Hello, friend. Today on the podcast we are talking about finding your limitations because this is something that I have been thinking about a lot lately. And I always like to start this conversation by letting you know, you know that that lovely inspirational quote of "You don't have any limitations." Except for the fact that
of course you actually do. You do indeed, on your way to your goal, have the limitations of time, space, and physics. There's also, I mean, to a certain extent, there's like some chemistry and biology limitations that you might have. Not nearly as many as you might think you have, but there are some. We do need to work within the physical realm while we are getting our goal, but I want you to know that...
Oh, and there's also one other one. I was about to get started on the whole topic, but I will tell you lately, technology is a limitation too. And that's not true [00:01:00] at all, but I'm having like the weirdest, I'm having the weirdest several weeks in a row of just really struggling with technological issues.
And it's been very interesting for me because I'm quite certain, like literally I am 100% certain that there is not only like a skill or skills to learn for me personally, but I'm pretty sure that there's like a lesson to be learned here. And it could even be the lesson that I'm gonna cover in today's podcast.
I am, I know that there is a way to create what I want technologically speaking. And also right now technology feels like it is limiting me at every turn. I have had all kinds of weird difficulties... I did a live on YouTube recently where I couldn't get the chat to work, so I, I did a workaround by going live on my phone instead of on my desktop, but on my phone, you can't see the chat very well.
It was very odd. It was. [00:02:00] I was actually super proud of myself, like I was legitimately proud of myself for how, how very calm I felt. Like I knew there was a way to do what I wanted to do, and also it didn't work quite the way I wanted it to work. I'm also, I'm testing out a new microphone for the podcast today.
I'm very curious how this one is gonna work. I've had a couple of failed attempts recently to record different podcasts at different times with the way that I have recorded for years and years and, and years. Oh my gosh. Like literally. When did I first get that lapel mic? And the recorder? I think that was like eight or nine years ago.
I've been recording and used to film workout videos with that lapel mic, and for whatever reason lately it is very inconsistently giving me bizarre sound problems. Like sometimes it basically doesn't record at all. It makes a lot of clicking and hissing. Sometimes it records perfectly and [00:03:00] sometimes the most recent thing that I did, it recorded, but it had like a weird hum and like background static for the first four minutes.
And then it was fine. Y'all, if I understood why it was doing it, I could fix it, but until I fix it, or maybe the fix actually is just doing something different. So anyways, today I'm doing something different. So yes, technology sometimes is a limitation, but what I actually wanna tell you today is that when it comes to getting your goal,
you don't really truly have the limitations that you think you do, and in fact, the limitations that all of us have besides the timespace continuum and physics and a little bit of biology and chemistry, but only just a little, we have the limitations of our imagination, our thoughts, and our feelings.
Those [00:04:00] three things are truly the only things that are limiting us and i'm gonna make this abundantly clear because I was gonna try and be like clever about it and tell you at the end, but I'm gonna tell you right here at the jump I am tying this to the Daily 3 Journaling Framework. The Daily 3 Journaling framework works because you work it because it works for you
when you create the way you personally and your brain, and your habits and your everything, make it integrate into your daily life. And it works because it legitimately takes a look at these three limitations. The only limitations we truly have besides time space continuum, besides physics and a little bit of chemistry and biology and a lot of technology.
I'm gonna hold myself to that one. I tell you what, I am not letting that story go. [00:05:00] Here's the thing about the Daily 3. The Daily 3 helps you expand your current limitations of your imagination. The Daily 3 helps you understand how you are currently limiting yourself with your thoughts, and the Daily 3 helps you expand your repertoire of feelings that you are willing to feel.
We're gonna start with the first one, imagination. Imagination is actually basically a combination of your thoughts and feelings, and it is presented to you in, in whatever way your imagination is presented to you. For me personally, my imagination presents itself in pictures and sensations, almost like memories and
generally speaking, while I am imagining a thing, I am also feeling it. Again, just like memories. Imagination for me feels very much like [00:06:00] memories. Your imagination is very likely different from mine and vive la difference. I mean, thank goodness for it. What I want to tell you though is that if you cannot, in whatever way you personally imagine things, if you cannot imagine your goal, I'm gonna say it.
