520. How to Make an Impact

If you could have any superpower, what would it be? Most of us will think about something that would save us time and effort and energy, but why? Why do we want to save time and energy? Because we want to be able to be more impactful. We want more time, more energy, the ability to show up in more places, or we might pick a superpower that does literally give us more control, or at least the illusion of control.

This is because making an impact is something we are designed to do. And today, I’m going to talk to you about how to do it. This is episode 520 of Better Than Happy, How to Make an Impact.

Welcome to Better Than Happy, the podcast where we transform our lives by transforming ourselves. My name is Jody Moore. In the decade-plus I’ve been working with clients as a Master Certified Coach, I’ve helped tens of thousands of people to become empowered. And from empowered, the things that seemed hard become trivial, and the things that seemed impossible become available, and suddenly, a whole new world of desire and possibility open up to you. And what do you do with that?

Well, that’s the question… what will you do? Let’s find out.

Sometimes, listening to a podcast is enough. But sometimes, you’ll feel inspired to go deeper. If you hear things that speak to you in today’s episode, consider it your invitation to a complimentary coaching workshop.

On this live, interactive Zoom call with me, you’ll get a taste of the power of this work when applied in real life. You can participate, or be a silent observer. But you have to take a step if you want to truly see change in your life… two steps, actually. Head to JodyMoore.com/freecoaching and register. Then you just have to show up. Your best life is waiting for you. Will you show up for it? JodyMoore.com/freecoaching. I’ll see you there.

All right, everybody. I am so excited for today’s episode. I have so many ideas and theories here that I’ve been formulating in my head, and I hope that I can articulate them in a way that will make sense.

I want to begin by talking about how we as human beings function at our best. And this is my own theory based on all the things I’ve studied from the world of psychology and human behavior, things that I believe from my religious tradition and teachings, and my over 8 years of coaching thousands and thousands of individuals and observing myself. Okay? So I want to preface it with all of that.

And the basic thing that I want to touch on today is that as human beings, we need to be moving. We need to be growing. If we’re not growing enough, if we’re not in motion, and I’ll tell you what I mean by that in just a minute, then we’re going to feel something like boredom or unfulfillment or even at more extreme ends, things like depression. Okay? So we are not designed for stagnation. We’re not designed to stay in one place. We’re designed to move.

Now, I mean, this is actually true literally, in the literal sense. If we just sit on the couch all day and never go anywhere, our bodies are going to feel the effects of that. But I’m not talking about physical movement so much as I’m talking about emotional and mental movement. I’m talking about you doing something, contributing, growing, changing in some way. Okay?

So, let’s talk about the far end of the continuum, first of all, which is stagnation, right? I like to think of this as a pond. A pond is a body of water that doesn’t have movement, right? And therefore, it grows algae, can get stinky. I always think of ponds as being dirty, stinky, lots of bugs, lots of bacteria, right? A pond isn’t a place that typically you want to go swimming in unless you really have to for survival purposes.

So, if we are not moving, if we’re like a pond, we start actually creating problems for ourselves and our brains and bodies create problems for us. And again, it can be as minor as boredom, it can be as severe as depression.

And by the way, that’s not the only thing that causes depression. I’m not saying if you have depression, it’s because you’re not moving. I’m just saying that can be a result of stagnation.

Okay, on the opposite end of the continuum, we have movement or growth. As opposed to a pond, think of this end as being like a river. Okay? There’s things moving in, there’s things moving out. It’s constantly moving. That can be both amazing and exciting and kind of scary and overwhelming. When I think about rivers, I think about the Spokane River that runs through downtown of the city that I live in. And it’s beautiful. It makes the downtown area so gorgeous. In fact, it’s a huge river where there are restaurants all over that have beautiful views of the river.

And we love to go eat there and just soak in the beauty of it. But it’s also overwhelming and scary. Sometimes there’s so much water moving so quickly through there, it feels overwhelming and scary. Okay? But nevertheless, that is how we as human beings are designed is for movement or growth.

Growth is the result that we get of the movement. So, what do I mean by movement? All right. This takes me to part two of my theory. All right? The second part is that there are basically three categories in which we experience this growth or movement, which keeps us at our best, keeps us healthiest.

