00:00 

Hey there, welcome to Intentional Living with Tanya Hale. This is episode number 68, "Taking Action." Welcome to your place for finding greater happiness through intentional growth, because we don't just fall into the life of our dreams...we choose to create it. This is Tanya Hale and I'm your host for Intentional Living. 

00:18 

Hello there, my sweet friends, thank you so much for joining me today. I'm really really happy to have you here. This has been a kind of busy week on a personal level for me. It's Thursday for me and I haven't done a podcast yet this week and I usually try and do one on Monday night. I've had car issues and I had a son who had a car issue and so I've just been kind of busy doing a lot of other things. So the bit of irony that I've had this week is that with this week full of great things, I haven't gotten to do anything really business-oriented. And here it is, Thursday. I haven't recorded a podcast yet this week and it cracks me up that I haven't taken action on my podcast that is about taking action There we go, but it's time. I have all evening with nothing to do but create and record this podcast for you tonight. So let's go ahead and get down to business. 

01:17 

Taking action is Brooke Castillo's number four on her list of things we need to do to have great mental health. Here is why taking action is so important: growth in so many ways is synonymous with happiness. When we are growing and progressing we find so much more satisfaction in our lives than when we are being stagnant. Think of two people who come home from work at night. One eats some dinner and then plops down on the sofa and watches TV for four hours until they finally drag themselves to bed. The other one comes home and eats dinner and then they go out for a walk and they have a great chat with a dear friend or with their spouse. Then they come home and they work on a project that they've been wanting to get done and they make some good progress on it and then they have an hour to read a great book before it's time for bed. 

02:06 

The first person in this example is living, yes, but their overall satisfaction with their life will most likely be pretty neutral. They probably love the shows they're watching and they're engaged and they're laughing or whatever but the stimulation is all coming from the outside and that doesn't create much growth. Things they're engaging in are passive and they don't require much, if any, self-discipline at all. The second person in our example is living by experiencing new things and moving their life into a new and a different place. Their stimulation is coming from the inside because engaging in relationship building, accomplishing projects and self-care require discipline and focus. These things engage them in learning. This person's satisfaction with life will most likely be stronger and deeper because of the growth that is occurring. They are engaging in action. So taking action puts us in a place of growth and that's one aspect of how taking action is really good for our mental health. 

03:17 

But let's talk about another here. Our primitive brain is not really programmed for taking action because that pushes us out of our comfort zones. It wants nothing more than to conserve energy, to protect us from things that feel threatening, and to maintain the status quo. So at our core our natural man really enjoys not taking action. It's easy, right? Taking action requires mental, physical, and emotional energy. Taking action puts us in situations where we can feel a lot of discomfort. We're engaging in activities where we may not know how to do things that can be threatening and that can be threatening for our primitive brains. We're learning new things which requires effort and energy. Also it's taking us off of the well-worn path of habitual behavior and we will have to create a new neural pathway in our brain. And our primitive brain doesn't like that. It will fight us the whole way. 

04:19 

But this is where our minds, our spirit that controls our prefrontal cortex, needs to kick in and override the habitual tendencies of the primitive brain. Our prefrontal cortex can plan for the future and it can see how changes in behavior are beneficial. Our primitive brain doesn't have the ability to look to the future because all it is programmed to do is to look to the past for answers. So following the base instincts of our primitive brain will lead us to a place of inaction. And this leads to complacency, monotony, and boredom. These are not elements of mental health. When we are mentally healthy, we are engaging and stimulating activities that require resiliency and grit. And these are characteristics that come from our prefrontal cortex rather than our primitive brain. 

05:13 

But here's the thing about taking action: it's hard and it's scary and it can be overwhelming. And I get it. As I'm working to build this life coaching business, I'm constantly butting heads with this opposition in my brain. When I was preparing to start this podcast last March, it was so challenging. Actually, I started the process probably about in November of last year. Okay, when I was in the learning phase, I felt safe and comfortable. When we're in the learning phase, that's called passive action. Is it good? Yes. Is it necessary? Yes. Is it all that needs to happen for us to move forward? Absolutely not. I spent a lot of time learning how to work the programs that I use and researching what makes podcasts successful and the proper formatting to use, etc., etc., right? 

