How’s your word working for you?

Pressing Pause Episode 102 How’s your word working for you?

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Welcome to Pressing Pause, I’m your host, Gabrielle Treanor, a coach, writer, introvert and sensitive soul with an inclination to ponder over the stuff of life. Join me as I explore how we can create, find and feel more calm, ease and joy in our daily lives.

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Before we get going I wanted to remind you that if you’re listening when this episode is first released then your chance to join The Calm Mind Club ends tomorrow, Thursday 30 June! This is the absolute final time the doors will be open for new members, after tomorrow that’s it, doors closed forever.

So, this is your opportunity to get six months of support to feel calmer, more confident and in control and happier. There is an incredible wealth of invaluable resources from experts sharing their knowledge and experience, to practical tools to deal with things like people-pleasing, boundaries, saying no without the guilt, comparison, resilience, dealing with change, to direct support from me through Q&As plus so much more.

Plus there are special offers only available to The Calm Mind Club members on my courses and coaching, as well as the bonus you get when you join of a one to one with me! Everything in the Club is available to you the moment you join, you don’t have to wait for anything and you can access it all on your phone, your tablet, wherever you like at whatever time you like.

The Calm Mind Club has been described by its members as Netflix of the mind, as the best decision they ever made, like a gorgeous box of chocolates that calm and soothe, and a positive and healing go-to.

So, if you would like six months of support to feel calmer, happier and more in charge of your own life, go to thecalmmindclub.com now and join before the doors close forever on 30 June.

Now, on with the episode!

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Welcome to episode 102. Did you choose a guiding word for the year at the start of 2022? No worries if not, I’ll come on to that in a mo.

If you did choose a word, how’s it going so far? We’re almost exactly halfway through the year so it’s a good time to pause and reflect on your word. I have a few questions to help with your reflections, you might find them useful to journal with:

• So how present has your word been this year, by which I mean have you often thought of it or forgotten all about it?
• How have you been embodying your word so far?
• How has your word guided or reminded you of how you want to feel, be or what you want to do?
• When in the last six months did your word make a difference?
• When did your word feel challenging?
• Going forwards how do you want to feel or be, or what do you want to do and how can your word support you with your intention?
• How do you want to embody your word for the second half of this year?
• Is the word you chose the word you want to continue with? If not, how did the word not feel supportive and why do you think might that be?

If you want to change the word you chose at the start of this year I would encourage you to be honest with yourself about why you want to change it. 

Think back to your motivation for choosing it in the first place. Has it felt challenging because it’s stretching your comfort zone? Did it come from a ‘should’? 

It can help to pay attention to how your body feels about the word as well as what you think about it with your head. 

Take a moment to be quiet and settle into the space you’re in. Say your current word out loud to yourself and see if you can notice any reaction within your body. You might notice a slight tensing or heavy feeling. Or perhaps a relaxation, an easing.

Your body knows how you feel about something quicker than your brain does. This isn’t cuckoo, the vagus nerve connects your brain with your major organs and your gut, and 80% of the information flows from the body to the brain and 20% from the brain to the body. 

Our body is giving us messages ALL the time, we just aren’t necessarily tuned into them. It’s known as embodied cognition, if you want the technical term.

It takes time to notice what’s going on in our body and to hear what it’s trying to tell us (I spent a lot of my life operating from the neck up so I’m learning to tune more into my body along with you) so don’t be surprised if you don’t get much of a sense yet. It’s something you can keep practising as you strengthen that connection.

Now if you want a new word, or if you didn’t choose one but would like to, there is nothing stopping you from selecting a new word now. 

You can choose a word for a year, part of a year, a season, a month – however long you like and you can pick it whenever you like! The idea behind it is to have a word (or phrase) that acts as an inspiring, shining beacon reminding you of how you want to feel or be, or what you want to do.

So, the word is to work for us, it’s to support us, not to provide a guilt trip or be a nag and it’s certainly not a ‘should’! And so we don’t need to limit ourselves by not allowing ourselves to choose a word at any point in a year.

You can use the same little exercise I described to help you choose the word you want. By the way, we’re not looking for the ‘perfect’ word, there is no right or wrong and as I’ve written, you can always change it! Get quiet, say out loud the word you’re considering and see how your body feels about it. 

A relaxing or a pop of excitement suggests that you’re chiming with the word. A tensing or dropping feeling is perhaps more of an indicator the word feels like one you ‘should’ have rather than really want.

There’s no rush, you can sit with the word for a while. Ponder over it, see how you feel in a few days’ time. 

And if you want to share your word with me, how it’s been going so far or if you have a new word, I’d love to hear about it! Send me a message to [email protected].

Now when it comes to my word for the year, which is joy, I’ve had an ‘interesting’ relationship with it so far in 2022. It still absolutely feels like the right word for me but I also feel like this year has really challenged me on it. 

There have been times when joy has felt really hard to access – when I’ve been ill, on days where I’ve felt tired and low, with the humanitarian crises and wars taking place, with the pain friends of mine are experiencing, and of course with the death of my darling dog, Georgie last month.

And that’s okay. Of course I’m not going to feel joy all the time, and especially not when there’s upset in my life and world – I never imagined choosing this word meant joy would be mine 24/7. 

What’s interesting is that having joy as my guiding word has helped me to focus more on joy then perhaps I would otherwise, when I felt it. It’s motivated me to actively create and share joy, to savour joy while I’m experiencing it. AND allow myself to not feel joy too.

My intention for the second half of this year is:

• to continue paying attention to what my heart and intuition (there’s the gut-brain connection again) are telling me about joy
• to continue welcoming in more quiet, everyday moments of joy
• to continue noticing what challenges my joy and what (or if) I want to do in response
• and to continue reminding myself ALL emotions are welcome, not just the so-called ‘nice’ ones like joy and making space for all of them

I’m excited for how the remainder of 2022 will develop with joy as my guiding word. And as I said, feel free to share with me your word and how it’s feeling for you!

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Thank you for listening to Pressing Pause, you can find the show notes at gabrielletreanor.com/podcast. And to remind you, the doors to join The Calm Mind Club close on 30 June and they will not reopen again, ever. This is your absolute last chance to get six months of support to feel calmer, more confident and in control and happier because after this month the doors will be closed permanently.

So, go to thecalmmindclub.com to find out all about the support you’ll get in The Calm Mind Club and join before the doors close forever on 30 June.

And if you have any questions or want to chat about the Club or the podcast feel free to send an email to [email protected].

Thanks again for listening, until next time.