The hardest part of The Gentle Rebellion

In this episode, I pull back the curtain on my personal struggles with The Morning Promise - a daily commitment to oneself - and discuss the potential resistance one might face in making this promise. 

Drawing from personal experiences and insights gleaned from my clients, we unravel how to make the morning promise work for you, and how to harness the power of gentle rebellion to reconnect with your softer side, that part of you that knows how to switch off, let go of your working day and be present with those you love.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Welcome to the Overwhelming's optional podcast, where each week, we find ways to gently rebel against the nonsense that overwhelming exhaustion are just the price you pay to have the life you want. The hardest part for me about this gentle rebellion business, about the idea that I can have it all by going small, that I don't have to choose between pushing on through or downsizing and quitting, that I can have it all health, sanity, the freedom to be myself, as well as a successful working life that supports a lifestyle that I desire. You would think that the hardest thing was the maintenance of that, because we're used to that right. So the maintenance of the opposite, the trying to hold all of the different parts of your successful life together while pushing through overwhelming exhaustion, that's really hard. That maintenance, just the maintenance, let alone the fact that we can't see what more, because we're always growing more fully into ourselves. So therefore, it would make sense that doing the opposite, which is actually wanting even more, it's a major life up level that would be much, much harder. But why?

Speaker 1: 1:16

If I'm really interesting, I've really been thinking about this recently because what I've noticed is, as the season is changing here in England, I've noticed this grief, this terrible, deep sadness and I feel like I'm running out of time. So that means that I've been waking up with this overwhelm with this. But you need to do this and this and this and this and this before the winter comes. You need to do this and this and this and I'm wondering if partly, it's like some ancient wisdom bubbling up within me saying you know, harvest everything so you'll be safe through the winter. But I know also, for me, I love the summer and I particularly love the spring into summer and as the night society and straw in the days are shorter, so it does feel. It can feel like you've got less time right, and also as this high energy in the summer of wow, I can do anything because I've got all of this time and I don't know. Anyway, I don't know if it is a seasonal thing, but it feels quite linked to the season and I've really noticed this sense of urgency and like I've suddenly got all these deadlines. But these are self-imposed deadlines, they really are.

Speaker 1: 2:28

Like, even if we go with the very basic thing of actual, real, not metaphorical harvesting and finishing of things, if I just left my entire vegetable garden to rot, it wouldn't matter. All that would happen is, all of those nutrients would go into the soil and when I went to plant go to plant in the spring it would all be good. Like nothing terrible would happen. Oh, there could be some weeds, but you know, hey-ho, it's nothing terrible. So I'm already safe. I can already survive the winter because I'm fortunate to live in a country and have created for myself the kind of lifestyle and work that supports me. I don't have to panic about the winter. I'm incredibly fortunate.

Speaker 1: 3:16

So where's this coming from? What's going on there? Well, I just think it is this sense of. I think it's a natural sense actually for me. Every now and again I don't know about you I get this like well, I really wanna finish some of these things. And because most projects actually are ongoing, aren't they? It's not often you actually finish something, not even a big thing.

Speaker 1: 3:36

So one of the biggest projects we've done this year is finally get the old concrete render taken off the outside of our cottage and beautiful lime render put on instead and the entire house is just drying out. You can smell it and this is really cool. This is a big thing. This is something we've wanted to do for years. This is something we've been doing in bits ourselves, but then decided to call the experts in. And this is a huge project, but what I've noticed is it doesn't feel like it's finished. I've immediately my mind has gone on to well, now you need to do this other project. So, for example, the most obvious thing would be, in order for these beautiful stone walls to dry out, we had the render taken off on the inside and the outside. On the inside, we haven't had lime render put on yet, which means that whenever I go into my sitting room, I'm looking at the messy walls. So already my brain's saying well, now you need to do that. And also because I spend more time inside my house, obviously, than outside, I mean there's a limit how many times I can go outside and admire this beautiful finished render, even though everybody else is really appreciating it and it is amazing and I really really noticed the benefits of it in the winter. It's still my mind's already dismissed it and it's already moving on to well, now you need to do this and this and this and this and this. And it feels like some of those jobs have to be done in the summer because there's more daylight, you can have the windows open, it's drier. So that's what's going on.

