Curiosity Conversation 3

Awareness can feel like the one personal development skill you can’t just “work harder” at and we wanted to unpack why. David sits down with Hannah and David’s mom, Laura, for a free-flowing Curiosity Conversation that starts with self-awareness, emotional awareness, and social awareness, then moves into how nature vs nurture shapes our starting point. From twins studies to family patterns, we talk honestly about what might be inborn, what gets modeled, and why building awareness often gets tougher as we get older.

From there, we zoom in on mindfulness as the most practical lever you can pull. Mindfulness training isn’t a buzzword, it’s the noticing skill that helps you catch your reactions, your language, and your assumptions in real time. We also tackle the messy side of modern psychology terms online: what gaslighting actually is, why “toxic” and “trauma” get overused, and how careless labels can turn normal conflict into a story of villain vs victim. The goal isn’t judgment, it’s clarity and better communication.

We end with tools you can use today: a simple “one-day project” list to reduce mental clutter, build momentum, and create intrinsic motivation through completion. Along the way, we talk psychological safety, why shame is a brutal motivator, and how entertainment and shared media can be more than escapism when it builds connection, empathy, and conversation.

If you like personal growth that’s practical and grounded, subscribe, share this with a friend who loves self-improvement, and leave a review so more people can find the show.

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Transcript

Welcome And Curiosity Conversation Format

SPEAKER_01 0:03

Welcome to the Sage Solutions podcast, where we talk about all things personal growth, personal development, and becoming your best self. My name is David Sage, and I'm a self-worth and confidence coach at Sage Coaching Solutions. So in today's podcast, we're returning to one of our alternative formats that we introduced a while back, our Curiosity Conversations. We've only done two of these before, but unlike the last two Curiosity Conversations, we have a new participant today. I am joined by my recurring co-host and lovely wife, Hannah Sage.

SPEAKER_00 0:50

Hello.

SPEAKER_01 0:52

And I'm also joined by a previous guest of the podcast, my mother, Laura Sage.

SPEAKER_02 1:00

Grateful to be here.

SPEAKER_01 1:02

Yeah, it's a very you response. If this is the first time you're joining us for a curiosity conversation, this is a format where two other people and I have a conversation about personal development topics without a preset topic that we're sticking to or even really starting with. Unlike other podcasts, where I have one topic that we're going really in-depth on, these allow us to have natural conversations about personal development topics. And as a result, we can bring in as many other different things that are related to whatever we're talking about as possible. We're also trying to model how to have these conversations in your life. We approach with curiosity and respect.

SPEAKER_02 1:52

But before we get into it, our goal with this podcast is to share free, helpful tools with you and anyone you know who is looking to improve their life. So take action, subscribe, and share this podcast with them.

Why Awareness Feels Hard To Build

SPEAKER_01 2:08

One thing I've been wrestling with around personal development in a lot of the topics that I've been researching for the podcast, but also in just my ongoing learning about psychology, human dynamics, the way that people interact with each other is how awareness functions a little bit different than a lot of the other muscles. And I've been noticing these things more and more even in my daily interactions with people and my observations of other people and in myself. Now I know awareness bleeds into mindfulness, and I want to talk about that in a minute, but different types of awarenesses seem to be harder muscles to build than many other skills or traits that we talk about on this podcast. And they definitely can be built. But for instance, when I was doing all of the prep for self-awareness and the whole episode that we did surrounding that, and as I've been looking at emotional awareness and social awareness, I'm finding more and more that there are at least major aspects of those awarenesses that seem to be almost inborn. Like people have natural tendencies towards these awarenesses, almost like a starting point. Like how it would be really hard if you're 5'1 to be excellent in the NBA. You know, your genetics are a factor on that, no matter how much you practice, you're at a a disadvantage. And I think for some of these awarenesses, there are definitely people that just naturally are more aware of things, especially socially, and people that are just not. And while I do believe we can build muscles surrounding these things, I feel like the maximum output and how easy it is to build those muscles might have an inborn part to them because it just seems such a stark contrast between the people that can naturally do it and who can't.

SPEAKER_02 4:31

Well, I think it speaks to with anything when you think about nature versus nurture. It's not a matter of versus, like it has to be one or the other. It's all some combination of the two. And so that can be the difference between some people, what looks like that natural, it's just been within them since the day they were born, and there could be that tendency genetically, but in the end, the environment and all the experiences add to all of that. For sure. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:07

Yeah. I think you're making a really great point. It's just some of the things that I'm noticing is specifically types of awarenesses. I'm finding that I'm noticing similar types of awarenesses family-wise from people and then like their father and their like up a line.

