48 Embracing the duality of life Good and Bad

You are listening to the Great Leader Great Mom podcast, episode 48. I'm your host, Liz Jolly, founder of the School of Courage. I'm an engineer, turned life coach, because I saw the need for more courage in my own life as a mom and wanting to be great leader. I use the skills we cover every day and I'm excited to teach them to you so you can unlock your own potential. Well I want to share what's been on my mind the last few weeks You know, life can feel good, but then bad all at the same time. Have you guys experienced this I think about this every time someone asks me, well, how am I doing or how is it going? Right? That's our standard way of checking in with people. Because often what I really want to say is, well, I'm both good and bad. But as you can imagine, our culture really only wants the one answer, which is good. No one really wants to hear anything but I'm doing good. We really aren't asking that question for anything other than just like a formal Hello or I acknowledge you exist type of a thing. But it's an amazing question when you think about the fact that we ask it with everybody we meet pretty much. How are you doing? How is it going? So if you would have asked me this lately, you would have seen me hesitate on my response because I'm really feeling truly both good and bad. Like both so good and so bad all at the same time. And so this has been fascinating me. And so I've been observing my brain throughout the day, throughout the weeks, really looking at what is going on. And I'm realizing how much we have this misconception that when something is going good, quote unquote, in our lives, that we should just feel good. Only good. And that when things are going bad, we should only feel bad. Now really think about this. Like It's never actually this way. What I'm seeing in my own life is this is absolutely not true. That I can be both good and bad feelings all at the same time. But what's interesting is we just stuff down the negative, the bad, the things we label as bad Whenever they surface or come up, especially when things should be quote unquote good. Like something's going good, we want to hide the bad. And I will tell you, I've been feeling so many truly positive emotions lately, like this incredible confidence, this incredible feeling of commitment, of empowerment, of of real courage and of accomplishment while at the same time finding myself feeling really sad and really truly disappointed and frustrated and in doubt and in shame. And when I say these emotions It's really they're amplified from what maybe I would have described them as even like a year ago. Like both sides are amplified Because on the one end, I want to burst with energy and tell you about how all the things are so great and how amazing and how confident and how like just excited I am to be courageous in different ways of my life And on the other side, I feel this like deep sadness happening at the same time. It's like if the extremes were on a wave, a wavelength shape, they would that wave would be so much higher and so much lower than just the normal kind of tighter wave that happens. And I've spent time crying. Like it's just fascinating to me what's going on in my brain and what's creating these feelings that are really a stark contrast, what feel like a contrast. So what gives, right? Like has something gone really wrong? Am I am I screwed up emotionally? You can uh think about that answer on your own, but like, no, what I'm finding is that this is the human experience. Like, this is what it's all about And I don't know if I've ever really consciously thought about this or watched it happen in my life so deeply or so clearly. I've been observing my brain and all the thoughts my brain has been creating to create both this negative and this positive side of emotions. And as I go through the day, right, for all of us, we go through this array, this variety of circumstances, like people are saying words, things are happening around us. And maybe for the first time, I'm allowing the bad, the things that I would want to just on default label as bad, to just be there and to just notice it and experience what it really feels like And not try to resist it or stuff it down deep or pretend it's not there. And I will tell you, our brains are absolutely fascinating. And the reason why I am able to come to this conclusion is because I've I've been putting myself in more of like an observer mode, more of like a a watcher mode, more of like I'm watching what my brain is offering me as thoughts and I'm noticing how they make me feel in my body. Like I'm and I'm noticing what it creates in my life. And It's doing it from a perspective of I'm watching myself on a TV show, like, oh look, now now she's thinking this and now it makes this feeling. And from that feeling, these are all the actions that she takes, and then this is the result she gets. So it is so interesting So I see the thoughts that are creating courage for me right now. And it's it's really like I can do hard things, I can figure it out, I can create this career of my dreams, I can make the impact I deeply desire and feel compelled to make on this world and I can figure out all these little details that are required to get there. I feel that so strongly in my life And on the other side, there are these thoughts like my kids should love school and they don't. And that makes me feel frustrated. And then I create the result of showing up like a terrible mom because I'm trying to control what their actions are. Like I'm trying to make them do more schoolwork. I'm trying to make them care about school by lecturing, which literally what does that create? They don't love school anymore because now I'm being this crazy person talking about how they should love school. It's it's totally not helping or serving me or my children to be that way. And so just that frustration is happening in my life, in my body, at the same time that I feel great courage. And so just this opposite of what's happening and how normally in my life I would push that away. I would resist the negative I would not realize that this thought, like my kids should love school, which feels like it should be effective and positive and great, is actually creating this really negative result in my life So here is the reality. Life really is always 50-50. Even when there are good things going on in my life and all of your lives It's not all good. Like it doesn't all feel good. There is always gonna be a 50% bad to that good that you're experiencing. And even when life feels all bad, there is 50% good out there. You need to notice it And that is the human experience. And really coming to that conclusion