Speaker 1: 5:12

For me is that normal frustration with life that one thing gets finished and then there's more to do, and it's always gonna be like that, which means there's always gonna be this risk of overwhelm, of pressure, of this feeling like I don't have enough time. What's going on? I'm running out of my life to finish all of these things. But then, if I go that metaphorical, if I go into the whole, well, I'm running out of time in my life. Well, first, we don't believe that and, secondly, that's not a very helpful way to live.

Speaker 1: 5:44

I never wanted to live in that constant emergency state of getting things done, getting things done, getting things done. I've always wanted and I've always made an effort to step back and enjoy the moment, to quite literally smell the roses. So for me, this gender rebellion is a constant thing that I have to remind myself to do. But what's been interesting? Watching waking up with overwhelm, waking up with my mind bombarding me with you must complete all these projects before we run out of time, even though that's an internal deadline, either invisible deadlines none of them are actual emergencies that feeling of urgency and not having enough time or not having enough energy or just not having it and then it becomes this squishing there's not enough space for me, that general frustration with life we can get into when we just feel bombarded by too much to do and not enough time and energy. That noticing that has made me really aware of what I actually think the hardest part of the gender rebellion is, and it's not the doing of it, it's not the rebelling.

Speaker 1: 7:05

This is what I'm actually finding hardest at the moment, as you always, and it's this, it's the morning promise and, on reflection with clients and with my group coaching program, get your Life Back, the morning promise is the sticking point. So I'm going to describe what happens to me and see if this makes sense to you. So if you don't know about the morning promise, just Google overwhelm as optional podcast the morning promise and it will come up for you and you can. There's a recorded audio within the podcast and explains the practice Briefly. What it is is every morning when you wake up, within the first, before you get into stuff. So before you start your day in overwhelm, you just pause, notice what's going on for you and then say, either in your head or out loud I commit to myself first, to living my life my way. Now, what I've really thought about recently is, although I do that regularly, I always notice not always a lot of the time I will notice resistance, and at the moment I'm noticing lots of resistance. So I'm going to describe to you what happens to me because I think this will help you. So this morning I had this overwhelm, this bombarding with all these millions of things that need to be done, and I said the morning promise and I actually said it out loud because my partner had gone to work and with my hand on my heart, feeling my feet on the ground, so feeling very present, I commit to myself first, to living my life my way. Do you know what happened?

Speaker 1: 8:38

This sceptical what's it? Voice in my head when what do you think you're doing? Ridiculous, you fool, what do you think you're doing? I thought it wasn't very good and it's the. I think it's the first time I've acknowledged. So I can now recognize this as a pattern and that sceptics been there before.

Speaker 1: 8:57

I know clients have mentioned this. It doesn't quite feel right, it doesn't quite resonate, it doesn't quite feel true. So I mean you can change the wording and that's what I encourage people to do Find a way to make it true for you, but when I think, whenever I'm particularly overwhelmed. So there's some days, there's many days actually, when I will just do it and it does feel really true and I'm really excited and I get really into it. But when I'm feeling particularly overwhelmed it doesn't. I just get this, what partly does, because it's practice, and the more you practice something, the more it becomes habitual.

Speaker 1: 9:31

But it's no good just doing things for the sake of things. It's got to be embodied, it's got to be felt, it's got to be really deep. Otherwise it's just saying words for the sake of it, and then it's an absence, right? So that's skeptic. I was like, oh well, that's interesting, then what's going on there? And it's that it's.

Speaker 1: 9:49

The next moment is what matters. So in the next moment I answered the skeptic back in a gently, rebellious way. And that's why the gentle rebellion is so powerful, because it's gentle and it's rebellious. It's gentle. So you're practicing the opposite energy, of the energy which forces you through your day to kick ass and hold your life together. It's the practicing of the opposite. It's a gentle and firm. It's linked to the softer part of you, the part of you that just knows there's nothing fundamentally wrong with you and you just don't do that. You know your boundaries. I choose myself. I choose to be myself, to allow myself to be happy, to allow myself to feel at home in myself.

Speaker 1: 10:38

I don't do overwhelm, I don't do exhaustion, I don't do pressure. That gently rebellious nature, the bringing that up, the connecting to that, or rather the reconnecting to it. It's the reconnecting and the morning matters, because that's how we're setting our day. Now you can't get this stuff wrong. So if you don't do it in the morning, if you did it just for you went to bed, that's also fine. That's not the point. The point is there's an opportunity to set your day, and setting your day in the morning is really powerful. We know this. There's tons of morning practices out there. This is the gently rebellious one. It only takes a moment, but it's very deep. So this is what I did.

