What can you hear?

Pressing Pause Episode 112 What can you hear?

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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 begin I wanted to remind you that The Calm & Joy Catalyst is open now for you to join. While the Catalyst is about you spending just a few minutes a day intentionally creating and feeling calm and joy, the benefits are much deeper and far-reaching than that. 

The first time I ran the Catalyst the women taking part shared how prioritising their joy increased their self-worth. They became more in tune with what they needed and actually wanted, and they felt empowered to speak up for that when in the past they didn’t feel able to.

What the women in the Calm & Joy Catalyst experienced was not just having an isolated few minutes of calm and joy but the deeper ripple effect. It strengthened their confidence, their self-belief, intuition, self-worth, self-compassion. And all the while still getting their work done and meeting their responsibilities!

In fact, the Catalysers shared in our live sessions how they were more able to show up for the people they care about because of the impact being a part of The Calm & Joy Catalyst was having on them.

The world is feeling really blooming challenging right now, there is a lot going on and so much uncertainty. I’ve been volunteering at my local food bank for nearly six years and I know the realities of life. And I know that without intentionally infusing my day with what gives me calm, with what brings me joy, I cannot show up for the people I want to support, for the people who need me, because I don’t have the bandwidth, the capacity. And the same goes for you.

It is absolutely not selfish or self-centred for you to make space for your own calm and joy because you are not the only one who gains, everyone else around you benefits too.

So, right now The Calm & Joy Catalyst is open for you to join, until Friday 16 September. If you go to gabrielletreanor.com/catalyst you can find out all about the Catalyst, what you get and how it can make a difference in your life. I’ll put a link in the show notes too but a reminder of the info page again is gabrielletreanor.com/catalyst. I’d love you to join me so that you can feel more calm and joy every day too. 

Okay then, on with the episode!

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Welcome to episode 112. For a long time I’ve been meditating in silence but sometimes I feel like listening to guided meditations from the Insight Timer app. While listening to one of these meditations the guide suggested placing your hand on your heart and saying out loud to yourself “I love you. I am listening”.

Saying the words “I love you” to yourself, and out loud, can provoke a strong reaction, perhaps just hearing me say it makes you feel a bit uncomfortable, particularly if you don’t often give yourself the compassion and care you give to others.

That’s a whole discussion point on its own but for now I’ll just say that if saying to yourself ‘I love you’ brings up emotions, please know that you’re not alone. 

You can take your reaction as an indicator that more care and compassion for yourself is needed and think about how you could give yourself some of the kindness you readily give others.

But it’s actually the second sentence that I wanted to focus on, the line, “I am listening”.

How often do you really listen to yourself? And the times that you do, how often do you act upon what your quiet inner voice is telling you?

Placing your hand on your heart and saying out loud to yourself (you could say it silently in your head but out loud is more powerful – try it and see), “I am listening” is an invitation to connect with your intuition. 

There’s a wise, quiet, grounded, peaceful, calm, knowing voice inside each of us that we often don’t hear because we’re too busy doing. Too busy trying to meet expectations, obeying the shoulds, juggling all the balls and putting everyone else’s needs and wants ahead of our own.

You may not want to hear what your inner voice has to say because it might be inconvenient. It might be challenging. 

If your inner voice says take a break, rest, but (because since we were little girls we’ve been conditioned by so many messages) if you believe that rest is lazy, that your worth is tied to your productivity, that to consider your own needs is selfish – you’re going to feel challenged by your intuition telling you something different.

You don’t have time to rest, you’ve got things to do, people are depending on you, what would it say about you if you stopped and took a break?!

Perhaps the answer when you tell yourself you’re listening is silence. Or you don’t get any kind of clear message back. 

That doesn’t mean you don’t have a wise, knowing voice inside of you. It just means that it’s a little tricky to connect with your intuition right now. 

Which, if you’re used to looking outside of yourself for answers (as society encourages to do) and hushing your internal monologue when it says something in support of you, that isn’t surprising.

But your inner wisdom isn’t missing. 

By inviting your inner voice to speak up, by telling yourself that you’re willing to listen, by repeatedly extending this invitation, you’re creating the space to start to hear your intuition.

And remember that whatever the answer you get it’s your choice what you do with it. Just because your inner voice says it wants you to rest or to say no to that request or to apply for the new job or whatever it is, that doesn’t mean you have to do it. And it doesn’t mean that just because your intuition said to do something it will be easy or successful.

But if that message is coming from a quiet, calm place (your intuition), rather than a loud, stressy place (your fear) it suggests that what you know, what you believe, you feel deep down is the right thing for you.

Becoming more in tune with your intuition helps to build your self-trust, your self-belief, your self-confidence.

Because you spend more time being and acting in accordance with your values and what’s true for you. 

And in case you wondered, the first time I said these statements to myself the answer was: “I’m tired, really tired. Please take care of me.” So I took some things off my plate, upped my supportive practices (and made a tick sheet to hold myself accountable!) and worked on the couch wrapped in a blanket to feel cosy and cared for.

Another time what I heard back was: “That email you’re dithering about – send it. It might go nowhere but it could go somewhere and you’ll never know if you don’t hit send.” So that’s what I did! I didn’t know what would come of it but listening to the calm, quiet voice instead of the shouty, scared voice I knew it was the right thing to do.

So, here is an invitation for you. Place your hand on your heart and say out loud to yourself: “I love you. I am listening.” What do you hear?

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Thank you for listening to Pressing Pause, you can find details of what I shared in this episode in the show notes at gabrielletreanor.com/podcast. 

As I said at the start of this episode I am running The Calm & Joy Catalyst again and I would love for you to join me. You can find out all about how the Catalyst can support you to build your self-trust, your confidence, belief and self-worth through experiencing more calm and joy every day, and the ripple effect out to the people around you, at gabrielletreanor.com/catalyst. The doors are open to join until Friday 16 September and we begin on Monday 19 September.

If you have any questions about the Catalyst or this episode, or you have an idea of what you’d like me to talk about on the podcast I always love to hear from you, so feel free to drop me a line at [email protected].

Thanks again for listening, until next time.