You cannot achieve it. Now, that sounds like a real limitation, and it also sounds like, it sounds like I'm being very like negative and telling you you can't have your goal, and I'm not telling you that at all. What I'm telling you is that practicing your imagination is the path to getting your goal.
Imagination, daydreaming, thinking about and feeling your goal is... I mean, the science behind it is well known and well understood that you have to create something in your brain before you can create it in the real world. I often [00:07:00] think about, and I know I've given the example one time on another podcast about going out and buying, you know, a pen at the store, but I often think about like the very first person who built a bridge. And I mean, we're talking like way back in, you know,
caveman days or whatever. Like somebody wanted to cross a river and had to imagine that there was a way to cross a river. And probably the way they did imagine it was from memory was from seeing, you know, a fallen tree that had crossed a river and being able to walk across it. They had to imagine that they could create that for themselves.
That they could either fell a tree or find an already felled one that they could put it over the creek or the river, that they could walk across that, that they would be able to accomplish what they wanted to accomplish by doing that thing. They had to picture all of it. Now you and [00:08:00] I in modern days, we do stuff like that so automatically and so easily for the things that we have either already done or somebody else has already done that
we've seen, that it feels. Well, honestly, it feels like something we don't even pay attention to. It feels very subconscious, like, you know, you can go to the store and buy a pen, you know, you can drive across a bridge that somebody else made. Like, like, you know that you can do certain things. Here's the tricky part though, if you haven't already done a thing,
which is probably why the thing that you want for your goal is a goal. If you haven't already done the thing, it can feel very difficult to imagine it. Because it's not a memory, because it's not in your past and you might not even, you know, in your, your network or your small circle of people might not have ever seen somebody accomplish this thing that you want.
This is partly why [00:09:00] the internet is not always a good place, but it's partly why the internet is a good place because there is such a variety of stories available to you. Anything you could possibly want to do, somebody has done something, if not exactly like it, at least enough like it, that it helps spark your imagination.
But here's the thing. We don't use our imagination very often, unless you're using the Daily 3 every morning. You can use your imagination, and I call it future self journaling, for approximately one minute. The thing about future self journaling, though, for me personally, here's what I have noticed in my own practice.
I, I say the words to myself, well, it's really hard for me to picture what it'll be like at my goal. Maybe you've felt that way too. Maybe you've said those exact words to yourself. So what I kind of default to is a version of writing things down that are almost like a to-do list, or almost [00:10:00] even like affirmations. Like I write down sentences that describe my goal, but I don't allow myself to immerse myself in it.
This really is the point of the Daily 3, specifically the future self journaling part of the Daily 3. It's not just a task list, it's not a list of affirmations. It's not writing out this thing that you want. It's fully imagining it. It is the combination of your thoughts and feelings so that it
appears as though like a memory or like a thing in your life as though it is reality. It is reality when it is in your brain, in your imagination. The trick really is allowing yourself to be immersed in it as opposed to staying in your brain. And let me tell you something, my overthinking friend, [00:11:00] this is a real, I'm gonna say danger.
That sounds very dramatic, but I'm feeling a little bit dramatic today. So let's just go with it. This is the real danger of not knowing fully why you are doing what you're doing. This really is my intent today on the podcast is to help you understand the why behind the Daily 3. In fact, it's almost always my intent on the podcast is to help you understand the nuances and the why you would use the Daily 3 so that you can use it really effectively.
The Daily 3 works when you work it. It has no nature. It really is just a thought in every single way. It is just an opinion. It is just a strategy. It really is the spark of you using it your way, deciding how it works in your brain, deciding how it works in your life, manipulating it, maneuvering it, [00:12:00] actually feeling the working of it.
That's what makes it work. So the other part of it that makes it work is to really understand why. The why behind the Daily 3 is that it is a brain body connection practice. The limitations that you have right now, timespace continuum, physics, a little bit of biology, a little bit of chemistry, and a lot of technology.
But the limitations that you have of your imagination, your thoughts and your feelings, your imagination is essentially a skill that you can practice. Your thoughts are viewable, and we're gonna talk about that next, through metacognition. The second part of the Daily 3 is metacognitive journaling.
It's the part where you see your thoughts as thoughts. Now when I come to metacognitive journaling, I ask myself a very broad question because this is something I have been practicing for a long [00:13:00] time. When you are new to metacognitive journaling, I actually, I recommend, and it's why I have guided journaling experiences.
