445. Becoming Empowered

Welcome to episode 445, Becoming Empowered. As a coach sometimes I get to help people better, but always my goal is to help people become empowered. Empowerment is truly what serves us best. Sometimes we want or need to feel bad for various reasons. But if we’re disempowered then we feel stuck in feeling bad and we are afraid of the life we are meant to live. In today’s episode I’m breaking down the four stages I see people go through on their journey to empowerment. Let’s do this.

Welcome to Better Than Happy. I’m Jody Moore and I’ll be your coach today.

Okay, you guys, I am very excited to be here talking to you about this topic today. I’ve got to tell you, this is an episode I’ve been wanting to record for six or seven months. And I don’t know if I thought I was saving it for a special time or I don’t know what I was thinking. But I’ve had this page of notes, of information I wanted to share with you. And I keep putting it off, putting it off and finally I was like, “Oh, my gosh, I’ve got to do that episode.” And I guess, the reason I’m telling you that is because I wish I would have recorded it earlier.

I wish I would have just not waited for the perfect time and the perfect way to utilize it and just recorded it when the inspiration came to me. So I want to encourage those of you who do anything like what I’m doing, maybe you’re an author, maybe you have a podcast of your own or maybe just in the teaching that you do in whatever form you do it in your life. You get ideas and you think, I’m going to save that because it’s so good. I’m going to save it for the perfect time. I don’t think that’s useful. I think that the inspiration sort of leaves us and it just isn’t as powerful.

So luckily I wrote down a whole bunch of notes. So I think I’m still going to be able to do this episode justice. But I just want to be transparent with you that I had so much fire around it when the idea first came to me and I’m still excited about it, but I just feel nervous that I’m not going to do it justice. Anyway, that said, empowered. That’s the word I chose to use as I went to name the episode because ultimately, empowerment is the best gift that I, as a coach, can give to my clients.

If they are empowered, then my job is done. And they don’t always leave empowered. Sometimes it takes some time, so that’s okay, but I’m constantly playing with in my head, what gets in our way of being empowered, what prevents us? And how, as a coach, can I do a better job of illustrating that to people? And when it came to me in this way, to put it into stages, I felt really excited about it because I know most of us do well with some kind of order and structure around these concepts that otherwise feel really ambiguous and vague.

And I think that having some stages identified, helps us become more aware of where we are and therefore become more aware of what we might need to progress. So my hesitation is always that I don’t want to take what are complicated subjects and oversimplify them, first of all. And second of all, I don’t want you to use what I’m about to give you to feel bad and judge yourself.

And both of those are potential dangers when we take something like this and put it into a model or a linear process because as human beings we are not actually, very few things I should say, just happen in a natural linear form. Usually we’re kind of messy and organic and coming in and out. So I’m just prefacing it with that. Please don’t think that there aren’t exceptions to this or that it’s always happening in a linear form, stage one through four. I think that all of us move in and out of these stages.

And please don’t use this information to create limiting beliefs for yourself because that’s not my intention with it. So you’re probably like, “What are you talking about?” Let me get into the content and let’s see if we can make this more real and tangible for you.

So what I’ve noticed is that there are people who are walking around at times feeling often negative, and maybe it looks like sadness. Maybe it looks like despair. Maybe it looks like dissatisfaction. Maybe it looks like frustration. Maybe it’s resentment. Maybe it’s worry. Maybe it’s overwhelm. Maybe it’s a self-loathing. And I don’t mean that they necessarily feel like that all the time, but there are people walking around feeling that way and thinking that the cause is something external.

And what I mean by external is it might be literally outside of them, something that someone else has said or done or something that someone has not done. Or it might be about something that they have created, words that they said or something that they didn’t do. And we might say, “Well, how is that external, Jody? That’s internal.” But what I mean is it’s an external result. It’s already happened. It’s in the past. The past is external now except for how we think about it.

So for example, let me just use some real life examples from my own life. So today I actually was this person, because by the way, these people I label as humans, in other words all of us. Some people more often than others, but every single one of us without trying, is born into the ability to feel this stage and some pick it up very early on. Most of us do at a very young age some maybe a little bit later and some are more prone to it than others.

