that kind of, was that there were not so many paths of building success. It was you go into trade work, which is perfectly fine, or you go into a you know more academic or thinking work, and that is also fine.

Jess: 23:14

But but now there are so many different things in between and I also think we experienced a really big shift during the pandemic, when things shut down and we all got hobbies, and then we realized that those hobbies actually kind of made us happy and that not everything needed to be work, work, work all the time. But I don't know, maybe that's just my, my echo chamber that has that has felt that way no, I think there there is some amount of collective amnesia about that now.

Lisa: 23:48

Um, I don't hear nearly as much about that when, when we were in the midst of covid it was, there was so much kind of like aha moments going on and and now you kind of they've, all you know slowly faded.

Lisa: 23:57

Now you kind of they've, all you know, slowly faded away because we're back to business as usual.

Lisa: 24:03

But I think I do want to acknowledge something too, as you're talking, which is that the way that you're thinking about this and the mindful approach that you're taking to this, the fact that it's hard, just means you're doing a great job as a parent.

Lisa: 24:22

You know, if you were not thinking about this, if you like, if this wasn't on your mind, then that would be a very different parenting style than what you've chosen to adopt, which is this incredibly mindful, incredibly supportive way of approaching your children. And so I do want to take a moment to kind of like pause, acknowledge the hardness that is what you're going through with this feedback for her, and also acknowledge the fact that, like you're a great mom, because you really care about these little moments that are seemingly I mean, how easy would it be to like get the teacher's feedback, bring it to her, give it to her, move on with it. So I mean, how easy would it be to like get the teacher's feedback, bring it to her, give it to her, move on with it. It's so I mean that's, that's fine, it's fine Right.

Jess: 25:04

It would totally be fine.

Lisa: 25:06

You are ironically overachieving.

Jess: 25:13

You know, as parents, becky Kennedy.

Jess: 25:16

Dr Becky Kennedy talks a lot about the fast forward button, and that's definitely a play for me here where I think, gosh, what kind of message am I giving to her about who gets to decide what is important, if I just kind of pass this along and the truth is, these are drops in a bucket. No one of these moments is going to make or break that. I think what was so weird about this is the reaction that I had when I heard the feedback. This is the reaction that I had when I heard the feedback and I was just I. I, I re. It made me realize that my own work is not done, because I mean, even as we've talked about the temptation to overachieve or to spill into into working harder is just so great, and so it's. It's a good reminder for me to be as mindful as I am in how I approach this with my kids, I need to be mindful in how I approach it with myself, because what I'm modeling speaks way louder than the words that I give to them. Yeah, oh.

Lisa: 26:33

I mean orders of magnitude more truly, that is what they will become, is what they see modeled for them. So, in that way, I think your mindfulness about yourself and your time and we talked about this last week but your schedule and how you approach taking care of yourself, that's a new paradigm for you. That's not a paradigm that was modeled for you, for you. That's not a paradigm that was modeled for you. So you are already doing some of that work. You're doing it for yourself, but there is a pass down of that that's happening, which is that you have to take care of that whole person, and not just the success part, not just the job part, not just the wife part, not just the mom part. You have to take care of that whole person and that your kids are going to see that and they're going to completely, without trying to be so much closer to that and hopefully, you know, I know you and I have talked about this, but like we want our kids to be better than we are, we want to just be the floor that they start from and just boomerang from there, but and I thinkerang from there, but um, and I think, I think you're doing that. So maybe that's not, you know, especially helpful, that I think that you're doing an awesome job, but but I do, and I think you are. I think you're so much closer than you realize and the fact that you had this visceral moment with this feedback is is just proof that you have is just proof that you have.

Lisa: 27:58

You've gone through a lot, that you have gotten through a lot and that, when you look at where you are now versus where you were in high school, when you had all these expectations heaped on you and you were told to constantly, constantly do more and do better and do greater and do further, because you had all this potential, and now you're, as an adult, reflecting on that time and saying I mean, it's hard to separate, but you quit your job and opened your own business and bet on yourself and are constantly proving that you are more every single day than you were the day before. I mean, I think there's some amount of this and there's some amount of this in your kids too, probably. That is just. You are just an exceptional person and they are exceptional little people who are going to do exceptional things regardless of what adults around them tell them is important, and that's exactly the message right Is that you get to determine, because everything you do is going to be amazing. You get to determine what of those things define you.