SPEAKER_00 5:26

That resonates with me because I grew up in a family that was almost probably too aware just because of wanting to make sure we're never inconveniencing anyone. I grew up in a strict household where you can't call anyone from five to seven because they might be eating dinner. You can't call anyone after 8:30 because they're probably winding down and going ready for bed. Also, the whole thing where you don't text anyone until at least 8 a.m. And even that feels early to me, just because I don't know what their day is looking like.

SPEAKER_03 5:54

Right.

SPEAKER_00 5:55

So that was definitely instilled in me by my parents just because it was rules that they had in their household. And there's a lot more examples of those kind of things growing up that cause me to be more socially aware. And I think also if you grow up with a reactive parent, there's a little bit of walking on eggshells. So you definitely get very cautious and like, oh, I don't want to offend, I don't want to stir any pots.

SPEAKER_01 6:26

I think you guys are both making really interesting and great points, especially from your knowledge bases and experience. And just thinking about and reflecting on what you said, mom, but also what you said, Hannah. It's hard to parse out what parts were ingrained in you from early childhood and your experiences, and what parts come almost naturally from literally within you, like your brain naturally, maybe your genetics. But there are studies where they take twins that were separated at birth. So they're basically isolating the factor of who they were raised by, especially when one twin was raised by the actual parents and one twin was raised by somebody else. And it's surprising how many of the traits stay, even though they didn't have the exposure to the parent, which has boosted a little bit of how psychology is viewed the genetic aspect in certain areas. And some of the studies I saw around the awarenesses led into those too. But I think regardless of whether it's truly nature or nurture, what I'm finding is that a lot of the basis for those skills comes from some combination of your genetics and your upbringing. And I think it's significantly easier to build those awareness muscles when you're young than when you're older. Not saying that you can't build those muscles. I just think it's interesting that it like puts you at a starting set point.

SPEAKER_02 8:05

Well, it brings you into a space of when you think about like as human beings, unless there's some sort of a disorder or abnormality. When a baby is born, there's the necessity of awareness of so many different things that are required in order for the baby to even survive. And so that's that natural piece of they're automatically aware of if they're hungry or uncomfortable or tired. Nobody had to teach them to have that awareness. But over time, and this gets a little bit into some of the training within mindfulness as far as being aware of what's present right now, all the way to the point of being able to be aware of your breath or to be aware of thoughts that are coming and going. That takes practice as opposed to what started out as a very innate just had to do it in order to be able to move forward. And so somewhere in there, things have shifted and changed that there was teaching, or there was modeling, or there was influence from an environment in some sort of way.

SPEAKER_00 9:20

Well, my above average Neanderthal bloodline has come a long way in regards to awareness and development. Just wanted to chime in. 23 and me said it was above average.

SPEAKER_01 9:34

She had an existential crisis surrounding this where she was doing like research on Neanderthals.

SPEAKER_00 9:41

I'm a different species than you.

SPEAKER_01 9:43

Okay, got no. You're not a different species.

SPEAKER_02 9:48

That's why I did ancestry. I don't think they get into that. I took the wrong test.

Mindfulness As The Awareness Engine

SPEAKER_01 9:54

Okay, but before I lose my train of thought, the conclusion I was coming to was really that the ultimate mover of almost all of the different awarenesses was building the muscle of mindfulness because it trains your awareness around so many different areas of your life. So that really is the way to move that dial the most. And I I think if you don't learn those mindfulness skills, it is going to make it so much harder to develop those individual awarenesses. I know mindfulness has become such a big thing that it's almost become a bit of a buzzword. It's so prominent now that I even see people roll their eyes because it gets overused or wrongly used in ways to be like be mindful of that as opposed to be careful when a kid is on a balance beam or something like that. And I do feel that there are a lot of terms in personal development that have really become these sort of cliche buzzwords.

SPEAKER_02 10:58

And actually the example that you just gave was really more about be aware.

SPEAKER_01 11:05

Yeah, true.

SPEAKER_00 11:06

Ooh, like gaslighting. That one bothers me how often it is used with our generation and the following generation. It seems like it's just a trend to point out that people are always gaslighting you.

SPEAKER_02 11:21

So the boomer in the room needs to get more information about this gaslighting.

SPEAKER_01 11:26

Are you really a boomer? Oh, geez.

SPEAKER_02 11:28

Right on the line.

unknown 11:29

Barely.

SPEAKER_01 11:30

Okay, boomer.