But every single human being on planet Earth does this from time to time, including me. So just today I have this trip coming up and we’re supposed to register all the guests’ names and get transportation arranged. And there’s a problem with the way I’ve ordered the package online, that I need to be able to put one of my guest’s names in and the system won’t let me. And I won’t worry you with all the details.

I’ll just say that I’ve been trying multiple times every day this week to get this fixed by using the channels that the company has provided to me. They say, “Send a request here if you need any help.” I have sent a request multiple times, can’t get anyone to respond. I get an auto responder saying, “We’ve received your request.” But I can’t get any help beyond that. They don’t have a phone number so I don’t know how to call but they have an online chat which I have to log into multiple times a day because mostly it says no one’s available.

And then when I have finally gotten hold of someone, they have told me that they would take steps to take care of it, that then never happen. So this is day five of me trying to solve this problem. And finally I just got pissed. I was like, “This is insane. I have paid so much money to you for this package and I’ve done everything you’ve asked me to do and I cannot get anyone to help.” And I’m starting to want to post stuff online. And I’m like, “What do I do? Do I threaten them? Do I just get really pissed?” And this is all in a chat, online chat, because that’s the only way I can actually get a live interaction with anyone.

So I think that the reason I’m so frustrated and upset is because these people are not taking care of me the way that I think that they should. This is called emotional immaturity. Every single one of us moves in and out of it from time to time. I don’t like the way I feel when I’m in that state. I don’t love myself. I’m not my best self when I am making threats to people. I mean not significant threats, I am not really like that, but making threats like, “This is insane. If you don’t take care of this right now.”

What was the threat I made? I’m going to make sure and let people know not to book with your agency in the future. They probably don’t really care. I don’t know. But anyway, that’s the extent of my threats. But still, I’m feeling desperate to get the help that I need. And so I move into emotional immaturity because I believe that these people not taking care of me is the problem. And here’s the thing, I could tell this story, and I have, to a couple of people. I’m telling it to all of you now, and you’re probably listening going, “That’s true. I mean, they should respond.”

I’m talking between the group that I’m going on this trip with, that we’ve spent over $12,000 with them. So now does that make you think they should reply and help you? I don’t know. Anyway, my point is, I’m in the state of emotional immaturity where I’m completely disempowered. That’s why I start making threats. That’s why I start acting like not my highest self. That’s why I start being cruel and mean because I’m feeling disempowered.

People who are violent or are using hate rhetoric or language etc., using fear tactics, using intimidation, are in a state of disempowerment. And they are trying to get what they want or need. Now, it doesn’t always have to turn that ugly. Sometimes we just feel sorry for ourselves. Sometimes we mope about, sometimes we just complain extra. And all of this is coming not from being sad, not from feeling bad. I want to be clear. I think that feeling bad is a beautiful part of the human experience at times.

But when I feel bad and I think it’s because of something outside of me, either something that I’ve done in my past or something that’s happening in the world outside of me, then I’m disempowered. And that’s when we get to be not our best selves. And it feels awful and it feels desperate. I’m constantly checking my email for, have they helped me yet? Have they solved this problem yet? So that’s phase one. And again, we all will move in and out of it. Some people hang out there a lot longer than others. Maybe you can relate to phase one.

Alright, well, what happens next? What happens next is what I’m calling awareness. We move into awareness and there can be any number of things that puts us into awareness. Usually it’s somebody offering us some good advice and that might come in the form of, for me, a lot of it came when I found coaching and started learning from other thought leaders and coaches. But also I got some of it from growing up with parents who taught me some great things. My religion taught me some really useful things.

Sometimes I see a quote or hear a line in a song or read something in a book. The more knowledge we get about how human beings actually are wired and what creates the experience we’re having and how to leverage ourselves in order to create more of the experience we want. The more empowered we become because we become more aware. So let me tell you how this relates because I think it’s easy to see when we’re feeling good and happy.

But what about when you’re feeling bad, how do you still move through empowerment? So I’m just going to coach myself, I guess as I record this podcast. I hadn’t intended to, but that’s what’s coming up for me right now because this experience is so fresh and still unresolved. I still haven’t gotten it fixed.

