Why Intentions Calm An Anxious Mind And Create Real Change

Ready to stop bracing for the other shoe to drop and start feeling guided instead of judged by your to-do list? We explore a simple but powerful shift: trading brittle, outcome-obsessed goals for gentle intentions that regulate your nervous system, expand your options, and create real change without the pressure to prove.

We start with the body. Say goal and notice where you tense. Say intention and feel what opens. That somatic difference isn’t semantics—it’s your nervous system deciding whether growth will feel like a threat or a homecoming. We unpack why anxious, high-achieving minds often feel trapped in conditional safety—I’ll be okay once I get there—and how that bargain fuels vigilance, sleep without rest, and chronic overthinking. Then we dismantle the inherited myth of control (thanks, checklists) and replace it with a foundation of self-created safety that makes learning and flexibility possible.

From there, we get practical. You’ll hear three daily intentions you can borrow, scripts to regulate before reacting, and a step-by-step way to translate hard-edged goals into humane orientations. We connect the science—regulation builds cognitive flexibility—with the spiritual—allowing aligns you with flow—so action becomes steadier and more creative. If decision fatigue, people-pleasing, and anxious perfectionism keep you stuck, this conversation offers a grounded path forward that’s kind to your body and honest with your mind.

Want a simple next step? Grab the PDF from the show notes to turn your goals into intentions, then check in with your body: does it open or brace? If this resonated, subscribe, share with a friend who needs gentler growth, and leave an honest review—tell us the intention you’re choosing this week.

Get the PDF Guide Here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1FCJ5qIp2TW5z3MDwurhmcFGPdr_UZSAH/view?usp=sharing

Thanks for listening!

Connect with me on instagram: @theburnedoutb

I'd love for you to message me what you thought, what it made you think about, your reflections, and of course what’s been coming up for your or causing you anxiety lately. I will never share your name or info unless you say it’s okay!

Chapters

• 0:00 Tempo: 120.0

Transcript

Tempo: 120.0

SPEAKER_01 0:06

Hi, I'm Nicole. And if you leave it here, it's not an accident. It means that you're ready for something to shift in your life. For the butter, this is a space to have real conversations. Regulate your nervous system. I feel more clear. Without my house saving your overthinking, we're excited. So unclench your job. Unclench your stomach. And let's begin. Hi and welcome back. I'm Nicole, your host of Unclenched Conversations, which is a burned-out bee production. And so if you have been working yourself into the ground, you little worker bee, or if you have anxious thoughts, OCD thoughts, ADD thoughts, ADHD thoughts, you're in the right spot. And you're in the right spot for this specific conversation. Now, with the new year, which by the way, I love an even year 2026. So excited. But with any new year, we do some reflecting. And I've been doing some reflecting. I've been doing some thinking about okay, like what's different for me this year than it was last year, besides the fact that last year was an odd year. This one's an even one, and I like this one much better already. We like to a lot of the times think about our goals from the last year. What did we achieve? Where did we fall flat, so to speak? And we probably don't really want to think about what we abandoned on January 17th, because then we're just going to beat ourselves up for it. And we're not here for that. Now, I've got to tell you that my reflections this year feel entirely different than they did last year. And that's because I'm an entirely different person this year than I was last year. And uh, in case you're wondering where am I not feeling this energy change, well, we're not quite to the Chinese New Year yet. And so we're still shedding a little bit of this last year of the snake before we then move into the year of the horse and the transformation that that is going to bring to all of us. The horse is so transformative. So when we're thinking about this next year and all of the promise that it holds, because it's going to be fantastic, I want you to think about how I am setting myself up for this. You might be surprised. Now, chances are that you have probably been surrounded by talk of goals, and that probably started on December 26th. New goals, big goals, stretch goals, crush it goals. And y'all listen, there is nothing inherently wrong with goals. Like we should all have something that we aspire to. Maybe all be so lucky to have something to aspire to. Now let's start with the difference between what is a goal versus an intention. And then I am not talking about the intellectual one, right? Like your mind is an asshole, your mind screws with everything. We want to start listening to our bodies, our essence. Okay, so do this with me. Say the word goal out loud. Goal. Do it again and notice what happens in your body. Goal. For a lot of us, and especially if we are type A, if we are a perfectionist, if we are used to overfunctioning as humans, goals come with like a subtle tightening. For me, it's happening like literally right in, it's right below my belly button. And it just goes, it just kind of like squeezes in just a little bit. There's pressure with goals, there's proving with goals, there's striving with goals. And guess what? When we are looking to create a more meaningful and mindful existence, this is the opposite of help. A lot of times there's a voice underneath that that says this. It says, see if you identify with this, I'll be okay once I get there. That sentence is loaded. It is absolutely loaded. Holy smokes. What that says to me is that I am not okay until I achieve that goal. So then that puts into our subconscious, I'm I'm going to be okay if I hit that. And then our anxiety sits there and it cycles and cycles and cycles. And it goes, what if I don't? What if I don't?