Gaslighting And Other Misused Terms

SPEAKER_01 11:32

Gaslighting is okay, this might not be a perfect definition, but my understanding of gaslighting is that you are purposefully misleading somebody in a way that is meant to make them question reality. So if you deliberately tell somebody that something that happened didn't, it's not just lying, but it's trying to get people to like almost question their own sanity.

SPEAKER_00 12:04

I think gaslighting started quite a bit with dating relationships. That's kind of where it became a big thing. Because that was like okay, say your partner cheated on you, and you kind of flip the script and say, You're crazy, that didn't happen, you're imagining things, or you even say something along the lines of, well, your actions cause me to do this. So you're like kind of flipping the script and making it the other person's fault. And that's like David said, causing you to question reality because that's not how you experienced it, but it causes you to be like, wait, what? What's going on?

SPEAKER_02 12:45

So it's not so simple as in dating as the example of, hey, that was a great date. I'll call you and then I don't.

SPEAKER_01 12:53

No, that's more just a lie.

SPEAKER_02 12:56

And ghosting.

SPEAKER_01 12:57

Yeah, that's yeah, ghosting is the better. Ghosting is often where you just completely stop all communication. Um, gaslighting is this manipulative lying reframing in a way that's meant to like mess with people, I guess.

SPEAKER_00 13:16

More of a manipulation.

SPEAKER_01 13:17

It would be like, the only reason I did that is because all of the things that you did caused me to do that thing, so it's really your fault. Or even they'll just completely fabricate the situation and be like maybe you're the person is denying that they even did the thing, and they're like, in fact, the only reason that you're bringing this up must mean that you're doing it, and you're just paranoid that I'm doing the same thing you're doing. It's a lot of telling people things that didn't really happen to mess with them.

SPEAKER_02 13:50

So there's an actual negative intention behind it.

SPEAKER_01 13:54

Yes. I've also seen it with like children kind of rewriting their parentage and retelling things as if they had this horrible childhood and adding things to make it sound like the reason that they have all of these problems are because a parent did X, Y, and Z, and oftentimes it's not even true or fabricated.

SPEAKER_00 14:21

Mm-hmm. It's kind of gross, but trauma is kind of something that people put on a pedestal, especially our generation and the next generation. I think Laura, with your generation, it was more of pull yourself up by your bootstraps, get it done, move on. You probably don't necessarily therapy is a little bit more of a weakness. Not as well, not yeah, seen as a going to therapy, right? Yeah. I don't think with you, but I think with other people in your age group. However, with our age group and younger, it's almost seen as like a a badge. A little bit like look at me looking at all my trauma and trying to dissect it and trying to grow, but sometimes I think that can be a negative.

SPEAKER_02 15:05

So it sounds like something that wasn't so great being taken too far because when you talk about like back earlier trauma and those types of things were essentially you just didn't talk about them, you didn't get help for it. That was the expectation. And it's sounding to me that it might be taken too far to the opposite extreme, that there really should be, if there truly is trauma, there really should be some sort of a balance.

SPEAKER_01 15:39

Yeah, and I I want to make a quick distinction. So the concept of gaslighting is fine. The problem is anytime somebody says something that they don't like or that they disagree with, you'll hear somebody be like, Are you gaslighting me? And it's like because you disagree with something does not mean that I'm trying to manipulate your reality to mess with you. I just believe a different thing, or I think you're wrong. It's not the same as gaslighting.

SPEAKER_00 16:12

Right. And then it goes into the difference between little tea and big T traumas. And I think a lot of those get kind of interchanged and confused. Like I can think of a few examples of people that either I know of or I've heard of, or I'm not naming any names, who have actively decided to cut people out of their life based off of a little tea trauma that is slowly turned into their brain into a big tea trauma many years later.

SPEAKER_01 16:42

Yeah. I want to say one thing. There are traumatic incidents that happen to people that are truly life-altering in very negative ways. And trauma is a very serious and very important topic. But I do believe that in some ways, trauma is another one of those buzzwords that gets overused, like it rained on a day it wasn't supposed to, and it's like, oh my God, this is so traumatic. And it's like, whoa, I don't think that this is traumatic. You just didn't like the outcome.

SPEAKER_02 17:13

Yeah, I'm glad that you just brought it back to like language, right? Using terms in the appropriate times and spaces to really mean what they truly mean. Because I do want to be very careful, and this is yet again, maybe another episode, as far as in the land of trauma, like not wanting to become judgmental. It does sound like we're very much in a space, though, of just being cautious about the language that we use and how and when we use it, so that it's at the appropriate time and place.

SPEAKER_00 17:47

Which I think the whole buzzword situation comes down to the language in regards to maybe not knowing the correct words to use potentially, or else just repeating words that you've seen or heard on social media without actually doing your due diligence.