Speaker 1: 11:17

I literally answered the skeptic back with I don't do overwhelm, I don't do pressure, I don't do exhaustion. It's not for me. And that is playful, but it's also firm, but it just is true because I don't, I'm not interested. I've been there, done that. It's absolute misery. I know the huge impact of resisting that and finding an easier way.

Speaker 1: 11:44

I love, love, love, being able to focus. I love knowing what my priorities are. I love being connected to my values. I love looking after myself properly. Have I got all that suss? Of course not, but the commitment to it means that I'm constantly aware of that. I'm noticing how close I am to committing to myself. Where's my attention going, where's my energy going? Am I doing the things I really intended to do, the things that really matter to me? Or am I flailing around in the weeds of clicking on emails and going no, no, no, pretending to myself that I'm being efficient? No, it doesn't work for me. I don't, I'm not interested. Yes, I mess up. Life is messy. It's this constant structure versus freedom, chaos and order. But that's the hardest bit, that, that recommitment. So I commit to myself first, to living my life my way.

Speaker 1: 12:38

The gently rebellious bit comes in when you get the skeptic going. Haha, who do you think you're kidding? You can't do tiny, small, tiny, huge life changing practices and expect us to make a difference. You've got to make some sweeping difference. No, not true. We got to. We got in this mess by tiny, huge life changing practices which weren't good for us but worked at the time, like the ability to push on through until your eyes are screaming at you because they've been staring at a screen so long, or till your body aches because you haven't moved all day, or you've forgotten to drink any water, you you've needed to pee for hours, like they're all tiny, huge life changing practices. They just happen to be detrimental. So all we're doing is reversing that. It doesn't.

Speaker 1: 13:26

I would argue it's no good having some great, big insight and then some big change, because In the end, it's not about big insights and big changes, because you still have to do the tiny, moment by moment Recommitment anyway. It's like, it's like it's very much like this so these days, people have enormous weddings and In the end, that's not what's important, because the marriage, the commitment to the marriage and the relationship is something that you do all the time, like the, when you're cross with your spouse. It's like do you choose to go and gossip about them with a friend or you know that? That choosing them, choosing us, all this a moment by moment thing, and it's lots of tiny, huge things, all that all the time. And that's the same with anything, isn't it? It's it's the in the moment decision and it's it's Recommitting, remembering over and over and over again. So the actual gender rebellion, where you're recommitting and remembering moment by moment, that's not. That's not too bad. We, we can do that. We can put in Tiny, huge, life-changing practices which are the opposite of the ones you used to get to this state of overwhelming exhaustion.

Speaker 1: 14:33

We can do that because they it is quite literally the opposite. So, instead of ignoring your body, you listen to your body. It doesn't mean you have to solve everything. It doesn't mean you have to suddenly go from not doing any exercise to having this perfect exercise routine, not a tool. You just start by listening, because that changes your life. But that's a whole nother episode, which I've already done and I might do some more on because I love it.

Speaker 1: 14:58

The tiny, huge practices throughout the day starts with the commitment, starts with the commitment to yourself list and then, if you've, if you've got a day when the skeptics, they're going, ha ha, who do you think you are? You can't commit to yourself first. What does it even mean anyway? What does it mean to commit yourself first? What are you talking about? You can't put yourself first. You've got loads to do. You always come last and you'll be fine because you're tough. You're not the kind of person to burn out. You'll be absolutely fine.

Speaker 1: 15:25

And if only you could learn to control your emotions better, then you wouldn't be shouting at everyone just because you're a bit stressed, like you can. That's what the skeptics gonna do. You've got this far. You can keep going, even though your body's screaming at you and you're having a volcanic Emotional eruptions at people you love. Like that's just temporary, right, it won't happen again. I've got a handle on this. I'm organized. That project's finished. I've done this now, or it's a different time of year, or blah, blah, blah.

Speaker 1: 15:55

Like the skeptics gonna tell you all the evidence for remaining stuck, and that's, that's usual. That happens in general. Change changes painful. We have to let go of an old way of being an old, an old part of ourselves. So that's gonna happen, because the skeptic just wants you to say to stay safe, don't raise your expectations, just downsize your dreams. It's safer, is it though? No, of course it's not, because that's the same as squishing yourself with the overwhelming exhaustion. It's the same squishing.

