Live w/ Dr.Charryse 🧠: When “Should” Steals Your Sanity

Hello there. So good to see everybody this morning. See, so funny. Many of you know that I am neurodivergent. So anytime I talk about neurodivergence, I'm truly talking about myself. And I laugh because I got myself all situated. I was like, oh, I've got plenty of time. And then I started doing things and then looked up and I was like, ah, it's time to start. All that being said, so glad that you decided to come and share in this time and thank you as always for the consistent flexibility as I navigate travel and rest and all the things.

Good morning to all those who are joining live and hello to all those who will watch on replay. I am back in the Queen City, as we call Charlotte, coming off of a busy week, but I'm very grateful. I would love to know how you're doing. Often we come into this time, good morning, Joycelyn. And say where you are in the world and rate your week one to ten. One bottom of the barrel ten. You're doing the best you can given the context of your life. Hello, Mel from New York. And again, please keep that word context.

And hello Andrea and Charlotte. So that is crucial. I want to take some time today and talk about when shoulds start to still our sanity. Hello, Dallas. This is quarter four. When we are navigating this time of year, we can often kind of not recognize how rigid our thinking has become. It can start to be really sneaky because we're in that battle between I feel like I want to slow down. Hello, Georgia. And the other part of you that feels like, but there's all these things that I haven't done yet.

Or this is a high time of year where people are also inviting you into things or you're trying to finish projects. So let's get into what happens when you notice that you're living in the land of should or must. Or I have to, because these rigid loops can sound like discipline, but they have an undertone that really can be fear, anxiety, overwhelming, and we don't want to leave them unchecked. Here's where I want to anchor us all. Take a moment and pop in the chat and let me know. What are you noticing about your own mindset right now in this area?

Are you giving yourself the ability to ebb and flow and adjust to your body's energy and fatigue? Or are you noticing there's some shoulds, there's some. I have to. I need to. Why didn't I? I should have. So this is just a moment of awareness for you. And then I'll continue. Let's talk a little bit about the neuroscience of rigidity, because if you're here and you're with me, that will always be something that we share a little bit of. I'm going to say it again. Here's why the neuroscience is so important.

We can often get in our head and feel like you're flawed or we are broken, or we. Or we're the only people who are experiencing certain things. But when we look at things through the lens of neuroscience, then it helps us recognize, oh, well, this is something that is a byproduct of the way my brain is designed to support me. And I'm not the only person who feels this way. That's also why I ask you to put what's going on in your life in the chat and where your mindset is so that you can see, oh, I've said that to myself, too.

I'm not the only person who. Who goes through this. And then it helps us normalize. There are things in life that we absolutely need to work on. So when you're in a season where you're emotionally stuck and pressuring yourself, sometimes, often unnecessarily, it is not just in your head. Neuroscience tells us that cognitive flexibility, your brain's ability to shift thoughts and adapt to new information and reframe challenges and is managed by your anterior cingulate cortex and your prefrontal cortex.

Right. Oh, this is wonderful. Some of you are learning to adjust the new you. Yes. Have to slow your pace so you can have victories. I love that because we can miss out on victories and on wins. I see others are taking some time away before work to prepare themselves for surgery. Joycelyn, I hope that surgery goes well, and I'm glad that you did that for yourself. Hello. Speak, wonder. So sorry you're getting over a cold. And yes, often rest is imposed. You know, you're hitting on a good mark. If we don't take rest on our own, colds, pneumonias, flus, Covid different things with our immune system will knock us out.

All right. When you are in a good mindset and you have a lot of flexibility, that means that prefrontal cortex is right online, and it's going to help you weigh your options and solve problems and override those automatic responses that might be rooted in negative language. So one of the things that I want you to pay attention to over the weeks ahead is how are you speaking to yourself when you're tired? How are you speaking to yourself when you're exhausted? How Are you speaking to yourself when you're in one of those self imposed seasons that force you to slow down?

Because that is going to give you a really great depth of understanding around how you're treating yourself. And yes, Andrea, grace is important and we often extend it to others, but we have a difficult time extending it to, to ourselves. When you find that you're in that loop, right, that spinning loop of I have to, I should. Why did I. I'm beating myself up. I always do this. It creates something called Hebbian learning, which is not a good thing. Hebbian learning is the idea that cells that fire together, wire together.

