Choosing Peace
Hello my friends, and welcome to the Discover Your Personal Power Podcast, the show to help you live a life filled with peace, purpose, and power. My goal on this podcast is to give you something fun and meaningful to make your day a little brighter. I want to help you find your light and your personal power within.
My name is Peggy Moore, and I am a wife and mother of over 30 years, a Nurse for over 20 years, a Certified Professional Coach and wellness advocate.
I want you guys to know that I get it. Being a mom can be hard; being a wife can be hard; managing a career while being a mom and a wife can be hard. Life can be frustrating at times and often overwhelming. I struggled for years with depression, anxiety, and perfectionism. I let everyone else tell me who I should be, how I should act, what my house should look like, what car I should drive, how my children should act, and what kind of mother I should be, till I STOPPED. I stopped listening to the outside voices, and I found myself again. I dug deep and discovered who I wanted to be and how I wanted to show up in this world. I found my light, purpose, and personal power, and I want to help you do the same.
I would love the opportunity to work with you. I have an online coaching program with fun go-at-your-own pace videos, a colorful 80-page workbook that was just published on Amazon; it has journaling prompts and fun exercises. You will get one on one coaching with me, and I will help you clearly define your purpose, discover your personal power, and live a life that you want to live. Go to Discover Your Personal Power.org or Peggy Moore Life Coaching .com and sign up now. I would be honored to work with you.
Today we are talking about Choosing Peace.
I want peace in my life. Ever feel like you are living a life of chaos and craziness? Feeling the overwhelm and frustration over this crazy year of 2020? When difficult things happen, or conflict arises, it can be difficult to feel peace. Our primitive brain’s fight or flight system may sense fear or anger or hurt or embarrassment. All those emotions may cause our brain to want to automatically respond by fighting - saying mean hurtful things, or fleeing -escaping by turning inward and blaming ourselves for the whole situation.
Either coping strategy has its consequences. Fighting may cause hurt and pain to a relationship that is important to us, and fleeing can damage to our own heart and soul.
In today's episode, we are going to talk about a better way. Today we are talking about choosing peace. Do you want to feel more peace in your life? I have a three-step process to help you find your peace in the midst of conflict and then 5 great tips to help you generate your Peace Playlist that you can tune into whenever you need it.
To help us live a life of peace, purpose, and power.
- Stop and Pause, and check our story.
- Lean in with curiosity and compassion
- Practice acceptance and gratitude
Stop and Pause
We can train our brain to react in a way that contributes to harmony, connection, and peace. But, we have to stop and pause and engage our frontal brain. Our executive functioning, reasonable, logical part of our brain.
This takes a few seconds. It takes pausing for a few seconds and not responding with an immediate fight or flight reaction. Pausing allows us to feel the emotion and then interpret it. It also allows our logical brain to determine how we perceive the information or situation.
Check the story you are telling yourself. If you find yourself spiraling into a panic of overwhelm, perceived disappointment, frustration overwhelm, or panic, Take a time out, pause, breathe, allow those emotions to pass through, allow them to process.
Name the emotion; simply labeling the emotion can help you look at it more objectively and begin to feel more peaceful. Labeling the emotion, giving it a name, takes away some of the power. Naming the emotion can allow you to look at the emotion more objectively. Naming the emotions allows acceptance and allows yourself the time to feel the emotion. Allow yourself the time to feel the emotion, don't resist it or ignore it.
Lean in with curiosity and nonjudgment. Be curious, investigate without judgment. What is causing the most pain or grief? What are my thoughts about what is happening?
Be compassionate with yourself. Acknowledge that you are suffering, grieving, frustrated, hurt, or angry. Recognize that these feelings are unpleasant, and that is OK. Remind yourself that everyone has these feelings from time to time. These are human feelings, and we are all human. Show compassion to yourself as you would a friend. Use positive self-talk. Research has actually shown that when you talk to yourself in the third person, you actually trigger the pathways in your brain that help you feel cared for, loved, and accepted.