SPEAKER_01 18:06

I really do think social media is probably one of the major culprits of turning some of these serious concepts into flippantly used buzzwords, and it really does cheapen how important some of those things are meant to be, especially like trauma. Another one is toxic. Oh my gosh. The amount that I hear people call minor things that they don't like toxic is another one that drives me a little crazy. And once again, like there are toxic behaviors, there are toxic traits like narcissism and things like that, like which that one kind of gets overused sometimes too. But like, just because somebody does something you don't like or has a trait that annoys you a little, that does not necessarily mean that they're toxic. I've heard a lot of people overusing that and using it as excuses to cut people out of their lives. So I've just found that we just have to be careful about the language that we use surrounding them.

SPEAKER_00 19:12

So if something happens and it happens to be a toxic trait, we don't necessarily have to stick a Mr. Yuck sticker on them and label them as toxic. Did you ever go to safety school, David?

SPEAKER_01 19:23

I did. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:24

Do you remember the Mr. Yuck stickers?

SPEAKER_01 19:26

We had Mr. Yuck stickers all over the house.

SPEAKER_00 19:29

I remember going in all the cabinets and sticking Mr. Yuck stickers to everything. Did we have that much yucky stuff all over the house?

SPEAKER_01 19:36

No, it was more I thought it was to tell kids like don't drink this.

SPEAKER_00 19:40

Yeah, it's the chemicals that are like under the sink. Poison. Yeah. It's like pesticides.

SPEAKER_01 19:44

Literal, literal toxins to the human body if you were to drink them or whatever.

SPEAKER_02 19:50

And I guess I just want to say, even from your opening remarks of the podcast, David and Hannah, as far as, you know, coming back to keeping in mind when we get into these spaces of people overusing, underusing, and appropriately using the term, once again, it's coming from a place of curiosity. Like where are these people? What is it that got them to the point that they either see, feel, or just simply use the term in whatever way, as opposed to becoming judgmental about it?

SPEAKER_00 20:22

That's true. We don't know what they've been through and what's going on in their lives.

SPEAKER_01 20:28

No, for sure. And I think there is a subjective nature to especially some of these, even like trauma, something that might not be traumatic for one person can definitely be traumatic for another. I guess where I was more trying to touch on is I really do think that social media is a lot of the culprit of people just parroting words without it even being where they're coming from. It's just like they've just heard it, so they say it. And I think we just have to be a little careful with that. I also think a lot of the things that we were just talking about as these buzzwords come down to sometimes we just need to be more tolerant of other people, as opposed to, like you said, labeling and judging. And I guess in some ways we were doing it a little bit about these words, but I think tolerance and awareness go hand in hand.

SPEAKER_02 21:18

And I think the final thing that I would say about that, and yes, I agree social media is a huge component to this, but there is a tendency to get into like these days back in my day, where back in my day, I'm just gonna bring up an example of going postal, which was a very common, typically used term for many things that were accurate and inaccurate. And I'm talking a very long time ago, and there was no social media to have that be spread.

SPEAKER_01 21:49

True that. Yeah, I suppose we've had problems with terms being used wrong forever. It's not just a new thing, these are just the current ones.

SPEAKER_00 21:58

Every generation's gonna have. They're different ones. So, with all of that being said, I'm definitely someone who has fallen victim to probably overusing some of these buzzwords. Absolutely. However, as someone who's used them in the past and will continue to use them here and there, how can I go about being more aware of my usage of them and learn how to just kind of maybe monitor my verbiage? Where would someone start if they want to be more aware about this stuff, would you say?

SPEAKER_01 22:33

That's a good question.

SPEAKER_02 22:35

So bringing it back to the awareness, I think we've already solved our problem. If you're aware of it's something that you want to change, then you've already done half of the changing because that awareness is there and you're going to notice it. And then you're going to catch yourself when you're doing it, and then you're going to think about was that the appropriate way that I wanted to use it and when. If it's not something that you want or care about being aware of, then it's going to continue to just kind of slide without you really taking notice of it.

SPEAKER_01 23:14

Phenomenal. I could not agree more. The only pushback I'm going to give on awareness, real quick, is I've found that even when it seems like people care about something, if their awareness isn't that great around it, there are times where they just don't catch it. You know what I mean? And I think it has to like occur to you to notice it. And that part of awareness can be the tough part, you know? What I will say to add on to what you were saying is I think having an understanding of the term helps a lot too, right? If you have looked it up and read a definition of a term, that definitely helps you understand it better. And I think especially when we're talking about terms that have like psychological definitions, that is a really easy place to start. If it's a psychological disorder, you should probably be careful about calling someone it. Because there's a whole criteria that's usually pretty serious for diagnosing that person.

