Picking on somebody else's emotions is not only exhausting, it can really debilitate your quality of life. You will start to absorb everything around you and you will make it and adopt it as your own. We don't wanna do that, so we're gonna talk about that right now. (upbeat music) Hey, hey, hey everybody, and welcome back to The Positivity Experience. It's your girl, Lori, and we're all missing to the new year. We're all missing to the holiday. If you celebrate the holiday, it is right here. I hope that you've done your shopping or just gonna sit down and recalibrate and just appreciate and have gratitude. This topic is going to be so beneficial, well, hopefully in your whole life, but it's gonna be beneficial going into the year, dealing with people, sitting around, and you're around people who you kinda don't wanna be around, and then you haven't got to the point to where you're just like, screw it, I'm not gonna go. So now you're sitting and you're just taking on everybody, and we are definitely gonna talk about that today. I'm telling you, it is so problematic for many, many reasons, but of course, it's your own quality of life. Now, there is going to be a really good worksheet over on Patreon. Not only are you gonna have the worksheet, then you're gonna have the like, okay, how are we gonna implement worksheet? How are you gonna implement it? Someone asked me about Patreon and what it is, so that is the paid Patreon, and you will get one episode every time this is released, you will get one, and the worksheet will always complement whatever the topic is, but you will get one a week, and then on the abundance tier, if that's your selection, you would also get one more bonus episode, but keep in mind it is four episodes, as long as there's four podcasts. So if that's your jam, hop on over to patreon.com forward slash the positivity experience, and you can get your worksheet, and every worksheet before thereafter. So most importantly, let's jump into this right now. I have heard this multiple times. I'm gonna empath can't help myself. Mm-hmm, yeah, we're not gonna do that. I have worked with empaths all over the world, and you guys know I'm intuitive. It is real easy to be affected as long as you allow yourself that. What you wanna be very careful in is just hanging your hat on. I'm an empath, I can't help it. You can, and that's where we're gonna go today. And you know, I think there's this idea, and a lot of us are born with it, not born with this, but we're kinda grown up in this, especially if you've had trauma, okay? If you've had trauma, you may have heard, or it not even heard, you may have felt, I have to take care of this person's emotions, so I don't get yelled at. You know, that's how it was with my dad. You know, he was a big drinker, all of these things were going on. I never knew what I was gonna get, and it wasn't consistent. You can say, okay, well, now we know, no, we didn't know. It was always, I don't know what to expect. Sir, there was this idea that I had to manage his emotions, so I wouldn't get the brunt of it. Now, that was in survival, and I did that for many years. But as you transition out of that, you have got to work through it, so you're not carrying that obligation going forward, but you have to be willing to accept that this is your journey, and you are capable of doing this. Now, you may have also heard that. You might have heard someone and go, don't make your mom angry. You better stop, or better yet. Your dad is gonna get really upset. You know, he's had a long day. You wanna be really careful. So now you're managing emotions. You're trying to do these things. In turn, you're gonna start absorbing it. So let's go forward. So now you're an adult, you're living your life, and I know you know people like this. Really think hard. You ever think to yourself, okay, I'm gonna go to this event. It doesn't even have to be a family member. And you're like, oh God, okay. This person's gonna have all of these emotions, and I want to help them. I don't want them to suffer, so I wanna be there and listen. Okay, that's fine. That's fine, but here's the problem. Now this person is heavy. It's negative. It's depressing. It's all of these things. And now you try to manage it. You try to take it on. It's one thing to have empathy, and it's another thing to adopt their emotions as your own. They are not the same thing. So you can't say, I'm an empath, I can't help but absorb their stuff. That's not true. That's not a true statement. Just because you have, say you're an empath, you're able to identify it, and you're able to see it more, but you still don't have to absorb it. And yes, it is possible to not absorb it, 'cause you have to first understand what it is. So when you're taking on somebody else's feelings, you are creating them, although it's like it's your own. I think I did this in a previous podcast where it's you're kind of looking at it as the projection podcast. You're looking at it and