Episode Description: Stopping Negative Self-Talk
Are you tired of feeling anxious, stressed, and overwhelmed? If you feel like you're stuck in a cycle of negative self-talk and self-doubt be sure to listen to this episode of the More Than Anxiety podcast.I'm talking about the power you possess to overcome anxiety and create a life you love to live.
Learn how to empower yourself and tap into your intuition and resilience so you can feel calm, and confident, and have fun again!In this episode, you learn strategies to challenge negative thoughts, build self-confidence, and take manage your emotions.
Key Topics:
The power of self-belief and self-empowerment
Overcoming limiting beliefs and negative thought patterns
Taking action and stepping outside of your comfort zone
The importance of self-care and prioritizing your well-being
Finding joy and fulfillment in life
Enjoy the episode
Podcast Transcript:
Welcome to the More Than Anxiety podcast. I'm Megan Devito. and I am a life coach for stressed out and anxious women living with anxiety, who want more out of life. I'm here to help you create a life you love to live, where anxiety isn't holding you back Get ready for a light hearted approach to managing anxiety through actionable steps, a lot of truth talk and inspiration to take action, so you walk away feeling confident in your ability to have more of what you want. Let's do this.
Welcome to Episode 34 of the More Than Anxiety podcast, my name is Megan and if we haven't met before, I'm a coach for women who are stressed out and anxious. If this is your first time that you're catching this podcast, thank you for being here. And if you're back for more, thanks for coming back. I absolutely love creating and recording these episodes for you guys. and I really appreciate your listening and sharing all of this valuable information. Before we get started, I want to offer that if there is a topic related to anxiety or stress that you would like to hear more about, let me know. And you can do that by finding me on Instagram or Facebook. I am @CoachMeganDevito on Instagram, and then I also have a Facebook group that you can join. Or you can just leave me a comment on this episode. I want to provide as much value as possible through this podcast and give you what you need to help you start feeling amazing, so don't be shy about asking for what you want more of and what you really need. I want to know.
That's actually a pretty good lead in to where I'm headed. this week, I'm going to talk about the power that you have inside of yourself right now to help you feel better, to feel less anxious and more capable, and confident and to go after what it is that you really want in your life. So often when you're spinning in a low value or a negative cycle, it can feel like you need someone to come and pull you out. But this isn't how it works at all. Today, I'm talking about the ability that you have to stop feeling anxious to find more positivity, and more energy, and more confidence, and have so much more fun. That doesn't come from someone else; not from your spouse or your partner, not from your family, not from your best friend, not from your therapist and not from your coach - just from you. You don't need somebody else to come by and save you. You are the only person who can save yoy, and yeah, you might need some guidance, or you might need some help. You might need a sounding board. But the work that has to be done to help you feel incredible, whether it's anxiety that you're experiencing, or maybe you're stressing about your job, or your relationships, or anything else can only be done by you. You are your own superhero, and you have everything you need right now, to change everything. You just need to believe that and then to say yes and go all in on yourself.
Maybe that feels a little overwhelming and maybe a little untrue, and I get it because I was there in the past as well. But if we're being honest, what you're doing right now Isn't working, because if you're listening to this, you're probably still anxious. Otherwise, why would you be listening to a podcast about taking care of anxiety, right? So if you're asking other people all the time, "Oh my god, do you think I'm okay?" "Do you think I'm losing my mind?" "Do you think I messed up?" If you think something's wrong... if you're doing that, it's because you're relying on them to tell you that you're okay. Instead, you need to trust yourself that you're okay, and you can do that. And you might have to learn how but it's possible. You might be asking someone else, "hey, what did you do when this happened?" "Like, what what do I do?" "How do I fix it?" What if you already know what to do and you're just afraid to do it? That was me. Like I knew what I needed to do and my clients always know what they need to do, and usually when I ask them and say, "Hey, what do you think you need to do?" They kind of like... "I know, but I don't want to!" because we want... whatever it is that we want... if it were easy to get, if we were just like, "Yeah, I'm totally gonna go do that." If it were as simple as going down to the grocery store and buying like a gallon of milk or something, we'd be like, 'Yeah, I'm just gonna go do that right now,' but sometimes we just don't know. So we just offset that thought to someone else. "Hey, what do we need to do?"