I recommend that you ask yourself really, truly specific questions to help kind of, kind of pen in your brain. When you ask yourself too broad of a question, your brain will just go a million different directions and, and you might really struggle to hear a specific answer that you can do something with.
Because I have been practicing metacognitive journaling for so many years now, and because I have really developed my practice, because I have developed my own intellectual property regarding metacognitive journaling. I mean, I have an entire book, Mind over Menopause, about metacognitive journaling. I offer you the Daily 3 with this explanation of metacognitive journaling.
Like I do consider it an area of real expertise for me. So I have gotten to the point in my practice where asking myself a broad question still gets me the, the [00:14:00] kind of response that I can do something with. If you are new to it, asking yourself a really, really very goal specific question is the most helpful way to get moving with metacognitive journaling.
The thing about metacognition, it is a fancy word that just means seeing your thoughts as thoughts, observing your thought as a thought instead of as a fact. Recognizing that you are telling yourself a story and the stories you are currently telling yourself are limiting you. When you tell yourself that something is hard for you, it will be hard for you.
It's not the other way around. Your brain is not actually describing reality to you. It is creating the reality of your future. And when you recognize that you are telling yourself something limiting and you can really see through that, feel through that. [00:15:00] That is how you break your limitations. The mechanics of it are that your brain tells you the story that has the most emotional resonance, meaning the the biggest, most intense feeling attached to it.
When you can feel that feeling without behaving from it, your brain, your brain honestly could care less about what story it's telling you. It's not telling you a story because your stories are true. It's telling you a story because of the emotional resonance. When you break that emotional resonance, your brain will find another story to tell you.
Your brain is always going to tell you stories. That's not a problem. Some of your stories are moving you towards your goal, and some of your stories are limiting you from your goal. The trick is to find the ones that are limiting you and lean in to the ones that are taking you where you wanna go.
Metacognitive journaling helps you see, observe, your limitations and feel your [00:16:00] way through them. The third thing that is limiting you is your feelings. Every single part of the Daily 3, and I've said that like there's lots of them, there's really just three. There's the future self journaling, the metacognitive journaling, and the success journaling.
But all three parts of the Daily 3 are intended to help you access your feelings. My friend, if I had to pick one thing that is your most limiting factor right now, it is your willingness to feel your feelings. And I don't say that as any sort of a jab at you, you've been deeply socialized. It's, it's why you are here identifying with me as an overthinker.
You have been deeply socialized to believe that your brain is better than your body. That your logic is better than your emotions. That your emotions are extraneous and useless, and to be squashed down [00:17:00] in favor of thinking, thinking, thinking, and logicking your way to what you want.
I will tell you that nothing could be further from the truth. Your brain and your body are meant to work together. By the way, your body is the, the domain of your emotions. Your emotions are physical sensations inside your body that you sometimes perceive as imagination, that you sometimes perceive as almost like memories.
You can perceive your physiological sensations in a lot of different ways. But they are indeed physiological sensations. You have a spark of electricity in your brain, that's your thought, that creates a cascade of physiological sensations in your body, which then get reinterpreted by your brain, by the way, which is why sometimes we experience our feelings as imagination or memories or even like smells or colors or other kinds of sensations.[00:18:00]
You and I have been so deeply socialized to trust our brain and mistrust our body, and there was just about to be a whole rant there about, about socialized misogyny and about how women's bodies can't be trusted and all kinds of things. I'm gonna leave it at deep socialization. You have been taught not to listen to your body and
that is a limitation for you right now. When you are willing to feel any feeling you will be able to create anything. Truly anything, within the space time continuum within physics and biology and technology. I'm gonna keep putting those caveats on there just because it's a little bit humorous, but also I like to keep this grounded in [00:19:00] yes, there are some limitations.
I don't ever want to be that that person who's like, there's nothing ever stopping you because I don't think you or I actually believe that at all. When you can see what is stopping you and what isn't or what is currently, but that is within your control. It really helps you take on your agency, your authority, your ability to create what you want.
Yes, you do need to work within the space time continuum, and you do not need to limit yourself by not imagining what you want. You do not need to limit yourself with the stories you are telling yourself about what you can and can't have and what's easy and what's hard, and what's right for you and what's wrong for you and what's really available and et cetera.