you're projecting. So you go, I know what it's like. I know how I felt when I was in blank, blank, blank relationship. So you see someone else, and you can tell that they're in peril a little bit, and you're relating that to something, the projection now. You're relating that to you. So now their stress emotions, you've now adopted them because you identify and you want to take that away. So now you have adopted it. Remember, listening and having empathy and being a support system does not mean you have to solve, does not mean you have to fix, does not mean you have to take it on. And this is really important. So let's go, oh, and by the way, this could be conscious or subconscious, and it causes you to be drained, overwhelmed, and anxious. That is right. Really think about being around someone. And listen, you're not always going to be able to avoid things. As much as you can do that, not avoid it, just distance. Sometimes you're not. There's going to be these people around you who there's emotions that are high and sad, and all of these things are happening. That's why you need to bubble up, and you need to remember that you can have empathy without absorbing. So let's talk about it. Empathy, okay, we're going to detail it here. So I want you to really think about this and put a little, I don't know, a little pin on your bulletin board about this, save this part and come back. Empathy, it recognizes the feelings of others. I can see that they are sad. Oh, I can, I see that you're sad. I'm really sorry that you're sad. I am here if you need anything. Boom, okay? Empathy, you're there, you can do that. When you are emotionally absorbing, you are over identifying. So this goes back to what I'm saying, oh my God. I know how I would feel. Oh, if this happened to me, this is what I would feel, right? So now you are over identifying with those feelings. To the point to where these become now your emotional experiences. And a lot of you do that. I mean, I dare to say all of us have done that. I have, you know, especially growing up as a kid and oh my God, I'm identifying it and then I see somebody else who's lost their mom or these things and then I'm like, oh, you know, you over identify when you're not really comfortable within yourself, I mean, within yourself, like you don't really have any other point of reference. But it's important to know what you're doing because you can't change it unless you're aware of it. And believe it or not, not everybody wants to be aware of it. Sometimes that's become their identity which we're gonna talk about in a minute. And you start getting so caught up in other people. But it is now your emotional experiences. So if you see what they're going through, you can have empathy and go, oof, but you can distance and say, okay, what am I gonna have for dinner? You really can. You can care without caring. Really hear that. Repeat that to yourself, write this down. You can care without caring. Very true statement. It's again, trying to navigate relating to something that someone has an experience that is similar to yours. So you wanna be careful not to over-identify. Now, let's go into some psychology 'cause this isn't just like, ooh, opinion. This is also scientifically backed through science and psychology because there is a reason why you do it, okay? You have mirroring neurons. Can I bring you a little nerdy here but I'll try to make it easy. You have mirroring neurons. That's just how you're pretty much, that's how your brain is, right? So it's a neuroscientific neuroscience way of explaining that and research describes us. When you have mirroring neurons, it is in our brain to emotionally absorb, okay? I'm sorry, not to emotionally absorb but it's to observe, that's the word I was looking for, others, emotions or actions. So you can look without absorbing. I see this, my brain goes, ooh, you know, you ever see, oh my gosh, I have empathy. You are seeing that, your brain is mirroring that. Where that becomes problematic is examining it to the point to where you're trying to figure it out to take that from them. That's where the absorption comes from. Observe, yes, absorb, no, okay? Care without carrying, observe without absorbing. And yes, it is possible but you have to be willing to do that. On top of that, you have to be willing to be the villain, you have to be willing to be misunderstood, yeah. There's a lot of things to work on in order to get to the place where you're okay with listening and carrying without carrying. You're not gonna listen to this or anybody else or anything else and just start doing this but you have to start somewhere. You have to start somewhere. So this is neuroscience, it's the mirroring. There's also something called emotional contagion, okay? Emotional contagion, this is why you want to surround yourself with forward thinking people, not victim mentality, not blame game, not constantly staying in a complaining cycle without seeking either a problem solved, like