The Overwhelmed Brain

Lots more to explore in part two of the self-help variety show. What you are upset about has an origin from the past, exploring that can heal the present. Do you stand up to your family for your significant other? Is it a good idea? How do you handle apologies and forgiveness? Should you ask for forgiveness? What happens when you partner's child doesn't accept you in their life? What do you do with the feelings of shame and anger around someone's death? Lots to explore in this New Year's edition of TOB.

I answer several questions about overcoming jealousy, people that impose their values on you, self-worth and self-esteem, getting over insecurities about body comments, letting go of intrusive, distressing thoughts, expressing yourself and more! It's the variety episode on emotional intelligence.

Some careers just don't fit. You can be happy-ish, but not necessarily happy. Or, you could be downright miserable. I invite Scott Barlow from Happen to Your Career on the show to talk about what it takes to find a career you can be happy in AND successful. Get Scott's free 8 day mini video course on figuring out what career fits you at https://theoverwhelmedbrain.com/career/

Do you give someone a second chance after there's been a conflict, toxic relationship, betrayal or something else that you swore you'd never do again? What are some positive signs that someone has changed and deserves a second chance? What should you look for? In this episode, I provide important, practical things to observe in someone who might deserve a second chance in your life. Today's highlight is loveandabuse.com

How do you know if the relationship you're starting (or the relationship you're in) is everything you want it to be? How do you know you aren't getting led into yet another heartbreak? Learning the signs of a healthy, functioning, and even happy relationship is how you know whether the relationship is worth continuing or letting go.

As the holidays come around, you will likely meet up with family and friends. And you may also run into that toxic person or people that you don't look forward to seeing again. Dealing with toxic people requires a few tools so that you can make it through the evening or the week. This episode gives you those tools.

How many decisions do you make in your life that are actually based on what you want instead of how someone else will respond? Sometimes it takes a swift kick in the emotional behind to get moving on your decisions so that you can get out of the emotional rut of trying to please others while losing yourself.

What does it take to become the best version of you? What do you need to do for yourself so that you become more happy and more fulfilled? This episode is all about you and what it takes to become the most supportive, compassionate person to yourself.

When you carry around an inability to be vulnerable, you can build up an emotional resistance increasing the negativity inside of you. When this happens, you end up living a life that isn't as happy or fulfilling as it could be. I explain this process in this episode.

It can be frustrating when someone doesn't understand what you're talking about. In fact, there are probably people in your life that you try to communicate with but keep ending up in arguments. In order to communicate with some people, you have to meet them where they are. That's what today's episode is about.

Silence is golden until it isn't. There are three main levels of silent treatment: 1. Processing time to figure out what you're going to do with what you just learned. 2. Cool down time as a way to regulate what might normally be a heightened response 3. A method to make someone you care about feel bad I'll give you one guess which one I'm talking about in this episode.

Do you enable behavior that you don't like? Is it possible that the people that cause you stress do so because you are allowing it in some way? This is a very important topic that may help you get your power back if you adopt and apply the message.

Social anxiety can be debilitating. In this bonus mini-episode, I talk about one way to start thinking about it differently so that it doesn't have such a grip on you. Take the social anxiety survey at theoverwhelmedbrain.com/safe to share your experience. Survey closes November 2018.

If they're not like you, you don't like them. If you're not like them, they don't like you. You have opinions, so do they, but should your differences separate you and cause you so much stress that you would rather lose relationships than accept people for their differences? This is a full episode with many angles, everyone will get something from it. Also, take the social anxiety survey at theoverwhelmedbrain.com/safe

Trying to find happiness is hard enough, but trying to do it when other people are in your life (or are interfering with your life) is even harder. The first email I read is from someone who has a problem with his girlfriend smoking pot. He wants the relationship, but not the pot. The second email dives into how deeply religious parents might want to continue controlling you even after you leave the nest. This episode is all about finding your true path and making the decision to follow it.

Hurtful people do a really good job of causing us to feel bad about ourselves. Not only that, we end up repeating what they said or did to us in our mind over and over again. The emotional trauma can last for months or years. In this episode I help transform the hurtful messages from others into empowering declarations that help us move on see them for who they really are.