The first category is what I call crisis. Okay? So sometimes there is a problem that arises in our lives. Maybe we’ve created the problem through a series of not very wise choices, or maybe it’s just a problem that we were handed by God or somebody else’s agency or what have you. Okay? So, we all know what problems are. We all know that they happen, right? And if you have a problem to solve, whether it’s, you know, just a problem that you’re creating or a problem that everybody agrees is a problem, doesn’t matter. Sometimes we’re in crisis mode, we’re trying to fix something that we think could be better or different. That’s totally fine, necessary at times even, right? Amazing, actually, that we have the ability to do that.

A step over from crisis mode, if we move a little bit into the center of the continuum, we have what I call consumption. Okay? Consumption is the word I like to use for learning. So if I’m taking classes, reading books, listening to podcasts, watching YouTube videos, that could be even entertainment I would put in the consumption category.

Okay? So maybe I’m learning something, I’m reading something, I’m watching something. I’m taking in things that allow my brain some movement, right? I can have new neural pathways connected in my brain as I watch or listen or consume something. I get new insights, I get new ideas, I experience emotions as we consume things, right?

So, consumption tends to be less painful than crisis. It’s certainly more enjoyable. Most of us prefer consumption over crisis. But sometimes staying in crisis mode, solving a problem is necessary and useful, right?

Even further over from consumption on the continuum, on the far right side actually, we have creation. Creation is where instead of consuming, taking in, reading, let’s just say someone else’s story that they wrote, we sit down and write an original story. Okay? Or instead of, like I consume a lot of podcasts, but right now as I’m recording this podcast for you, I’m actually in creation instead of consumption. Okay?

Now again, this isn’t to say that creation’s better than consumption. It’s just different. I just want you to notice there’s a difference. And it’s not to say that we shouldn’t be in crisis again at times. It’s just different. Crisis mode, consumption mode, creation mode, all different, right? And I do think that as we move across the continuum that the most fun, the one that gives us the most movement and also is the most scary probably, is creation mode.

It’s like the Spokane River as opposed to just a little creek flowing through my backyard, right? The Spokane River, like I said before, can get very high. There are huge falls. In fact, there’s a gondola where you can ride over the river, right over the rapid rushing water. And I don’t really like riding on that gondola. It kind of scares me. Okay? That’s what creation mode can be like.

Because it’s both amazing and fast-moving and exhilarating and refreshing like a rushing river, but it’s also scary because the brain views a lot of it as dangerous. Okay? But what I want to focus on today is that creation mode. And the reason why is because I think it doesn’t have to be scary. You don’t have to create in any huge, big, scary way. But if you understand, first of all, why it feels so scary, and you understand where there really is danger and where there’s not danger, then it becomes less frightening and it’s the most exciting, amazing way to live. Okay?

So, like I said before, in this creation mode, it might be a hobby that you take on. It might be that you decide to learn how to paint or draw, or you might dive into learning all about physical fitness. You might dive into learning more about nutrition. And then again, in creation, I should say, not just learning, but like teaching others, sharing it, writing about it is what happens in creation mode, sorry. But you might sew something, draw something, paint something, play the piano, practice the piano, or the guitar, or whatever it is, right?

There’s also creation where we not only do the thing, create the thing, but we share it with others. Maybe we try to sell our book, or maybe we start teaching other people how to play the piano, or we in some way offer what we know and are good at to others who are now in either crisis or consumption. You with me?

It kind of happens in a loop. Sometimes we’re on the far left, crisis. Sometimes we’re in the middle, consumption, and sometimes we’re on the far right, creation. And in creation, that’s where we are available to help people or serve people or contribute to people who are either in crisis or consumption. You with me?

And that place of being a creator, being in creation mode when you can help other people, makes us feel the most alive. It’s the most exciting, empowering, wonderful way to live, right? Have you experienced this? This is why people say to me all the time, I just want to help people. This is why it’s so amazing and fulfilling and rewarding when somebody sends me a message saying, “Hey, I’ve been learning from you. I’ve been in Be Bold for the past year and I just want you to know that my marriage is totally different. My relationship with my kids is different, or I lost a bunch of weight, or my business has taken off,” or whatever it is. When they write and tell me that the things that I’m doing in my own creation mode are helping them, there is no better feeling than that.