without solution or getting to the place of, okay, acceptance, that is one thing. When you really think about this, that's why you hear all the time, elevate. Get with people who are elevating. If you want to be successful, whatever you deem that in, doesn't mean to be a millionaire, you want to be around people who are supporting the same thing. Again, real world, you're not gonna be around all those people, but that's why you wanna bubble against them and you're gonna have to accept maybe it's your family, maybe it's your friends, maybe it's the people that you thought it was gonna be and they are the ones that are just negative. Then what, guess what's gonna happen? You are going to mirror, right? We already talked about this, how your brain is wired, you're going to mirror it and then you're gonna get the emotional contagion. Remember, emotions spread like a virus. They really do. If you go into a room right now, let's say it doesn't matter if you're in a good mood, bad mood, you walk into a room right now, I'll say everybody's in there negative. I mean, it is just heavy. You walk in, you're almost like, oh, what is happening? Well, if you came in in a halfway decent mood, good Lord, you're gonna be, oh God, I'm ready, go home. Oh, and you started off so good. Just the other way around, you could feel down, not so in a great mood and not, you know, where you walk in and people are like pretending as though life is perfect, but positive thinking. They're there, they're, hey, how was your day? Ah, you know, my was okay, that's okay, we have tomorrow. Like these people who are seeking forward thinking, not living in a victim space is what's gonna elevate you. So you wanna be around things that you were going to, I guess, get affected by. Essentially, that's what it is. And when you're in that, you have to understand that social psychology, right? Because as a social person, you're always gonna have a level of psychology. It really suggests that being close to someone, experiences, you were able to almost catch the vibe. You ever hear that one somebody said, "Dad, gone, I just caught a vibe." That's how. That's why you wanna be careful what you absorb online, what you watch on TV. I mean, I'm a merit murder podcast kind of girl, but I like to look at it from the eyes of, oh, what's going on with this person mentally. It's not so much I wanna be around the negative all the time. 'Cause I mean, it's more educational. So when you are selective, because you gotta be careful, when you are not feeling super well, and sometimes I remember doing this as a teenager, you're sad, you're really in the emo type emotions and you're sad, so you turn on sad music. You just wanna hear sad music. You just wanna be in the moment you wanna live in that sadness. Well, fast forward ahead. That's not where you wanna be. When you're younger, you don't really know. But you want to do things that are promoting that feeling. Now, you're allowed your feelings. You're allowed to experience your feelings. Preferably don't feed them. Experience them. Feed your emotions, no, no. Experiencing your emotions, yes. To feed your emotions is something similar. I'm gonna be a 15-year-old girl again. My friends are leaving me out. I'm really upset. All I wanna do is listen to music that just says either how much of a victim I am or how terrible they are. I just wanna lay in bed, yeah, we don't wanna do that. Again, 15 years old, you're not really thinking rationally. You are able to experience them without falling victim to them. And that's actually a big part of my practice, to be honest with you. It's getting you to accept it and even me to remind myself of that on a pretty regular basis. My daughter, a lot of you know this, my daughter is 17. She has struggled with mental health issues all of her life. She was in a facility for a short period of time. She came out. She has cycles. She just went through a cycle. It is really difficult and I really was talking to a couple of friends of mine and clients and friends that I really had to do my own therapy work. This isn't just for everybody else. This is actually for me too. And a lot of what I tell you I've experienced and I can tell you what does and does not work long-term from a psychological perspective. But I had to really go, okay, I cannot absorb her stuff right now 'cause it's very negative. It's very not sure if I wanna be here on the planet. There's a lot that comes along with that. And in that moment, when someone is in that darker place or just in a place of like, I don't really see the out, it's that you don't, they don't really want the solution because nothing, no solution's gonna be enough. Well, we could do, that's not gonna work. Okay, well, I don't wanna do that, that's dumb. You're like, oh, okay, cool. So then you have to accept that not, the people aren't going to take the resources until they're ready to take the resources. Now we're through this cycle and most people have a cycle. I mean, some people can stay in it but usually there's a cycle, there's that clock, right? 