So we don't want to create an imprint of negative and rigid thinking because it creates a neural pathway that almost destines us to repeat it unless we break that cycle. So here's a few signs that you've lost your sense of safety and flexibility. I'll give you a few. If you can think of others, by all means, add them to the chat. Here's a few mental signs. All or nothing thinking. If I can't do it perfectly, I failed. Another one is overgeneralization. It's always like this. I'll never get ahead.

This always happens to me. And then difficulty making decisions or shifting your focus. So you are so focused on the way you thought something would work out and wanting it to work out in your kind of picture, in your timetable, that you struggle to realize it's going to work out, but not the way I anticipated. So I need to be a little bit more flexible. Okay, then the physical signs. Tight shoulders, shallow breathing, clenched jaw, fatigue despite resting digestive upset or racing heart during minor stresses.

Oh, I love that one. So Andrey is saying one of the signs that she recognizes in herself is that she's quicker to forgive others than she is herself. That is a big one. I would also add you may find that when you're in these moments of rigid mentality, a rigid mentality, you are harder on yourself than you would be with someone else. So it's really helpful to ask yourself, would I treat someone else the way I am treating me right now? Would I put these demands on them? Would I talk to them? Here's another one.

You may find when you're in a place where your mind is rigid, you withhold the things you need because some part of you doesn't believe you deserve them. Almost like you need to earn them or you haven't done a good job. So you can't pull in this resource. It's really helpful for you to know the signs that are specific to you mentally and physically. I will also say some additional physical signs for me and then you can put others that you recognize are there. I will often begin to have digestive pain and distress when I'm rigid and in that kind of threat, hyper vigilant stage.

And I also will have some lower back pain. Those are some big tells for me and can't leave this one off the list. Insomnia. My mind is racing. My mind is running. I am pretending that I'm not laying there calculating everything that I want to work out in my life instead of giving myself permission to rest. So know your signs mentally and physically. As we wrap up, I want to give you two tools that work with your brain, not against your brain. When you notice that you are in the land of shoulds and you are shoulding yourself, the first one is the name it, reroute it technique.

So when you notice a rigid thought like, I should be further along by now. Oh, I know we've all said that to ourselves. At some point, pause and say, that's a should statement. Let me reroute. Saying it out loud is a crucial aspect to breaking that loop in the brain. That's a should statement. Let me reroute. And saying let me reroute is reminding you that you have an opportunity to pull that moment back and go a different direction versus fueling it. Then you want to replace that thought with a flexible question.

Here's the question you can ask yourself so you can practice this as a skill. What's one next step that would move me forward right now so you're not getting stuck, you're not spiraling, you're not beating yourself up. What's one next step that would move me forward and then that pulls the prefrontal cortex online and that shifts you out, out of judgment and into action. The next one is a somatic reset. So remember that getting out of a rigid mindset isn't about just what's in your mind, because often we feel it in our body.

So doing some simple breath work helps open up the nervous system. Very simple. Inhale for four, let those shoulders go up, and then exhale for six and let those shoulders go down. Be intentional about four, six breathing. It is extremely helpful and so crucial. Right? So you've got the name it rerouted technique. And the somatic reset. Oh, yes, that's another good one. The whole dynamic of your nighttime snacking, when you would typically do water or herbal teas or music, and you'll notice you'll have certain foods that when you are struggling and when you're trying to push past what is actually best for you, you will absolutely notice that there are certain foods that you start to crave and you just can't get enough of them.

You kind of get stuck on foods. Hyper fixated on foods for a while. All right, closing thought. The next time your inner critic says you should have done more, remind yourself, I'm not failing. I'm flexing. Right? You are learning. You're staying aware. You have the ability to reroute. But it takes practice. Don't wait for somebody else. Right? Don't wait for someone else to give you permission to be kind to yourself. Be mindful of that. It is so important for us to treat ourselves well through a lens of grace, through a lens of compassion, and through a lens of hope.

Because none of us are stuck unless we choose to be. All right, as always, it is wonderful to be here with all of you. I'm actually planning to do an extra live. You'll see this continue over the weeks ahead, but I'm going to do another live this Saturday morning and do some guided meditation and breath work. So take a look at the calendar, place it on your schedule. I would love to have you join me. Until then, please have a wonderful week and take care of.