And that’s because that’s what we’re designed for. That’s the ultimate rushing river movement, is that I get to create and it helps impact somebody else for good, right? I think this plan, the way that our Heavenly Parents created us, is amazing and beautiful. I love to think about this. I love to think about how sometimes going through a crisis and figuring out how to get on the other side of it allows us then to move into creation mode and serve other people who are in crisis.

And the person in crisis, and crisis is a strong word, but sometimes it is a literal crisis. Sometimes it’s just a challenge, but nevertheless, the person who’s in crisis benefits tremendously and is in growth mode, is in movement, and often benefits or needs or even requires the help and support of somebody who’s in creation mode. And the person in creation mode benefits just as much, if not more at times, than the person in crisis by being able to use their skills of creation to help.

And even if we’re working with somebody in consumption mode, it’s the same thing, right? For those of you that are authors who write amazing novels, somebody reads your book and tells you, “I loved your book. Thanks so much.” That’s an amazing feeling, right? To know that you created something that helps someone else. Now if they say, “I loved your book so much, it was so fun to read, and it helped me heal from some past trauma I’ve been working through,” even better, right? What an amazing plan. What a beautiful plan.

All right. Now, the next thing I want to teach you is that whether you are in crisis, consumption, or creation is up to you. Now, there are times when I want to be in crisis mode, meaning I want my brain and my efforts and my time largely focused on a problem I’m trying to solve. That’s okay. I’m not saying that’s wrong. I’m just saying, do you like the amount of time that you’re in crisis mode? I think there are a lot of people walking around in the world in crisis mode, complaining or worrying about what’s gone wrong or stressing about what may go wrong.

And okay, if you want to do that, you totally can. It’s just the least fun. It’s filled with negative emotion. And like I said, so is creation, but the difference between the negative emotion you have in creation and that you have in crisis is that the creation negative emotion is useful. It’s moving you forward. The negative emotion we create in crisis is keeping us stuck. Even though we’re still moving, we’re not in stagnation, we’re sort of moving in a circle instead of moving in the direction a river moves, right? So, are you in crisis mode too much? Here’s how you’ll know.

You’re making things around you be problems that when you step back and slow it down and really consider it, you know are not actual problems. For example, if you’re constantly feeling bad about how the house is a mess, that may or may not be a time when you want to stay in crisis mode. Like, does it really matter that the house is messy? Is that really what you want to spend your energy, your efforts, your growth trying to solve for? I mean, maybe the answer is yes, but just something to consider, right?

So, a lot of people are in crisis mode. Even more people will stay in consumption mode because we live in the most amazing world ever, where there are so many awesome things to consume. And people who choose to go into creation have more channels than ever by which to offer us their creations. I love this about our world. I don’t think this is a bad thing. I think it’s a beautiful thing. I just want you to be onto yourself that your need for growth and for movement can be fulfilled by being in crisis or consumption mode, but it will never feel as amazing, as fulfilling, or help you reach your potential as much as if you allow or even push yourself into creation mode at least some of the time, more of the time than what most of us do in today’s world.

For example, I love learning about marketing. I love learning about being an entrepreneur, about how to be more effective at serving both my current clients and my potential customers and clients. And so I listen to a lot of marketing podcasts and I read a lot of business books. And that’s fine. Nothing wrong with that, right? But that’s not the same as me testing something out. It’s not the same as me going out and trying to market my services to people. And yet the brain doesn’t really understand the difference. Or I should say the brain just prefers that I stay in consumption, because listening to a marketing podcast has no risk, right? There’s no danger. There’s no risk of me spending money that doesn’t yield a return. There’s no risk of me putting out some kind of content that somebody is offended at and writes me and tells me that they feel that way.