06:04 

But at some point book learning isn't moving me forward. There will always be another podcast to listen to or another article to read about how to have a successful podcast. But until I actually take action and record and post a podcast, I'm not really really moving forward on my dream of a successful life coaching business. Passive action is all about the things we do to prepare for taking action. Sometimes this is called intellectual action because we're not actually doing something. And here's the thing: if I have a goal I want to accomplish, for example, I want to do life coaching full time and build a practice where I can help hundreds, if not thousands of people have greater mental health, then reading and thinking and listening and processing aren't really going to help me accomplish my goal. 

07:01 

Are there elements of that that are important? Yes, for sure, but it won't actually start moving me toward my goal until I actually do something, until I record a podcast, until I begin advertising, until I begin offering coaching to people. But the fear that we can feel when we get ready to take action is real. But what is fear? It's a feeling. And where do our feelings come from? Our thoughts, right? Bam! Bam! This is a thought model warning. This is the perfect time for us to do some self coaching or to work with a coach to identify the thoughts we are having that are creating the fear. We have a thought, it creates fear, that fear creates inaction. 

07:55 

I know as I coached myself through the podcast creation I had two major fears. One was putting my stuff out there and getting criticized. I'm a person who has largely avoided conflict for a huge part of my life because I didn't really understand the value of it. I had this idea that there was if there was conflict then I was being attacked. So I had to learn to manage my thoughts around the idea that many people out there may not agree with what I have to say and they may come after me in some way for it. 

08:25 

So instead of thinking "I don't like it when people criticize me," I started learning to think it's important for my growth to be willing to voice my ideas about living a better life. And another thought I started thinking was these ideas can help so many people to be healthier and happier and live their lives better. So by inserting these thoughts in place of the idea that "I don't like it when people criticize me," I started to feel courage and conviction rather than fear. And I found the strength to move forward with action toward actually recording and posting my podcasts. 

09:02 

The second big thought that I had that created the feeling of intimidation was the thought, "once I get started I can't take a break, I just have to keep going." Okay, now that was a huge thought for me as well because even though I really want this business to work, my primitive brain wants to take it easy and just come home from work and watch TV or veg, right? My primitive brain rejects the discipline necessary to come home after a day of teaching eighth graders and invest another several hours of work rather than taking a break. So I had to learn to speak new thoughts to myself on this one as well. The thought that I started saying was the "consistency is really going to create momentum and momentum and start moving my business forward." And again, rather than feeling intimidation by the time and effort commitment, I began with this new thought to feel excitement and anticipation of great things to come. 

10:06 

Now if I'm feeling intimidation that my actions are going to be more of an inaction, but I'm feeling excitement and anticipation, I get more into the action. My actions become actions, right? Because here's the thing: passive action doesn't require any risk. Our primitive brain feels really at ease when there's no risk and action requires risk. It requires that we put out there in a way we may have never done before. It requires effort and our primitive brain pushes back against expending effort. But letting our prefrontal cortex, our mind take control of our primitive brain is a huge step in the direction of good mental health. There is a feeling of self-respect that comes when we make progress in the direction of accomplishing goals and doing hard things, and it's hard to act against the urges of the primitive brain. 

11:11 

But taking action is such a huge step toward forward motion. Taking action creates momentum so that the next step we need to take, we have more confidence because we've done it before. Taking action also moves our primitive brain into a bigger place because once we've done an action and we've survived it, it now becomes something in our past that our primitive brain is no longer afraid of. Isn't that amazing? Our primitive brain is afraid of things it hasn't experienced before, but once our mind gets us to do it and overrides the primitive brain, then that experience becomes part of our past our primitive brain can now draw upon as a past experience of success. It will no longer be afraid of that action because we know we can do it because we already have. 

12:05 

Putting my first few podcasts out there was a little nerve-wracking. I also had the thought, "what if no one ever listens to it?" I finally realized that even if I put out 100 podcasts out there and nobody listened to it, that I would experience massive growth and that alone would be worth it. And that was another propelling thought for me when I felt insecure about this plan of action. So action is huge for our mental health. It creates self-respect, confidence, and forward momentum. Three things that give us a sense of well-being and enjoyment in our lives. 

12:47 

In the initial podcast on mental health, part of one of the definitions on mental health I quoted said, "mental health also includes a person's ability to enjoy life, to attain a balance between life activities and efforts to achieve psychological resilience." That's the end of the quote. I love the concept of really enjoying life, not just living life. There's such a difference in those two concepts for me. Taking action does just this. We find great satisfaction and even joy in achieving difficult things. Think, for example, about the game of Sudoku. If we put it on a challenging level, we may find ourselves struggling to see the patterns and the connections we need to see. But when we have a small breakthrough and we figure out why a certain number goes in a certain square, there's a little burst of dopamine, isn't there, that makes you go, "oh, I got it, I got it." And then another burst when we figure out another square. And each time we figure something out, we get a little boost of confidence as well. And we learn new strategies for how to solve the puzzle. By the time we finally finish it we're feeling confident and we feel good. But then we want to move to another one right away. We don't want to just sit and relish in that accomplishment for the next 20 minutes. Give me five seconds and then I want to start another puzzle. 