So if I can recognize that, listen, the only reason I’m frustrated and angry and upset is not because people haven’t taken care of me the way that I think they have. It’s not because the ticket issue isn’t resolved yet. It’s because of the story I’m telling myself. It’s because of what I’m thinking and  believing. That’s it. Now, what am I thinking and believing? I’m thinking and believing that these people should take care of me, that I’ve spent a lot of money and so they should be more responsive, that this isn’t a great way to do business.

And behind all of that is this fear that I’m going to get to my trip and something’s going to go wrong. I’m not going to be able to have the enjoyable experience that I’m planning to have. That they’re not going to let one of us in or we’re not going to have transportation from the airport or whatever, that something’s going to go wrong. There’s going to be a problem and a crisis and we’re not going to be able to solve it there. And then we’re going to end up, I don’t know, with a problem or some kind of danger or something.

That’s what’s really going on. Not to mention as the one who sort of booked this trip with my friends, I’m sort of viewing myself as the one responsible for making sure everything’s set up. So I think there is also a little bit of pride getting in the way of, I don’t want people to think that I didn’t do a good job of planning and setting up this trip. And if something goes wrong, I’m going to look irresponsible or I don’t know. That’s all I can think is really going on.

I definitely know the part about fear, that we’re going to get there and they’re not going to let somebody in and whatever is on the top of my mind. So thinking that, and by the way, that’s not a crazy story to think. Just like whatever thoughts and beliefs and stories you’re thinking aren’t crazy, they’re logical, they’re justifiable. Some of you are like, “Well, yeah, that is a possibility.” In fact, it says right on the webpage, you must have every guest registered or we will not let them in. We all have valid reasons for what we’re thinking and believing.

But thinking about that is the reason I’m upset. So awareness comes with some kind of applied effort, usually meaning, I’ve got to go in and take a look at what I’m thinking. And this is the second stage of empowerment. It’s a little bit more empowering to notice that what I’m thinking and believing is creating the real problem than it is to think that it’s something outside of me. And in fact, maybe some of you who listen to this podcast can relate to this.

When you first learned this, for me anyway, it felt like something I was like, “Oh, yeah, duh. I think I knew that.” But it wasn’t until someone really laid it out in black and white like that for me that I realized that’s always true, because I think I thought that was sometimes true. But sometimes there are outside things making me mad. You know what I’m saying? And when somebody showed me, no, it’s always true, then suddenly there are a couple of areas of your life that you can apply it to really quickly and easily.

And you experience this surge of empowerment that is so awesome that you want more. So I know some of you who listen to this podcast have experienced that. Some of you guys write me the most lovely messages and you tell me that and you leave beautiful reviews and I appreciate that. Please keep doing it. I love getting your messages and I love reading your reviews. But at any rate, you can listen to a podcast or you can, whether it’s me or it’s some other teacher teaching some version of this. You can read books.

You can get some good stuff on social media if you’re curating what you’re getting there. And you can get some immediate relief and happiness. And when you realize that you created it yourself, you become empowered. So I love this stage, awareness. For most people, it feels really good. Even as I talk about right now, the situation where I’m still upset and frustrated and I haven’t got a resolution to my problem.

Reminding myself that the story I’m telling myself, that this is going to be a crisis and it needs to be solved and then turning that into judging this organization or these people as doing it wrong is not serving me. And it’s all of that thinking that’s the only problem here. We don’t actually have a problem. I’m not at an event with my friends trying to check in and they’re telling us no, that hasn’t happened and it might not happen. For all I know, we could get there and go to check in and explain what happened and then they’ll fix it right then and we check in.

And all the angst that I had all week was pointless. That’s very possible, it’s possible. So I automatically feel a little bit more empowered, just remembering that.

Today’s episode is brought to you by the Better Than Happy Masterclass. If you haven’t made it to my masterclass yet, get a move on. You can join the January 30^th or February 15^th class, but after that, it’ll be gone. What happens in the masterclass? I’m glad you asked. Think of it like snowboarding, but there’s no snow or gear or falling down. But think of it like snowboarding in that listening to this podcast is like listening to an audiobook about how to snowboard.

But coming to a masterclass is the equivalent of strapping a snowboard on and going up the mountain with me. In other words, you’ll get a much deeper understanding of how to live a life that’s better than happy. Head to jodymoore.com/masterclass and grab your spot. That’s jodymoore.com/masterclass. I’ll see you there.