SPEAKER_00 6:25

What if I don't? What if I don't? What if I don't?

SPEAKER_01 6:32

Okay, let's leave the goals for just a moment. And I want you to say the word intention. Intention. Does that feel different? It feels different to me. Okay, when I say intention, the way that I feel that in my body, it's in the same spot actually. Like it's in my stomach, but it feels like opening. Intentions open something. And here's the other really cool thing about intentions is that they orient rather than demanding. They point us in a direction rather than demanding. They guide rather than forcing. That feels a lot gentler, doesn't it? So this distinction matters so much, not just philosophically, but also biologically. You thought that I wasn't gonna get science in here. You were wrong. So why do goals backfire for anxious humans? Well, for anxious humans, goals activate the nervous system in a way that feels like I have something to prove. I need to get this right. If I don't follow through, this means something about me. Where goals unconsciously reinforce the belief that you are not yet enough, your safety is conditional upon meeting that goal. Rest comes after we achieve something. And uh y'all, that's exhausting. Are you exhausted? I'm exhausted thinking about it because what anxious humans need is definitely not more pressure, right? What we need is room to breathe, we need regulation. So, really, goals versus intention, it comes down to forcing versus allowing. And frankly, we could do the same thing with those two words. Say the word force. Did you feel that? Did you feel it in your jaw? Did you feel it in your shoulders? Did you feel it in your abdomen? It's gonna be somewhere in your body that you're feeling that word. Now say the word allow. There's space with the word allow. There's breath with the word allow. There's softening with a word allow. This is proof that your body already understands this distinction. So long before your mind does, because I know what my mind tells me, it tells me like, Nicole, it's just a word. Why are you getting so hung up on just a word? Well, because words are spells and like the things that we say and we think come they come true. Like every cell of your body is eavesdropping on you 100% of the time. The problem is, again, our body understands the distinction. But allowing also feels terrifying to a nervous system that's anxious. Why is that? Well, allowing feels a lot like a loss of control. It's like I'm letting something happen and I'm like not having my fingers in every single step of it. And I want my fingers in every single step of it. So where does this conditioning come from? Because I just wasn't born needing to have control over everything. Well, many of us were raised with a very specific and a very similar message, and especially by our boomer parents. Super sorry, mom. Like we've had this conversation, though. This is not a surprise. And it went something like this if you do all the right things, you follow the program, you work hard, you check the boxes, you'll be rewarded, you'll be taken care of. And that framework felt really safe. Like, oh, okay, all I have to do is XYZ, and then everything will be good. Great. I'm in. Sign me up. Because checklists feel safe, predictability feels safe. Effort feels like control. So, like when I'm efforting, I'm like, oh boy, I'm in control of this situation. No problem. And by the way, I'm gonna force my way through it. So we internalize this belief that, like, if I just do it right enough, well, then nothing bad will happen. Except for that's not actually how life works. And here's the truth it's really difficult to swallow.

SPEAKER_00 11:29

You can do everything right, and you could still get the short end of the stick. Are you mad at me for saying that? Because it's true.

