335. Good Feeling Power

I’m Jody Moore and this is Better Than Happy, episode 335: Good Feeling Power.

Did you know that you can live a life that’s even better than happy? My name is Jody Moore. I’m a master certified life coach and a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. And if you’re willing to go with me I can show you how. Let’s go.

Hello gang, what’s happening? I have a little bit of a rant I want to go on today. I have just some thoughts and really strong feelings about this topic, and so I’m going to just let myself kind of speak to it and hopefully it will make sense.

But before we get into that, I want to make sure that you have purchased a Be Bold annual pass for yourself and/or your favorite person for Christmas, because after Christmas that option goes away. You will get a year-long membership to Be Bold for whoever you buy this gift for. So you’re basically giving them the gift of confidence, less worry and overwhelm, being able to achieve their goals, being inspired, and motivated, and excited about their life again.

That’s the gift we’re giving when we give Be Bold. And we do it through all kinds of workshops, monthly workshops, live Zoom calls where they can come and get coached or get help. They can learn about various topics, tons of bonus content. A place to write in to get help. A private podcast feed where we replay everything for people that don’t want to come live, which is most people, to be honest, all kinds of stuff. And they’ll also get a free copy of my new book, Better Than Happy, with the annual pass.

So it’s a pretty awesome Christmas gift, I must say. And you can get it at jodymoore.com/gift.

Today I want to talk about good feeling power. I want to talk to you about the power that positive emotions have in our lives. And I’m hoping, I’ll just be totally upfront, I’m hoping to sell you on the importance of feeling good. I think that most people highly underestimate how powerful feeling good is. I think we all kind of want to feel good. I think we try to seek it out. But I don’t think we understand the magnitude of the impact that feeling good has on our lives, not only for us, but for anybody else we come into contact with.

The way that we have influence in other people’s lives means that the more we feel good, the more we impact others for good. So I want to offer to you that one of your most important priorities should be two things. Living into your higher self, being your highest best self as much of the time as you can and feeling good as much of the time as you can.

The reason there’s two things is because I was thinking about just trying to sell you on feeling good. But then I was realizing there’s a lot of ways we can feel good in the short term that maybe don’t align with the values that we have. So for example, we could all just take powerful drugs every day and feel good. And some people do that and they feel a lot better anyway when they’re on those drugs. We could just keep drugs in an IV circulating throughout our bodies and mask what’s really going on and live under this false feeling of feeling good.

And that’s not what I’m talking about. I don’t mean feel good at the expense of your overall lifestyle, and health, and value system, and being who you want to be. So that’s why I added the second part. You want to live into being your highest best self as much of the time as you can, which by the way, you don’t have to be perfect at any of these things. I don’t mean you have to be perfect at feeling good all the time. You don’t have to be perfect at being your highest self but those two things are the goal.

So I’m going to talk to you about different situations, but first let me tell you why this is so powerful. Because so many people I see are either feeling good at the expense of their highest self, like I just gave you an extreme example with drugs, but it doesn’t have to be drugs, it can be all kinds of things. It can be just not showing up for our goals in our life the way we want to.

Or we get a little hit of dopamine when we gossip about one another. We feel connected to someone, we feel good for a minute when we share a piece of gossip. But that’s also for most of us not really who we want to be. So feeling good as your highest self, when you do that your life becomes exponentially more amazing than you could possibly imagine. So, many people, like I said, are either feeling good at the expense of their highest self, or they’re trying to be their highest self, they think they’re living into being their highest self, but they’re sacrificing the part where they feel good.

Let me give an example, I coach a lot of parents. So I have a lot of times let’s just say a mother who is trying to be a good mother, and she’s trying to guide her kids towards what she thinks will serve them best. But those kids, darn them, still have agency and make their own choices. And so in the name of trying to be her highest best self, a lot of the times, it’s not uncommon for me to coach a mom that is really worried, or anxious, or upset with their child for the choices that their child is making.

So notice how we believe we’re living into our highest selves, it’s questionable whether or not we really are in that situation, but we’re trying to anyway. But we’re sacrificing our own feelings along the way. We’re feeling worried, anxious, judgmental, what have you. So the goal is to live into our highest self and feel good. That is your most important priority, my friend.

How do you do that, Jody? How do I guide my child? Let’s say my child is sleeping with her boyfriend, or on drugs, or has left the church, or whatever other number of things I coach on all the time. How do I be the kind of mom I want to be and not worry about my child? Now again, you don’t have to be perfect at this. I’m just being really upfront that I have not figured out how to be perfect at it, but it is available to you for a good percentage of the time.

