Penny Casselman:
If you have 10,000 thoughts a day and you believe all of them, would you still believe all of them if a perfect stranger walked up and shared them with you? Wow. Let that sink in for a minute. Too often, we are so quick to believe everything that we think. Yet, if it came out of someone else's mouth who you had never met, there is no way that you would put full confidence, full trust, and full belief into what they were sharing. Welcome to the Pivot with Passion podcast. Hi. I'm Penny Casselman. I believe everyone is deserving of a phenomenal life.
Penny Casselman:
Regardless of where you came from, life is what you make of it. And when you learn to pivot with passion, your world explodes with opportunities. Go grab your favorite beverage, and let's shake things up as we explore how to pivot with passion. Hello, director. Welcome to another episode. What are we celebrating today? Yes. If you are new around these parts, you will find that I start every episode with this question because I believe we don't give ourselves enough credit. We don't celebrate enough in our lives.
Penny Casselman:
And so for those of you who have been around for a while, were you thinking, oh, Penny's gonna ask, what are we celebrating? What can I contribute? If that automatic reaction hasn't kicked in yet, I hope it does become a habit because, director, you do amazing things every single day that you need to celebrate. My celebration for this week is I put together new patio furniture. As I was putting these swivel chairs together, they sent the wrong screws. Luckily enough, I had no problem running up the street, not literally, I drove, to get replacement bolts that I knew were gonna fit. But that just added an extra layer of complexity, and you might be thinking, Penny, why are we celebrating that? Well, let me ask if you find yourself doing this. Do you ever accomplish something and immediately dismiss it because it was easy for you? You think everybody knows how to do this. Yes. I am celebrating putting together patio furniture, and it looks beautiful, and I can't wait to sit and enjoy warmer weather whenever it is that decides to show up here in Cleveland.
Penny Casselman:
If you're watching on YouTube, you will know when it is finally summer when my plaid electric blanket is no longer in the frame of this video. Okay. Enough about me and celebrating my patio furniture. What did you come up with? I would love to celebrate you. Hit me up over on Instagram or send me an email. I would love to give you some huge props on whatever it is that you found to celebrate this week. Today, I would love to dive into one of the biggest myths that we all fall prey to, that we all sometimes embrace with a death grip, and that is believing every thought that we have is true. Ouch.
Penny Casselman:
How many times do we think about something in our minds that we believe to be true, but secretly is not? I can think of one really quick for me. I consistently tell myself I'm bad at remembering names. Director, do you think that helps me remember someone's name when I go to meet them? No. Because my brain has already convinced me that I'm not good at that. Let's unpack this idea a little bit about believing everything that we think is true. A lot of our thoughts are automatic. They happen so quickly, we might not even recognize that they're kicking off in our mind. They become habitual.
Penny Casselman:
Back in episode 37, I talked about habituation, about this idea that we get very used to repeating thoughts, ideas, and things that we see. One of the things I love to lean into is that high performers choose our mindset intentionally. There's a psychology aspect to what we explore, and it's a choice. And at first, if you're not used to calling yourself out or pausing long enough to recognize an unhelpful thought, it can be a little uncomfortable and challenging. You may have heard this statistic before, and some studies that say 7,000 there are some that say 70,000. To make it a nice round number, I'm choosing to say we have over 10,000 thoughts per day. If you have 10,000 thoughts a day and you believe all of them, would you still believe all of them if a perfect stranger walked up and shared them with you. Wow.
Penny Casselman:
Let that sink in for a minute. Too often, we are so quick to believe everything that we think. Yet, if it came out of someone else's mouth who you had never met, there's no way that you would put full confidence, full trust, and full belief into what they were sharing, especially when it came to things about you. Let's pretend and treat our thoughts as if they might be from a stranger. Are they true? Because in order to live a high performance life, in order to achieve everything you want, go after the life that you deserve, director. You have to start challenging what you're thinking in order to ensure you're moving yourself forward. A great analogy here would be think of your thoughts as emails in your inbox. Stay with me.