If you are complaining about the people, the situations or about the things that you're doing that keeps screwing you up: "You know what? Everything would be fine if it wasn't for my stupid brother in law." "Everything would be great if it wasn't for the fact that my job sucked" or "I think it'd be fine, but you know what, I'm just too anxious to do that!" All of those things are just situations in your life, and you're having thoughts about them. I know that sounds super simple and maybe like 'this woman has no clue what she's talking about.' But when push comes to shove, you can think whatever you want about people and honestly they can think whatever they want about you too. But if you are putting all of the reasons why you're still feeling like crap on someone else, you're just letting them run your life and that is not fun. And it's not getting you what you want. It just keeps feeding that feeling of stress or doubt or anxiety because every time your jerk brother in law walks in the room, you're giving them all the power to screw up your day. You don't need to do that.
You get to decide to have a good day, even if the jerk brother in law shows up. If you keep asking someone else to fix your feelings, or relying on them to make you feel good. It's never gonna work. It's not someone else's job. It's not your mom's job. It's not your partner's job. It's not your best friend's job or your kids job. It's nobody else's job to help you feel good or have what you want except for you. I feel like I'm being really up in your face right now but this is what it takes some times because you have all these thoughts about why you can't do it yourself. And let's be honest, those thoughts feel really real and you really might not like the other people or the situations in your lives. And you don't have to like them to still be able to move through whatever it is that you're thinking or feeling and have a good day, or to feel confident or to feel less anxious. You can do it all by yourself.
But you might have thoughts about like, Yeah, but what if I can't do it? What if I am that person that actually is meant to be anxious for the rest of my life, because you know what, Megan? I've tried everything. I've tried all the things. I've done the things that I've listened to on YouTube. I've read the books, and I've tried the stuff and It's not working, I get it. But if the thought is it's not working, you're just going to keep finding reasons why it's not working. And I am making this so simple, but I think you guys just have to understand that it took me so long to get to the point where I understood that. Every time I looked for reasons why it wasn't working, I found more, and every time I looked for reasons why something was maybe getting a little teeny tiny bit better, I found those too. You might say, You know what, I'm already way too anxious to do a lot of things, so how could I possibly do this? I am freaking terrified! I'm scared to feel anxious; like I don't even know how to do the thing, because I'm already scared enough just to feel anxious. I feel it all the time. Yeah, I know, and It's really, really big, and I just want you to know that those feelings that you're having inside your body are normal. And they're not dangerous. I've talked a lot about the fact that that's just adrenaline and cortisol and I know that I am oversimplifying, but It's because it truly is that simple. And I know it feels really awful to feel anxious. And I also know that the more that you learn to calm your body down, and the less you believe the thoughts that you have about yourself or about situations, the less anxious you're going to feel and the less often you're going to feel it until it just turns into a big giant nothing, and I assure you that you can get there.
Another thought that you might be having on why you can't do it yourself is because you're too confused. "I don't have any idea what I want or what it would be like to feel good." "I don't know what feeling good feels like because it's been so long and everything feels so impossible." "And I wouldn't have any idea how to start." "I doubt I would even know where to start." "I've tried all these things. I've started a million times and I keep stopping." Yes, I get it. You start and you want it to feel good right away and to change right away. Like,iIf I do this once or twice or three times. "Why Isn't it working?" "I give up." "It's not working." Or, "I still feel anxious, Megan." "I've tried them." "I've tried these tips, and I still feel anxious so I'm just going to stop." Yes, I know.