Jess: 29:02

Thank you for all of the affirmations. I used to really worry about that because I wanted to be the best mom that I could be for my kids and there's some pretty interesting research that says being the best parent is actually not that much better than just not being a bad parent. I'll have to see if I can find the quote on that, but it has relieved a lot of pressure, Just remembering that. You know, I'm not trying to completely change the color of the water in the cup. I'm not trying to erase everything. What is that phrase? Solution through dilution or something. It's like you clear out the there's this video.

Lisa: 29:56

Oh, yeah, yeah yeah, it's like you clear out the there's this video.

Jess: 29:57

Oh yeah, yeah yeah, yeah, with particulate matter in the cup and the person just kept adding more and more and more water and eventually it clears up. So I think I can recognize the journey within myself, even since my oldest was a baby.

Lisa: 30:24

I mean, just thinking in the last six years, how much that has changed since she was a toddler, not a baby, but yeah, yeah, I think there's. There's a lot of success already baked in there and I think it's worth noting. And, and I think it's, it's so good that, on behalf of your kids, you kind of get these, these prickles from the past, you know, and say like, I think, I think it's, I think our memory is, is our one of our greatest assets, because then we don't, we're not doomed to repeat the same things, you know, without our memories we would just be making the same mistakes over and over and over again.

Jess: 31:00

I think you're right about that. It's also hard, though, I think, sometimes being hyper focused on memories. You know I think I'll zoom back to an event and it. It feels so crystal clear to me and I realized probably my kid doesn't remember that at all because it happened before she was five and so she might've remembered it for some period of time and then it's almost certainly gone. There's just the feeling of it that stays.

Lisa: 31:34

Yeah, that's such a funny, interesting part of being a human is that like that missing, just missing whole sections, and the longer you live, the more you miss, yeah, and the more it's just gone, except for you. You have an amazing memory that I'm so jealous of, because you remember more about my life than I remember most of the time.

Jess: 31:55

I do have a freakishly good memory, but it is. I think it is a fallacy that I remember everything because I don't. I forget large, large chunks of time that were not memorable to me, and so that's really. I have to keep that perspective too. That just because I mean I talked to one mom and she was feeling pretty down about herself because she couldn't remember a lot of her, her child's childhood. She was working, moving across the country during the pandemic, and I thought about it and I was like you probably can't remember a lot of your life, so why is it that that those moments stick out as so much more important, at least to the point where she felt like she needed to beat herself up for not being able to remember those things?

Lisa: 32:50

So and they're just such good memories we want to hold on to them. But we know, I mean, if you're, if you're a mom, you know. So much of that is just gone. I went over to a friend's house after she had a baby a couple of years ago and I brought them dinner and we sat down, the four of us, and we had a nice time and I said you guys know you're never going to remember that this happened right, because they were two weeks into parenthood and they're like no, no, no, no, no, We'll totally remember.

Jess: 33:18

I remember that it happened. I remember which friend. Yes, I remember that dinner.

Lisa: 33:23

you know, you know the dinner and I guarantee you that they won't remember it, because there there's, just when you become a parent, there's whole chunks that just disappear and it sucks because it's one of the best times of your life and it's also hard and sleep deprived and lots of other things, but exactly and a really good well, thanks.

Lisa: 33:41

Thanks for unpacking that, and yeah, I want to hear I want to hear back, and probably listeners want to hear back, like how the full circle moment that this was, you know, from receiving it to giving it and kind of all that.

Jess: 33:54

Yeah, I will. I'll do my best, we'll see. Sounds good. Switching gears yeah, what are we unpacking for you today?