There’s no risk involved in consumption. And so the brain’s like, “Hey, we’re totally working on our business. We’re totally working on the marketing end of our business by listening to this marketing podcast, aren’t we?” It feels like we are. The truth is, until I actually try something, until I actually market a part of my business, I haven’t really worked on the business, right? So this is important to know. I want you to be onto yourself. I want you to know that again, there’s nothing wrong with consumption and learning from other people is amazing and good. But the ultimate joy and the ultimate result that you probably want in your life is going to come from creation, right? I don’t just want to learn about marketing. I want to use marketing to help better serve people and grow my business. And that’s only going to happen if I move into creation and I go try some things in the world. Okay?

So, the reason why most people will stay in consumption or stay in crisis is, I want to go through seven, I just gave you some reasons, but I want to break them down into seven categories. Okay?

Number one, we think this thought all the time, “I don’t know how.” I don’t know how. Okay? So maybe you feel a call to start a business. I’m going to use starting a business as an example because to me, it’s the ultimate and most fun way to keep myself in creation, okay? So maybe you think, “I don’t know how.” I’m not an entrepreneur. I know nothing about business. I coach a lot of women who say, “I’ve been a stay-at-home mom for the last however many years. I haven’t kept up on technology or what’s happening in this particular industry,” etc. They say to me, “I have no skills,” which is a lie, but that’s what their brains tell them, right? “I don’t know how.”

Okay. First of all, I always say, “I don’t know how” is a lie, because I find that when I do that, my brain suddenly decides, “All right,” and it finds some solutions and answers. But you can always go back to consumption and learn a little bit. I just like to monitor myself by going, what is the next thing I need to learn? I’m only going to learn the thing I need to take a step forward. And then I’m going to go implement and get back into creation and do the thing that I just learned before I go back and learn more. We tend to think I need to know the whole journey. I need to know how I’m going to get from California to New York. So let me study the map and let me find all the stoplights and let me find the road construction. And that never works, right? It’s just not really feasible. So it’s okay to go and learn. Learn something. Learn the next thing you need to learn and then take a step forward. Get back into creation, if that’s you. Okay?

Number two reason that we stay in consumption or crisis is our brains tell us, “That’s just not going to work.” Like at least for you. Other people can do that. Other people can be successful, but not you. You’re not like them. You’re not charismatic enough. You’re not confident enough. You’re not experienced enough. You’re not that kind of person. You’re too shy. You’re too whatever. You don’t write well enough. You don’t know how to sell. These, this goes along nicely with number one, right? I don’t know how, and it’s not possible for me.

These are just stories your brain tells you because moving into creation, remember, has more risk. The brain doesn’t like that risk. The brain thinks it’s scary. It’s trying to keep you in consumption or have you just drop it all together and go back to like, “Let’s just worry about what the neighbors think of us. Let’s just worry about what people at church think of me.” The reason I’m using these examples is because I’ve coached so many people who end up in crisis because their brains are trying to move and progress and grow and do something and strategize and solve a problem, when I’m like, “This is not really a problem. You see that, right? It doesn’t matter if the person at church is judging you. It’s totally fine. That’s just life,” because there’s nothing else for the brain to focus on, and it wants to move and grow. It doesn’t want to be stagnant. Okay? So, we want to get into at least consumption, but ideally creation as well. We don’t want to just stay in consumption.

Okay, number three, fear. I mean, that probably should have been number one. Fear is the most common reason. We’re afraid of failure. We’re afraid of trying something and then it doesn’t work. And so we just won’t try it at all and then it for sure didn’t work. Let’s just fail ahead of time. This is what the brain does, right? We’re worried of judgment.

Our brains don’t know the difference between physical danger and emotional danger. The part of the brain that generates negative emotion to try to protect you physically is the same part of the brain that tries to protect you mentally and emotionally. Okay? So there might be a snake that would bite me, triggers in the brain the same way as there might be somebody who sees what I post and thinks it’s ridiculous. But notice that a snake biting me may be actually important for my survival. But somebody seeing my post and thinking it’s ridiculous, not at all important to my survival. It’s just good to know, right?