So what can you do that will help you help yourself so you can be that hero that you've been waiting for? Honestly, it starts with the decision, you have to decide that you're done feeling like crap. I had to decide that I was done feeling like crap. My clients had to say, "You know what, screw it. I'm done feeling this way. I've tried everything in the world. and what's one more thing." It's as simple as tha. You don't like it, and it probably feels like It's out of your control right now, but that is only because you don't know what you don't know. You don't know where to start. If you did, you'd already be there. But where you start is by deciding to do what ever it takes to find the help you need so you can do your work and your work isn't on making someone else help you or fixing a situation. Your work is on yourself. It's not about stopping the triggers. It's not about controlling your brain. It's not about controlling your body. It's on you trusting yourself and believing that you can absolutely feel good and that you deserve to feel good. And maybe before anything else you have to believe that you really deserve to feel happy and calm and confident, and like you can have the things that you want. If that's where you need to start, then that's where you go first.
The second thing that you have to do to be able to help yourself is you have to be willing to feel uncomfortable. Uncomfortable is part of the recovery process, but It's also 100% of what anxiety is made up of. You can feel uncomfortable, or you can feel uncomfortable. You can sit there and be uncomfortable where you are right now, and it feels like garbage, and you don't want to be there. Or you can sit there and feel uncomfortable doing the things that help you to grow and to feel like you do have some power inside of you and to feel like you really are lovable, and amazing and capable, and smart and powerful that you can do the things that you've been avoiding for so long! Because they made you feel the the other uncomfortable, this discomfort might feel more threatening, because it's new, and that's okay. New is different and different, right now, is exactly what you need.
So often when people come to me, they've tried a lot of different things to make themselves feel less anxious. They've been to therapy, they've done tons of self help, they might be taking medication, and all of those things are super, but they're still convinced that nothing will work because they still feel anxious. I've had people tell me, 'I'm not even sure that this coaching thing is going to work. But I'm willing to see if you can help me.' And I would love to take all the credit because I've seen some really incredible changes in people after we start coaching together and none of it is from me. I'm not doing anything, It's them. So let me give you an example. I started working with a client last fall and this person contact me contacted me and said they had anxiety since they were a little kid, and they were really struggling with their spouse, which was making it a lot worse. Because if you're having problems that feeling anxious anyway, and then you top anything else on that it just layers that anxiety because you have to work through multiple situations at once. But what if you don't have to work through those situations. Something that they had said was that they used to go out and do a lot of things with their friends, but they stopped because it was making them feel anxious even to go out and they wanted to go. But the thought of going out and doing fun things caused them to feel anxious. So after so many years of feeling like they were going to throw up first thing in the morning, and then have it moving into this feeling of anxiousness about driving or just traveling overall, they finally reached out. It took years of trying different medications, of just avoiding things and living with feeling like crap for this to happen and they admitted that they weren't actually sure that coaching was going to help them at all. It was sort of like, 'Okay, whatever' kind of thing. 'We'll just see how this goes' and I knew that upfront. And this was a kind of a Hail Mary for them. I actually love the situation too, because these people are 100% in and I know it took about everything they had to get there. They were at this point of just deciding that they had to try something new and this was their last first step. Like I was their last first step at that point. And these are the people that are like grit and anger when they come in and I kind of like it. So I asked this person what they wanted and they wanted to have a lot more fun with their friends. They wanted to be able to travel, and to not have to worry about feeling sick all the time. We talked a lot about waking up feeling anxious and having it ruin their entire day. And you can hear more about waking up feeling anxious if you go back to Episode 31. I just did an episode on waking up anxious a few weeks ago.
But for you, I want you to stop right now and ask where do you want to start? It depends on what you want to change. Really, if you want to stop being afraid of feeling anxious, you have to have the confidence to do the things that you used to love to do, and to stop avoiding fun. You have to start with knowing what you want. So take some time. and think about this, and I can help you figure this out on a consultation call as well. One of the great parts about that call is really letting you explore what you would do if you didn't feel like crap so that we can find the places where you're holding back and where anxiety is really just ruining things for you. Because the more that you avoid, and the less that you do, the less joy that you find and the less fun that you have and joy and fun are kind of the opposite of anxious, aren't they?