Lisa: 34:06

well, I have kind of you know we're we're playing with formatting and and what we, how we unpack and what we unpack. So I thought I'd bring um in our second episode here. A little bit of a weird one, okay, I love weird things, yeah. So in general, the sort of the TLDR is unpacking stress, particularly my stress, as I mentioned at the top of the show. It's been a week, it's been a month, it's been a year. Lots of stress, lots of stressful things from various places. And I was really interested in how my stress shows up in my life, how it manifests in my life, because I have gotten better over the years, especially the last couple of years, at being able to shake off certain things and be able to focus on the things I can control, and just better at managing stress in general. I think this is a gift of maybe the late 30s that you get for living this long is you get to sort of manage some of this stuff a little bit better. But occasionally it will start to really kind of build up in the system and it comes out. My hypothesis is in different people different ways. So I created an escalation matrix of how stress is represented physically in my body and then I sort of broke it down into categories. So I'm unpacking the manifestations of stress and hopefully, what I'd like to kind of get to today is are there some clear antidotes to these different categories that I can start addressing and be able to when I sense the escalation, that I'm on the escalation path of stress? How do I disrupt, how do I intercept these, these various things? So I will, I'll go through them now and then I so I'll share, I'll share the escalation path as it shows up and then I'll kind of break it down into the categories. So actually, I lied, I'm going to do it the other way. I'm going to tell you the categories first, because I think it's easier. Okay, so, category one this is sort of the lowest level of stress that I'm experiencing, stress and I haven't been able to fully shake it off, and so I'm starting on the path.

Lisa: 36:37

The first category is distract. So I initially start and this is almost entirely subconscious I start with distracting myself. Social media is the first one that I go to, and I know this because it's the first thing that I do when I'm avoiding something even slightly unpleasant. I will open a social media app and I will find myself there, just there, and I don't even know, like why, like why. Why did I pick up my phone? Why did I go to this social media and start scrolling right now and usually I'm able to trace that back to because you're supposed to write an email right now that you don't want to write, you know? It's something like that. So distract is the first category. The second category is soothe. So now we're moving up in escalation, now I move to soothing myself in some sort of way. Distracting didn't work, now it's time to soothe myself.

Lisa: 37:35

And then the final category is spiral. This is when I have truly lost control of my stress. It is on top of me. I am getting choked out by it in some way or another. So, breaking it down a little bit further, in the distract category we have social media distraction. We have sort of online shopping where I'll like go to the Amazon app and just open it up and go to the homepage. I'm not looking for something in particular, or maybe I do have something that I'm sort of, you know, toying with the idea of buying. But I will find myself in that app and immediately, you know, be looking around, just noodling about and other forms of productive avoidance would kind of go into this category as well. So you know, oh, I don't want to do this thing, or you know, I'm stressed about doing this thing. Let me go do something. That's easy, it might even be unpleasant to do, but it's not the thing that I need to do, right? So I'll go put in a load of laundry or I'll go unload the dishes. I'm doing something productive but I'm not doing what I'm supposed to be doing. So that goes into that distract category.

Lisa: 38:49

Into the soothe category we have the time tested sugar addiction. That comes in where the cravings for sugar, especially, you know the cravings for sugar, especially, you know, gummy candy that's kind of my Achilles heel, those those start to creep into more and more of my like daily life and I'll notice that as I'm getting more stressed, as I'll start to notice those cravings start to like uptick and that's in that soothe like I'm looking to soothe something. Another one, this is I could tell a much longer story about this, but I have been a nail biter since I was roughly two or three years old. I was a thumb sucker. I was given an ultimatum or I was given maybe a bribe Maybe that's a better word that if I stopped sucking my thumb I would get the millennial classic Polly pocket. Oh yes, I took that deal. I took that deal right away and immediately the next day started biting my nails. So the oral fixation game was still afoot and remained so for the rest of my days. So I will start doing that as like a soothing mechanism On to the spiral. Now we're like next level. None of those things have worked. The soothing didn't work, the distracting didn't work. We're moving up.

Lisa: 40:16

I will get songs stuck in my head and they will repeat and repeat, and repeat. Usually only four or five bars I'm talking like the tiniest part of a song. And I think there's a difference. When you have an earworm song that has recently been played and you're like, or whatever, and it's just kind of in your head, this is different. This is pathological. It is there to destroy you right?

Jess: 40:44

It's like the jingles and inside out to sugar free gum, whatever, yeah right, yeah exactly yes, and I.

