Episode #82: Boardroom of Emotions

Listen on Apple Podcasts | Spotify Podcasts | Google Podcasts 

Summary

Welcome to a brand-new episode of the Unstoppable Mom Brain Podcast, the Boardroom of Emotions. Dr. Priyanka Venugopal is here to guide you through a profound exploration of emotions and their impact on your weight loss journey. In this concise episode, you'll uncover a fresh perspective on emotions and discover how understanding and managing them can be the key to achieving your weight loss goals. Emotions like stress, boredom, and complacency don't have to derail your progress, and Priyanka will show you how to empower yourself to stay on track.

If this podcast resonates with you, make sure you get on the waitlist for my next Unstoppable Group. You can get all the details and join the waitlist over at https://www.theunstoppablemombrain.com/group. And when you’re on the waitlist for the next enrollment, you’re going to get early access to enroll.

Check out my Free 5 Day Mini-Course: Lose Weight with Less Time. Go to https://www.theunstoppablemombrain.com/ and grab that for FREE!

What You’ll Learn from this Episode:

• The Think-Feel-Act Cycle: Learn how your emotions are deeply connected to your thoughts and actions, and how harnessing this cycle can lead to lasting motivation.
• The Boardroom of Emotions: Envision a boardroom meeting with various emotions as the directors. You'll see how both positive and uncomfortable emotions play a vital role in your life.
• Embracing All Emotions: Challenge the belief that only "positive" emotions are acceptable and recognize the value of all emotions in shaping your life.
• You're the CEO: Discover how you can be in control of your choices, even when you're experiencing less motivating emotions.
• Managing Emotions: Priyanka outlines a three-step approach to engage with your emotions and ensure they don't run the show, ultimately guiding you to your desired results.

Listen to the Full Episode:

Enjoy the Show?

• Follow: Get new episodes in your feed every single week on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google or search "The Unstoppable Mom Brain" on your favorite platform.

• Rate & Review: Take a few seconds and leave your review in the stars and comments of this show.

• Instagram: Come hang out with me on Instagram, you'll find me in your daily feed @theunstoppablemombrain

   

Featured on the Show:

• Want to work with me? Learn more about The Unstoppable Group by clicking here.
• Free 5 Day Mini-Course: Lose Weight with Less Time.
   

Full Episode Transcript:

Click here to download the full transcript

•  

  Hey, this is Dr. Priyanka Venugopal and you're listening to the Unstoppable Mom Brain Podcast, the Boardroom of Emotions. Today's episode is a short and sweet episode because I have talked about emotions on the past on this podcast, but I wanted to bring a different lens and a different way of talking about emotions because here's the one thing that I know if you understand emotions and if you understand how to engage with your emotions, no matter what flavor of emotion you're feeling, you will be more empowered to lose the weight that you want to lose. And better yet, you will be more confident in keeping it off. One of my goals for all of my clients and for all of you is that you never sabotage your weight loss efforts. It's simply because of something you're feeling.

  So today's episode is for you. If you want to change your relationship with hitting goals, no matter what you're feeling, whether it's boredom or complacency or something more like stress, overwhelm, and just life frustrations, none of those emotions ever really have to get in the way of you hitting your goal.

  So if that sounds like something that you want to dive into, let's get into it. The only reason that you ever eat when you aren't hungry. Is because of an emotion, literally any action or inaction that you ever take is because of an emotion and every emotion that we ever experience comes because of something we're thinking. In a nutshell, basic human behavior is centered around this, the think feel act cycle. You don't ever just feel motivated on Monday morning, or when you start a brand new program, or when it's New Year, on New Year's Day. Motivation didn't fall into your body from nowhere. It came because you had a thought. This is the week, or this is the year. And while you keep thinking this type of thought, you are going to feel motivated.

  It's that feeling of motivation, that vibration in your body that will compel you to take action. You'll plan. You'll follow through. You'll even overcome obstacles with more ease when you feel motivated. So what changes? When your motivation wanes away on a Tuesday afternoon or by February 1st, where did it go?