Okay, now I want to talk next about stage three because I see this happen so often and maybe you’ll never experience it, but if you do, I just want to prepare you. Phase three is what I call a misuse of tools. And here’s what I mean by that. So we go from thinking, the people outside me are the problem. They’re the reason I’m mad, frustrated, sad, upset, worried, etc., to, okay, I’m the one making myself mad, frustrated, sad, upset, etc.

And then instead of being upset with them and judging them, then I start judging me. And it might be outright judgment, where you’re telling yourself what’s the matter with you? You shouldn’t be thinking this. And I do think for me, phase three, I tend to be pretty good at not falling into now that I’ve been doing this for 10 years, more than 10 years, but it’s taken me that long. So don’t feel bad if you still fall into it.

But in phase three, again, it might sound like outright, what’s the matter with me? Why am I thinking this? Or it might sound a little different in your head, but it’s still a rejection of your current thoughts. Sometimes it’s just a quick, okay, I don’t want to think that, what should I think instead? It’s a quick, I don’t like this. I realize I’m creating it. How do I get to the new place?

So sometimes you guys message me and you’re like, “What’s a better thought to think about this?” I’m like, “Whoa, slow down. Why are we in such a rush?” Because the truth is, even though we’re now more aware that we’re creating our current problem, sometimes rushing to change it, doesn’t work. If it does work great, I’m in. But many times it doesn’t because your brain, like I said, has a valid reason for what it’s thinking and believing. Your thoughts aren’t wrong.

I hear this a lot on coaching calls, people come on and they go, “I know you teach this or you say to think about things this way.” And I’m like, “What are you talking about? You should think about things however it works best for you.” I don’t know the right way to think about anything. I know what’s right for me. I choose what’s right for me, but I don’t know what’s right for you. And so sometimes I’ll coach one client one way and I’ll coach another client, the totally opposite way.

What I mean by that is, sometimes I get people who are other entrepreneurs, especially coaches, who want coaching on their business. And one of the areas that I coach on a lot is niche. How do I know what my niche should be? And there’ll be one client who I’m coaching in a direction where I’m trying to help them get really more specific and clear on their niche and have something that’s really narrow and fine tune.

And then there’ll be another client right after that I’m coaching in the direction of like, why do we care? Why don’t you just go help people? Why don’t you stop trying to define your niche and have a narrow focus? And the reason why I know which direction to try out, sometimes I try stuff out and if I can tell it’s not empowering you, then we’ll go a totally different direction.

But the reason I know which direction to go is because I’m always going in the opposite of the direction you brought me because I know that’s the problem. So I don’t know if this is making sense. For those of you in The Lab, it’s probably making more sense than to others, but my point is, you can take these tools and you can use them to tell yourself that you should think something. I should behave this way. I shouldn’t behave that way.

I see people do this with coaching tools just as much as they do it with religion or any other kind of self-help or psychology or good advice about nutrition and health. You take some good advice. I’ve been listening to Huberman a lot lately, the Huberman Lab. And he’s a scientist, so he knows the science behind all this. He’s a neuroscientist, and I love listening to the neuroscience behind it all.

And he’ll explain how the brain works this way. And there’s a part of the brain that does this thing and releases this kind of a chemical and that you can access this kind of motivation or that. It’s so fascinating, but it’s easy to go, “Okay, so I should be doing this and I shouldn’t be doing that. And I should eat this way and I shouldn’t eat that way.” And you start shoulding yourself. And that is what I am calling a misuse of tools.

Again, you can do it with religion. You can use religion to judge yourself and to feel bad and to feel like you’re not measuring up and you’re not good enough or you can use religion to be inspired and empowered. You can use coaching in the same way.

So if you find yourself in stage three ever of misusing tools, using them to judge yourself, to keep yourself stuck or to think, I’ve got to get to feeling really good before I can work on my goal. Then what I recommend is that you come into The Lab because that’s a phase that’s tough to get out of because most people don’t know they’re in it. They think that they are coaching themselves. They think that they’re being most aware and they’re taking accountability, but accountability is not the same as empowerment.