Here’s how, you notice that the worry, and anxiety, and stress is optional. I promise you. I was just coaching an entrepreneur today in her business who was like, “I’m starting this new program, and it’s just so overwhelming, and it’s so hard, I forgot how hard it is, there’s so much drama.” And I was like, “Did you know that part’s optional, the drama?” It’s not like first you get a business license, and you find an accountant, and then you experience drama. No, the drama part is optional. You could just leave that behind, it’s not necessary.

Just like worrying, and being freaked out, and anxious about what our kids are going through is optional. Just like judging other people and feeling self-righteous, or we know what’s better, or whatever other kind of judgmental type negative emotions we’re bringing on. That part’s optional, it’s not required. It’s not even required in order for you to do the first part of this, which is live into your highest best self. It doesn’t make you a better mother because you’re worried about your kids.

I used to think this, I remember when I decided you know what I’m going to do? Is I’m just going to, as much as possible choose not to worry. I remember thinking, am I doing something wrong here? Am I not being a good mother? Am I just being naive and delusional? Am I just burying my head in the sand and not paying attention because it seems like maybe I should be worrying about this, maybe I should be anxious, maybe I should be nervous.

So I’ve examined all of that, and I would encourage you to do the same. You get to decide what you want to believe. This is just what I believe. But I have found zero upside to worrying. I have found that it does not make me a better mother. It does not help me find more creative ways to teach, and support, and guide my children. It does not help me be more consistent at holding them accountable to what I expect. It does not make me better at loving them. It does not give me a feeling of faith and connection with God. It does the opposite of all of those things.

Being the best mother I can be happens when I’m feeling peaceful, and calm, and confident, and loving, and open, and curious with my children, no matter what they’re doing, or not doing. So I coached someone this week who said, “Well, my daughter has left the church. And she has a baby and lives with the baby, and the baby’s father, and they’re not married. And I’m just worried about this.” And I said, “Okay, but you realize that part’s optional, right?”

So after a lot of coaching, which I won’t go into all the details of. But where her brain keeps going is, if we follow the prophet, there’s safety in that. And what I pointed out to her is that the advice to follow the prophet is advice given to each of us that’s meant for us to apply to ourselves individually. It’s not meant for us to try to control our children. Now, I’m all for you teaching your children. I said, “Have you taught your daughter what you believe is the best way for her to live? And what you believe about following the prophet, and what the prophet teaches about this subject?”

Of course she has. She’s done her job. The next part where we worry and freak out is us not following the prophet. Because I’m pretty sure the prophet, I’ve never heard any of the prophets anyway ever say, “Make sure you panic, and get anxious, and really upset, and stay up late worrying about your child.” I’ve only heard them say, “Love them unconditionally. Have faith.”

The atonement of Jesus Christ covers everything. Fear not. Draw close to the Lord. Love those children. Be an example of Christ like love. Show them why there’s no need to fear. If you have a true testimony of the eternal nature of God’s plan, there is nothing to fear. The atonement covers everything, it’s a safety net.

So again, I’m not saying you have to be perfect at this. I’m just saying the worry, the anxiety, the negative emotions, not useful, not necessary. When we clean all of that up, we operate at our very best. We operate the most like our heavenly parents and like our savior. When we choose love instead of fear we find the most amazing creative resources and ideas. We attract the right people into our lives to help us with whatever we’re working on. That’s when the miracles happen. Faith proceeds the miracle, not anxiety and fear proceed the miracle, no, faith proceeds the miracle.

So listen, we live in a world where people are offering us thoughts to think, and stories, and ideas all the time, all the time. Everywhere we’re being bombarded with everybody’s opinions. I love our world. I’m not trying to demonize it, I’m just saying people are offering you things to think. What are you going to take? Just because someone offers it to you doesn’t mean you have to take it.

So again, you don’t have to be perfect at this. I still have to wrestle with it at times. Sometimes I get a story or a thought in my brain about some future thing that I’m worried about, maybe it’s about my kids, maybe it’s just about the world in general, maybe it’s about our country, maybe it’s about the pandemic, you name it. I can definitely find things and people everywhere are trying to offer me things to worry about. And my brain tries to entertain them at times.

But here’s what I know. Feeling good as I’m living into my highest self is my most important priority. It makes me a better mother, a better wife, a better coach. It makes my life better. It makes me serve I a more effective way the people that I want to serve. It makes me more generous, more able to contribute. It is my most important job, and it’s my job. It’s nobody else’s job.

So when I get offered a story, or my brain comes up with a story, or finds a story about something that it wants to worry about, I just be fascinated by it for a moment, a moment might be a day or so. And then I notice how I’m feeling when I think about that story. And I genuinely believe that if I feel negative when I think that story, then it’s not true. That’s just what I choose to believe. I’m not telling you, you have to believe that. It’s just what I choose to believe.