  I promise you, it did not dissipate into thin air. You simply stopped thinking the thoughts that created your motivation to start. So instead of thinking, this is the week, or this is the year, you start thinking, maybe this time doesn't matter. It's okay if I just skip it this once. I'll start again tomorrow.

  Or I deserve a break. These new thoughts create new emotions. So instead of thinking, this is the year and I've got this, your motivation gets replaced with complacency, boredom, apathy, and permissiveness. So it's important to understand that all of your emotions are coming from something you're thinking, which is why your thoughts are incredibly important.

  But what really matters and what the intention of this episode is all about is to really understand that your emotions are created on a moment to moment basis, and [00:03:00] they're driving you to show up the way that you are. When you take a look at all of your actions, minute to minute and day by day, and you compound them all together, you will see so clearly exactly why you have the results that you do.

  Especially that for the scale. So what is the boardroom of emotions? Which is really what this whole entire episode is centered around. It's a visual that I like to use to describe how to feel empowered no matter what is happening or what you're feeling. Imagine that you're in a boardroom full of directors that are running your company.

  And you're at the head of the table. You're the CEO. Every single seat at this boardroom is occupied by a valuable member of the whole team. Each department has a role and a place. And for this visual, I want you to imagine that every seat of the boardroom is occupied by an emotion. You know, that movie Inside Out, just like those little characters that symbolized different emotions that you too have different characters that are filling the seat of your boardroom.

  And each seat is occupied by an emotion, joy, confidence, accomplished, pride, satisfied, loved are all in the boardroom, but also in the boardroom are frustration, envy, worry, fear, anger, annoyance, disappointment. The mistake that most of us make and I know that I did, is believing that the uncomfortable emotions are bad.

  These emotions are somehow a problem simply because they don't feel good. And what we do when we think that stress and overwhelm and worry and frustration are bad, we try to avoid them. And at some point along the way, if you're listening to this podcast, you likely have tried to eat food or drink alcohol to distract yourself from experiencing them.

  The fastest way to gain the weight back that you've ever lost, or to stay struggling with that number on the scale is to keep villainizing your uncomfortable emotions. Here's the truth. Any emotion, happy, sad, frustrated, joy, confident, disappointed, anger, despair is just a vibration in your body and some feel really good and some really don't.

  But how you engage with that emotion in your body, regardless of how it feels, is what determines whether or not you're going to hit your weight loss goal. If you experience life stress or worry or overwhelm, and you don't know how to allow those emotions without eating food, it makes perfect sense that weight loss has felt perpetually hard.

  This episode is to provide an alternative way, an alternative way to think about your emotions and how to engage with them differently. And in my opinion, I think that is so empowering to know that no emotion that you ever experience is actually bad. Stress, worry, even overwhelm are important members of the boardroom.

  And as the CEO, I want you to imagine what would happen to your company, your company vision, and your results. If you villainized half of the members on your boardroom staff, or let one of them overtake and run the show. It would feel chaotic and disempowering, and you would absolutely not have the results that you wanted.

  Instead, I want you to imagine that every member of the boardroom, every single department that is a part of your company, is an important and normal part of your life experience. And it's a normal part of your company, or your body's, Ecosystem. This episode is all about inviting you to get to know the members of your boardroom.

  If you're anything like me, you have spent most of your life because this is how I was raised to believe that being happy and joyful and confident and grateful were the right way to be. And really normally our childlike brains just believed that the alternative or the opposite was bad. And maybe we were even taught that sadness, frustration, and anger were inappropriate.

  I invite you to challenge that whole paradigm and instead think about every member of the boardroom, the ones that feel good and the ones that don't as your life's powerhouses. Imagine that you didn't have to feel confident or excited or motivated to lose the weight you wanted. Now, there's a difference between letting every member of your boardroom have a voice, feeling recognized and allowed to have their, their place in the boardroom and letting a board member run the show.