SPEAKER_01 11:43

You can be responsible, be kind, you can follow the rules, you can work hard, you can make all the right choices, and you could still experience loss, disappointment, and chaos. Just think about anybody graduating from college right now, right? They kept their grades up, they got into college, they went, they did the work, they got their degree, and what's waiting for them? Not a job, not in this economy. They did everything right. They still experience that loss, that disappointment. They don't want to live in your basement. They really don't. They think you're so lame. And they're like, great, now I'm gonna live with my lame parents instead of being out there having a life where I can come home at 3 a.m. and nobody notices. Look, doing everything right and getting the short end of the stick, we gotta remove the thought that that's because we failed. You didn't. It's because the control was never real to begin with. That was manufactured and that was in your mind. And that realization can be really destabilizing because that control very, very much feels like safety. And this is where anxiety sneaks in. All of my anxious sisters here are going to 100% understand when I say that they are unconsciously waiting for the other shoe to drop all of the time. Even in the good times. We're like, oh, where is that other shoe? Like, it's gonna drop. I know it, I know it, I know it. Something's going to happen. This means that biologically, your body is living in a state of anticipatory threat. Like you are looking for where is that leopard that's gonna jump out and like bite me in the neck and like whoop dead. If you're constantly waiting for something bad to happen, your nervous system is never actually at rest. This is why you could sleep for a whole night, which a lot of us don't, but like you could sleep for a whole night and not feel rested. Because you weren't at you were asleep, but you were not actually resting. So here is what I would consider to be a key insight. There are other opinions. This one is mine. You cannot relax your way into allowing if your body believes that vigilance is what keeps you safe. So sitting there and telling yourself to relax, by the way, this is why a lot of anxious people have a hard time meditating. I have a class for that. Don't worry, we can get you meditating. Like I have never failed so far. You are not too anxious, you just have not had the right approach. So, why doesn't real change come from the external, from our checklist? Well, I did all of these actions in my physical reality. So, why isn't it working? This is also why our deeply ingrained patterns don't break from the outside. And more goals, better goals, out efforting yourself from last year isn't gonna fix it. More productivity won't fix it, more discipline won't fix it because it isn't a behavior problem. It's a relationship with self problem. Let me say that again. It's not a behavior problem, it's not an effort problem, it's not a discipline problem, it's not a productivity problem. It's a relationship with self problem. Now, breaking those patterns is 100% possible for you. It just requires turning inward and not to fix yourself. So get that right on out of your head. It's not to fix yourself, it's to reconnect with your true essence. This is where intentions come in. Because intentions aren't about the outcomes, they're about orientation. An intention might sound like I intend to meet myself with compassion. I intend to regulate before I react. I intend to notice what I'm forcing instead of allowing. I start my day every single day with three intentions. Here they are. I bring the intention to be the positive voice in my own head, to think kind thoughts about self and kind thoughts about others. So if you don't know what your intention is, borrow that one. It is an excellent starting point. This work is not comfortable. It's not comfortable because it requires honesty, but like not honesty with me. Like, don't think I'm sitting here waiting for you to be honest with me. You don't owe me that. You do owe yourself that. It requires that honesty of self to really look inside and and and be truthful, to be plain with yourself about like, oh good Lord, like this isn't cute. But I see we're doing that action that like I really don't want to do and it don't doesn't align with my values. And here I am noticing it. That's the work. This work requires slowing down a little bit so that you can notice. It requires feeling things that like maybe you've been outrunning a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 17:48

So yeah, buckle up.

