Hi, Amy here. Are you feeling stuck or overwhelmed by things that pop up in your daily life. And perhaps these are because of past traumas or toxic stress? Have you tried traditional therapy and found that it wasn't enough? I know that was the case for me. That's why we developed the whole health lab. Mini trauma has put together a program that combines the latest research with proven methods to help you recover from trauma and move forward from these daily stressors and triggers. We use somatic therapy EMDR, cognitive behavioral therapy and internal family systems therapy. We use nervous system regulation, and many other tools so that we can combine the best methods that are identified in the research to help you recover without being completely overwhelmed. So you can work on trauma on your own pace, your own time. And still with the mentorship and support of a highly trained certified staff. That's us no more waiting for appointments or sitting in traffic driving to see a therapist with our online program, the whole help lab. You can access it from anywhere, anytime, even on an app, visit mending trauma.com backslash whole health lab and learn more. Get your questions answered. We've got a Frequently Asked Questions section and sign up so that you can have this life changing program in your world today. Don't let your past hold you back any longer take control of your future and we can't wait to see you in the whole health lab. Welcome to the universe is your therapist. We are your hosts, Dr. Amy Hoyt and Lena Hoyt, we are sisters. Take a seat and let's dive into this week's episode.
So today's episode, we're going to talk about awareness and insight without judgment. What does that mean? In order
to have change, we have to have some awareness of what's happening or whether or not we want to change or what we want to change. And insight is how those behaviors that we're now aware of affect us. The Insight allows us to figure out what we want to change so that we can be more effective in our lives. And the key piece is to do so without judgment, judgment puts us squarely back into the limbic brain, which is the autonomic nervous system. And in order to learn new behaviors, we have to be in our prefrontal cortex. So without judgment is really key to using awareness and insight productively. So how do we cultivate this, the way we cultivate it is we start paying more attention to what is happening, what we feel, what we're doing, our behaviors, how we are impacted by things, how we impact others. And as we attend to that. And notice that without judging, we start to gather more information about what behaviors were engaging in our life that may be causing us suffering or pain, what
would be an example of an awareness of a behavior that might be causing suffering or pain that we could use?
Sure, one example might be that if I am stressed, I tend to be less attentive. And when I'm less attentive at home, then that impacts my relationships with my family, being able to notice how something impacts me. So let's say something occurs and I am emotionally impacted by it. When I am able to acknowledge the emotional impact, then I can do something with that if I so choose other ways, I am just impacted by things without awareness. And so it's hard for me to make more conscious choices about my behavior and my responses.
What does judgment do to us judgment
is so fascinating, because as soon as you think or say the word should, you're now in judgment, and as soon as you're in judgment, you're now in the autonomic nervous system part of your brain. And as soon as you are in that part of your brain, you are not connected to your prefrontal cortex as well. When we are in our autonomic nervous system, the blood flow tends to go to our extremities to prepare us for fight or flight. And when that happens, the blood flow to our prefrontal cortex is limited. It's restricted, it gets cut off. Well, let me give an example. Have you ever been calm and thought to yourself I never want to do that behavior again, because it's not good for me healthy for me, it doesn't work the calm behavior or the behavior that I'm reflecting on their behavior reflecting on when you're calm. Oh, yeah, all the time when we are calm and can reflect on behavior that we would like to choose differently or that We would like to amend in some way either to decrease it or eliminate it, we are very determined. And we're connected to our prefrontal cortex. And we understand all the reasons why it's wise not to engage in that behavior. And then as soon as we get agitated, for whatever reason, we can be hungry or tired or stressed, or we can be emotionally impacted by something, the blood flow to the prefrontal cortex is diminished. And in the moment, it's very difficult for us to engage the prefrontal cortex to make our wisest choice, we tend to be more reactive, because we're coming out of the fight and flight part of the brain. So when we're calm, and we decided to make a change that is sincere, a lot of clients will say to me, Well, maybe I just don't want to change. That's not a good understanding about how the human brain works. We do want to change when we're calm, and we're in our best wiser self. And yet, when we are agitated or distressed, our best kindness part of our brain is less connected.
So the first step when you find yourself in judgment is to
let the judgment go. Well, that's where awareness comes in. So I need to be aware that I'm in judgment.
Okay, so being the observer, wow, I am being really critical of myself right now, interesting. Wonder why I'm being so critical of myself.
Anytime, if you can train yourself to start paying attention to the word should, then that is a shorthand for your brain to know as soon as your awareness increases that urine judgment. And one of the things that you introduced me to me years ago was from Gabby Bernstein, out of the book, the universe has your back. And it was the response of a choose love. So it can be very simple to notice that you're in judgment, and then to say to yourself, I choose love, it increases blood flow to our prefrontal cortex, and it allows us more bandwidth to make choices that are good for us in the long term, and not just the short term.