  Like when you feel a flicker of worry or stress or overwhelm, does it start to take over your day? over your week. Does it start to bulldoze over your plans? Does it drive you to stop taking needle moving action towards hitting your life goals? Whether it's on the scale in your relationships or at work, when you aren't hitting goals the way you want to be hitting them, whether it's in weight loss or in your life, it's most likely because an emotion is running the show. So how is it that we allow our emotions, this boardroom of directors to have a voice without letting any one emotion take over the room? There are three steps in how I engage with any emotion under the sun. Step one, while it might be so simple is one that I still need practice on.

  And that is remembering that every single emotion is completely normal. Every single one, and it's just a part of being human. Step two is remembering that I am still the CEO of my life. So if you find yourself feeling worry, nervous, disappointment, boredom, or complacency as the CEO, it's my job to remember that as the CEO, it's my job to remember that no matter what emotion is speaking at the boardroom meeting, I am okay and safe to still make powerful choices. This means that I might have moments where I don't feel like doing something, where I feel unmotivated, unexcited, maybe I feel downright disappointed or angry or frustrated.

  It's okay for me to experience any of those emotions and also remember that I am still the CEO of how I make decisions. This leads me to step three, which is we can allow any emotion, but don't let any emotion drive you. So if you've ever felt bored or complacent or the, I don't feel like it's have kicked in, I want you to remember that it's okay.

  It's totally normal. And don't let those emotions drive you feeling unmotivated is just one member of the boardroom. And the question that I always like to ask myself is, is that the emotion I want running my life? I would say this is contrary to how it might feel, especially if you grew up like me, I grew up really learning and believing that everyone should feel happy and grateful all the time.

  And you need to feel motivated and confident to hit goals. So this is going to come as a shock, but all emotions, the good, bad and the ugly are all normal, and they never have to get in the way of you hitting your weight loss goals. Every single emotion has a place, has a role. And when you know how to engage with the members of your boardroom, you will feel so much more empowered around them.

  You get to become so much more in control over the results in your relationships at work and absolutely on the scale because you never have to hide avoid, run away, or eat to distract yourself ever again. You are the CEO of your life. And when you think about every emotion you've ever experienced as members of the boardroom, I want you to ask yourself, how do you want to lead them?

  If there's one thing I know, it's that women want to feel empowered. You may have heard that women are too quote unquote emotional. I beg to differ. I think that we are just the right amount of emotional, [00:11:00] honestly, and I can't even believe I'm saying this, but the more that I have gotten to know myself and the more that I have gotten to know the different members of the boardroom, the bigger I've been able to experience my life.

  I think that before the past few years, before I ever discovered coaching and the power of our emotions and the power of the think, feel, act cycle, my emotional vocabulary was very limited. I used to think that I felt good or I felt bad, happy or sad. The number of emotions in my vocabulary repertoire were very, very limited.

  And in that space, how small my boardroom was, the more that I have gotten to know myself and gotten to tease apart the nuances of annoyance and irritation and frustration, and gotten to know each member of the boardroom. Individually, my life has become bigger, more colorful, and I want to say more fun. I don't think that any of us ever need to feel happy or confident all the time.

  What we really want is to feel empowered. And I would be willing to say that if you do this work, if you get to know the members of your boardroom, that you will to experience this. I hope that this episode painted a different perspective for you and maybe a new visual. And for now, just start by noticing what you're feeling, which member of the boardroom is talking and put a name to it.

  These are your powerhouses, understanding and knowing the members of your boardroom, non villainizing them, avoiding them or hiding them, and definitely never having to eat through them. If you never had to distract from them or avoid them, imagine what would open up for you. I hope you all have an amazing week getting to know the members of your boardroom.

  Bye. If you're loving this podcast, here are some amazing resources that you have to know about. First of all, make sure that you're on the waitlist for my next unstoppable group enrollment opening. You can go and get all of the details for when the next enrollment period is, when our dates are, when the times of the coaching calls are, the investment, and basically any question that you could ever have over at www.theunstoppablemombrain.com/group. And also I have a free five day mini course to help you Lose Weight in Less Time. You can go and grab that resource over at www.theunstoppablemombrain.com and click the free resources button at the top. I'm so glad that we got to spend this time together and I love you all

  Bye.