Ep. 08: Resistance is Actually a Good Thing, Here's How to Move Past It

I used to have a toxic relationship with resistance. Meaning: I would avoid it at all costs. 

Run away from it. Want it to go away.

Until this one reframe that I'm sharing with you inside this episode helped me actually lean in.

This is a juicy one! I'd love to hear how it landed for you in the comments.

Transcript

0:00

Oh my God, I'm so fricking lit up today and I'm so excited for this episode. Welcome back to In Your Bones, the podcast for people who know they are here to dream big, to do epic shit, to be visionaries, to do it differently than what they were taught. Ah. You know those feeling, that feeling in my bones? It's like, I know I'm meant for more. I know I'm meant to do the shit that scares me. I know I'm meant to ask for that. Raise to find the husband in my dreams, to build the business of my dreams, to do creative shit, to build art, to do it. Oh, oh my God, I'm fucking, fucking buzzing. I'm just like buzzing from the day that I've had. But this episode. I wanna talk to you about the resistance that comes up when you are doing epic shit, and I have faced this over and over and over again in my life, and I will, and I hope. I genuinely hope that I continue to face it until I die, because the second, the fucking second that I am not feeling resistance to doing something, then that's when I'm playing too small and I don't wanna be in that. Arena. I wanna be in the arena where I'm going for the big shit. When I'm doing the things that make my heart be outside of my chest when my voice is trembling. I mean, I've just like, I want this life where I get to be 80 years old and I'm like, holy shit. I fucking did it like I did it. I did the things that I wanted to do, and I did the things that challenged me, and I left it all on the table, and I created a life that was a legacy for my children to step into. Like that's what fucking motivates me every single day, and I'm using. I'm using that motivation now to like pour into my business to keep building this thing because for so long, I mean, I've been a freelancer since 2021. I wanna say, gosh, I should really know the year and for so long what I'm about to talk to you in this episode. Oh. I resisted the feeling of resistance for years. I thought it was something that was a, I thought it was something that was wrong with me. I thought like, why? Why is everyone else like. Better able to create this freelance business. I would see other people that started in the course that I started with and like just take off or people's like stories of like how much money they made in their first two years of business and all this stuff. And I was like, wait, what? Why does their, or like even people's reels that they were posting about back in 2021, I don't know if you remember but like 20 20, 20 21 on Instagram. Everything was like overly. Um, perfected, everybody had the epic super, uh, polished photo shoots and the super polished houses, and like, ev, my business is perfect. I'm perfect, blah, blah, blah. Super styled hair and makeup, I'm actually very grateful that Instagram has shifted into something that feels more real. Um, I hope it continues to go in that trajectory, but it was this moment where I was like, well, why am I supposed to actually feel resistance? Like it seems like no one's actually talking about how hard building a business is. And first I wanna define what resistance is. It's that moment when you go to like sit down and write that email or work on that project or send that proposal and all of a sudden you feel like you want to go do your laundry, clean your house, listen to. Music or like scroll on Instagram or anything else, right, than just doing the thing. And it can also show up as being super tired, feeling lethargic, uh, just feeling like my flow is out of whack. Like the words just aren't coming out as I'm trying to write this email that. That's right there is resistance. Whew. And it is just your body telling you, we haven't done this this way before. That's it. And in fact, if you think about it, feeling resistance is the best thing you can feel if you are stretching and growing. If you have a growth mindset, it is part of it. It's like, oh, thank gosh, I am feeling resistance. That means I am actually on the right path. That little reframe has helped me so much because then I'm not even, I'm not resisting the resistance. I'm not thinking it shouldn't be there. I'm not making it more difficult. Then I'm like, wow, this is actually a marker, a green light that's telling me I am doing things right because it feels uncomfortable when you are growing and that like, I just wanna emphasize that if you are feeling resistance. You are on the right path if your goal is to have a big, incredible life where you push yourself to the limits. And I also want to say that it isn't about overriding your resistance, and we'll get to that in a second, what you can do instead, but I want to name this period that I went through where I thought, well. My intuition should be guiding me it as I'm building this business, it should feel right it to my body. I went on this whole year and a half where I thought everything should feel in flow following my intuition. Should feel. My bo my body should