What if some of our behaviors are deemed problematic beyond our own judgment? How do we cultivate the resilience needed to start addressing that? I don't
know if this is quite where you're headed. But are you talking about the ability to see our behavior as separate from who we are so that our shame is not so greatly triggered?
Not necessarily. I was just thinking, you know, sometimes when we have experience with the inner critic, it's don't wear that. Don't say that don't do that. And other times, it's, you know, for instance, someone who's self harming I mean, I know that there are times when you're not even aware of how destructive your own self harm is. And so how do you start cultivating enough resources to deal with self harm or OCD that can occur when I get super anxious, I start pulling my hair out, but I don't know I'm pulling my hair out. So how do you start kind of keeping that awareness and insight when you get a glimpse at it? How do you grow that awareness?
I'm not sure we can do it very quickly with judgment. So soon as judgment comes into play, we want to run from the awareness because it triggers our shame. What we want to be able to do is we want to be able to notice or observe without judgment, we want to be able to say to ourselves, given the circumstances, it might make sense that I am not aware of that I'm pulling my hair out. So you offer yourself an explanation that honors the fact that given everything that's going on, it might make sense that you're more stressed or less aware,
I guess I'll talk about what I find most helpful for resourcing is journaling. Usually first thing in the morning, when I'm still in that sleepy kind of access to the subconscious brain mode, where before I check my phone, before I work on anything, I'm just stream of consciousness journaling, and a lot of times my worries will come out some of my fears about who or who am I not being or becoming or any sort of resistance will usually come out of that stream of consciousness. And then if I write long enough, it flows into a much more neutral, and then it eventually flows into where I'm saying, you know, I think I actually can embody this and I'm more projecting, like a next version of myself that I want to inhabit. So journaling has been really helpful for me in terms of self awareness. breathwork
How do you find that helpful in regards to your self awareness?
Well, I think what it does is for me, it is accessed deep, deep, subconscious thoughts that I'm not good enough. I'm not worthy, and that's what is the foundation of my shame. And I usually end up having some sort of visualization as a child and so it gets it helps me get to these really foundational shame issues that I can be quite painful. But afterwards, I am able to release some of that. And so that actually helps me with my self harm. And with my hair pulling in with my anxiety because I become more settled in myself,
that makes a lot of sense. I'm wondering if one of the elements of your stream of conscious journaling includes the act of not judging, but just writing as things occur to you.
Yeah, there's no editing, which is really hard for me, that stream of consciousness, no editing, no judgment, just whatever is coming through.
And the process you're describing is one in which your awareness builds as you continue to write.
And so I think that for any of our listeners, is such a helpful tool, there's a whole book called The Creator's way. And essentially, her theory is that if you do this for 90 days, stream of consciousness and write long enough to where you get all the yuck out and go towards more empowering statements, and actually, you don't even have to do empowering statements, it's whatever comes out that you will create such a profound sense of awareness that it will shift your creative abilities because to create, you need to be really in tuned with your authentic self
is the author Julie Cameron, by any chance?
No, I will find it and we can put it in the show notes. And it's really profound. And that is what I want to keep coming back to is some of these practices seem so simple. And I resisted them for so many years, because I thought they can't possibly actually help as much as I thought something else would. But I find the simple practices extremely life altering.
I'm encountering that with meditation. I have been interested in meditation since the early 90s. And I have attempted it multiple times and have been through a transcendental meditation course. And until recently, the last few weeks, I have really struggled with a meditation practice. And I have found something that offers guided meditations that are very effective for me. And it's interesting to me how we can be as humans where we can seek after knowledge that can be transformative, and yet struggle with internalizing the knowledge or practicing the new practice, which may be an opportunity to when we put those things into play, to be grateful to our self and to our brain for allowing us to take that next step in the practice.
Okay, so the action step, I always want to leave listeners with something they can do on their own to guide themselves a little further in their healing journey if they choose. So the action step would be becoming aware when you are judging and being curious about it. Interesting, and being really hard on myself about this, what's that about? And then the step for people who want to go a little further than a micro step, I think would be the journaling for I mean, I probably do 10 minutes in the morning or less, and just stream of consciousness, no editing as much as you can. You know, obviously, I skipped some mornings, depending on if a kid wakes up early, or you know, but I do definitely try to make it a priority, because it's so settling and helpful. But you don't have to be perfect at it. Just start.
