Overwhelm is Optional

How to find the hidden ease in your life

• Heidi Marke • Season 1 • Episode 208

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There’s hidden ease all around us—if we take the time to notice it. In this episode, I share how to uncover the moments of simplicity, flow, and joy that already exist in your life.

Plus, explore these Messy Journaling Questions (MJQs) to deepen your reflection:

  1. Where am I insisting this is the only way to do something or have something?
  2. When do I use words like 'difficult' and 'hard work'?



🎙️ Welcome to Overwhelm is Optional

This podcast was created to help big-hearted, driven professionals break free from overwhelm and experience more clarity, ease, and joy.

But here’s the exciting news… I’ve moved beyond overwhelm.

If you’ve been listening and resonating with this message, you’ll love what comes next.

I’ve created a new podcast: Deep Heartfelt Success—because success should feel as good on the inside as it looks on the outside.

🎙 Join me there → Search "Deep Heartfelt Success" on your favourite podcast platform and subscribe.

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🎧 Free Audio: The One Minute Marke
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Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Gentle Rebellion where overwhelm is optional. Hello, how are you doing? Lovely to have you here with me again this week. I hope you had a good week.

Speaker 1:

At the risk of sounding really silly, I didn't know about airport lounges. I didn't know about airport lounges. So by airport lounges I mean these secret oasis where you pay extra money before a flight to go and sit in there in comfort and get fed endless food and drinks. To me it's magical. I kind of knew of their existence as in you can see them, can't you, when you're at airports Well, at least I've seen them for years where it's like this secret door or this corridor with this sign going to something like a secret club, which I assumed was for first-class travellers, paying like £10,000 for a trip or something. I didn't think it was available to me. I just it wasn't even on my radar and I wasn't resentful. I don't have a problem with it. I've, happily, every time I've been to an airport in my life, I've been excited. So it's not like it's taken away anything from my life, not knowing that it was open to me.

Speaker 1:

And then, on the first day of our road trip, I had this amazing experience of being in an airport lounge Excuse the noise just giving the dogs some biscuits. That odd noise. If you heard it was Ruby on her back on the floor, legs in the air, rolling around just celebrating the day life, I don't know. Anyway, hopefully they'll be a bit quieter for you now. So airport lounges had no idea they existed, turns out, they're awesome. So what happened was we got Barclays travel insurance and Simon chose the one that gave you extra things, and one of the extra things was airport lounges. Oh, my goodness, he was so excited about his airport lounge, and also he wanted to get his money's worth, that we went early to the airport.

Speaker 1:

Now, I don't know about you, whether you're an early to the airport or a late to the airport person. I was going to allow just two hours because I'd read that you no longer have to do three hours. I think airports have got a bit more organised recently. Well, at least my experience has been that they're running really well now. But no, apparently we needed to go for three hours so we could get our money's worth and basically eat everything in sight, which I certainly couldn't do. But anyway, it was quite amusing. I cannot believe how wonderful it was. It just really, really added to the adventure. It felt like such luxury. But for me also it was that calm, steadiness, so there's not a lot of movement. I mean there is movement obviously because people are coming in and out of an airport lounge to catch their flight, but in general it just felt calmer, stiller, just easier, and that ease, that comfort. I could just sit and read my book, oh my goodness. So this got me thinking.

Speaker 1:

Airport lounges have been hidden from me. So what else is hidden from me that would make my life easier? So the airport lounges have been there all the time. I mean, I don't know the history of them, I don't really care to look, but let's just assume the airport lounges have been available to me all this time, but I didn't realize it. I wasn't aware of them, even though I'd glimpsed them out of the corner of my eye. So even when they did come into my awareness, I turned away from them, I switched off my awareness of them, because I just made an assumption that they weren't available to me and this wasn't true. Now, obviously there are times in my life when I had less money, so maybe that was true, or I was in a hurry, so there would be no point. So there's all sorts of reasons why that would be understandable. So it's not a judgment. It's not the point, is it? What are our hidden airport lounges? That's my point.