Lisa: 40:54

They will play night and day, even when I'm sleeping, and that is a surefire sign that I'm in the spiral is a surefire sign that I'm in the spiral and phrases are is the next level of the spiral. So, beyond songs, I will get a word or a phrase that will just repeat and repeat and repeat in my brain. I had one the other day as I'm in all of this crazy stressful month and year of my life. It was I can't remember what it was now, what it is now, but it was some paleolithic era the name of that era, which I'm not in any way in that line of work, so I have no reason to have that stuck in my head and that it was like the Mesozoic era or something like that was stuck in my head and would just repeat like the mesozoic area or something like that was stuck in my head and would just repeat, repeat, repeat back and forth, over and over and over again.

Lisa: 41:49

And then the final level of the spiral is auditory hallucinations, where I just start to hear things that aren't there, and this usually comes with some level of sleep deprivation, and there's obviously there's a lot of, there's a lot of things that go into this, but the extreme stress and the sleep deprivation kind of go on top of each other. So that is what I've mapped out, what I have done, some pre unpacking for your benefits In the last week you've done a lot of unpacking.

Jess: 42:21

I would say even having an awareness that there is an escalation path is in and of itself remarkable, because I think probably most people do not have that level of conscious awareness that they're experiencing stress. Yeah, something I thought was interesting is it seems like there's kind of a big gap between soothe and spiral. That spiral it's it seems like fail-safe mechanisms are firing on at that point, whereas soothe I mean you kind of have your own little feedback loop. That's happening especially with sugar, because then you you're eating more sugar, so you're craving more sugar. Of course you're craving more sugar. Of course you know that's that's going to continue. You said in the beginning, when you wanted to unpack, that you were kind of looking for ways to disrupt. It seems like you had some, some inclinations in there. What's coming up for you with that?

Lisa: 43:20

Well, I think, I think, ideally there's going to.

Lisa: 43:23

There's always some amount of stress, stress that's going to kind of come into my life.

Lisa: 43:28

If I can interrupt prior to the spiral phase and save myself the sleep, it's less likely to continue to increase and perpetuate itself. Because obviously, when you're in the spiral category, the other ones are still true, you're still doing all of the things, you're just, it's being, it's an adding or multiplying, it's not an either or so all of those things are still at that point true and I don't think any of them are productive, like I'm not, I'm not, you know, it's not the kind of stress relief or stress kind of dealing with that you end up getting some sort of side or tangible benefit from. These are all objectively uncomfortable things and so if I can interrupt at the distract though that seems a little bit unlikely, maybe, I don't know it seems like it's a bit ambitious to think that I could interrupt the entire escalation path at the distract category, because it's pretty daily, at least for me, and maybe that's something else to unpack, but like there's always some amount of that happening in my life, mostly around my work, that I fall back on those habits.

Jess: 44:46

I wonder if, counterintuitively, the thing to do is to give yourself a brain break because you're at the distract stage. You notice that you're doing it. So there is some specific action that you could take. Yeah, even just something that I did when my kids were a lot younger, especially when I was home with them, is, every time I pick up my phone, I would say out loud why am I picking up my phone? I remember that and that did wonders because it brought that level of conscious awareness, and so I think you already have all of this awareness that's happening. What would happen if, when you, each time, you got in that new habit of I'm picking up my phone to scroll social media? What is that telling me about my stress levels right now?

Lisa: 45:38

Yeah Well, first I think I would probably laugh at myself. That's the first thing I would do.

Jess: 45:43

Which might also be a stress reliever. Yeah, that's not a bad thing.

Lisa: 45:46

That might work pretty well in my favor, because what I currently say is, within about probably 30 seconds, I go what are you doing, what is your purpose here? And so I'm sort of already doing that.

Jess: 46:08

So what? What would be something that you could do to kind of recognize when you're in that first level of distraction phase and pull yourself out of it?

Lisa: 46:19

I think I think you kind of hit it on the head. I think a brain break is probably the best thing I can do, I think. In particular, I love to walk and if time allows, I think it would be great to take even a five-minute walk outside, time and weather, I suppose, permitting. I don't get the same level of I don't know deep release from walking on a treadmill, but yeah, I think there's probably more to see with that. But I think the biggest thing was putting together this escalation and thinking it through and seeing these different things. I feel like it is going to be so much more recognizable to me now and I um, yeah, I don't. The soothe one is going to be tough. That's going to be the toughest one, because that's that's me giving myself what I want so that I can. It doesn't, but it doesn't reduce the stress, right, like it doesn't actually make the stress go away.