I think starting is really important. One other opportunity for being aware of our judgment is to be aware of times when we feel upset or stressed, and then to check in with ourselves about what our thoughts are. So sometimes when I'm driving, I can start to get agitated. And I realize it's because I think the drivers in front of me should be driving a certain way. And so that means I'm in judgment, because I've utilized the word should, you should be driving differently, and being aware that my agitation is coming from my thought then allows me to correct or alter or challenge that thought, which then brings me back into more common peace and my physical body.
Man, that's a question I like to ask myself. Is this true? Is this really true? And what is my evidence and that works? A lot of times when I'm really leaning into those false stories we tell ourselves about ourselves. I'm not sure it works as well in traffic. But since moving out of a larger town into a very small town, I have not had to deal with traffic this year. Okay, anything else you want our listeners to take away from
this? Just remember to be kind to yourself, see yourself as human know that our journey is part of our human experience and to honor and value the experiences that we have so that we can make choices that can empower us to choose differently. For me
love the universe. God is really helpful in terms of drawing my sense of awareness to what I need to be focusing on. We talked a little bit about this before, but there are times in my life where I just feel overwhelmed. And I need help prioritizing, and I can make a logical list. But I need help really understanding what my true priority is. And so when I go to the Divine, which I typically do prayer, but I also do meditation, I go with the intention of being shown what is most important right now? What's my next right step. And that helps my awareness in terms of stopping me spinning, because I spin a lot in my mind. So the insight without judgment, I think, is really interesting, because I think so many of us have a very large sense of the inner critic and imposter syndrome. And for me, I always felt like if I achieved enough, if I got enough degrees, if I made an you know, did enough accomplishment successfully, that I would somehow feel better about myself. And it didn't come. It didn't come with college, it didn't come with graduate school, didn't come with a PhD. It didn't come with money. It didn't come until I really, really dug into my inner self and realized I was trying to outrun I was trying to out accomplish my trauma. And so the insight without judgment has been helpful for me when you taught me the concept of benevolent curiosity, because I was able to ask myself, why am I doing this? Why am I working 16 hours a day, and not allowing myself to rest? And the answer for me was because when I rest, I feel I'm feeling is really scary. And so that has been one of the processes I've been working on this past year is slowing down, working smarter, not longer, automating a lot of my work and systems and really taking a page out of Rachel Hollis or Mel Robbins, perhaps Jen Sincero. But if it's not a Hell, yes, it's a no, if I am not like, that sounds amazing. I'm not going to do it, I'm going to politely decline. And I think once I gave myself permission, to really only put my effort and energy into the things that I love, it was an action of being kind to myself. So it propelled more kindness to myself. It's that positive cycle
we've identified before, the reason why I think awareness and insight without judgment is so essential is because if we have awareness with judgment, it triggers our shame. And then we can't use the awareness to grow because we're contracting in our shame, and we're hiding in our shame. And so many of us have religious trauma, where we have experienced teachings of a God who is a constant judge. And when we think about awareness and insight, and we think about the divine and how to bring that into this concept of being able to be aware without judgment, I think it's really essential to address that idea that God has a lot going on, the universe has a lot going on, they're not sitting around it, isn't he she is not sitting around, keeping tally of how many naughty bad things I'm doing how many times they have to remind me not to do that one habit, if we conceptualize a power greater than our selves is love than judgment is not this distinguishing feature of that higher power, safety, safety and love, connect, connectedness, holding, being with presence,
when I think that's why we, I mean, I know that's why we named the podcast, the universe is your therapist, and we're going back and forth, should we say God or the universe, and we didn't want to alienate anyone, because I believe there's many, many paths to the divine. So I wanted to honor that. But the universe is your therapist is really central because if you conceptualize the universe or God as love that is a safe relationship. And we know that trauma can only heal in a safe relationship and whether or not you can see the person or the entity or the being or the wavelengths, they are real, it is real mean energy has been measured. And love is the highest frequency, it is measurable. It is not visible to the naked eye, but it is measurable. It is real. And it is through love that creation occurs, including the creation of new wiring for ourselves, outside of and beyond trauma to go from this place of surviving into thriving and many people have there are many people who have survived trauma and become thrivers. And we want to be able to encourage those who are on this journey with us to take that capacity that you've found to thrive and then apply it to these other areas of
your life where you are struggling or where you're challenged to get out of these old wiring patterns and let love be The healer, the corrector, and the creator of new wiring for you.
Thank you so much. Thank you for listening to the universe's your therapist this week. If you have any questions or looking for more information, you can find us at mending trauma on Instagram, as well as mending trauma.com Our website and if you're enjoying our content, we'd love it if you could rate review and subscribe to the show. We'll see you all next week.