SPEAKER_01 17:53

Because this is also where freedom lives. And from a scientific standpoint, regulation creates cognitive flexibility. It helps your neurons map together in your head, it helps you see different options. And my favorite way to describe it is it helps you see possibilities that, like, frankly, like when you're not there, when you're not regulated, it's like you're one of those horses with the blinders on. They put those on so the horse doesn't get distracted. And you're staying focused with your little blinders on on the one pathway that you, that your anxiety mind can see through an obstacle. If we take those blinders off, you're gonna look around and be like, holy shit. Why didn't anybody tell me there were all these options out here and all these different ways that I could achieve my goals? So here's another reason that I like intentions more than goals. A goal assumes that there's a specific way to get there. Yeah, I'm here to tell you there is no one way to do anything ever. Even in science, we can get to the same conclusion about seven different ways most of the time. Safety allows us to learn and to change. And y'all, like I'm just gonna say it. Nobody's gonna give you that safety. No one's gonna come and save you. Nobody is gonna fix your surroundings or your external or your job or your life. Nobody is going to do that for you. Like, that's a movie. That's not real. You have to do that for yourself. And yes, it feels like a lot of work. But it's also like the work that you're gonna feel like was the most worthwhile of your entire life. That is a promise I can 100% make. You having a mindful awareness is what will interrupt unconscious patterns. So, like, once you do. The work of slowing down and noticing the rest really just kind of falls like dominoes because your subconscious does the work. You go, Oh, I saw myself do that. Your subconscious then goes along and kind of like fills out the rest of the story for you. So the next time that thing shows up, you're gonna be a step further down the path, you're gonna be a step more regulated, you're gonna already be taking a different action just because you noticed the one that you didn't like. It's freaking magic. From a spiritual standpoint, allowing aligns you with flow. So a lot of people, when they come to me, they're like, Yeah, I tried manifesting, didn't work. Oh, did you? How did you try it? Because when people come to me and they say, I'm anxious, I have ADD, I have ADHD, I have OCD. You're not fooling me. I know what's going on in your head. And it's a lot. We have to get back to that grounded space, that connection to self before we start to go do that work of manifesting. Okay. Okay. Like you've heard just as well as I had, like, you know, the uh oh my gosh, I almost just called it Braxton Hicks, Abraham Hicks. Don't tell them. We're leaving it in, but like, don't tell them. Um, I always say, like, just jump on the high energy, you know, wavelength. And like somebody with anxiety is like, I've never seen that one before. Like, what does it look like? Uh, I will show you what it looks like come to class. Our intentions actually shape our perceptions. And this is one of my husband's favorite sayings. He says, perception is reality. Well, yeah, it absolutely freaking is. Your intention shapes your perception. You are when you have that intention, you have put in your mind, this is where I want to go. And the cool thing about your mind is that it functions in the background. It's like, you know how now on the Google Chrome, it will kind of like turn off the tabs, like it won't keep the memory for the ones that you haven't used in a while. I only know this because I have a thousand different tabs open at any given time. Well, your brain isn't turning off the power to it. It's still functioning that entire time. It's still working that entire time. And so it's it's not conscious to you, but it's working things out for you, I promise. Like your brain is a Google search engine. We'll talk about it some other time. Let's come back to focus, Fox, because we're talking about intention, perception, and presence. Your presence in the moment with yourself that reconnects you to yourself, to your essence. Now, if you're wondering, if you're like, oh, I don't know, I think I'm pretty connected. Tell me five things you want right now. Tell me five of your most important values right now. When I was in the throws, in like the absolute pit of my anxiety, and I'm telling you this so that you don't have to feel like you're weird when you couldn't answer that last question immediately. I couldn't identify one single thing that I wanted for myself. And moms, I think, are gonna really probably, you're gonna go, uh yeah, chick. Um, when somebody asks you what you want for your birthday or for Christmas, and you're like, oh God, oh no. And like even thinking of something to want feels like another to-do on your list. You're like, good God, when am I gonna get around of that? When am I gonna get around to wanting something? I'm too busy being a people pleaser and checking things off my list and causing myself anxiety to even think about what I want. Or another time, my husband asked me, like, well, what protein would you like to have for dinner? And like, literally, it was chicken or beef. And it reduced me to tears because, like, one more decision, like, I don't know what I want. And in that moment, I didn't know what was the right answer. When we're very anxious, a lot of times we're just looking for the right answer to give so that we can get that external validation back to us. These types of indecision inability to make decisions or really agonizing over them. Man, that's a that's a pretty big flag to us that we need some regulation. Now, you can go to the show notes and you can download a PDF that's gonna help you to translate your current goals into brand spanking new shiny intentions. It's right there in our show notes from me to you. Let's put this transition on paper and treat yourself a little bit more gently this year. And even more interestingly than that, I think is going to be like, what are we gonna say to ourselves? What do we say to ourselves at the end of December 2026 when we use intentions in our year instead of goals?

SPEAKER_00 25:24

Are we gonna feel like we failed in intention? Are we gonna feel like we were guided all year long?

SPEAKER_01 25:35

I'm here to help you feel guided all year long, guided to your purpose, guided to your highest calling, guided to where you are elevating. So if you're entering this year and you're feeling pressured to prove something, what would it feel like to choose allowing instead? I just felt like it just released in between my shoulder blades. Like my body really is like, yes, let's allow things. What would it feel like to set intentions that support your nervous system instead of goals that activate it? And y'all, this podcast is not here to tell you what to strive for. It's to help you regulate your nervous system, find and learn and love the essence of exactly who you already are, so that you can soften into that and you can discover the real change that happens when you stop forcing yourself to be somebody else and just be you. And if you if I say like just be you and you're like don't worry. We're gonna keep unpacking this together. I'm holding space for you, I'm holding space for all of these questions and these problems. And know that you like send me those questions how do I be myself? How do I love me being myself? How am I gonna be okay with me being myself? Like when you send me questions, like here's something about me. A lot of times I don't even know that I know something until I'm responding to a question, and so that's where we get like the best juiciest stuff is just by asking questions. Okay, we're gonna keep unpacking this together. So until next time, breathe, unclench, and allow. I'll see you next time, bees. If you made it to the end of this episode, that means that you're truly committed to yourself. I want to thank you for being a part of this community and for showing up for yourself today. We have so much to talk about. I have so many tools to share with you that you can bring into your life every single day to feel regulated, rounded, and clear. So that you can build the most beautiful life. So if you're ready to stop wishing and start really feeling better, you're in the right place. Stick around. Your experience here really matters to me. So I want to invite you to leave an honest review wherever you're listening at. See you next time, please.