100 The Mind Reader Naming Your Inner Critic

Welcome to the Great Leader Great Mom podcast, where we trade in mom guilt and burnout for courage, calm, and a whole lot more joy. I'm your host, Liz Jolly, engineer turned life coach, mom of three, and founder of the School of Courage. Welcome to episode 100. Yay! Thanks to all my listeners who've been a part of all of this. I love you guys. We're continuing our series on your inner critic and what the name of your inner critic would be. Today is all about the mind reader. How many of you have been in a meeting and you've seen someone make a face? You've gotten a short email back, maybe from your boss Or you've noticed a weird little glance between two people, and your brain instantly decided it knew exactly what they were thinking. And it's not that your brain just wondered what they were thinking or was curious But you had decided you knew exactly what was going on in their mind. Something like, they think I'm wrong. They think I'm annoying. They think I'm not ready for this role. They're disappointed in me or they're really judging me right now. They don't take me seriously. And from you reading their mind, you start reacting to something that no one has actually said out loud Here's what I want to talk about today. The mind reader is the voice inside your head that describes what everybody thought before they've even told you or said anything a lot of times That voice, she fills in the blanks. She interrupts the silence. She takes the every facial expression, every tone, every one-word email, a missing compliment, and she Is confident she knows what's happening in their mind and has a full story about what they must be thinking about her Usually, let's be honest, the mind reader, she's not very nice and she doesn't usually assess things in your favor. She doesn't say, oh yeah, they're probably just distracted or That email was brief because they're super busy at a meeting. She definitely doesn't say that person's face may have absolutely nothing to do with me. Nope. The mind reader she goes straight to they're unimpressed by you or they're annoyed at you or they think you're just off today. They're questioning your capability to be at this table. You need to fix this. And what happens when we believe the lie of the mind reader? We create so much suffering in our lives, so much withdrawal of who we actually are. Because once you think you know what everybody's thinking, you start trying to manage it. You start trying to clean it all up to over-explain, you over-function, you over-please, you over-edit everything You've stopped just being in the room and showing up and you've started working overtime inside everybody else's mind. from your imagination. And that's really exhausting. I think so many women do this all day long without even realizing how much energy it's costing them. When you get home, why are you so tired? Let me give you a few examples of this because these moments are just so ordinary and that's what makes them really powerful if you can address them. Let's start with someone in a meeting. Say you're sharing an idea and you are talking through a recommendation. Maybe it's your perspective, something thoughtful. You've really mold over and you really want to bring forward for the group and somebody across the table has a neutral face. Maybe they even look down. Maybe they glance at their laptop. Maybe they're just not actively listening to you and they're not even making eye contact. Immediately your brain goes to They hate this. I'm totally lost them. This is not landing at all. I sound so ridiculous. Now nobody has said anything out loud But it really feels like this is what's happening. Your mind reader has started to create a story about what's in their brain. It feels very real. And then you start changing how you show up. You start to win them over and try to sort out what you think they're struggling against with your argument and contest it. You start hedging, you start softening your message. Maybe you add a million qualifiers. Maybe you're explaining way more than you need to and you're just saying so much that really you do lose people. Sometimes you rush into the end because you're just ready for it all to be over. You're shutting down, you want this to no longer be happening anymore. You're reacting to what you think Their face, their interaction, their listening skills really mean about you. That is your inner mind reader. Here's an example I think is so human. One day my coworker who sat across from me came in and he was so upset. He was like, Yesterday I was sick and I sent my boss an email. And you're not gonna believe what she said. And I was like, tell me. And he's like, I told her I need to work from home today. And she wrote back, okay. I was like, that's what she wrote back was just okay? He's like, yeah, just okay. And he was just going on and on about like, I can't believe she just said that. I'm sure she thought I was slacking and not working from home. She probably doesn't think I was actually even trying or contributing. She thinks I'm just terrible at my job, I'm sure. And that was just some lame excuse. He was in defensive mode, trying to prove to me that he really should have stayed home because he was so worried that she didn't approve Like he was reading