SPEAKER_00 24:20

For sure. And I'm guilty of this. I think narcissism is one of those words. Same with psychotic or crazy or any of those kind of words.

SPEAKER_01 24:28

Ooh, OCD. That's a big one for anyone who is particular. But yeah, I guess by knowing about something, I think that definitely does also help your awareness of it.

SPEAKER_02 24:43

And then the other piece is you have to care. If you care about you want to use it appropriately and think about it and use it in the right context, then you're going to do what you need to do that. If it's not that important to you, or you don't see the value in it, you're likely going to continue doing whatever it is that you're doing.

SPEAKER_00 25:03

Therefore making you more socially aware.

SPEAKER_01 25:06

I also think that the mindfulness piece is what teaches the noticing. By practicing building the skill of noticing things in the present, you are actually more likely to notice the thing that you then care about and know about.

A One-Day Project List Method

SPEAKER_02 25:24

So when I work with my fitness dance ladies, we typically have a topic that we kind of focus on or become more aware of in each month. And I set that topic and we have some conversations around it, and we sort of set intentions for ourselves personally and sometimes share our stories with each other. And for the month of August, I have chosen because of things in my own personal life that have occurred recently, as well as I have a number of people who are in education. And so in August, you typically, as an educator, start the summer with, oh my gosh, this summer I'm gonna do this and this. And then the summer occurs, and the beginning of the school year starts coming, and you start going, like, yeah, what did I actually get done? And now the day's coming, and so now I need to get it all done at once, kind of overwhelming. So the idea that I had come up with for everybody was that they were to actually sit down and make a list of some projects that have been rolling around in their heads for a while. The caveat is the project has to be at most something that would take a full day to do, could be less, could maybe be an hour, could be a couple of hours, but not something that would take more than a day. Write that list out. All those little things that have been rolling around in your head that, you know, how many times a day, a week, an hour does that thought come into your mind and you go, Oh yeah, that's right. I meant to. Oh yeah, that's right. I was thinking I was going to. So you put them down on paper. You actually get it down there so that you don't have to continuously be thinking about it. It doesn't have to be in any particular order of any sort. It's just get it out and get it on paper. And that the goal for the month of August that I've set for the ladies is to choose one of those items. Doesn't matter how big or small it is, it's just something that was important enough that you put it on that paper and do it and cross it off and see how that feels, not only completing it, but actually to go to that list and cross that item off.

SPEAKER_01 27:36

This reminds me of some of the topics that we talked about in our five life hacks that actually work episode. And it really does relate back to this idea of closing your open tabs, of when you have these pending things, whether they be decisions or tasks or whatever it is, they have a cognitive load. And by crossing these things off the list, you are freeing yourself from them.

SPEAKER_02 28:08

I think the other intention behind it is no matter how many items you actually put down, we come back to the mindfulness piece or the awareness piece as far as, and I can do one at a time. And that's very important with choose the one and just do it. It doesn't matter if there's only three on the list or if there's 23 on the list.

SPEAKER_00 28:34

Now, Laura, how has this been being received by the ladies in your group?

SPEAKER_02 28:41

They loved it. They loved the idea of just kind of taking that time to organize their thoughts about it and to put it down in writing. And then the other thing that they very much love about it is that then when we come together when we have classes, people are kind of checking with each other as far as were you able to get something done. And if somebody did and they were proud of it, they shared it and obviously got the accolades from the group of, you know, nice job. So yeah, it's actually, and again, because of the group that I have, different ages and stages and different things going on in life. They're very much in general people who kind of like something organized like that to set their intentions with. And a few people were like, oh, I already this and this. And I at that point had said, you know what, put it on the list and cross it off, and then put your other things on there. Let yourself have that moment of like, I already got a few of these done, and now I maybe can do one more.

SPEAKER_01 29:45

Well, that's really cool because it sounds like there's some built-in accountability and social support that's aiding the process beyond just the list.

SPEAKER_00 29:55

And encouragement. Like, how good does that feel to have everyone probably cheering you on and congratulating you for getting that done? And that, of course, is just going to steamroll into trying to get more of those things done.

SPEAKER_02 30:08

That being said, the idea came from I myself became overwhelmed by the the thoughts and ideas of things that needed to be done. And I by myself, before coming up with this as a group, made my list and then gave myself the permission to focus on one at a time. So it is very helpful to have that tribe of people to be able to support you in it. Right. But I have to say, even me on my own doing it, accomplishing it, still gave a dopamine boost.