So I think you should join me in The Lab where we can help you on this. If you don’t like my style, there’s lots of other great teachers and coaches or therapists out there, but typically it requires a little bit of third party help. And I don’t even mean that it has to be you getting help, but you’ve got to have massive exposure to the coaching tools. That’s why what we do in The Lab works so well because you listen to it over and over again, you’ll apply it to your real life, I promise.

I coached a woman last week on her niche and it really wasn’t about niche because it never is, by the way, about the actual subject. What it was about was indecision and fear of commitment. So you don’t have to have a business and look at be trying to choose a niche. You don’t even have to know what the word niche means to get a lot out of realizing, I see what she’s doing there with indecision and fear of commitment. I think I’m doing that same thing in this other area of my life. Okay, so that’s phase three.

Now, what is phase four? Oh, my gosh. I love phase four so much when I’m able to get there, which I am sometimes, I don’t always stay there. So phase four is what I’m just going to go ahead and call better than happy. That is what we’re all striving for. So in phase four, we feel happy and joyful a lot of the time, and we also feel negative emotions a lot of the time. And when we are in phase four, we rather than use it against ourselves and judge ourselves and in a hurry to get out of it. We’re just simply fascinated by it. We’re just simply curious.

We’re like, “I see what I’m doing there. That’s interesting.” That’s where I’m working on getting to right now out of phase one, which, by the way, thanks for being my audience. You’re indirectly coaching me as I talk through this. I don’t think I want to be mad at these people. I think I’m more aware now after talking it out loud that I’m actually just afraid that something’s going to go wrong on my trip. And I think that’s fascinating. That’s interesting.

So in phase four, we’re just fascinated and curious and interested. And I’m not going to try to hurry and coach myself out of it, although as soon as I become aware, I’ll tell you there are other thoughts that start to surface that are attempting to entertain, it’ll probably be fine. One way or another we’ll work it out. I still have, I don’t know, five days before I leave on my trip. So a lot can happen in five days, and even if it doesn’t happen by the time we get there, when we get there, we’ll figure it out.

I’m a smart person and I’m traveling with a bunch of other smart women. We’re certainly capable of figuring this out. There’s so many other thoughts that are pretty available to me that I could go to. Another one that might be useful for me to consider is, who do I want to be? This is one of those situations when even if in my mind I can’t get to, they haven’t done anything wrong. I’m not really ready for that. I’m still in the phase of they should do better, which is just a thought, but it’s just still where I’m at.

But I could also answer that thought with, that’s okay, though, I’ll do better. I want to be the person in this situation that handles it with grace. And that doesn’t mean that I’m people pleasing and that I’m not speaking up for what I want or any of that. I’m just talking, how do I handle myself in this situation, and what do I want to bring to it? So that might be worth entertaining.

But I’ll tell you there are other situations when those thoughts right now feel true to me and they feel good, but I might slip back, what if this doesn’t get resolved before we leave? I’ll probably go back into this negative spin and I’ll just be curious about it. I’ll go, “Look at me having a little freak out. Look at me having a little tantrum.” Alright, it’s okay, you can do that, Jody Moore, you do that sometimes and it’s alright. And I love you anyway. Go ahead and make yourself upset. Notice I’m trying to stay empowered.

Go ahead and make yourself upset. It’s alright, I got you. And that is empowerment, you guys. So in this phase, let me describe, again I’m giving you my personal example, just because it’s really real for me right now, but this is going to apply in all different ways. Sometimes it’s just being able to feel feelings, and when you get to stage four, better than happy, you’re able to handle negative emotion. You don’t have to hurry and run away from it because you know what to do with it. You know how to feel feelings.

You’re not afraid of feelings. You don’t use them to believe that you’re doing something wrong and you don’t have to escape them. You become what many experts and thought leaders before me have called the watcher of your thoughts. I think that originated with Eckhart Tolle or Tolle. I’ve heard his name pronounced both ways, so I’m not sure. But he calls it moving into the watcher phase, where you watch your thoughts.