12, 3, 6, 9, 12. And so there is that part that constantly kinda either keep cycling and the more you fight that, the more you stay in that loop. So if you're constantly in 12 to three or three to six and you're just bouncing through there, you're not gonna get out of that. So it's gonna take you a lot longer to actually come into that. So that's where you wanna be really careful of absorbing it or even fighting your own, chasing yourself to get out of it. You can even look at your own emotions and go, my God, am I absorbing my own emotions? I know that's on silly, but you can even observe your emotions. What is this teaching me? What am I missing? What am I seeking? What do I still need to heal versus getting stuck in it? So you can even absorb your own stuff. But that's really important 'cause you have to understand that there's a contagion there. Now hyper vigilance, oh, I know we've talked about this multiple times, hyper vigilance from trauma. This is where you're like, nope, childhood trauma. And this is, I'm speaking also firsthand, also psychology based, science based, but also firsthand experience. Childhood trauma or any chaotic relationship. So it's not just childhood trauma. This can cause hyper vigilance and cause this idea that you have these emotional cues for safety and security. So you're looking to, this is like my dad's situation, right? And other people along my life. You're looking for the emotional cue so you don't have to have conflict with it. And that's that whole, okay, I don't want to deal with anything, but you're still absorbing it. You're absorbing their fears. You're absorbing their anger, which again is a lesson you have to learn. It's not something to beat yourself up about. Hell, you don't really have the tools. 98% of us weren't given any type of tools 'cause you're only gonna have the tools that the unhealed people before you gave you, right? You can't say, why didn't you give me the tools? They didn't have the tools. They were making shit up as they went along. And then they were given the unhealed tools. And so there's a cycle break that has to happen. Has to happen, but your hyper vigilance, you think as a protector, you gotta be careful of that. 'Cause then that's where you want to do it all by yourself. Again, I'm a very big person of like, I got this. Like if I could go to Lowe's, if I needed a refrigerator and everybody was busy and be like, screw it, I'll figure it out, I'll get it in my car. I'd go down, I'd order it, I'd be like, they all need to take it out, I'll do the damn thing myself. It's good in some spaces to be independent, not hyper vigilant, independent. It is not good to always feel as though you have to be. I understand it's a trauma response, I got it. But trauma responses cannot, you cannot stay in a trauma response. Yes, it changes your brain chemistry and you can rewire that again. That's what we talk about here. Neuroscience, the things I talk to you about, I make it like layman's terms, it's science based. Okay, I'm gonna always have a harsher approach. I'm gonna let you know direct stuff. If you wanna sit and listen to a scientist, they will tell you the same thing. It just might be a different delivery. And you have to decide what that delivery method is, but just because some people don't like to hear it, or they don't like the package, doesn't make it less true, right? Just 'cause you don't like how it's presented doesn't make it any less true. And so those are the things that you have to remember. And you have got to understand that taking everything on is not this impressive thing. It's great, it does come in handy. I'm not gonna lie to you, I'm not gonna lie. 'Cause when I wanna get something done, I'm like, screw it, I'll figure it out. That's good. Just be careful of that not kind of linking. You gotta be really careful of that. Now, and that hyper vigilance is always going to be something that you're always seeking too. I need this person to be in a good mood, so then I feel safe, but that's not always a true statement. Just 'cause someone's in a good mood, and if you're trying to dance around it, are you really safe? I mean, you might feel safe in that moment, are you really safe? Because then you're always like, oh God, what's gonna go on here? So then you're always keeping, trying to keep it safe, but is that really safe at all? If you have to constantly work and work and over analyze and over please and do all that stuff to try to feel safe, you're not safe. Because a person in a relationship in a situation that is truly good and safe for you, you would not have to do that. Now, the issue comes when you want that specific person to do it and that specific person does not owe that to you. So accepting that safety isn't supposed to be coddling, safety is allowing yourself that time and that space to be with yourself and feel good and feel that these