When you end up in a miserable relationship, who's to blame? Do you feel powerless as the relationship gets worse and worse? It's vital to see the signs at the beginning, but it's even more important what you do later on when you are heavily invested.

If you're a commitment phobe or someone who has trouble making and committing to decisions, you probably notice your life coming to a standstill more often than you want. The solution may be a simple change that's a challenge to implement, but could transform your life. It's time to tackle commitmentphobia.

When you get that suspicious feeling that a friend, family member or partner is doing something deceptive, do you investigate further or take their word when they say nothing is going on? When you have that gut instinct kicking in, it's time to listen and perhaps even dig a little deeper just to get to the truth. I also revisit values and what steps to take to show yourself love, respect and compassion so that you don't end up in toxic relationships.

How difficult is it to experience life to the fullest when you have a dark cloud of problems and challenges? In this episode, I help you tackle the problems in your life with many questions designed to loosen the grip emotional challenges have on you. If you can get some relief from the problems in your life, perhaps you could experience more of what it has to offer.

The best relationship, job or event in your life flashes by and now you are afraid that's the best there ever was and it will never be that good again. When you use the words, "never", "ever", and "always", you set up your present and future for a daily misery that never ends. It's time to examine the language we use and make sure we are not setting up our reality to be a nightmare.

How do you know if you are the difficult one in any relationship? Whether it's at home, with friends, or family, when everyone seems a bit unhappier than you think they should be, perhaps the common denominator is you.

In any relationship, mixed messages are the key to diminishing trust and certainty. When communication is based on deception to make others think one thing while you do or say another, you introduce confusion and sometimes even a bit of insanity.

Your level of function or dysfunction as an adult is almost always determined by the most unhealthy or toxic people in your family growing up. When you are raised by those who didn't or couldn't love and support you as you deserved, you may have developed "broken" tools to deal with situations as an adult. When your emotional toolbox has a bunch of broken tools, you may keep getting the results you don't want, causing you to stay unhappy. In this episode, I help you identify those broken tools and what you can do to start utilizing them the right way, or even fixing them altogether.

People pleasing can be exhausting. Spending time and energy trying to be what you believe other people want you to be destroys relationships and wears on your emotional well-being. In this episode, I help you understand just how damaging people pleasing can be.

If you withdraw your emotions or give others the silent treatment, you may not be surprised to hear that this behavior, if repeated over and over again, can drain your relationship of love, affection, and intimacy. Over time, if not addressed, the relationship can perish.

What do you do when you've done a lot of work on yourself and feel like you've addressed the toughest issues in your life but still feel as if there is something missing? What's the secret to figuring out what's keeping you from feeling fulfilled? By asking yourself the right questions, you'll get the answers you need.

When you find yourself throwing away compliments in place of beliefs and self-perceptions that aren't true, you stay in a self-perpetuating cycle of negativity and may never get out until you are ready to give up that sometimes you are just plain wrong. People see us differently than we see ourselves. The problem isn't when we think we're better than others perceive us, it's when we don't believe people who say good things about us.

If you have difficulty being intimate, it might be time to stop looking at all the top ten lists on how to get closer to those you love and listen to this episode. I dive into what you need to do to increase your connection and intimacy with the people you love. During the close, I talk about a way to stop obsessive thoughts. It's a bit unusual which is why it might work.

If you think something is wrong with the relationship but aren't sure if you should leave or if you should work on things, perhaps it's time to get an answer so that you can have some closure. In this episode I help you access the resources you need to make a choice.

There is a path out of the rut of depression, feeling unworthy, unlovable, stupid, and any of a number of other thoughts and feelings that can permeate your life. If you're in that miserable, stuck state, this episode may be a path to a door that shines the light on the dark.

If guilt holds you back from enjoying life and making good, healthy choices for yourself, it's time to let it go and gain some forward momentum. Guilt suspends happiness and keeps you from doing what you really want to do in life. Could letting it go completely change your life? It's time to find out.

One of the main disadvantages of stuffing negative emotions is that, quite simply, you are probably not happy most of the time. Walking around with so much negativity can lead to mini explosions in your relationships. The key to clearing these obstacles from your system is to express them. But how? And to whom? And will you ever feel safe doing so?