feel right a hundred percent of the time. Like meaning, like my body should, should not feel any sort of resistance if it's actually meant for me. That's what following your intuition, I thought was No. No, no, I was very much confused. I was like way too on the woowoo side of things, where it was like, let me just be in my soft feminine flow and opportunities will just find me if I'm happy enough. I call complete fucking bullshit on that. It feels, it feels good to be in that state, to be in your comfort zone. Yeah. So that is the benefit for believing that. But that is not how you're going to get to where you wanna go. Opportunities aren't just gonna find you 'cause you're feeling good in your feminine era. And I'm all about being in a feminine era. But sometimes being in your feminine era means being the fucking bulldozer and going after the shit that you want to do in this life. And it isn't just laying down in a flowy dress, which is like, I didn't. I didn't fully understand that, but I. I thought my intuition is always going to feel good in my body. No, no, no. Your body will lie to you. Your body will feel like you're in danger when you're doing that thing that feels a little bit scary. It will start going into threat detection mode. That fight flight, sympathetic nervous system response that we're all familiar with. That doesn't mean. That just because you're feeling that, that you're not following your intuition, sometimes following your intuition, actually a lot of freaking times following your intuition. I wish this was talked about more because your soul will want something that will expand you and your body wants to stay in homeostasis. That's literally how. Built our brain wants to know what will happen next, and if we are venturing out into the edges of the unknown, our brain can't predict what will happen next, and our brain thinks that if it can predict what will happen next, that is what will keep us safe. Our brain is a prediction machine. It wants to go, okay. A, B, C, alright, A, B, C. Alright, A B blank. Well, that should be C, but in reality, that blank could be anything else. Could be anything else. But our brain wants to automatically put the C in there. If we've been experiencing C after B. It wants to fill in the blank with what we have already experienced in the past, but if we are on a growth journey, are we just trying to repeat what we've experienced in the past? Yes. No, no. We are trying to create something completely new for us. That is what building something, building your vision is gonna take. It's gonna take literally brainwashing yourself to believing something that isn't even in existence yet. And there is no proof that that thing will be a viable thing. But you have to be the first one to believe in it. You have to act in accordance with it. Already being here when I go to post anything on Instagram. Like, I'm still getting low. Likes five likes, six likes, 10 likes, 15 likes, maybe 20 likes a post, but I am showing up. As if I am the version of myself that already has thousands of followers, I have brainwashed myself into thinking that I am this person that is speaking to thousands of people already. And I feel that in my body when I go to post, when I go to speak on my on here, on the podcast, I started brainwashing myself and listen, we're all freaking brainwashed. We're all running on programs that they told us. What, when we were younger, how things worked in this world. So why not fucking brainwash yourself in the way that benefits yourself, brainwash yourself in the direction of your dreams. And part of that is learning to welcome resistance with open arms. To actually see it as a sign that you are doing something right now. I don't think that the best way to deal with resistance is to just try to overpower it and go full speed ahead and use all your willpower and like push past it like that. You can do that for maybe a week or two tops. And then that energy runs out. Willpower is a finite energy finite. The way to do it is the same way that a physical trainer would teach someone how to lift weights that hasn't lifted weights before or maybe has only lifted. Mm. Lightweights. You start with titration. Building up the next level, one step at a time, and that is what I had to do to be comfortable showing up online. I have shared before that. I would cry. Cry in my therapist's office. I remember sitting in his office completely beige office. He sat at a desk that was way too far away from me, like the whole room felt in between us. He was an old man who didn't really give me much of any sort of support. He just kind of sat there and took notes. As I would talk, I just, the whole thing. Uh, really I look back and I, I'm very confused that this is what, what was, I don't know what someone would think was helping somebody. And I remember telling him I can't even post a picture of myself on Facebook. It makes me wanna, like, scr, like just hide. I, I can't even do it. And I see other people doing it every day, posting pictures of what their smoothie, their walk, their cat, their dog, what is wrong with me? I thought there was something wrong with me, and it wasn't that there was something wrong with me. It was just that I was out of the practice of being someone who was visible. So