people around me have my emotional best interest at heart, but I don't have to work to prove that to them or to myself. And so that's all rooted in the psychology. Now, here are some empathy misconceptions and I cannot begin to tell you how much people misconceive and misconstrue what empathy is. Many people equate being an empath with having no choice but to absorb others. Others emotions, other stuff. It's not a mandate to carry the burdens of others. That's the thing. You're looking at it and saying I must have empathy and I must be there to fix and solve. You're not gonna be. You can be empathetic. Listen, some people are gonna have more empathy. It's just true. Some will have more empathy. Some will have more patience. Doesn't make you better or worse. It just were different as people. But the misconception that says I am an empath, I have no choice. I have got to absorb others. This also goes into an identity. 'Cause now you'll be like can't help but I'm an empath. There is this level of I'm gonna take this on. There's this level of purpose, going back to last week's podcast, this misconception of purpose. My purpose is because I'm an empath. My purpose is to be here for these people. That's not your purpose. So allowing yourself, and we know that being an empath typically comes from a trauma response anyway. So when you're in that space, again, you wanna be careful of adopting it. I know what this person went through, so I have extra empathy. That's projection. So if you haven't heard the, if you're new here, hey, hi, welcome. But if you haven't heard it, or even if you have, go back a few weeks, probably a month and a half ago, to the projection podcast. Because the amount of times that we project onto other people is insane. It really is. So much of what you do, the choices that you make, I mean, you got a point of reference. I mean, at the end of the day, you gotta do what you gotta do. But don't project your stuff onto other people. I know how they would feel. I didn't have somebody there for me. In turn, I have got to be that person to solve this problem, and that is not gonna save you. That is not gonna save your mental health at all. It doesn't fix your past. You know, you keep trying to find these fixes. Where going back in time is great if you're like, okay, I want to learn from this. What are my things? Like, what did I learn? What were my challenges? What can I do with that? Now, no, when you're in the middle of it, you're not gonna know. You're not gonna know. So there's no need to beat yourself up. It's about awareness. What are you aware of today? Because that's a big one. Because when you're carrying the burdens of others, you think that you're running interference for them. And you're not. Many times, and this is a tough one. I just told you what I've been going through with my kid. And it's not my first time. It's not my first rodeo around here. Is when you are seeing this, and when you are experiencing this, it is very easy to get lost in solving the problem. In turn, you're absorbing the emotions and you're projecting. It's so easy. And it's the awareness. You have to pull back, journal it. Book a session with me. Book a session with somebody. Listen to 57 podcasts, read books. But they're only as effective as you're willing to do the work. Of course, it's hard to watch someone suffer. It's hard to see what they're going through. It's hard not to take on that emotion, but you will lose yourself. You cannot make someone want to heal, and it is not your job to do that. Because you start absorbing it, you will lose all sense of your healing. Again, you're in the black and white thinking. If I'm not super empathetic and trying to solve it, fix it and be there at any given beck and call, then I'm a bad person. I'm cold and callous and rude and selfish because I'm not at their every beck and call. There's not, that's not a thing. There's 87,000 different colors of gray and different shades of gray, and you're allowed to find those. Again, going back to what I said, care without caring, observe without absorbing. Again, tattoo that on your forehead should you need to, but it's important for you to understand it because then remember this too, an affirmation doesn't change you. Like you don't just go, okay, here's my affirmation. I am plentiful, the universe provides me abundance. Yes, but you got to believe it, you got to live it, and you got to repeat it, and you got to do the things. Just saying I'm abundant in the universe, the universe isn't just going to drop everything on top of you, you got to work towards it. Same thing, it's going to take you a minute, but you have to remember that when people have become not absorbing, they know that you're absorbing and they know that you're problem solving and fixing it, when they feel some kind of way they will reach out to you because they want you to basically heal and fix them. And the moment you're like, oh God, this is like, because I don't care who