If I have this story about the future, this thing might go wrong, or we might all die, or my kid might struggle, or whatever. And I feel negative when I think it, then I just go, “No, not true.” I mean, here’s the thing. I know it’s true that any of these things could happen. That’s not saying, again, I’m not suggesting we bury our heads in the sand. I’m just saying it’s just a story. And I am pretty good at this point because I’ve been doing this for so many years. I’m pretty good at finding an equally true in my mind story that feels a lot better.

And really my faith and my membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and my connection and relationship with the savior, helps me to do that. Because I always have these default thoughts I can go to, which is the Lord’s in charge. We’re all going to be fine. This is God’s plan. The atonement covers everything.

And so all I need to do is just keep loving and trusting, and choosing happiness, choosing peace. That’s it, that’s my job. I’m going to do my job. And I’m going to teach my kids. And I’m going to hold them accountable to things. And I’m going to try to be the best mom I can be, but not with fear, and worry, and anxiety, with peace, and love, and faith. That is my most important job.

And if something was going to go terribly wrong that I needed to know about. I will know about it. And if there is a problem down the road for me, or one of my family members, or something, then we will know what we’re up against and we will have all the pieces of the puzzle we’re trying to solve so we’ll be able to solve it. We’ll be able to figure out what happens next.

Think about the pandemic. I was thinking about this. I was thinking about how kind of amazing human beings are and how many brilliant people there are in our world that have helped us adapt to what’s going on and figure out how to navigate it, to where wearing a face mask is just a normal part of my kids’ lives. They just know that’s just what we do.

And if somebody would have told me two and a half years ago, “Hey, at one point your kids are going to be wearing a face mask to school every day for a good year or two. And we’re all going to wear face masks every time we get on an airplane. And we’re going to be getting COVID tested all the time. And we’re going to be – there’s going to be a pandemic and it’s going to affect the global supply chain, and our economies, and a lot of people are going to die.” If somebody would have described this to me two and a half years ago, I would have been freaked out.

There are still a lot of challenges. I’m not trying to minimize the challenges that COVID has provided for a lot of people, and the loss, and the grief and all of that. I’m not saying that any of that’s not real. I’m just saying, on the greater whole, we’ve figured out, okay, we need to wear a face mask to school. Or however it is that you choose to navigate COVID. Some people choose, it’s not a big deal if I get sick, I’ll be fine. Whatever it is that you choose, this is not meant to be a COVID agenda episode. I’m just saying, we figured out how to navigate it.

And even if it means, heaven forbid, that we’ve lost a loved one, then we’ve figured out how to grieve that, and how to move through that process, or we’re in the process of figuring that out. And we just adapt and we figure it out. And overall, we’re okay, we’re always going to be okay.

So once we get there, the problem itself is never as scary as the problem that our brains dream up. And so I do believe that feeling as good as I can on a day-to-day basis is my job. It’s what I want to bring into the world. I want to offer peace and love and I do. I’m not worried about the future. I’m not worried about my kids even, other than in small moments when my brain brings it online and then I just go, “No, not true.”

Feeling good is your most important job as long as you’re doing it while also living into your highest self. It is the most important work you can do. Think about it, you’re a better parent, you’re better at your job, you’re better at your church calling. You’re a better neighbor, you’re a better friend, you’re a better sister, you’re a better cousin, you’re a better wife. You’re better at anything you want to do when you feel good. You are better at pursuing your goals, you’re able to be more generous, you’re able to be more forgiving, you’re able to stop judging.

All bad behavior comes from some version of fear, period. That’s what the research shows, that’s what the experts teach. Hurt people, hurt people. Which means that well people, happy people, healthy people, help people, that’s it. Not to mention, it’s a lot more fun. It’s a much more fun way to live your life. And I do believe that emotions are something that we all borrow from one another, just like we all borrow thoughts from one another.

And if you want to feel good, you’re welcome to come and hang out with me because a good portion of the time I’m pretty good at feeling good about any topic. In fact, that’s one of the things that’s so powerful about coaching is I give people permission to feel good about things, and we do it in a way that’s believable. We’re not just chanting affirmations. We have to find stories to redirect the brain to that are believable. But I give people permission to feel good no matter what the circumstance and everybody borrows from that.

So if you don’t have a coach, you know how I feel about that. You should for sure get one to help you to feel good because it’s your most important job, please don’t neglect that job.

Alright everybody, thanks for joining me today. I hope you have a beautiful rest of your week, and I’ll see you next time. Bye bye

Hey there, if you enjoy this podcast or even if you just find that it sort of piques your curiosity, or it makes you think, you’re going to love the book that I wrote. It’s called Better Than Happy: Connecting with Divinity Through Conscious Thinking. And it’s available now at Amazon in print or kindle version. Or if you want me to read it to you, head over to audible and grab the audio version. And why not grab a copy for your sister, your best friend, or your mom while you’re there too. Just saying.