is what is freeing in our lives because we eliminate all this extra suffering Trying to resist the fact that wait, but good things are happening, I shouldn't feel bad. Or bad things are happening, I shouldn't feel good about things. Like if you're in a hurricane and People are losing their houses. There's bad, and you're beating yourself because you're feeling good or you had a good day. Like, do you notice there's this dichotomy of both good and bad every moment, every day, and that acceptance of the truth of that is freeing. Because when we're denying that, we're resisting what reality is and it causes a bunch of suffering. I also think the more we dream big, the more we have big goals, the more we try new things, the more we put ourselves out there. And that can be from everything like having children to trying a new job to moving somewhere new to taking on a new hobby which requires you to kind of be vulnerable and put yourself out there and maybe public speak or Learn a new instrument in front of people, perform in front of people. And it's gonna require even more of the experience of 50-50 because you're no longer hiding. If you think I'm crazy and that something has gone wrong because I feel both good and bad, then I would challenge you to ask yourself, what are your big dreams that you're hiding from? What is the impact in your life you want to make and why are you staying so comfortable? Because I love this, I just heard this, that a ship in the bay is safe, but a ship wasn't made to hang out in the bay. And I think life is so much more. And so I would just ask these questions and explore them in your life And if you're avoiding the 50% negative, even if you're trying to hide and stay in the bay as a boat or just stay small, there's still going to be the bad. And so why not dream big? Why not have these these goals that you want to accomplish and just accept the fact that to get the good it comes with the bad. It's the 50-50 life human experience for all of us. We have this thought that we shouldn't feel bad at all is such a painful thought for us. It is so much of the creation of our suffering. And just this week, like notice as you go through your day, when those negative emotions come up, and you see this in children, especially when they're like, wait I feel bad. Like the teacher said something and I feel disappointed or I got a bad grade. It shouldn't be this way. I should feel good all the time. If I'm doing it right, I should feel happy all the time The more we can accept this, the more there's this peace. What I want you to notice is in your day, how often do those negative emotions come up and you numb them out or you pretend they're not there And numbing is like when you turn to, I'm really bored. I think I'm gonna shop on my phone or I think I'm gonna look for clothes or to Instacart for the grocery store or like it's not that any of those things are bad. It's just that when you do them to hide the reality of 50-50 experience as a human So this means you had a rough day and you're feeling disappointed and you go home and drink to hide from the disappointment This is your board, so you eat to hide the boredom you give yourself something to do. And then there's a net negative to that in our life. Or you tap out on whatever's happening in your life with social media and you're s you're doom scrolling or you're over-netflixing There's so many ways that we all look at the human experience and we decide I'm not supposed to feel bad at all. So I'm gonna resist it. I'm gonna numb it out and pretend it's not there And what we create for us in our human experience is more negative. Like now if you do all these things, like you've either wasted more of your life doing things that don't like create something great for you in your future, or You've made yourself feel bad by over-drinking, or you've overspent on money, or you've gained weight because you're eating your emotions. And so my challenge to you is just this acceptance of life is 50-50. The more you're willing to experience this range of emotions, the more this is your superpower. I think that the definition of self-confidence is that you are willing to experience any emotion because emotions are vibrations in our body, they are not something outside of us that we need to fix. They are there as part of our experience on this planet in life. Life is half awful, half amazing. Life is both good and bad, 50-50, all the time. And if you're not feeling the 50% negative, you may want to ask yourself, how am I numbing the negative? How am I pretending it's not there? How am I resisting what's real for me in my experience in life Because I will tell you right now, I'm feeling so much of this positive emotion of true confidence, true empowerment, true excitement. And on this other side of the spectrum, at the same time, I feel the negative 50% as well that brings up the The shame or the disappointment or the sadness in my life and not resisting it, just allowing it to be there is so poignant. It's so incredible from an experience standpoint. So I hope you can find this freedom of just allowing the experience in our lives to be 50-50. Don't add a layer of judgment on top of something like it's gone very wrong. Don't avoid it. Just let it be there. Just notice it. Just pretend you're watching yourself on a TV screen and you're seeing, what am I thinking that's making me feel This negative side, what are those feelings? What am I feeling on the positive side? Just become more and more aware. The other thing you'll see is that our circumstances, what is around us, the people's behavior, the things around us. are not what create those feelings. It's all of our thoughts. Become the observer. This is true self-awareness. This is how you build the superpower of being so confident, so empowered. So authentic in your own life that you're gonna live the life you really want to live, that you're so proud of When people ask you how you're doing this week, smile. Surprise them with I'm amazing or I'm awesome. You don't have to hide the negative. You don't have to tell them, well, life is 50-50. Let me lecture you on what I just learned. Don't do that Just embrace the fact that it's a moment for you to remind yourself of the 50% amazing and just smile because smiling does so much for your own self to make you feel great And so you don't have to share about life being negative and share all the things. People, again, they really don't want to know that. Use that moment for you to remind yourself of the amazing aspects of your life right now So that's what I have for you today. If you ever need help, go to listjolly. com, send me a note, and I hope you have an amazing week. I'll see you next week.