you are, that's going to be draining. I don't care who you are. So it's going to drain you. You're allowed to be supportive. People go through shit that's really dark and deep. Be supportive without absorbing it, but you also have to protect your mental space and your mental peace along that journey. Now, why do we absorb it? Some of these are going to be very common ones for you. And this one is like the standard. If you go back and listen to half of my podcasts, you're going to hear me say this, fear of rejection. Your subconscious or conscious way, you're seeking for approval. You're seeking for a connection. Your fear of rejection, it's the same thing with people pleasing, right? Like there's a level of people pleasing, not all, but there's a level of people pleasing where you're fearing the rejection, right? Like again, been there, done that, bought the shirt with my dad, many other people. You want to just keep the peace. Just everybody, just please, don't stress me, don't hit me, don't do whatever. So you come to that, right? So that's a hypervigilance we talked about. But there is still this level of acceptance. You don't want to be rejected. So you try everything that you can. By absorbing, you're trying everything that you can. So you fear being rejected. And just remember, every no is not a rejection and not everybody in your space needs to stay there. So you can't really be, a no is not a rejection. And somebody, if somebody feels the need to quote unquote, reject you and run in the other direction because you weren't at their beck and call, that's okay too. That's okay too. Then let them go. Because if it's gonna be that situational where somebody asked me the other day, what's the difference between love and attachment? Well, that's pretty easy. Love wants the person to live their best life even if you're not part of it, right? I want you, let's say you're my friend and you've decided I can't talk to you anymore because I'm on my own growth journey. As hurtful as that might be or as bruising to the ego as that might be, if I love you, I want you to have the happiest life even if I'm not in it. I don't need the accolades, I don't need you to tell me. Thank you, I don't, I love you, I want what's best for you. Attachment is now you're attaching stuff to an outcome. You're attaching a certain thing to, if somebody calls you your, love and attachment are very different things. If you go back to the attachment podcast probably six of a months ago, you'll hear it a lot better and a lot deeper, but you have got to remember that your fear of rejection is what also keeps you in that cycle. Well, I gotta be there for them so they can see my value. If I'm not there, they're not gonna see my value and I'm gonna be rejected. Unclear boundaries. Oh God, this is a regular one, huh. Oh, goodness. Unclear boundaries. Without those, you are going to be enmeshed with feelings. A boundary is, I will, now some of this you have to put it within yourself, okay? My boundary is blank. You know, I will only commit X amount of time to it. This is what I'm gonna do. The moment you do not adhere to your boundaries is the moment you have now not only dropped your boundaries, you've now told the other person, ah, my boundaries are just a suggestion. It's fine. I mean, this is my boundary, but you know, it's okay. You're gonna start negotiating. Well, I mean, I know what this would feel like, ooh, projection. Ah, yeah, I just don't want them to be mad at me. Ooh, rejection. Anything with a shin, projection, rejection. I feel like I just did conjunction, junction. So it's that thing that you have to remember there's a deeper rooted issue as to why you continue to do this. Now, identity confusion, this is what I was talking to you about before, is your identity now becomes the saver, your identity becomes a person who takes on everything else. When you lack a strong sense of self, when you're not strong within yourself, this is gonna become a thing. Oh my goodness, this is gonna become a thing on the highest of levels. Because now your identity comes with saving others or being a mesh with others, and then there's the codependency. And that's a belief where you can fix others to maintain harmony. Really hear that. Codependency, when it comes to observing emotions, this is really important. When you're a codependent, you believe that you can or that it's your job to fix others to maintain harmony. That's not true. It's just not true statement. How do you stop that? And again, we'll go way deeper over on Patreon, but let me give you some tips. You gotta be willing to do it. There's no fast fix. Let's go through this first. There's no fast fix. If you're not consistent, it's not gonna work. Do not over explain yourself. If you're willing to do these steps and be uncomfortable, 'cause you're gonna be uncomfortable at first, that's how you're gonna be effective. So first you have to recognize your ownership. That's right. Recognize emotional