Speaker 1:

So to find the hidden airport lounges, I have to be able to bring the hidden ways of having more ease into my awareness, which means I have to assume there are hidden eases available to me. And once I've made that assumption, I can then look at the world with this new and exciting gently rebellious lens. Where is there hidden ease that I'm not seeing or I'm dismissing? So the easiest ones to find would be the ones that I'm seeing but dismissing Seeing them but dismissing them. So that means there's an underlying assumption that they're not available to me. So that's what I'm playing with this week, and I'd like to invite you to do it as well, because here's to finding more hidden ease. So I always want to start with the easiest ones to let in. I've no idea what these are now, because this is just something I'm exploring, but who knows what's going to happen. Do you want to play this game with me? So this game is put on the gently rebellious lens of the assumption is there is hidden ease, and now I'm going to look for it and the easiest place to find that is the ones that I'm seeing but dismissing, and the seeing but then dismissing ones are based on a belief or an assumption I'm making. So this is an opportunity maybe to go a little bit deeper with this, should you choose to, I'm going to play with it, but gently and lightly, assuming nothing is wrong, dropping any judgment any well, I ought to be better at valuing myself and accepting. Help, drop all the nonsense, normal judgment. It's so boring and it just adds to the pressure and the overwhelm. So instead I'm going to invite you to just play with me, because this is what I'm doing. I'm going to play with this. So I've got two messy journaling questions here.

Speaker 1:

So, messy journaling. There's a whole episode on that. It sounds silly, but it's a really serious practice. So the idea is that, instead of journaling and trying to keep it all legible and really neat and trying really hard to find the one correct answer or you know, going back over time and trying to record all of the messes up you made and analysing it like serious journaling like that. Oh, my goodness, I do apologise for my dogs. Did you hear that? That was Rosie, it's ridiculous. Sorry, I don't know what to do about it Apart from lock the doors down. Lock the doors, lock the doors, lock the dogs downstairs and that just feels really mean and I know most of you enjoy hearing the dogs, but that was a. That was a weird piglet noise there from Rosie. Thank you very much. So back to messy journaling.

Speaker 1:

Messy journaling is a way to get out of your head into your body, connect to your body and your heart and allow the words to go move across the page. So you're asking deeper questions. You allow the words to go move across the page, so you're asking deeper questions. You allow the words, if you choose to, to resonate in every cell in your body and then get curious and just allow the pen to move across the page and see what comes up. And because what comes up tends to be faster than the hand can move, you're going to drop the need to spell correctly, have punctuation, even finish sentences, even finish words. So it's messy, doesn't have to be legible, because what you're doing is allowing this deep connection as easily as possible and then you can just let go of it. So it's designed to be destroyed afterwards. It's not trying to keep a record. It's not heavy, it's just light. It's just, it's curious. It's curious and it's out of the head into the body, so you can play with that. There's a whole episode. I'm not sure what episode is. Might be 66. Anyway, it's the first year of this podcast, so enjoy that. There will also be blog articles about it too, or you can ask me a question. You can just email me, heidi, at heidimarkcouk, and I will tell you more if you like. Okay, so these are the questions for messy journaling for this week. Should you choose to accept the play challenge?

Speaker 1:

Where am I insisting this is the only way to do something or have something? Where am I insisting that this is the only way to do something or have something? I hope you wrote that down if you want it. So when we insist there's only one way, we restrict all of the easier ways. I do this all the time. It's not just you, we all do it right, and sometimes there is one way that's been working for a long time or kind of working, and then it stops working as well. But we think, well, it did work, so I need to stick with it. And sometimes it's just time to say, well, there's some useful information here. It's not working as well as it was, or it could be better. Maybe in some way it could be easier. So I'm open to the idea that there's another way, even if I can't see it, which brings me back to one of my well-known sayings, which is trust. There's always an easier way, especially when you can't find one, especially when you can't find one, because that's when the overwhelm's there. If you can't see an easier way, just assume it's not you, it's not life not being on your side. You don't need to fight the universe, it's just overwhelm. Nothing's wrong. Get out of your head into your body. Feel your feet on the ground and just allow easier ways to be revealed to you by just letting go. And I don't mean standing there in this kind of full sense of yes, I'm just letting go, I'm relaxed, and then expecting all these ideas to come to you. No, I literally mean feel your feet on the ground, allow your belly to notice how you feel, notice how you feel neutrally, ask a question. So there's got to be an easier way. I wonder what it is, get into a state of curiosity. Let go get on with your day and wait for stuff to be revealed, because the answers are always all around us and with hindsight we can see there is easier ways, right? I mean, if you take big things, like a job that was killing you because it was so stressful, when you look back you can see that there were other options that you couldn't see at the time because you were stuck in survival mode, which is chronic overwhelm. That's okay, that's normal. That's okay, that's normal. But using the wisdom of hindsight now requires the same thing If you clear the overwhelm, you get that now there are always easier ways to do things. There's a lot of hidden help and freedom from restrictive assumptions and beliefs, all sorts of things, because there's all sorts of ways of living your life, because you're smart, capable, highly driven, big hearted and determined to live this full life, which means that for you especially, there are lots of ways of doing things. But it often takes a shift, and the shift is usually the letting go of the assumption that there's one right way of doing it. So that's the first messy journaling question. Where am I insisting? This is the only way to do something or have something? The last one? There's only two. Who wants more than that? That's plenty right. In fact, you've already got enough. You don't even have to get a pen out if you don't want to.

