Dear ,
If you've ever tried to change the way you think – and felt like a failure when it didn't stick – I want to tell you something:
You're probably going about it backwards.
Most of us have grown up with the idea that if you just behave differently – act confident, show up anyway, push through – your thoughts and feelings will eventually follow.
It's the "fake it till you make it" version of change. And it sort of sounds logical.
Except it doesn't actually work.
In reality, thoughts create feelings, which drive behavior. Not the other way around.
If you think someone doesn't like you and feel rejected, you won't reach out. If you think something is going to be hard and feel dread, you won't do it. The thought comes first. Which means if you want to change how you feel or what you do, you have to start with the thought.
But even if you already know that, you might find yourself stuck at the next step. You sit down to work on a thought and immediately judge yourself for having it. And that judgment derails the whole process.
We've been taught that the thoughts running through our minds say something about our character.
That thinking something unkind makes you an unkind person. That not wanting to do something means you're lazy. That being jealous means you're a bad friend/sister/partner.
But your thoughts are the product of your biology, your upbringing, and every cultural message you've taken in from the world around you – not your moral worth.
When you treat every difficult thought as evidence of something wrong with you, shame kicks in.
And when shame kicks in, your brain wants to avoid looking at the thought at all. So you never get close enough to it to actually change it.
We've been told that being hard on ourselves is what keeps us accountable. That if we go easy on ourselves we'll get complacent.
But all self-criticism actually leads to is anxiety and paralysis.
So try getting curious instead.
Next time a thought pops up that you don't like, instead of saying, “I can't believe I thought that, what's wrong with me?”, try saying: "Interesting, I wonder where that came from?"
Don’t make it mean something about you, just notice it and see what you can learn from it.
Mindset win of the week:
Jennifer shared the power of removing shame and looking at her thoughts with curiosity:
I experience extreme anxiety. I made this mean so many things. Things like “there’s something wrong with me” and “I won’t be able to create the future I want until I get it together”. This morning I reminded myself that the feeling of anxiety isn’t a problem and it’s simply coming from my thoughts. I also realized I was making the anxiety into some sort of handicap by thinking I can’t create the life I want because of it. It’s not a handicap.
The anxiety can be there while I take action toward the life I want. The anxiety I experience in the AM is usually an 8. This AM it’s about a 4 which is huge progress!
What I’m loving this week
It’s actually shocking that as the daughter of a rare book and photography dealer I didn’t know about this until now, but liveauctioneers.com is a goldmine if you have the patience to dig through it.
We’ve got a whole farmhouse to furnish post-renovation, and since renovations cost approximately eleventy trillion dollars no matter what you do, I’m trying to furnish and decorate on a budget.
I’ve found things like a pristine Arts-and-Crafts Danish sideboard for 30% of the normal antique store price, and sets of hand-painted engravings from the 1840s for $200 (that would be easily a thousand or more in any hip vintage store in Williamsburg).
Pro tip: Make sure you take into account the “buyer’s premium,” which is an additional charge, and the shipping costs, before you choose your max bid.
Pro pro tip: If you find something large you can’t live without, a company called uShip will connect you with long-distance truckers who will pick up and deliver any item, anywhere – you post the info, different people bid for the job, and it is surprisingly reasonable.
How to go deeper this week:
Is Take Back Your Brain still on your TBR list?
My NYT best-selling book is the evolution of my years as a feminist coach and academic, leader of a membership community that's 3,000 members strong … and of course, my lifetime as a woman and owner of a smart brain I'd been battling with for most of my life (until I discovered thought work).
If it's still languishing in your To-Be-Read pile, let me ask you …
Do you want to build authentic confidence and love for yourself – without constantly trying to "fake it 'til you make it"? This book will show you how.
Do you want to love your body at any shape, age, or size, without feeling like you're gaslighting yourself by saying you're a gorgeous, perfect, beautiful goddess into the mirror 100 times? This book will give you the tools.
Do you want to have better sex and uncover how to advocate for your own pleasure without feeling like a weirdo? Oh yeah, that's in this book.
Do you want to feel confident around your finances and stop losing your mind with anxiety every time your accountant asks about your savings strategy or your taxes? Yep. You'll find that in the book.
If you answered yes to any of these questions, get a copy of the book and crack it open today!
>> Click here to get your copy now. <<
Here’s what’s on the podcast this week:
UFYB 511 — Coaching Hotline: When DEI Feels Like a Threat
Do you catch yourself resenting opportunities others get, even when they're designed to increase fairness or diversity? I answer a listener struggling with scarcity thinking at work and explain why it's the thought, not the circumstance, that creates anxiety and resentment. You'll hear how women are socialized to wait for rewards instead of creating them, and why taking responsibility for your own success lets you see opportunity as something you generate, not something handed out.
UFYB 512 — Greatest Hits: Most Habit Change Advice is Wrong
Do you struggle to make new habits stick? We've all been told that consistency is the only way to successfully adopt new habits. But what if the key to successful habit change is actually embracing inconsistency? In this Greatest Hits episode, I challenge the conventional wisdom that you need perfect consistency from the start, and explain why our perfectionist mindsets often sabotage our habit-change efforts.
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That's all for now – see you next week!
Kara
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