14:09 

The thing is when we're finished with the puzzle we do feel a sense of satisfaction, but that's not where the real joy comes from. It comes in the doing, in the processing, in the figuring out. This is where our greatest sense of satisfaction comes from. You know that phrase "joy in the journey?" It's what this is about. Taking action is much the same. When we are in the process of figuring it out is when we find our greatest satisfaction and joy. When we take an action and we fail at it, but we immediately try something else and then eventually figure it out. That's an awesome feeling. That's when we get a dopamine rush. It's the process of taking action that brings the greatest benefits, not the actual success at the end. 

15:01 

I know for me with this podcast, the more I have been consistent, then the more confidence I've gained. And yes, my growth has been amazing the last seven months of doing this and I love it. I'm creating a person in myself who understands me better and the path I want and I need to take. I feel a greater awareness of what I'm really capable of. I'm more clear on where I'm going and I'm feeling more confident in speaking up rather than always taking the path of least resistance, which is the path of no conflict. These are all aspects of good mental health. Again, a definition of mental health we talked about in podcast number 64 says mental health "refers to our cognitive, behavioral, and emotional well-being. It's all about how we think, feel, and behave. Mental health can affect daily life, relationships, and even physical health. Mental health also includes a person's ability to enjoy life, to attain a balance between life activities and efforts, to achieve psychological resilience." So yep, taking action is really important for our mental health. Taking action helps us to attain this balance  between life activities and helps us to achieve psychological resilience. Taking action helps us to turn our dreams into reality and our goals into gains. 

16:31 

One last thought. If you're waiting for the inspiration to move forward, wait no longer, because it's not going to come until you begin movement. Ever notice how when you have a big project that you can put it off forever, but once you just get started then you can put push forward much longer than you thought you could. Inspiration rarely comes until we start doing. I find it fascinating that I can really be struggling with a concept for a podcast and so I'll keep putting it off, waiting for the inspiration to hit me. But when I finally just say "okay, I gotta get this done, I'm out of time," when I finally just sit down and start putting down thoughts, then they start flowing and that's when the inspiration comes. Once I start the doing. And when I finish it I'm always so proud of what I've created and I add to my mental health feelings of competency and awareness and self-respect. 

17:31 

So what about you? What have you been plotting and planning to do? What have you been expending a lot of passive or intellectual action on? And what is a do action that you can do to start creating what you dream of creating? Today is the day, my friends. Take a step. It may be really small, but move it out of your head and into your hands. Stop thinking and start doing. It's really good for your mental health. Gosh, I love growing up, don't you? I think it's amazing. It's amazing. And self-coaching or getting coached is a huge process here. I had a meeting with my coach this last week, and we were walking through some ideas and some concepts and some thoughts that I'd had. And I had a major breakthrough, and I was like, "what? What? I was not even thinking that." And my coach just helped me to see something that I had never seen before. And she helped me to identify a thought that I was having and a thought that I needed to move into in order to make some real progress. And I was so grateful for that. Coaching is amazing. I would love to be your coach, okay? 

18:50 

If you've got stuff going on, you can get a free consult by getting on my website, tanyahale.com, and you can send me an email, and I'll get back in touch with you, and we can set up our session to help get you started, okay? So alright, again, last thoughts. If you are enjoying this, share it with friends. Make sure you subscribe, and leave me a review, will you? I'm trying to get 100 reviews, and I'm not even close, and I know from my numbers I've got a lot more people listening than the few that I've got who have left a review. I know it takes a couple of minutes, but if this is helping you, I'd love for you to turn around and to help me. Alright, my friends, have an awesome, awesome day, and move forward. Do something today. Take some action. Make a difference in your own life, okay? Alright, talk to you next time. 

19:44 

Thank you so much for joining me today. If you would love to receive some weekend motivation, be sure to sign up for my free "weekend win" Friday email: a short and quick message to help you have a better weekend and position yourself for a more productive week. Go to tanyahale.com to sign up and learn more about life coaching and how it can help you get to your best self ever. See ya!