Practice acceptance. Learning to accept the things that are out of your control can bring you peace. The Serenity prayer says God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the Courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
When we fight against the things we cannot change, it is frustrating. When we resist our circumstances or situations or events, we create suffering and grief. Sometimes we hold ourselves to a version of reality that doesn’t exist. If you struggle with perfectionism, you will understand this. The perceived version of perfection is just that; it is a version of life or a situation or circumstances that you have thought up in your head.
What if we just accepted ourselves for who we are. Acceptance is the ability to value all parts of who you are unconditionally. Acknowledging that you are human. There is good in you, and there are things that need improvement.
This can be hard because we are often too critical of ourselves or rationalize all our misgivings. Finding a balance is essential. Acceptance comes in understanding who we are, our strengths, and our weaknesses.
If you are lying to yourself, it can be challenging to show up authentically and connect with others. If you are lying to yourself, you can’t practice self-compassion and acceptance.
One of my favorite Authors is Gretchin Rubin; she wrote the Happiness Project, a fabulous book, where she took a year to discover all the happiness in her life. And one of the things they found was to be herself. To accept herself for who she was, with all her strengths and her weaknesses. She found that she stopped being what other people thought she should be, and she stopped berating herself for the insane expectations she put on herself to be more like Sally or like Jane but just to be herself. To just be Gretchen.
Here is an example from Brooke Castillo, from the Life coach School
If someone doesn’t like peaches, we don’t blame the peach. We don’t even blame the person for not liking the peach. We just accept that some people don’t like peaches. It doesn’t matter how juicy the peach is. It doesn’t matter how beautiful the peach is. It doesn’t matter how plump it is. It doesn’t matter how ripe it is. That person just doesn’t like peaches. There’s nothing that peach can do to make that person like it. And the peach is not upset that somebody doesn’t like it for being a peach. The peach doesn’t try to become an apple, so more people will like it. Peach just is what it is. Peach just shows up and says, “I’m a peach. And if you don’t like me, I’m still going to be the best peach I can be.” So, are you being your full expression of yourself as your own peach? And are you walking through the world saying, “I’m a peach,” and not be offended if someone doesn’t pay attention to you or if someone doesn’t hire you, someone doesn’t want to date you or marry you or be in your space? When you decide to be your full self, to be the peach that you are, you get to love yourself on a much deeper level. You get to understand yourself on a much deeper level.
Accept who you are and be the best version of who you are. Accept that you are not like anyone else. Part of being who you are and is accepting things you like to do and recognizing things you don’t like to do, and being OK with that. Take those things that you like and run with, fuel your curiosity, and explore the things you love. This not only helps expand your depths but allows you to grow and evolve into the best version of yourself.
Accepting yourself also means letting go of judgment. Be compassionate with yourself. Judgment and fear can hold you back from living a life of peace, purpose, and power. Judgment and fear may cause us to avoid relationships with others, avoid challenges, or mental and physical pursuits that help us grow. We often use judgment and fear as self-protective mechanisms. We let our primitive brain and our fight or flight system quickly take over and prevent us from living a life of authenticity and peace.
Again, we need to learn to train our brain and manage our minds. Acceptance and Commitment theory support that our mind is neither friend nor foe, it is simply doing what minds do, which is to produce thoughts. The first thoughts or the automatic thoughts that come up first come from the primitive brain and are there to protect us and keep us from using more energy. The primitive brain reacts with emotions instead of using the extra energy that the prefrontal cortex part of the brain needs to make a more logical or rational decision. Immediate judgment and fear come from our primitive brain. We have to stop, take a time out and let our prefrontal cortex examine the evidence of our thoughts.
A few things our prefrontal cortex or logical brain can think about to help create decisions of peace and acceptance. As we lean in with curiosity and nonjudgment, we may want to ask ourselves, what need is not being filled?