Speaker 1:

Obviously, the second messy journaling question gift to you this week is to notice your language. So to just watch your language. When do I use words such as difficult or hard work? So this is related to the assumption that life is hard, that everything worth having requires sacrifice, because if that's true, then by definition life will be hard and you will sacrifice your health, your relationships, your free time, your ability to switch off and hear your partner speak. You will sacrifice because you're assuming that's the deal you've made with the universe. But not everybody lives that way. There's all sorts of ways of living, and finding the way that works for you matters. So let's just assume that life doesn't have to be hard and that success doesn't require the sacrifice of your health and relationships. How would that change things for you? Well, hugely, and that is the whole gentle rebellion.

Speaker 1:

But instead of that huge question, I invite you instead to just watch your language. And I don't mean watch your language as in catch yourself out and try and change it. No, I don't mean thought police. I mean get curious about the words you're using, because they will reveal to you where your hidden ease is. So if you're saying but that would be too much hard work or that would be really difficult. So, for example, I'll give you something that I'm playing with at the moment.

Speaker 1:

So we haven't finished renovating the house, but we also want to do an extension. But the extension is a long-term thing and so it's easier to think well, I'm not even going to think about it because it's not on the table at the moment, but that's not much fun. And also it's easier to do it more slowly, right, it's easier to have plans and dreams and imagine them in and then get focused on them and then not have to wait. So normally what happens is you decide what you want to do and then you have to wait for the workman to be free. Well, what if we do it the other way around? And it's just easy and that's what I'm up to.

Speaker 1:

So I'm inviting somebody around to talk about what's possible way before we've actually got a kind of fixed plan, because we're still renovating and also we've just been on a big adventure, so a lot of the renovating money went on a huge road trip, which is beautiful, and we've got another one planned as well. So you know, like there's choices in life. But it's easier and more fun to. Well, I've decided it's easier and more fun to play with the idea of what the extension would look like, way before we're actually seriously, you know. So there's nothing concrete, so there's no rush, there's no hurry. So before I was thinking well, it's too difficult to think about it because we're not ready to do it, it's not on the cards yet. But then I've just shaken up and gone.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, but it might be fun to dream and plan, and of course it is because it takes a long time actually. Well, I find it takes a long time to get two people's dreams considered and in line and really discussed. Well, that's what I've learned from being in a relationship for a long time is that you need to give the other person time and yourself time to consider, to think oh well, if we did it that way, what would this mean? I know somebody who built their own house or designed it themselves and had it built or something like that, and I said, oh, that must be wonderful because you've got everything where you wanted it. And he said to me yes, but it also means that every time you go to switch on a light switch that's in the wrong place. Only you are to blame, which was interesting, whereas if, imagine, you just relax and you spend a long time thinking about it, then are you more likely to allow more ideas to come up.

Speaker 1:

Anyway, this is just my idea that, instead of assuming it's difficult, what if I make it easy? Because while it's not high stakes, it will become high stakes? What it looks like Right now it's no stakes, so fun, it's just fun. Anyway, that's quite a big thing. But often the things that we think we're using words like that would be hard work or it's really hard work to do that feel like they're big things anyway. So how about making them lighter? Anyway, this isn't about the. The invitation is actually much, much easier than that. It's just the idea to get curious about where your hidden ease is by listening to yourself talk. That's it.

Speaker 1:

So, anyway, I'm going to be doing these as well this week. So if you want to drop me a line and let me know how you get on, I'd love that. I love it when people contact me. I had two lovely messages this week about last week's Gently Rebellious Read my newsletter, which is usually linked to what I'm talking about in the podcast, and that was just. It's just really nice. It's always lovely to hear from you, so thank you when you reach out, thank you to those people. It means a lot. Okay, that's it, guys. I wish you a week of lovely little moments that tickle your heart and make you laugh out loud when you realise, oh, I've been doing it the hard way, I could have done it an easier, easier way. I wish you a week and a life, obviously, but this week let's focus on hidden ease. I wish you a week of finding delightful, easier ways of doing things. Lots of hidden ease. Enjoy For more resources to help you gently rebel.

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