SPEAKER_00 30:42

That totally makes sense.

SPEAKER_01 30:45

Yeah, I'd actually be interested to hear some of your thoughts, Hannah, as somebody who has talked about having an identity of a doer. I think, like you said, you don't need the social ties or the social support for this to be useful. It makes a lot of sense. It's interesting that this was the strategy that you came up with and then decided to bring it forward. And I think it was Hannah might have said, it really pushes you forward. It definitely creates that inertia during the day and then momentum over the long term, which will make you more likely to do more of those things on that list because you've started. Oftentimes it's that initial friction of standing still that once you're in action, once you're doing something, it's so much easier to continue doing something. An object in motion will stay in motion, an object at rest will stay at rest.

SPEAKER_00 31:44

Yeah, so if you've been listening to our podcast for a while, you'll know that I've talked about lists a few times. Lists can be a little bit of a problem for me, which is interesting because my self-worth is so tied in how much I get done a lot of times. But I think it's the intention in which you have when you write the list makes a big difference. In regards to Laura, you were kind of saying that they're all things that could take anywhere from like an hour to a day, but it's probably nothing that necessarily needs to be done by Tuesday. It's all things that you can come to when you've got good time and you've got a couple hours to kill. Okay, what's a task I can fit into this time frame? So I think it's the pressure. If you write the list without any extra pressure and you're mostly just looking to get extra things done, I think that's awesome. However, David is one who likes to write every single, every little thing on a list. Everything, because you love to cross off. And so we start a list to do together before we go on vacation. And I kid you not, I have like 20 things. And I'm usually the planner. I'm the like one who kind of lays out these are the things that need to get done, these are the requirements before we leave and hit the road. David will come in and add like 70 things to the list of things that I hadn't even like 30. He'll we go from a list of 20 to 50 just because he loves to cross off, and that starts to feel a little overwhelming for me. I'm more like, okay, what are the big things?

SPEAKER_01 33:34

Okay, also in my defense, real quick, there are things that you have done that weren't on the list that I will add just to cross off to show that we've done more.

SPEAKER_00 33:43

He'll pull things that we did yesterday to give himself a cross off.

SPEAKER_02 33:48

That sounds to me like maybe you each just need your own list.

SPEAKER_00 33:53

Probably.

SPEAKER_01 33:54

Sometimes it works that way, sometimes it doesn't. It's tough. I do want to touch on one thing real quick. I think it's really important, and we didn't really frame it this way, but I think I picked it up in the way that you said it. It also sounds like you were giving the ladies permission to just do the one. I think that also is the thing that can make the list not have that backfire.

SPEAKER_00 34:22

Right. You're not trying to have them do everything by the end of the month.

SPEAKER_02 34:26

Yeah, it's part of like when you mentioned earlier in the podcast about modeling how to do some things. And so doing that with the women, the two goals of it was get it out of your head and on paper so that you don't have to keep stirring with it in your head if it's things that you kept coming up and coming at you. And then, as you had said, the whole point of it was if you do one, you did well. And allow yourself that. Like instead of, but I didn't do the 13 other thing, it's I did one and that felt good.

SPEAKER_00 35:02

It allows you to give yourself grace.

SPEAKER_01 35:04

And I think that grace feeds into a form of self-compassion. So instead of beating yourself up for not doing those other things, you're focusing on, you're controlling your focus, you're controlling your perspective and framing it in a way that makes you feel good about the thing that you did instead of focusing on the the other stuff that's on the list that you haven't yet.

SPEAKER_02 35:28

And for a lot of people, that takes practice. Their automatic is gonna be, but what about the ones that I didn't do? And so it is mindfulness and a practice of being aware and all of those things. It takes practice to be able to go, I'm gonna focus on the positive, on the one that I did do, and I'm gonna let go of the other ones.

SPEAKER_00 35:50

Which is interesting when it comes down to momentum, because I think when you're focusing on the things that you didn't get done, that does cause you to stagnate and to focus on the negative and lose the energy to keep getting things done.

SPEAKER_01 36:06

Yeah, that definitely does come in and kill the momentum. I don't think I've thought about it that way, and I think it's really important to bring that up. Just because you've done something doesn't mean that the momentum will carry if your mindset isn't allowing it to carry. We do talk a lot about taking action on this podcast, and I think it's because it is one of the foundational things that everyone in the world struggles with at some time or another. Whether it's being too in your head, whether it's not getting yourself to start, in fact, one of the best ways you can possibly learn is just taking action and learning from the results of it. One of the things that's really helped me is focusing on that completion. So whether it's the crossing off and yes, this is why I like crossing it off of the list, but actually focusing on after I've done the thing, thinking about how good it felt to have been productive and to have accomplished the thing and trying to reinforce that so that when I think about doing the thing that I don't want to do next time, I remember that feeling. It is like a it's adjacent to what we talked about with intrinsic motivation, where you actually focus on the effort and create that loop. I think this is creating another form of intrinsic motivation where you're remembering how good it feels at the completion, not necessarily because of hitting the goal, but just the feeling of productivity.