The next step is choosing one thing that you can do right now to create forward motion. After the consultation call or if you choose to have a consultation call, you can decide if coaching is the next step. If you're like a lot of people that I've helped, you probably think you've already tried everything and there are no more steps. But I promise you if you're still anxious, most of the time, you 100% have not tried everything, because if you had you wouldn't be anxious anymore. That's how confident I am that nobody has to stay this way. You don't even have to be positive that'll work to start because there's just is no way to ever know 100%, is there? Anxiety oftentimes is looking for a guarantee and very few things on this planet in this life are guaranteed. We always just are guessing and hoping, but to sit around and wish or put all of the responsibility that you have to take care of yourself on to anything other than you is doing nothing, and you have to keep stepping forward.
The decision to go all in on yourself can feel really scary because you're responsible for what happens. You choose to start and stick or you choose to stop and quit. And I'll be totally honest with you and tell you that you're not going to feel better after the first try. You may not even feel better until after the first four tries. But you think and feel differently just by deciding that you're ready to start, and that you're not going back. And then one day you wake up, and you wonder what the heck happened and when you started feeling so good. This is only if you keep moving forward and choosing to take care of yourself, though.
So I saw this as I continued to work with this client, there were some really tough things going on in their life and this person was fully committed. They were doing things on their own, following what they knew was true, and taking chances on feeling anxious just to prove they could do it. I mean, putting these giant obstacles that would have made them throw up and be a nervous wreck in the past, right in their line of sight. I'm talking about like scheduling flights when you're terrified to fly. And they played a game of Truth or Dare with their anxious thoughts and their sick stomach and, oh my god did they win! It was incredible! Because by the time we finished working together, this person was traveling, and spending more time with friends feeling good. Even when they had a moment of feeling anxious, it was no longer a problem because they knew they were in control. And it was so much fun to watch and to be a part of like, I was blown away, it was so incredible.
You don't need anything other than to believe in yourself for one blink of a moment. You hold all of the power in your life, in your recovery, and in coaching. You create the goals, you decide what you want, you decide what feels good, and you decide what feels true to you. You choose the steps, we create some steps together and you choose if this is the best step for you or not. Yeah, I'm gonna push you but you get to decide to do the work and you save yourself. You have coaching for guidance, not to save you because I only work with people where I 100% believe in anyway. If I think you need extra support, whether It's therapy, or a medical doctor or anything else, I will absolutely let you know that that might be necessary to and that's fantastic. It's extra support! But remember, your therapist isn't going to make you come talk, and your doctor isn't going to make you take your meds, or change what you eat, or stop smoking, or force you to work out or anything else. It's always up to you!
This is how you can work with me, you can start by scheduling a consultation by going to the show notes. Then all you have to do is show up. You just call me. Pick up the phone, "Hey, Megan, this is so and so I scheduled a consultation." Be ready to change. Commit to yourself and do what you want instead of waiting for somebody else who isn't coming anyway and couldn't help you anyway. They're not going to fix you. You do the work, and you blow your own damn mind. and then you celebrate. And I mean, this is really, really important. You need to celebrate! You need to show your brain that you are doing amazing things that you didn't think you could do. Celebrate the little teeny stuff. We do this a lot. You can start helping yourself right now by scheduling that consultation to talk about what you want, how I can help you get it and really commit to feeling good. Nobody's coming to rescue you but you, and when you are the one who gets to show up feeling excited about your life, people start to notice. You're going to be so proud of yourself for what has changed. I can't wait to hear what you're going to do. I'm so excited for you.
To schedule your call using the link in the show notes or go to www.megandevito.com/workwithme and I'll be back again next week. Talk to you then.
I hope you've enjoyed this episode of The More Than Anxiety podcast. Be sure to subscribe and leave a review so others can easily find this resource as well. And of course when you're ready to explore coaching with me, jump to the show notes, click the link and schedule time for us to talk. See you soon.
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