ownership. Because when you're enmeshed and when you start to overthink it, it gets all blocky, right? Like it's all, it really is. And then it's hard to kind of figure it out. So something really good to ask yourself, write this down. Okay, just pause this right here. Go get a pen or whatever you got. And I want you to write this down. Is this or are these? Is this or are these my emotions? Or are they someone else's? Not are they your emotions? Not I feel sorry that this, no, no. Are those emotions yours? Or are those somebody else's? Are these emotions mine or are they somebody else's? Ready? With that, you can do a dot dot or underneath that. It's very important, okay? Empathy does not equal responsibility. Hear that well. Empathy does not mean responsibility. Correct. And that's what we have to work on. And that's detachment. I also did a podcast on 90,000 different things. If you have probably a good month and a half, two months, a little bit more, you're going to find a podcast on detachment, living detached. It is the best way to live. Detached but connected. And yes, that's a thing. And yes, that's rooted in science. And yes, that's gonna help you in many ways. So if you go back and you listen to a lot of those, especially if you're the worksheets, just go back and visit them or redo them. I think it'll be helpful. If you are over there and you do get the worksheets, I always say don't just don't once. Go back six, seven months ago. And you might find many different things have changed and things that you can celebrate. But it is so important to understand many things, but you can care without carrying. Write that down too. And empathy does not equal responsibility. Really, now, the same way I'm telling this to you, that's the same for other people with you. This isn't just about you. This is also about respecting and understanding other people's needs. And they can be empathetic without suddenly taking on responsibility. And if you're insecure and if you have an ego and if you're doing those things, that's when you start to freak out. Well, nobody cares. No, they just don't doing the things you want them to. And then that's a whole other thing. That's a whole kind of different topic, but kind of not really. Another thing you can do is you've got to strengthen your emotional boundaries. Your emotional boundaries are key 101, life 101. I want something I do. I do this before I go into groups. Sometimes I do this before my sessions for the day, but not always 'cause I don't need to. If you can visualize a bubble, just you're standing in a bubble, you know one of those big bubbles and you see people getting kicked down the hill and they're like, "Wee, one of those." You're in one of those. Or what I visualize is I visualize this really awesome white light and it's hitting the top of my crown chakra and it just emits this almost iridescent light and it's a bubble. It's a visual exercise. So if you have to redo this bubble 100 times a day right now, redo it. You're not gonna be able to avoid things. Life isn't gonna be perfect. So you better operate from a place of what you can control and visualization is one of them. It'll take you a minute. I can visualize sitting here, talking to you and I can escape and go to Italy and have no idea what here looks like anymore 'cause I'm there. That takes time. Visualization is one of the best tools you can use in life. You can listen across the board to that and in science. Visualization is a massive piece. So if you can visualize it, this bubble around you and just constantly, you sit there with your crystals. You can have something inside there, have your cats on the bubble with you, I don't care. But know that that is your personal space. Their emotions are not my responsibility. Bubble, their emotions are not my responsibility. Make that your mantra. I mean, I like the mantra in my morning 'cause I am capable of handling anything that the day sends my way and I only ever have today. That's great. That's like my morning mantra. Adopt it, steal it, do what it's not stealing. I'm giving it to you. Can't steal something that's affirmations aren't stealable. People can use the same affirmations, you know what I mean? So, but you can use that. But there, if you're going into a space or you're going into a holiday function, their emotions are not my responsibility in vice versa. Right? So sometimes if you're in a down space, you have to remind yourself, my emotions are not their responsibility. So this also allows you to respect them in that same token. Grounding practices are yet another one. Again, rooted in science. If you look at a brain scan of somebody who is in meditation or who is grounded and someone who is not, it is different. It is totally different because your brain works really good on visualization, on grounding, on breath work. That's just how your brain and your body works. That's how your peers are sympathetic. I mean, there's all of these things that come into