How much are you willing to risk to have the greatest relationship you can have? How much emotional connection do you want? It seems the more the reward, the higher the risk. In this episode, I talk about how staying emotionally closed up or closed off takes away most of the human experience and keeps everyone you want to love at a distance.

Where does your self-worth come from if it isn't instilled in you from your parents or caretakers? There is a path to a higher sense of self-worth and self-esteem. It may not be an easy path, but it does exist.

Would you know if you were being emotionally abusive? There is a question you can ask yourself to determine if you are being emotionally abusive or not. Once you know the question, you can change how you communicate with anyone.

What are the steps to figuring out the challenges that come into your life? Is there a process? What happens when someone you know is going through a particular challenge, do you know what questions to ask? Join Matthew Bivens and I as we talk about our process of discovering issues and where to dig further.

Whatever fears, pain, shame, guilt and other negative emotions are lingering inside of you are preventing you from reaching empowerment and walking the path of enlightenment. This episode is all about starting that path and releasing the stream of negative emotions that may be flowing through you.

If you're stuck in a state of constant fear, what can you do to become more fearless and more confident so that you can feel good instead afraid of what's around every corner?

If you've ever come out of a relationship feeling unlovable and unworthy, it's time to consider the source of this false belief and how you are sabotaging yourself for future relationships. Also, I read an email about conditional versus unconditional love and just what makes up love anyway.

What happens to the relationship if after you make life plans together, one of you changes their mind? I received a letter from a woman who said that she and her husband planned on having a baby, but he has now changed his mind and no longer wants one. There's a lot to discuss in this very challenging topic.

1. That one decision you regret that changed your entire life for the better… or would it have been worse? 2. You lose the love of your life, now you know you'll never be happy again. Can you recover from losing "the one"? 3. You filter you everything you do through certain criteria. Is that filter serving you?

What are the best life lessons to learn along your journey? How do you know what your next step is? What if you're a little too introverted and can't seem to find the courage to take steps that you believe you need to take? Matthew Bivens and I have a discussion about this in this special mid-week show.

Cheating might be the end of most relationships, but many couples have survived and thrived after the affair. There are many components to infidelity. In this episode, I explore the basics of cheating and what will allow your relationship to survive and heal after the affair.

1. One huge mistake can change your life. Then when it's time to make up for that mistake, you have to prioritize what's most important. Sometimes that means losing something you love. 2. When you control someone, you cause them to want to be away from you and seek their needs from someone else. What starts off seeming to be the only way to get what you want them to do turns into the very thing that drives them away 3. What do narcissists do that makes them so cunning? Why does everything feel like your fault? A little taste of the narcissist in this third segment will help answer those questions.

1. If your brain or your heart closes up at the thought of sharing your feelings about someone else, this first segment is for you. 2. It's vital to have someone or somewhere to express the deep negative emotions. Finding that safe person with whom to share your shame, guilt and fears may be just what you need to heal. 3. How do you get past criticism? I read a negative review of the show, then do something a little different on overcoming criticism.

1. What do you do when you lose your mentor? Here's a trick you may think is a little out there. 2. What is the biggest problem in your relationship? Cheating or worse? To heal, you may have to work on something else first 3. You can only control you.

1. Have you ever listened to a motivational teacher to the point where you were ready to make huge changes in your life, but after a couple days you lost all that motivation? Motivational teaching is great for building you up, but where do you go after you come back down? 2. Matthew Bivens joins me and we talk about wisdom and when everything in life is failing.

1. When you get angry, frustrated or upset toward someone else, how quickly do you recover? Would you like to recover faster and get into a better space? I'll walk you through questions you can ask yourself that lead to change. 2. How do you feed the dysfunction of others? If you get into emotionally abusive relationships but can't figure out how to stop the abuse, you may be part of the cause. 3. You can commit to someone then re-evaluate that commitment when they don't hold up their end of the bargain.

1. If you want to change someone's life, sometimes all it takes is a heartfelt "Thank You" or compliment. But not in passing. A thank you or compliment that makes them stop and process it can be quite powerful. 2. If you are dealing with insecurities about yourself, this segment and the final segment will help you start to heal from them. I reveal one of my own insecurities for the first time on the public airwaves.