24 Creating the Life You Want: Key Concepts and Practices

Jul 17, 2024

Creating the Life You Want: Key Concepts and Practices

Introduction

  • Old Cherokee Legend: Two wolves within each person - one is evil (anger, envy, hatred, etc.), the other is good (joy, peace, love, etc.). The one that wins is the one you feed.

  • Course Recap: Previous episodes covered soothing the body, identifying unhelpful thinking, practicing willingness with emotions, and more. Check out the playlist if new.

The Big Picture of Creating Change

  • Happiness and Control: The aim is to feel happy, control your destiny, and resolve painful emotions.
  • Therapy Limitations: Unable to take new clients due to legal restrictions; recommends BetterHelp for therapy.
  • Course Details: Video 24 in 30-part series "How to Process Your Emotions," available with additional resources and workbook.

Two Key Concepts of the Course

  1. Gradual Choice-Based Happiness: Happiness is created through many small choices.

    • Tiny choices influence character, mood, quality of life.
    • Emotion processing and values-based actions lead to overall emotional changes.
    • Requires consistent effort and time.
    • Thich Nhat Hanh Quote: Avoid watering negative seeds; water positive seeds daily.
    • Change 1% every day for huge life transformation.
  2. Power Through Emotion Processing: Gain power to choose responses by processing emotions.

    • Not reacting to emotions but responding to them mindfully.
    • Viktor Frankl's Insight: Between stimulus and response, there's a space. In that space lies the power to choose our response.
    • Expanding awareness and flexibility in problem-solving by slowing down emotion processing.

Examples and Stories

  • Doctor’s Patient Story: Man in his 40s, discouraged about life. Through small changes (like switching to diet coke), started improving his life. Tiny changes led to better health and overall happiness over a year.
  • Father-Daughter Story: Father struggling to set boundaries due to his own unprocessed emotions from childhood. Processing emotions helped him parent better. Daughter acting out because of unprocessed trauma.

Practical Applications

  • Emotion Processing Tools: Learning how to slow down, breathe, and stretch the space between stimulus and response.
    • Dropping the struggle with emotions.
    • Mindful acceptance of emotions.
    • Calming the body and using a bottom-up approach to soothe the nervous system.
    • Resolving destructive thinking patterns.
    • Noticing and separating from thoughts.
    • Challenging and choosing which thoughts to act on.

Looking Forward

  • Upcoming videos will cover:
    • Creating a life aligned with values.
    • Creating sustainable change.
    • Letting go of self-labels.
    • Developing a growth mindset.
    • Why trying to feel happy can backfire and alternative strategies.

Conclusion

  • Call to Action: Subscribe for the next videos. Access the full course for more detailed guidance and resources.