her mind. When the only thing she did was write a one word reply. Okay. And it just was really funny to me because he was trying to read her mind and guess what she was thinking based on two letters. That's it. Everything else was a story created in his mind from the mind reader. And this is such a great example because it shows how quickly our brain wants to close the gap. It's like our insecurity comes through and gives meaning to the people around us. We look around and we take all the things around us as evidence against us, against our soft spots. And and this is such a perfect example because it shows how quickly your brain can close the gap on anything. It hates ambiguity, it hates not knowing. So it just decides. It makes up a story. And once it decides, the body follows. The explaining starts, the proving starts the hustles and then we're just desperate to prove our own story about what they're thinking wrong. When we don't even know what they're thinking. We do this all the time. And maybe your example is different, but you've probably had this play out in your office as well. Like you get a short reply and now you're trying to manage the reaction when you don't even know what's actually happening in their brain. You're guessing. You shift and now you're trying to get back into someone's good graces or get their approval or have them not be disappointed in you. You feel uncertainty and now you're performing and pretending and trying to please. And it's all back to the mind reader who just made up a story. Here's one more example. Say you're in a leadership meeting and you say something and two people exchange a glance or a laugh quietly right after on the side of the room and you notice And your brain immediately thinks they're talking about me. They think I am sounding ridiculous. They just don't take me seriously. They're laughing because they don't think I should actually be in this room. And maybe they weren't even reacting to you See the mind reader takes over. They could have been getting the same note on their Teams or Slack and decided They were gonna giggle about it, and they may have no idea what you're even saying, so their response could very likely have nothing to do with you. But when you think that, when you let the mind reader's voice take root in your brain, you get so paranoid and you shut down, you react, you overfunction You don't show up as your best self because you're trying to manage what you think they're thinking. Our brain is so fast to fill in the blank. We don't like to sit with that ambiguity at all. We make everything mean disapproval or that they dislike us or that we've been rejected. Silence becomes a verdict. And I really want all of you to see this because The pain here is not just the overthinking. The deeper pain is that you start abandoning yourself in response to thoughts that may not even be true. Very likely they're not even true. That is the cost of letting the mind reader take root in your brain. Because you've stopped trusting your own voice. You've stopped staying anchored in your own clarity, your own confidence and courage to be at that table. You stop checking in with what you think because you're so busy trying to anticipate what everybody else is thinking. And from there, you people please, you overexplain, apologize, overwork, you soften what you really want to say Because half your energy is spent on trying to play out what else is going on in their brain, in their brain, in their brain, all around the table. You don't even know what you think anymore because you're wasting your energy. We have this sneaky thought That tells us, if I can just manage what they think of me, it'll all be okay. But that's not how you get to peace, and that's really not courageous, grounded leadership. That is anxiety trying to earn safety. I think this pattern lands for especially women because so many of us have been praised for being perceptive or rational or thoughtful or emotionally intelligent and those are all beautiful qualities but there's a difference between being emotionally intelligent and being hyperviligent and kind of paranoid Right? Letting the mind reader take root. That's what I really want to name so clearly here. The mind reader is thinking it's really being useful and helpful to you in survival mode and helping you thrive and be successful But it's really just fear. It feels like being prepared or self-protection, but maybe you're just trying to stay one step ahead. But really, it pulls you out of the present moment and into a made-up reality Where now you're responsible for solving what other people are thinking or not thinking. That's a terrible job, and it's not your job, and it just doesn't work. So what do we do with all of this to stop letting the mind reader take root? The first thing is just to be aware of it, to catch it. Catch the moment when you move from exactly what happened into what you've decided it means, right? Your crazy story. That's the moment, right? Where maybe she had a neutral face or sh you decided she hated your story or your argument about what you should go do for the project. Maybe he replied with the two letters, okay, and you decided what it meant about you. We look around always worried about what other people think about us and then we try to control what