Penny Casselman:
We get so many emails, promotional emails, spam, emails that try to scam you. We get important emails. We get emails that are nothing more than other people's priorities. As you are thinking about your thoughts, remember that not all of them need your attention. Not all of them have anything to do with you. Many of them have nothing to do with helping you live your best life. They are simply hanging around trying to derail you. Director, as we continue through this episode, I want to empower you to hold thoughts that are helpful, that are encouraging, and that are joyful.
Penny Casselman:
Because in embracing all three of those, the life you deserve is just waiting for your thoughts to align with that ultimate vision. It's time for a clarity cocktail. Welcome to my favorite segment of the episode, the clarity cocktail. I stumbled across this quote from Eleanor Roosevelt, and after I read it, I thought, oh, she and I might be cosmic sisters in this whole thing called life, because here's what she shared: With the new day comes new strength and new thoughts. How often would we benefit, or do benefit, from just hitting the the pause button, recognizing what it is we're doing or thinking just isn't working, and the best course of action in that moment is not to keep pushing to get something done, or pushing to figure something out, it is to close the laptop, or pour a cup of tea, or a cocktail, because we know it's 05:00 somewhere, and start fresh the next day. Because with the new day comes new strength and new thoughts. I do not make big decisions in my life after dinner, because after dinner is when I find my energy dips to the lowest point that I have had all day. It's especially noticeable if I have had a very active day, meaning I've done something physical throughout the day or attended a six hour webinar.
Penny Casselman:
Right? Those kind of things will drain this introvert of energy, which severely impacts my ability to catch those unhelpful thoughts and keep them at bay. So after dinner, I honor that about myself, and give myself permission to revisit whatever it is I think I need to make a choice on and defer until tomorrow. Because I know time and time again, I will go to sleep, wake up, I will feel so refreshed, and think to myself, why was I having such a difficult time last night? Why did I think I was going to push through or make a choice? I will also link to a past episode number 59, where I talk about this three-two-one method, which is three hours before bed, no food, two hours before bed, no work, and one hour before bed, no screens. And in today's world, I am still challenged to make that three two one a habit. However, on the occasions that I do put that into place, I feel so much more at ease when I'm crawling in bed. Director, if you are feeling stuck, stressed, if you are looking up and thinking the sky is falling, please remember tomorrow is a new day, and that with a new day comes fresh energy and fresh perspectives. As spring is coming to life all around us, it's an easy reminder that just given a little time, things will bloom brighter. So give yourself the gift of space if you need it.
Penny Casselman:
And remember Eleanor Roosevelt's quote, with the new day comes new strength and new thoughts. And now back to the episode. Cheers. Circling back to this idea of rewiring your mindset, let's pause and explain the problem that we face. First, if you are believing negative thoughts, you are probably keeping yourself stuck. And that is a word that I know at times I have thrown around like confetti, I hear other people using it, heck, it is why my freebie is called The Ultimate Get Unstuck Guide. And if you need it, hop on over to my website, it's on every single page, it is free, you can grab one for yourself. However, that is exactly how it makes you feel.
Penny Casselman:
You feel stuck. Because whatever thoughts you are having that are not helpful, are not truthful, won't allow you to look at new opportunities or take a small step forward. Another issue is we use statements like I can't or I'm not good at or I could never. Any of those statements that we use shut down future possibilities. Those thoughts are not helpful, nor are they true. They are simply one moment in time, one perspective that you've experienced and have habituated a negative thought around it. What happens over time, if we continually repeat those, if we don't check them, if we don't push back and challenge those thoughts, we adopt them as facts. And that is where that feeling of stuckness can perpetuate for days, weeks.
Penny Casselman:
I have even been there in the past for a decade. We are now at the portion of the episode where, yes, let's talk strategies about how to approach thoughts, how to attempt to catch them so that we can pause long enough to reflect and possibly reframe so that they are helpful. The first one, reframe the statement. As you're thinking, pause long enough to audit what you just said. If you routinely catch yourself having a thought that is limiting, meaning the thought I had about I'm not good at remembering names. Can you instead be curious and swap it with a different question? So instead of, I'm no good at remembering people's names, I might say, how can I get better at remembering people's names? Our brains must answer questions when they're posed. My brain will instantly go to work and start helping me figure it out. Another strategy to use when it comes to the thoughts that you have is using powerful questions.