SPEAKER_00 37:41

Doing it for the positive as opposed to doing it for avoiding the negative, I think makes a big difference. Avoiding the negative can help give you that kick in the butt for sure, but I think that tends to be a little bit more of a short-term motivator as opposed to a long-term motivator because ultimately it does end up leading you to feelings of shame or negative emotions.

SPEAKER_02 38:08

And I do want to say us doing this in my fitness dance ladies group is there's completely an understanding of the group and that there is no sense of if anybody for whatever reason isn't able to accomplish it at the end of the month, it's completely safe space to even share that with no judgment, completely accepted. So, yeah, that's important too, that if you do it in some sort of a group setting, that there is that safety net.

SPEAKER_01 38:40

Yeah, I think psychological safety is a really important topic that we haven't even really touched enough of on this podcast. It's a big thing in businesses and organizations as well. I know in your fitness dance group, you have really instilled a lot of the ideas that prop up mindfulness and incorporated mindfulness into the whole process in the way that you guys talk about things. You literally do a meditation at the end. I think you also do yoga, which has a lot of overlap.

SPEAKER_00 39:15

The women are definitely led to feel safety with their vulnerability, which I think is huge kudos to you for creating that environment. That's awesome.

Momentum, Grace, And Shame As Motivation

SPEAKER_01 39:25

And I also want to circle back to shame coming up. Shame is such a blunt force instrument for getting social compliance that it really existed in an evolutionary psychology point of view to force people to not do things that would get the entire tribe killed. It wasn't meant to be like minor adjustments to get people to be better. This was the don't you ever do that again type of thing. And that type of emotional weight is crushing, which is why it's such a bad motivator towards action. It just crushes you away from doing something you're not supposed to do.

SPEAKER_00 40:07

If anyone's seen the Odyssey yet, Odysseus constantly does stupid things that puts all of them at risk. I'm not gonna give anything more away if you haven't seen it yet, but it's good.

Stories And Shows As Real Teachers

SPEAKER_01 40:22

I do actually want to double-click here on Hannah bringing up the Odyssey. I do think that there are times where fiction or stories or shows or movies or books that aren't personal development at all are more than just entertainment, where there are lessons that are taught and when they just grab you and pull you in, they can become these reference points for different things in real life. I know one that all three of us really enjoyed was shrinking.

SPEAKER_00 40:57

On Apple TV.

SPEAKER_01 40:59

What is this?

SPEAKER_00 41:01

We need to tell the listeners where to find it. It is good though.

SPEAKER_02 41:06

This came to mind for me because I got thinking about what are some shows or books or things that I do where it's it begins with entertainment, but then through that twofold, maybe it's the topics that are in the show that then open conversations with people who can identify and can feel and experience some things that are in there, or just other people that also enjoy the show and get into it, and then that spurs on conversations that different people have about it. It just got me thinking about different entertainment pieces like that that have that opportunity to do that. Now, you brought up shrinking, that was one that I had very much had an interest in from the start, of course, being that it was involving therapists and that type of thing. That was the original interest that I had because of the connection as far as being a psychologist. And then when I found out that it was connected also to quite a bit of talking about Parkinson's disease, which, as I think you've brought up on the podcast, that is very close and personal for us with my father. And interestingly enough, in me watching the show, you guys watching the show, us talking about it, my dad and my mom then getting into the show, and whether it's conversations that they have around it, or even just for an opportunity, there's been times where my dad has mentioned as far as or agreed with, it was interesting to hear people talking about it.

SPEAKER_01 42:45

Yeah. For sure. I think that show especially does such a good job because they're already talking on these different neurological or psychological topics, but they also just have such interesting good dynamics between the different characters and the conversations that they have surrounding it that I learned a ton just from watching that show, just because it was like there were pieces of it that I was psychologically learning from, but they just had such interesting experiences that almost made me feel like I got to learn from a breath of knowledge, yes, these are fake characters, I get that. But I got to learn from their experiences in a way that I don't personally have that kind of broadens my horizons.