Speaker 1: 16:34

So the hardest part of the gentle rebellion is that recommitment, first thing in the morning and Then later throughout the day. But I, it's the, it's the big one in the morning. That really gets me. Because throughout the day, once I've made that, once I've set my intention, okay, oh, I don't do overwhelm. Oh, I'm getting overwhelmed, okay, I'm not doing that. Let's get out of overwhelm first. Refocus what really matters here. Just do that. That. I can do over and over and over again because I'm practiced at it.

Speaker 1: 17:03

But unless I have that like theme for the day of, oh yes, I'm a gentle rebel, I don't do overwhelm, I don't do pressure, I don't do exhaustion that's my guiding light throughout the day. But the skeptic in me, when I'm particularly busy and I'm tempted to just go back into the tunnel, create the tunnel over my head, well, I think I have to just push on through, because it will be worth it. Because once I've shifted this, then everything will magically be All right. That trickster, that skeptical trick stuff let's just go slide back into our old ways. That's a strong pull. So Bringing myself back to gently rebelling and the way I do it is in a funny way so you can laugh all you want, I don't care works for me.

Speaker 1: 17:49

So after I've done the morning, promise whether or not I get the skeptic and I don't always get the skeptic. I always say Out loud I don't do overwhelm, I don't do pressure, I don't do exhaustion. And often I do it by messing around in a Warrior yoga pose or some version of it, because I like spontaneously dancing to yogurts. You can come food kung-fu type movement, partly because I've been trained in them all so they're kind of there, but I Don't know. It just feels good, so I do it and I don't care. Okay, well, it looks like I don't do it for a crowd, obviously, but sometimes I do that in the mirror because I need to embody it and that's a way of doing it, because it's playful.

Speaker 1: 18:37

So the playfulness is connected to that part of me that knows how to switch off and have fun, that knows I can kick ass at work and have a life that I don't have to compromise my health insanity to have that. I'm connecting to that by moving my body in these hilarious poses to go. Nope, I Don't do that. I choose myself. I choose freedom from overwhelm, I choose the ability to focus on what matters most to me. I don't overwork, and because I don't overwork, that means I've got to find a way to be really, really efficient. That means I know the cost of wasting my time Constantly checking emails or checking messages or checking just I'll just check, I'll just check, I'll just check. That's a very strong pull. That's because Social media in particular has been designed to do that right. It's like a slot machine. It's very, very addictive. So I know the cost of that because I neutrally notice what I'm up to through Throughout the day.

Speaker 1: 19:35

And the more you do this, the more you know you get a picture of yourself. Where are you most likely to slide back into? Messing around and not just going? Okay, so I've got two hours. I need to get this done. What's most important? What does it need to look at? How will it feel? Setting the intention not to complete it? I've. This is a good trick. Actually we're going into a different topic now, but I will just share this with you.

Speaker 1: 19:58

I've decided that completion of projects isn't the point, because it's not, because life isn't a completed project. It's the process, it's how we do things, it's enjoying it on the way, it's loving the problem-solving and the little challenges on the way, it's the creation of it. But if I think I've got two hours, I need to complete that. That's really pressured. It doesn't work. If I, however, I say I'm going to spend two hours on that project.

Speaker 1: 20:20

Low and behold, stuff gets done. Sometimes I set a deadline. For example, small things like write an email or Create this podcast episode. That has a certain amount of time it needs to be completed because I put those structures in, but usually those structures are moveable. So if I'm doing it at the last minute of creating my own stress there, and as I don't do stress, I Need to think of a different way so that the process of the gender rebellion, the actual actions and the noticing, the neutral noticing through the day and the course, correct corrections and the choosing to notice the unexpected lovely stuff around me, to allow joy in my day, to allow movement, to allow looking after myself, connection, whatever is that?

Speaker 1: 21:07

That is the fuller part of me, not just the work part of me. That's creative fun. That's just a curious journey. That is the journey of my life. Now, how? How do I get to gently rebel? How do I Get deeper and deeper into this gentle rebellion? Because I know I'm onto a good thing. That's, that's a, that's the project of my life, whereas the morning promise, that's the hardest bit for me. So I just thought I'd share that because I Think it's important that I share where I'm getting stuck because I know it will help you. So, to all those clients who have shared with me when they're getting stuck with the morning promise over the years and what they've done with it, how they've changed the wording of it, how they've Made it work for them when it's not working for them, thank you for every time you've shared that with me. I'm really grateful. I hope this episode really, really lifts and inspires you. Have a great week For more resources to help you gently rebel. Please visit my website, wwwheidymarkcouk.