they're thinking And it's exhausting. This is where if we can catch it, if we can be aware of it, all we get all our power back. Because once you can separate The circumstance, like man said words or they looked the other way, from the thought, from the story you made up, you can create more space. And the space is what matters so much. Because if you're in that space, you can then ask a better question. What is it I actually know that just happened? Not what do I fear, what's happening that's against me right now, where does this fit into my insecurity? What old pattern is coming up right now What do I actually know in the moment? Because usually what you know is so much more simple and less dramatic than the story your brain is creating. And then the next question you ask yourself is what am I making this mean? And this one matters because now you can catch the hook, right? Catch the thing that's triggering you. You can hear the sentence underneath the spiral. They think I'm incompetent. They're disappointed in me. I'm losing credibility. They think I'm not good enough or not worthy enough to be at this table. I have to fix this. Once you hear that sentence and you question it You can choose to lay it down because you can notice how do I show up when I believe that? And see how it's pulling you away from your own confidence, your own groundedness, and putting you on shaky ground. Who do you want to be in this moment? Do you want to be the person who spends the next three hours trying to recover from the two-letter email? Do you want to be the person who makes a neutral face? into a full-blown character assessment? Do you want to be the woman who leaves herself every time a room gets ambiguous and your brain can't handle it? Or do you want to be the woman who can stay with herself and stay grounded? Maybe it sounds like I don't actually know what they think. I can let this be incomplete. You know, I can't read what's going on in their day. I don't know what's going on in their mind. Maybe they're having a rough day. Maybe something is really bothering them and they're not even present in the moment, and that's okay. I've been there too. Your job isn't to read minds, it's to lead yourself. That's where you find your grounded self. When you come back to your own power, everything gets clearer. Your communication gets clearer. Your ability to ask questions, your energy is so cleaned up and you're not wasting it on all of this nonsense. You're a confident, grounded leader in that moment. Because now you're not spending the whole day reacting to the things that haven't actually happened. You're not solving imaginary problems. You're not twisting yourself into different versions trying to get approval and change whatever it is you're guessing they're thinking. You're just here being you, your authentic grounded self. That's where we want to be, whether at home or in the office or in the Top floor meeting with all the executives. If this is your pattern, if you read the face, if you decode their tone, if you obsess over the short reply, chase the approval after the silence or assume you already know what everybody thinks, I just want you to practice this one thing this week. When you feel the spiral start, pause and ask, what is the circumstance, the pure neutral circumstance? Like man said words, woman said words. They didn't look at the slides. And then separate out the thought you have about it. What did you make it mean? Why is it a problem? Because that question can change everything. You can slow down, you can create enough space that the awareness steps in and you can examine it. Does that even matter? Does it make sense? Have you been in a meeting where you've stopped listening or looking at the sides? Maybe this is how they listen. Keep showing up as your best self Don't let the mind reader take hold within you. She's trying to protect you, but she's making you pull away from your best self. And the more quickly you can notice her and name her, you can even call her like Mindy the Mind Reader and make yourself laugh. And come back to what is true for you, you will be your grounded self. And that's what I want for every single one of you. I want you to let the neutral face just be a neutral face. And let the okay email reply just be okay and nothing else. Let the unfinished moment stay unfinished. You don't need to finish it. Find your way to something that's within you where you've made the same thing and it's okay. Nothing has gone wrong. This is where your peace really lives. And that's how women begin to feel the truth instead of this fear and this wasted energy. We want to spend our energy on the things we love, not on all of this nonsense. If this episode resonates with you, not only follow this podcast, but share it with someone who needs to hear it. And if you want support, learning how to stop people pleasing to create more space, if you want to end the mind reader dominating your brain, go to lizjolly. com and you can find out more I have a weekly membership where we get together and we not only learn these topics, we experience them and we talk through tons of examples. So you can just not understand it intellectually but you can apply it the moment you leave the meeting room. With that, I wish you all an amazing week. Take care everybody