First, we may want to look at what need is not being filled. What can bring you peace right now? I love in 13 going on 30 when Jenna finds out that her life is not how she remembers it and she is at Matty’s apartment in New York. He tells her that they are not friends anymore, she starts to hyperventilate and get a little squirrely, and she says “I want a fluffy pillow.”
Hugging a fuzzy pillow helped her ground and center, find peace, and think about her situation more logically. She figured out what she wanted, and she asked for it.
And then she sat and savored it.
Next, we can use mindfulness. Mindfulness helps us become more aware of how our thoughts affect our emotions, bodily sensations, and interactions with ourselves and others. Mindfulness allows you to sit without judgment and fear and sit in a place of curiosity and wonder.
We sit in a place of wonder and curiosity. We learn more about ourselves. Here is an example of a time this week, I had to sit in wonder and curiosity.
I really hate to be late for things. I find myself getting physically ill if I think we are going to be late for something. If it is my choice I am going to arrive at least 5 minutes early, 15 is what I really like. I cannot wait till the last minute to turn assignments in for school. Talk about physical ill. If I wait till the last minute, I will have a full out panic attack and not get the work done. I love traveling, but that trip to the airport is always stressful. I would rather get to the airport an hour early and have time to sit and relax than run straight to my gate. There are so many things that could go wrong when getting to the airport and on a plane, and I like to be prepared for all contingencies. I also love the feeling of leaving early and getting to my destination early. When I feel like I will be late, my chest gets tight. I get sick to my stomach, my respiratory rate and heart rate increase, and I can get really nasty to my loved ones when I feel they are making me late. My primitive brain is definitely in fight or flight mode and works out of fear, overwhelm, and frustration.
My husband is the exact opposite. He believes that getting somewhere early is a waste of time. He literally counts his minutes, and if he has tracked it to be a 10-minute drive. He is only going to give himself 10 minutes. He does not like to sit at the airport. He would prefer to time it just right so he almost walks on the plane. He feels he works best under pressure and will not even start a school paper early because he feels he does better work at the last minute.
When my brain is in judgment mode, it wants to say my way is right; my way is better. But in reality, we both get things done. We both get to the places we need to be; we both get to the airport appropriately, even when flying separately, and get our papers done for school.
Since we have become empty nesters, this particular stress has lessened about 80%. I no longer have 100 places to be picking up kids and taking them to this lesson and that lesson. I don’t have to get 5 people fed, dressed, packed for vacation, and out the door at a specific time. No matter how hard I tried, I was yelling at everyone like a crazy lady as we were going out the door. It was not fun for me and not fun for my family. I am sure everyone knows and understands this struggle.
So in my empty nesting stage, this has lessened so much, it is a relief. We don’t have as many deadlines, and so it doesn't come up very often.
Well, the other day, we were meeting friends for brunch at 1015, and it was about 945, and I was ready to go, and my husband still wanted to take a shower. I automatically got that panicky feeling and started yelling at him, and I literally had to stop and just walk away so I could think. I had to breathe. I recognized it would not be the end of the world if we were late, and It would be OK. I had to stop, pause, and take a Time out. While my husband was in the shower, I had a few minutes to be curious and sit without judgment and feel the feelings of hurt, anger, fear, and frustration and be curious about my thoughts and the story I was telling myself in my head. The pathway in my brain that I have used for so long fired up in nothing flat.
The story I was telling myself was full of so many what if’s and worst-case scenarios. These scenarios or stories did not bring me peace. I had to stop, take control of my thoughts and my emotions.
If we want to be in control of our emotions. If we want to feel peace, we have to learn how to and practice managing those emotions. We have to train our brain to pause for a minute and let our rational brain take over so that we can show up how we want to show up in this world. I don’t want to be that crazy lady, who is always so wound uptight, and yelling at everyone to hurry up, or we are going to be late. I don’t want to feel that anxiety and panic and react in a way that I will regret later. This takes practice.