tell me if this is you, because this was me. I was someone that learned early on in my household that if I could be quiet enough, if I could keep the peace enough, if I could make sure that I was good, good enough, keep all my grades, show up to the bus every day, uh, clean my room, do the dishes, do all of my chores, like I really tried in my household. Ah, man. I just, I feel sadness coming up as I'm thinking about this. Whew. I really tried in my household to be as small as I possibly could. I mean, my father used to quote the Bible, the meek will inherit the earth. I don't fucking think that's what the Bible actually means. Bible like being, like being small actually is a disservice to everybody else. But that's on a tangent. I, I, I could make a whole other podcast about that, and in fact, I should. But I would, my strategy to make sure that my parents didn't get angry at me, which they did a lot, was to be as small as quiet, as peaceful as I could possibly be, and I couldn't understand why a lot of my siblings couldn't also. Adopt that same strategy. Like if you can just be small enough and quiet enough and do everything right enough, then I can finally feel good enough about myself. Then I can finally feel accepted by my parents. Then I can finally have an evening where they don't yell at me. Then I can finally, ba, ba, ba, ba. So that was the strategy that I took with me into my twenties and beyond. And I was simply out of practice of being okay, feeling resistant, showing up and talking, and saying what I wanted to say and posting about what I wanted to post. I was out of practice. And the way our subconscious works is that the more we avoid something, the more we think it's dangerous. Think about someone, okay? Think about a smoker. They are smoking every single day and they have brainwashed themselves to thinking that it, it actually isn't dangerous, which is the opposite of that. The more you go go towards something, it can feel not dangerous, even if it is. So somebody smoking cracks, same thing. Uh, it's just a little bit of crack, but someone with a phobia of an elevator, they might get into an elevator. Or they might let their daughter get into an elevator so they understand that it actually isn't dangerous. Otherwise, they would never let their daughter or someone that they love get in an elevator, but they will never get in an elevator. And the more that they avoid the specific thing, the more their brain, the inner part of your brain, the subconscious part of your brain thinks it is more and more dangerous. So I grew up playing. Small. So the more I practiced that, the more my body and my brain thought visibility was dangerous, the more I felt resistance around speaking up, raising my hand in, in class, posting to Facebook, all of that. So I was out of practice. Letting there be resistance and I certainly didn't know how to move past resistance. I certainly didn't. I mean, I would just, I, I would tell little teenager me if I could go back to like, raise your hand more to practice speaking what I was feeling more in situations where I wasn't gonna get yelled. Ah, so maybe that's talking to the grocery store clerk or friends about thing, whatever it was, but to be in the practice of it more at an earlier age. Whew. Obviously, I'm so freaking happy with the way, like I wouldn't change anything about my life and I don't think that it is a very healthy thing to, to even fantasize about changing anything. But I would see the benefit in coaching my own girls, which I will into speaking up more and more and making it a practice. And meeting resistance with open arms, surrendering to it, but doing so in a way where you're taking that one next gradual step. So lifting that 20 pound weight if you're used to lifting 10 pounds. So that doesn't mean. Uh, all of a sudden trying to make yourself be a speaker on stage, if that's not something that you're practiced in, it could mean though practicing talking to the person next to you at a coffee shop, talking to the person who's bagging your groceries, talking to someone at a family, get together, you don't usually talk to. Sending someone a DM that you normally wouldn't send a DM to thank them for their message that day, things like that. And honestly, I'll tell you where I really started. I started in my head first because again, there's a part of our subconscious mind that doesn't understand the difference between visualization and what's actually happening. That is why you can cry. So I had to start visualizing myself, posting on social media to feel more comfortable with it. I had to picture myself pressing the post button and just letting it go, and now I feel so comfortable, like I, I get resistance when I'm not doing it consistently and then trying to show back up again. It's almost like I've landed the plane and now there's no inertia, and now I have to let the plane take off again. But doing it when I've posted yesterday, posting the next day feels freaking like nothing. And I, I can't even, I can't even get over that. I can't even get over how I've been able to get over the fear of that. Like I, I, I swear I would've never thought it was possible for me to be so comfortable being visible to it just blows my mind. I remember, I remember my boss telling