You fill in the blanks with your own stories. You do not [00:20:00] need to limit yourself by squashing down your feelings, by trying to logic your way to your goal. By telling yourself that your feelings are extraneous. Your feelings are actually taking you to your goal. Your feelings have a job. Their job is to drive you into action.
Here's the thing that I think is maybe helpful. I think it's illuminating. How about that? The feelings that we don't notice are also the ones that really are taking us to our goal. When you feel motivated, you don't really notice that. I mean, you might say something like, wow, I was really motivated today, but you've never necessarily thought about that as being
physiological sensations inside your body. We attribute our ability [00:21:00] to produce things and to get things done to this feeling without really noticing that, because it feels so pleasurable. Your feelings have the job of driving your actions, and right now. Again, I'm gonna say this in a way that sounds like I'm blaming or pointing fingers, so please hear this as nothing but love because we all do it to ourselves.
You are currently limiting yourself through an unwillingness to feel uncomfortable feelings. Mostly this is going on subconsciously. You are hardwired to seek pleasure and avoid pain. There are so many feelings you don't even know that you are squashing down because it is so, first of all, socialized and second of all, so deeply uncomfortable below the surface that your brain and your body just kind of do that work without [00:22:00] you being aware of it.
The success journaling part of the Daily 3 is even more intentionally feelings work than the other two. Even though future self journaling is absolutely about your feelings and metacognitive journaling, even though it's technically about your thoughts, it is also 100% about your feelings. But success journaling, success journaling is where we really get the opportunity to feel feelings that seem like they're going to feel good
but currently do not. Here's what I mean. I believe that we have all been socialized that there's a certain amount of pride that you're allowed to feel, and anything beyond that is not okay. Therefore, that word pride, once it came out of my mouth, almost all of us had a feeling attached to that. Like, Nope, shouldn't do that.
Shouldn't feel too proud of myself. Can't get too [00:23:00] big for my britches. The actual feeling of pride, the physiological sensations, for me personally, the feeling of pride actually feels a lot like my shoulders relaxing and kind of pulling back a little bit. It feels like my chest filling up very gently in a very nice way.
It feels like standing up taller, it feels well, for lack of a better word, it feels good. It feels good now is what I should say there because feeling the feeling of pride was very, very difficult the first many times I felt it. You and I have such strong socialization against feeling too proud of ourselves, or too good or too big for our britches, or many of the kinds of [00:24:00] feelings that we associate with accomplishment, with confidence, with getting our goal.
We've had those feelings socialized out of us in a way that they feel uncomfortable right now. When you practice for approximately one minute a day, actually feeling your success. Not just, you know, crossing it off the to-do list and telling yourself, yep, I got that done, but taking that time to feel the accomplishment, feel the success that creates the capacity for more of it.
When you keep your success in your brain as words that you say and you know, check marks on your to-do list, not actually [00:25:00] feeling the feeling of your accomplishment is the reason why lots of us, and I'm gonna raise my hand here, why lots of us achieve our goals and don't feel good about it. And then go immediately from achieving that goal directly into trying to accomplish something else, like chasing after that high of getting another goal because the goal that we've gotten doesn't feel as good as we thought it was going to feel.
Practicing in small doses, actually feeling good is the thing that can help you, not just get your goal, but have your goal. The capacity to have and hold onto your goal is practiced in very small doses by feeling the feelings of success. When you are willing [00:26:00] to imagine yourself with your goal, to find the thoughts that are currently stopping you from accomplishing your goal, and to feel the feelings that are currently stopping you from getting to your goal,
you will have found your limitations, a k, a, the timespace continuum, physics, a little bit of chemistry, a little bit of biology. And yes, some technology are actually the only things truly limiting you. Everything else, your imagination, your thoughts and your feelings are all yours. You have the ability to create
what you want. You have no limitations with that small asterisk. My friend, my friend. This is the part where I'm gonna deeply encourage you to go watch or listen to the [00:27:00] Daily 3 masterclass. I just recorded the Daily 3 Masterclass as an audio only that is available as a private podcast. There are links in the show notes for both the, the visual, the audio visual version, which is the, the video masterclass or the
audio only private podcast of the Daily 3. Either way, what you're gonna get is 20 minutes of instruction that really dive deep into the Daily 3 journaling framework that can help you get your goal. Thank you so much for listening today. I'll talk to you again soon.