It means taking a time out and not judging our emotions but sitting with them for a minute to allow them to process and look at the situation a little more objectively. To look at the situation, more objectively takes using our rational brain or prefrontal cortex. The facts were, we did have the time for him to shower. We did end up getting there on time, and even if we didn’t get there on time, it would not have been the end of the world.
There are lots of ways I could have handled this situation, but first, I had to recognize my own emotions, my own thought patterns, and focus on what I want most. And what I want most is a good relationship with my husband. I want to feel love and peace.
We have to take that moment to Stop and Be curious, to be compassionate without judgment, and figure out the need and the thoughts stirring up unpleasant sensations within us.
Accept the things we cannot change. We cannot change other people, certain situations, events, or circumstances. But we can change our thoughts, emotions, and behaviors.
As we stop, take a moment to pause, lean in with curiosity and nonjudgment, learn about ourselves, and create new pathways in our brain that create a playlist for peace.
We can refer to our playlist and engage our pathway of peace whenever we need them. This can allow us to feel peace, even in difficult situations. We can create a Peace Playlist in our brain—a playlist of pathways that create the emotions of comfort, love, and peace.
Take some time to think about what brings you joy? What are you grateful for? What thoughts create focus and peace to your soul?
This creates your Peace Playlist and allows the ability to tune in when needed.
1. Figure out what brings you joy, What makes you feel happy, safe, loved, and savor that for a moment. Write out a list in your journal or put it on a post-it note in your office. Keep it in a note on your phone and when your feeling overwhelmed from all the expectations that come from being a wife and mother and sister, brother, friend, co-worker, take a few minutes to remember your Joy.
2. Gratitude: Along with knowing what brings you joy is Choosing to be grateful - we talked a lot about gratitude in the month of November. Gratitude brings peace and contentment to your life. When you practice gratitude and think about what you are grateful for, it increases your brain's happy chemical dopamine. It actually makes you feel better to think thoughts of gratitude.
3. Stay clear of negativity. It is hard to have inner peace in your life when surrounded by negativity. Negativity can quickly destroy your inner peace. Instead of looking for flaws, instead of looking for perfection, choose the good, find the positive, stop complaining, and focus on peace. Social Media Detox - Studies have shown that social media can be disrupting to one’s inner peace. Individuals are constantly comparing themselves to others. We have all heard of FOMO or fear of missing out. Social media portrays people’s best moments. Enjoy those best moments with them and don’t compare or create envy because your friends have a good time. Social media also allows Individuals angry debates, name-calling, and unkindness because they can hide behind a curtain of anonymity. Clean up your news feed. You can snooze people, block people, or unfriend people. Make social media what you want it to be for your life.
4. Don’t pressure yourself. With the holiday season upon us and all the expectations, we tend to put ourselves this time of year. Take a break. The holidays are no fun when you feel burned out and drained. Keep a balance over the holidays. Mind your energy and schedule arduous tasks during times when you have your most energy. Schedule rest breaks and self-care time. Recognize and accept that you are human. You are doing the best that you can.
5. Know your limits and maintain your boundaries. Part of the power of peace is knowing yourself. Knowing and understanding your personal needs, knowing how to verbalize or meet those needs. Knowing when and how much to give to others and knowing when and how much to take care of yourself.
I want peace in my life. I don’t like living in turmoil and craziness, overwhelm, and frustrated. I know that I can
- Stop and Pause, and check my story.
- Lean in with curiosity and compassion
- Practice acceptance and gratitude and Play my Peace Playlist.
You guys, in this past year of 2020, we have had many things happen that have created anger, injustice, pain, and suffering in many ways. I think it has put us all a little on edge. Take time to create your Peace Playlist and enjoy a life of peace, purpose, and power.
I would love to hear how you are creating your peace playlist. You can reach out to me at Peggy.Moore.Life.coach@ gmail.com or hop over to the website. 2021 is a new year; let me help you make it your best year yet. Join me in the Discover Your Personal Power coaching program, and I promise you will learn how to create the life you want.
Until we Meet again my friends