play and you can engage in your senses. You can grab ice. Literally, you can grab ice. You can do your breath work. You can come back to here. You can visualize, I have an anchor space. So like an anchor space is where if I visualize, two anchor spaces, I visualize myself being there and I can tell you everything that's there, the temperature, the weather, what I'm wearing, what the house that I'm in looks like because I go there frequently. So it's like my little escape whenever I wanna go. I tell everybody I vacation around the world almost every week for free because I get to do that visually. But it's allowing yourself to have that, focusing on your breath, doing your journal work. Those things are imperative, imperative to ground you because you get real caught up in your brain. You're real caught up top. When we start worrying about the things we can't control, which by the way you heard human being, nobody's expecting you to just flutter through life, just peace, love and happiness, but you've gotta have some of that. 80% of the time, you're gonna have to inquire with your inner child and say, what do you need? And sometimes it isn't, I need people to love me. You need you to love you. And sometimes breath, work and grounding work is just as effective. You've got to practice emotional detachment, go back to the emotional, or the detachment podcast, you've got to do this. Just because you are not attached to them does not make you an asshole. That's not what that means. Detaching is not about being cold or indifferent. It's about being supportive without a measurement. I can support you, but you know what? Sometimes a person might constantly be chronic on this and you might have to be like, okay, emotional boundaries. I can't talk to them today. I'm gonna let them know, hey, straight up and down, tell them, hey, I don't have the mental bandwidth today. I wanna be there for you, but I also have to kind of step back and kind of recalibrate. I'll talk to you tomorrow, whatever the case may be. You're allowed your emotional boundaries, does not make you cold, does not make you indifferent. It allows you to treat yourself the way that you know that you need to be treated. And of course you've got to limit exposure. I know we're going into the holiday. And even if it's not this holiday, it's a random Sunday. It's a Tuesday. It's a Tuesday when your sister calls and tells you all of these things over and over and over again. That's where we are today. Sometimes you have to limit exposure. Can't do it for everybody. Stop thinking you have to show up to mom's house every Sunday for dinner. Why are we doing that? Why are we doing that? You don't have to. You've got to limit exposure to the best of your ability with these people and with things that are very problematic. Again, we have all fallen on dark times and you probably will in the future. We all will. You want a support system, but you want to be able to say, I want a support system, but I don't want to dump my stuff onto somebody. And I want to be there for them and I want to be 100% engaged, but I cannot carry their stress and their strain. It's a lot. And it's going to take you a minute. And that's why I said we're going to kind of go over and we're going to do some exercises on why this is happening for you. I just want you to realize that you're not a dick because you're not absorbing something. You are going to have to give yourself time. This has been part of your identity. This is what you do. You're the kind person. You're the glue of the family. You do all of those things. It's not going to happen overnight. And you got to ask yourself if you even wanted to. You might be fine. But if you find yourself drained and constantly disappointed and you feel like nobody's supporting you and you feel like you're being taken advantage of, then maybe you want to really check not just your ego, but what energy you're absorbing around you. And I think that's an amazing space for you. And this is something that you have to get honest with yourself. What am I trying to gain from being emotionally absorbing? Are you absorbing it because you want to have validity? Are you absorbing it because you don't really want to be rejected? Are you doing it because it's part of your whole purpose in your mind? Because that's not the case. Go back to last week's episode to the podcast to pay good God to purpose and really get clear. You got to be honest with yourself if you want to make that change. And the key is do you want to give yourself grace? You haven't, just is brand new for you. Just be consistent, but you can do this. And when you do this, your inner child will thank you. The relationships around you will thank you. You will have better relationships. You will have far more mental clarity and mental peace. And you'll be able to dedicate and spend real quality time with people and really be a solid support system. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music)