So your thoughts don’t impact you as much. You don’t feel the effect of the emotions created by them as significantly because you’re just kind of watching them like, look at that thought I’m thinking. That’s interesting. That’s fascinating. That’s curious. I still have that one or I really believe that one. Do you see what I mean? You don’t have to get rid of them, but you’re also not just letting them drive you and create who you are. In this better than happy phase, you can create goals without attachment. You can be highly committed to your goals.

This is something I learned recently in a course I did where the teacher said, “You can be committed to your goals without being attached to your goals.” I was like, “Ooh, what does that mean?” Here’s what it means to me. I’m going all in on this goal. I’m going to show up for it. It’s important. It matters. And if I don’t achieve it, it doesn’t matter at all. And even when I do achieve it, it doesn’t make me a better person.

But the process of committing and going all in and trying and learning and growing and meeting people etc., is valuable enough that I want to go all in. And achieving the goal would be fun and not achieving it will be disappointing but I’m not overly attached to the extent that it’s going to crush me if I don’t. Which also means when I do hit it, I don’t need to be jumping around for joy. If I’m doing either of those things, I’m overly attached to my goal.

Boundaries are an important part of this better than happy phase. So it becomes, I know I’m the one creating my own experience and also I have boundaries to make it as easy as possible for me to be the person I want to be. Because there’s no reason to make it harder than it needs to be. In this better than happy phase, we get a lot better at connecting with other people. And I don’t just mean the people that you like, I mean all people.

You become much more open to people who are different than you. You become much more curious and fascinated with other people because you’ve already learned how to become curious and fascinated with yourself. And I always say. judgment is the fog that we live in where we’re judging others and we’re judging ourselves. When you come out of the fog into curiosity and fascination, up above the fog where there’s sunny skies, you’re curious and fascinated about yourself, also about others, which allows you then to connect.

Connection requires vulnerability. So if I’m not able to be fascinated and curious about myself, then I’m not going to be comfortable being vulnerable. And it also requires, again, a lack of judgment for others as much as possible. In this phase, this better than happy phase, I feel like we develop true confidence. And to me, true confidence is your relationship with yourself is healthy. True confidence is, I like me and I notice that I do a lot of dumb things or think a lot of things that don’t serve me or whatever, and it’s okay.

Just like anybody else in my life who I love, take any one of my kids. I love them and I respect them and I like them. And sometimes I don’t understand why they do or think or say what they do. And I can see ways that I think they could be better. It doesn’t change how much I love them. That’s what true confidence is, is here I am, here’s where I’m at right now. Here’s what I’m good at right now. And also I know there’s a lot of things I’m not good at and it’s okay. It doesn’t make me less lovable. And so I don’t have to hide it all the time.

But also I’m going to evolve and grow it and there’ll be new things I’ll be good at and then there’ll be new things still that I’m not good at. So that’s true confidence for me. And that happens in this better than happy phase. Decisions, this is one I’ve been coaching on a lot lately. I kind of mentioned it earlier, but you’re able to make more decisions in this phase because you’re empowered. You realize that the decision itself isn’t going to make or break my experience. I’m going to be the one to create my experience.

So you get out of indecision, much faster because you recognize it’s not, again, what niche you choose. It’s not what diet you choose to go on. It’s not whether or not you choose to move to a new town. It’s not anything outside of you. It’s always going to be you ultimately creating your result. So the decision, not that we don’t take into account, again, which decision will make it the easiest for me to create the result I want, but you stop looking for the perfect thing, the right thing. You just look for the good enough, what seems to be the easiest thing and you move forward.

In this better than happy phase, I feel like I receive a lot more inspiration. And inspiration is kind of a lofty word. Sometimes when it comes to creating content here for this business I literally am trying to be inspired. But let’s take what I brought up earlier, this problem of getting my trip situated. Inspiration might come in the form of ideas, of things that I could try or ways I could get a hold of someone or possibilities for solving this problem that I haven’t tried.

Instead of continuing to go down the same path and pound on the same door without getting any help. I might be able to come up with some more creative options of how to try to solve my problem once I move out of the number one, disempowered, emotionally immature human phase and into a more better than happy phase.

Another thing that happens in this phase is you become more comfortable living in the space of unanswered questions. This is something I’m really challenging myself. And I noticed that over the 10 years I’ve been really immersed in my work as a coach, I’ve gotten much better at it, but I think I still have a long way to go of being comfortable living in the space of unanswered questions. In other words, can I ask myself really powerful questions?