me, you can have another night working the VIP lounge. After the night that I worked the VIP lounge. I made no money. He said, you can have another night. I'll put you on the schedule for another night. Working the VIP lounge for this place that I worked at. It's called Beauty and Essex, on the va, on the Las Vegas Strip. Would, I would've made $700 that night had I said, okay. Yeah, but no, something in me, I, I al I felt like, I felt like I clammed down, like my whole body was shaking. I said, no, no, I, it, it came out of me. Those words, no, I'm okay. Came out of me before I could even mentally process, like, do I wanna say yes? Do I wanna say no? No, no, no. Just came out. And so I'm saying this because. Everything you want in this life. That feeling of, oh my God, I actually made it through to the other side of this. That's going to come after moving through the resistance. A lot of times we think, oh, once I feel courageous enough to show up online, then I'll start showing up online, or whatever it is. I just use showing up online. 'cause to me that's like the most mind blowing thing of like having had gone through the resistance of, but it could be anything. Talking to your boss, sharing your thoughts in a meeting with your coworkers, going out on a date with that hot guy, creating art and posting about it. Any of those things there's going to be resistance to and getting to the other side is the going to give you the feeling you're looking for and that feeling won't happen before the resistance. I remember thinking, I'm going to start my podcast when I feel ready to start my podcast. I'm gonna start posting online when I feel ready to post online. Err never came. The feeling ready never came. And the more that I speak to entrepreneurs, the more they will reflect the same thing back to me, which is, feeling ready is a decision. It's not a feeling, it's a decision. I decide I'm ready even though my whole body is shaking, even though my voice is shaking. The first time I recorded my, uh, podcast episode, I mean it took me hours. And here I am just free flowing. This podcast episode is, this episode's not even gonna need any edits, but the first episode I had to start, stop, start, stop, edit, edit, edit. You know, but the more, the more you practice moving towards resistance, the more you will get the feeling that you are looking for on the other side of it. And I want you to know that the feeling of resistance, it doesn't mean that there's anything wrong with you. It doesn't mean you're lazy. It doesn't mean you can't do it. It's not a sign to turn around. It's not a sign to not do it. Everybody feels resistance when they're going after something that feels different. Yeah. And everybody that you've ever admired and you're like, wow, how did they do that? How did they build that business? How did they become that athlete? How did they become that keynote speaker? How did that become that CEO of that company? Everybody has moved through resistance to get there, and they've done it over and over again. It's a part, it's, it's, it's, it's the cost. It's the cost of success and it's easy to procrastinate and distract in the moment. Trust me, I know this. I am still working on Mm. I'm still, I, I, I will forever still be working on that, but there's also a cost to. Choosing to procrastinate. There's that feeling. I get this feeling in my body when I don't, don't move past the resistance. I'm not comfortable not doing it. Just like pushing, just like pushing in the uh, towards resistance is uncomfortable. The other option isn't comfortable either. I get this feeling of like, oh, I should have done it. Oh, I get like a dull feeling like in my chest, like, Ugh, I get antsy. I get anxious. You know, like there's like this ugh, tension in my body, and the whole reason I didn't do it in the first place is because I didn't wanna feel uncomfortable, and then I end up feeling uncomfortable anyway, so I fucking lose when I don't. Move towards the thing that I wanna do, and I'm curious if that shows up for you too. And so the sneaky lies that will come up is like, I need to do more research on this. Who do I think I am to do this? Oh, I'll just start tomorrow. Oh, I'll just start next week. All of that. Is part of resistance and it is so insidious, like it's, it's always there. Like it feels so logical to just start tomorrow. It feels so logical to, like right now I'm actually, my goal for this year is to shorten the distance between when I have an idea and then when I execute on that idea, I know that there's a big gap there that I can shorten. And it feels so logical for me to be like, okay, this would be a really cool reel. Let me write it in my notes app and let me execute on that in tomorrow or in two days. Right? That's the resistance at play. It's like, oh wait, we don't need to do that. Now that thing is feels scary, but instead I can do one thing that is in the direction of that. I am now practiced. At creating reels, I can create them now in 25 minutes. What? Why? Why not? Why not just do the do the thing? Spend the 25 minutes doing the thing? Practice. Practice doing the scary thing, one step at a time. You can practice by first visualizing, then you can practice doing it in low stakes environments. Then you start playing