Lisa: 47:28

It just gives me some kind of like dopamine hit, which I guess distract us a little bit too sometimes too, but it gives me that like it's okay, you're going to be okay. Look here you have this favorite thing, you love this thing. Doesn't that make you happy?

Jess: 47:47

I think you're hitting on kind of the insidious nature of these coping mechanisms, which is that all of them are rooted in something some desire to make yourself feel better.

Lisa: 48:00

Yeah.

Jess: 48:01

Something that just came to me. When you said walk, I realized you started off by describing these things as happening in your body, but most of what you experience is in your mind, and so I wonder if maybe the body break, maybe that's your mind saying. Something is happening in the body that needs to be released right now and that's just the psychological manifestation of the physical stress that your body's taking in.

Lisa: 48:36

Yeah, I mean, yeah, these are definitely things to try out. I think I'm going to have to do some more research on myself, but I love knowing myself a little bit better. I think that's a really fun thing to do at the stage of your life where you feel like you're always growing, always getting better, but you're learning about who you truly are as well, and so it's this push-pull of, like growth, mindset and internal knowledge at the same time.

Jess: 49:14

Exactly. Yeah, that's such a good way to put it, and I don't know about you, but for me it's. And I don't know about you, but for me it's almost. I kind of it's like shining a light on the fact that not everybody processes these things in the same way, yeah, and so we're so used to it. We're like, oh yeah, that's the thingamabob that I use for the thing, so I don't forget my keys. And people are like, why don't you just put your keys in the thing? Oh, oh, wow, I guess that was an easy thing that I could have been doing. So it's. I love kind of bringing that to light and validating your own experience in how you experience stress. I can say I don't think I experience stress in that way. Distraction is definitely part of it and distraction is definitely part of it, but it also means that whatever you are going to find that will help you soothe and come back to that state of being regulated and not stressed is also going to have to be unique for you.

Lisa: 50:19

Yeah, exactly.

Jess: 50:25

And I look forward to kind of figuring out a little bit more about that.

Lisa: 50:32

Yeah, so I wonder if anybody else has created an escalation path for their stress. The only people I could imagine that have done this would be Gretchen Rubin and her sister, elizabeth on the Happier podcast. That that the only people that I could imagine that would have gone. Gone through this level of effort, yeah, but but I do, I do like knowing myself better and I think I'm I'm just able to show up better for myself when I know myself a little bit better.

Jess: 50:57

So right and and you have given yourself so many different concrete cues to recognize and and try different things. When you are wanting to disrupt that cycle, then you can just experiment with it, Exactly.

Lisa: 51:14

So I will also report back. Yeah, we're doing a lot of that, but no, I am. I'm so grateful for this time that I get to spend with you and just having this space, and I just hope that you know it, even if one person goes oh my gosh, I I get phrases stuck in my head too. I thought I was the only person. That was weird like that. Like you're not the only person, because there's at least one other person and that person is me. It's weird like that. Like you're not the only person, because there's at least one other person and that person is me. So exactly, Exactly.

Jess: 51:47

I love that. Well, thanks for unpacking today. Yeah, thank you. I hope that the weekend is not filled with sickness and strep and whatever else is going on in your family.

Lisa: 52:02

Likewise, Likewise. No, I'm I'm looking forward to this weekend. I'm looking forward to more unpacking with you next week.

Jess: 52:10

Okay, can't wait. All right, love you, love you Bye.

Lisa: 52:17

Bye stories to share from our hearts to your ears. Lots to unpack there. Tune in every week you won't want to miss. Dive deep into life with jess and lisa. I remembered what it was that was stuck in my head.

Jess: 53:07

What was it?

Lisa: 53:10

The Pliocene Epoch. But here's the weird thing it's the word epoch or epoch or whatever, but I've also heard it said epic. So have I Right and I don't know why, I don't know why it's epic when, like, the word is epoch. Either way, I think that's why it was stuck in my head, because of that weird like affect with the word epic that is sometimes epoch. I don't know, I don't know. It's weird.