Can I set really big, extraordinary goals for myself and get excited about them and commit to them, even though I have no idea how to achieve them? I’ll tell you what, that in the past I haven’t wanted to do that. I’ve set goals, but I’d like to set ones that I can see what I think the path might be. Even though sometimes I’m wrong, the path changes, a lot of the goals I set are goals that I’m like, “I’m pretty sure we could do this.” I’ll set it just outside my comfort zone. But what I’m talking about here is, can you set it way outside your comfort zone?

I’m setting goals now that I don’t even know where to begin. I’m telling you, it’s still really uncomfortable for me. But I’m just allowing it and I’m practicing getting more comfortable with the unanswered questions. I wish I could remember where I heard this, but somebody was talking about working with a shaman or someone. And they asked him a question and he said, “I won’t know the answer until I know.” That’s so good. Instead of being like, “But what is it? I’ve got to figure it out. Let me ask someone else.” Just be like, “The answer will come to me, but I won’t know until it does.”

And I’m not saying you don’t go try things and you don’t look for answers or have discussions, but not from a hustly place of, I’ve got to figure this out right now in order to believe in myself. Just from, I wonder where the answer is going to come from, a curious seeking instead of an urgent needing to know. See what I’m saying in this better than happy phase?

The last thing I want to say that I feel happens in this phase and I’m sure there are a whole bunch I’ve left out, I apologize. But the last thing I’ve noticed in this phase is that you become comfortable with two seemingly opposing ideas being true.

There is a podcast that came out a couple of weeks ago with Ben Schilaty that was called Love Like Jesus. Ben is an LGBTQ member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. And he did such a beautiful job of describing that in his life two things are true. One is that he has a strong testimony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which includes things like no same sex marriage and the law of chastity. And just a lot of doctrines that are sort of in opposition to a homosexual orientation, gay orientation.

And at the same time, he’s a gay man. And so both of those things are true and people get upset with him on both sides saying, “Why don’t you come to this side?” And the other one’s, “Why don’t you come to this side?” And he just has learned to live in that space. I’m not saying it’s a comfortable space or an easy space all the time, don’t get me wrong. But there is also kind of something really empowering about living in the tension of those two spaces. And noticing that I don’t have to know the answers and I don’t have to reconcile it either has to be this or that.

I can let both things be true and navigate life day-by-day and navigate situations as they come. So that’s what we’ve got, folks. Stage one, let me just recap them, of becoming empowered is emotional immaturity. All humans go through it from time to time, some live there a lot of the time. Stage two is awareness. This is a pretty cool stage. It feels actually really good. It feels really empowering because it’s like a relief from being in phase one so much of the time.

Many people move from phase two into phase three, which is a misuse of the tools. Now they start judging themselves or thinking that there is a right and wrong way to be or think or feel and that stage is definitely optional, but you might find yourself there from time to time. I recommend you get more exposure to coaching or whatever is the self-help tool of your choice if you’re in that phase. And then phase four is better than happy. So listen, that’s what we’re doing here. We’re trying to live in phase four as much of the time as possible and I’m here to help you do it.

So I forgot to announce this at the beginning, but this is exciting news. If you have a question for me, we have a brand new podcast hotline. So I want to invite you to call in and leave me a message and we’re going to play some of those questions here on the podcast. And I want to be able to speak to them directly. I’m trying to figure out how do I make this podcast more of a two way conversation so that it lands a little bit better for you. And this hotline is one way we’re doing that.

So the phone number is 888 Hi Jody M. So that’s 888 H-I-J-O-D-Y-M as in Moore or 888 445 6396 if you prefer old school numbers. But 888 Hi Jody M. Please call, leave me your question. I would love to address it. Thank you for joining me here on the podcast. Have a beautiful rest of your week.

If you find the podcast to be helpful you’re going to love The Lab. In Better Than Happy: The Lab we experiment with applying all of it in your real life. Whether you’re in the middle of a challenge and ready for some relief or you’re ready to commit to pursuing your dream goals and making them a reality, come join me in the lab at jodymoore.com/thelab. That’s jodymoore.com/thelab.