with the medium stake environments. Yeah, that's what's, that's what people call exposure therapy. So you're letting your brain know that it is indeed safe to do the thing. So your brain is showing you all the evidence why it wouldn't be safe to do the thing. Oh, look, at the time when someone laughed at me for posting something on social media, like that might come up. If, if you're someone who's like wanting to post something but feeling resistance towards it, your brain will feed you that story of that one time that that one person said that one thing. So funny, right? I mean, just it's funny the way that our brain will actively try to sound so reasonable by showing us all the times when we've felt the most shame, but. If you can understand that, that is just a mechanism your brain knows how to pull. It's just a lever that's saying, Hey, I don't feel safe here. Here's why I don't feel safe. And so you can take that moment and you can say, actually, we're safe. And you can provide it evidence that you are safe doing the thing by taking that one next step. And if it is something that feels really, really scary, like if the resistance is really, really strong, I have felt resistance so strong in my body before sometimes doing one small thing and then rewarding yourself on the other side. Like, okay, let me just do this one thing really quick. Lemme just do it. Lemme just, ah. And then like, go eat a fucking chocolate bar if that's my, or, or, or if you have healthier habits than me, go on a walk, go, um, dance, dance it out, dance the angst out. But for me, it's, it's the fucking chocolate bar. I'm not gonna lie, it's it, I like dancing the angst out too. I like going on a walk too, but like the first thing I reach for is like, okay, sugar. But knowing, teaching your brain that it actually isn't scary is a whole, it's a whole skill. And the more that you look at it as a skill that you're developing, the easier it will be. Instead of like, oh my God, I shouldn't feel this. Oh my God, there's something wrong with me. Oh my God, why does everyone else seem to be doing it so much easier than I do? Like those were my thoughts. Like everyone else seems to have it figured out instead of that. It's just a skill. It's just a skill. Some people have cultivated that skill and. You can also cultivate that skill and it is so worth it to get to the other side of something that feels scary. Like haven't you ever done something where you got to the other side and you were like, wow, I did it and it wasn't actually that bad. I have had so many moments in my life and those are the moments in my life that I have felt the most alive. The most alive, the most, I don't wanna say proud 'cause I don't even like the word proud, but the most lit up by life. That energy is worth, worth reaching for. And if it wasn't as hard as it was, then that feeling wouldn't feel as good as it did. Everything has an equal and opposite reaction so that how much resistance we're feeling in the moment is equally proportionate to how good it's going to feel on the other side of it, and that that is what you can help latch onto to pull you through the resistance. Think about how good it will feel on the other side, and that is actually my compass now to whether to do something or not, because whether it's gonna feel good in the moment or not is not the right compass. Eating a McDonald's cheeseburger feels good in the moment. Having a pint of ice cream feels good in the moment. Uh, having sex with a stranger feels good in the moment, but is it gonna feel good on the other side of it? Is it worth the cost to your future self? I, I haven't had a McDonald's cheeseburger in years. I refuse. Now I know that I am playing a game where I have to take into account my future self every time. Is this something that's going to make my future self feel lit up inside? And if it is, I'm going after it. And if it isn't, then it's a sign like maybe I should switch directions. So resistance is your friend. It is the ticket to the life that you know you are here to create and everything you want is on the other side of it. It's on the other side. There's like this expansion that happens. There's like this realm of like, wow, it's possible. For me, that is a growth mindset of like, wow, I can do it. Let me try to find opportunities. Let me try to figure it out. Let me do it. Let just relax or render to the resistance. That is a growth mindset and if you are devoted to a growth mindset, if you are devoted to a big life, if you are devoted to doing what it takes, you are in the minority you are. Most people don't, and so do not look to other people to validate what it is that you're doing. That's a whole other podcast too, but I just want you to know, do not look to other people for. Feedback on whether you should push past the resistance and do the thing that feels scary because most people are not playing this game, but you are, and you can. Man, this has made all the difference for me in the past six months, and I hope that it has served you too. So the next time you're feeling resistance, think about what is that one next step I can take, and how can I just do it? Feeling scared. All right, I'm rooting for you. I will see you in the next podcast episode. Sending you so much love. I.