Penny Casselman:
So train your brain with better prompts. A perfect metaphor for this approach, if you have used chat GPT, you know that the gold is in the prompt that you give. The better the prompt, the more helpful the output is. Think about other powerful questions that can help you revisit a thought that is not helping you. For instance, we'll use my example again of not remembering people's names. The question I could pose instead is, what would it look like if it was easy for me to remember someone's name? Stepping back, giving it a little bit more robust question might help my brain figure out how to take that thought and turn it into something that is helpful for me to move forward. Another question might be, what is one small step I could take today that will help me get better at remembering people's names? Again, your brain director must answer questions. Make sure you are asking the right questions when it comes to the thoughts that you have.
Penny Casselman:
This last one is another slice of gold, and that is speak it out loud. Too often, we think about thoughts, we don't discuss our thoughts. Even if no one else is around, simply saying the thought out loud sometimes gives it a completely different feel, It gives it a life of its own, which, right after it leaves your mouth, you will think, that sounds ridiculous. I wouldn't listen to a stranger that walked up to me and said that to me. That is the power of speaking a thought out loud. It gives you enough space to pause and see the BS that just came out of your mouth. You can think thoughts far faster than they can come out of your mouth as words. So by audibly sharing your thought, even if it is only with yourself, will help slow down the process and give you time to reflect.
Penny Casselman:
So those three solutions or strategies in quick succession again is reframe your thought, pause and see if you can replace a word, Ask how can I? Number two is use powerful questions. Think of our thoughts as a chat application, because the better your prompts, I. E. The better your questions, the better response you are going to get. And the third is speak it out loud. Hearing yourself say it out loud into the world is so different than just sitting with the thought. And this third approach for me has been so helpful. I can't practice giving a keynote address and only do it in my mind.
Penny Casselman:
I have got to say it out loud. The minute I start saying it out loud, I can hear times and areas where I need to pause or change something. I would never have noticed if my practice was only in my thoughts. So I encourage you to try one of those three over the next week, when you find yourself confronted with a negative thought, or when you have a thought that you've never challenged the validity of. Maybe it's something you've been carrying around since you were in your twenties. Is it true? How can I do it better? Ask a good question. As you move forward this week, remember that your thoughts are often suggestions, and not commands or the ultimate truth. You get to choose, director, when you pick up your red marker, you get to choose those thoughts that you accept as truth.
Penny Casselman:
This week, I want you to ask better questions. I want you to choose those thoughts that help move you forward. Don't choose the ones that hold you back. In the event you find it challenging to identify those thoughts, if you find it challenging to rephrase, there are several ways that I can support you in modifying your thoughts behavior. The first one is get your hands on the ultimate get unstuck guide. That is something that will definitely help you move from feeling stuck, whether it's personal, professional, spiritual, financial, you name it. If you are feeling stuck, this tool will help move you forward. The second way I can support you is invite you to join me for my free webinar, Stop Settling, Start Choosing, which is what we discussed throughout this episode.
Penny Casselman:
I want to empower you to stop settling for what you currently have and start choosing the life that you want. And the third way, you can always apply at any time for a free strategy session with me. All three of these offers are linked in the show notes, and I stand ready with my red marker to support you in any and every way that I can. Because, director, I know a phenomenal life is waiting for you today. Friend, thanks for listening to this episode of Pivot with Passion. If you've been feeling stuck, exhausted, or frustrated, this is your permission slip to go grab a red marker and claim the life you desire and deserve. If you enjoyed this episode, share it with a friend, and then hop over to rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts. Because my goal is to put a red marker in everyone's hand, and I need your help to spread the word and make that happen.
Penny Casselman:
Until the next episode, go grab a red marker. Get excited for your future and make your first move to pivot with passion.