Another thing again that I hear a lot of people have a fear of is, “I don’t want to waste time. I don’t want to waste money.” That’s a whole other podcast episode I need to record. I don’t have time to go into it in detail. In short, I’m just going to tell you there’s no such thing as wasted time or wasted money. Because remember, the goal is movement. Movement is what we want. Creation gives us the most movement, and then we learn and course correct if things don’t play out the way we want. That is a much better thing than sitting back worrying you’re going to waste time or money in stagnation or consumption even.

Okay, number four, “I’m just not good at that,” quote unquote. I’m just not the kind of person who’s good at this. As though you should be good at it right away. As though most people are born good at these things. That is not true. You know how we get good at things? We be terrible at them first. We be willing to be terrible at them and then we just keep going. This is one of my favorite things I learned from my coach and teacher, Brooke Castillo. She’s like, your life will become more amazing the more willing you are to suck at things.

I love that. I always hear that voice in my head whenever my brain’s like, “I don’t know. You’re not very good at that.” Like Reels, I just started making Reels, right? I’m like, “Gosh, I’m not a good actress. I’m not going to dance. I don’t want to be silly. I’m just not good at that.” And I told myself, “All right, what if we just do a bunch of Reels that aren’t good?” Because Reels help people. They get their attention and they help them better understand the concepts I’m trying to teach that will help them. So okay, we’re just going to be not good at it.

Number five, we take resistance to mean that we’ve made a wrong choice. Okay, so I can’t think of anything that you might go out and do in creation mode that wouldn’t at some point for most people trigger some resistance. Resistance sounds like, “I don’t want to. It’s too hard. It’s not working. Like, why are we even doing this?” The brain will just offer you that. It’s supposed to. It’s totally natural, normal. It doesn’t mean that you made the wrong choice. Your brain’s really tricky though, right? It’ll turn it into that. It’ll go, “Maybe this was selfish. Maybe I was foolish. What was I thinking?” Resistance doesn’t mean you’re doing, you’ve made the wrong choice or that you should stop. Resistance means, “Oh, I’m a human being. Okay.” This is why this is an opportunity for growth, because I get to answer that part of my brain. I get to not just let it dictate my experience. That’s where the growth happens. Okay?

Number six, the reason I see people stay in consumption or crisis or at least quit when they’re in creation mode, is that they don’t have a routine that works for keeping them focused and moving forward. Okay? So in other words, I have routines now in my business that keep me focused and moving forward. Like every Monday morning, I meet with my team and I record a Monday Magic video for my members. And every Tuesday, I send a certain email. And every Thursday, I record a podcast and every, I have routines, right? I have meetings, I have calls, I have schedules, I have routines.

So anytime my brain’s like, “I don’t feel like working today,” I’m like, “Yeah, some days are like that, but we just, we got things to do. We got a routine,” right? Your kids have a routine of going to school. They don’t always want to go to school, but they follow the routine. If you have a job working for an employer, you have a routine, which is whatever time you have to be at work and whatever things you have to get done and whatever time you go home. Routines help us just do things even when we don’t feel like doing them. It might take you a little time to develop a routine, but I promise you it all gets easier once you do, create a routine.

And number seven reason I see people stay in crisis or consumption or quit on creation is that they are operating from scarcity. Scarcity is, “Oh no, I got to hurry and make a bunch of money,” or, “Don’t let anyone else know what you’re doing because they’ll steal your ideas,” or, “Oh my gosh, that person is so successful, and it’s not fair. I started before them. What’s the matter with me?” Scarcity shows up in so many ways. And when you’re operating in scarcity, at least too much of the time, you’re going to go back to consumption or crisis.

Thanks for joining me today, everyone. Have a beautiful rest of your day.

Oh wow, look at that. You made it to the end. Your time and attention is valuable, and I don’t take it lightly that you made it this far. In fact, it tells me you might be like me; insatiably curious about people and life and potential and connection. Maybe you have big dreams but a small budget and no time. You’re tired, but bored. You’re content, but dissatisfied. Sound familiar? Come to a free coaching call and see for yourself what’s possible: JodyMoore.com/freecoaching to register. That’s JodyMoore.com/freecoaching.