SPEAKER_00 43:38

Not to mention just the fact that their cast is incredible. You have Harrison Ford who is playing the therapist with Parkinson's, and he actually learned from Michael J. Fox and was able to kind of figure out how that looks and how the disease has progressed and It's beautifully done. Very beautifully done. David and I have sobbed a handful of times while watching this show.

SPEAKER_01 44:08

And I'm sure you haven't at all, ma'am.

SPEAKER_02 44:12

It just got me thinking there are shows that you connect with like that. Yes, it's entertainment. Yes, there's humor in it. Yes, it brings up feelings and emotions. And then it got me thinking about maybe some of the series that I've seen where it's like I almost don't even want to watch the very last episode because then I know it's done and it's been such a huge piece, which just happened to me recently with the bear.

SPEAKER_00 44:34

David and I are there with Ted Lasso. We didn't watch them last season, but now they have another one. So we don't really know what it's supposed to be.

SPEAKER_01 44:41

Literally were putting it off because we liked it so much.

SPEAKER_02 44:43

And interesting, I got into another piece of getting into shrinking, is because of Roy from Ted Lasso also being one of the writers and and one of the smaller part actors in shrinking.

SPEAKER_01 44:57

Maybe that's one of the reasons why I like One Piece because it's been going on since 1999 and it just won't end.

SPEAKER_00 45:05

You never have to deal with that.

SPEAKER_01 45:07

Yeah, I'm sure it'll come someday.

SPEAKER_02 45:09

So that brings up another that got me thinking about that is I was somebody who, whatever, everything going on in my life, everybody I know of was talking about it when it first started, and that's Gray's Anatomy. When it first started, I don't even know what year it's. I was gonna say that's another one that's 21 seasons or something and lots of episodes, and ended up at some point thinking, like, you know what, I'm just gonna start from season one, episode one. And it's fascinating because of things that have happened, for example, recently with John dying from liver cancer, and then there being an episode way in the very beginning that actually had a situation with liver cancer, and the amount that I was able to identify with that and feelings that it very much brought up to be able to just kind of pause and feel and go through all and again understanding this is all somebody's wonderful writing, people do wonderful acting, and it's not real, but it is to the person that's watching it when it touches them in that way and connects with them on that level. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:17

Which I wonder how much there's these shows that have been going for decades at this point, and you wonder then how much correlation is there with the relatability of different phases of life and being able to feel seen or heard or understood in a way. I wonder how much that kind of goes hand in hand with these long-running shows. Not like The Simpsons, but then again, they cover a lot of relatable topics again. It does in its own way.

SPEAKER_01 46:51

Humor is one of the ways that people connect. Humor allows for topics to be bridged that would otherwise be too uncomfortable. I think humor is one of the great connectors and ways that we allow ourselves to talk about tough things without them getting too heated. So yeah, it's definitely not as serious and it's silly and it's a cartoon. But I think they still spur on conversations and topics in a different way. Total side tangent here. But it's reminding me of something as I've been studying philosophy way back ancient Greeks, which I guess I'm almost touching on the Odyssey here. It was, I believe, Plato that was really against uh plays. Because as I'm sure people know, the Greeks were some of the early playwrights and where a lot of theater came from. You've got the comedies and the tragedies. Tragedies. And comedy doesn't necessarily mean that it was funny in the way that they had them. It was more just two different styles. And Plato, who is like w one of the fathers of Western philosophy, believed that it pulled people away from the real and caused them to not be as in touch with reality and that they just wanted to escape. But Aristotle, who was both taught by Plato and disagreed with him on never several things, was really big into pushing what we're saying. That these fictions allowed people to experience things that they wouldn't and expand their scope and be able to step into other people's shoes.

SPEAKER_00 48:39

And sometimes life is so hard that you need an escape. I think that's where a lot of reality TV shows come into play, being able to see other people's lives, even if they are over-dramatized. I think there are different phases of life where maybe you do need that escapism. I think it can be potentially harmful if you don't come back out of it.

SPEAKER_01 49:03

And I think there's a lot of different escapism. Not to judge one way or another, but I think there's a little bit of a difference between turn your brain off and laugh of what people will call like trash TV escapism and getting lost in like a fantasy or a crazy sci-fi or something where you're in a different world and that makes you feel like you're escaping. And I think there's probably value that can happen for people in different ways from both.

SPEAKER_02 49:33

There's a lot of different genres. Another piece of it is it gets me thinking, I've actually had occasionally some, I don't know if I want to call it emotional connections, but things that kind of help me process and go through things through, for example, fixer up or home remodeling kind of thing, if it's something that you shared with somebody, right? Both enjoyed watching it together and had conversations around it and the connections that were made, or even maybe a specific cooking show. Right now I'm into very much the Jamie Oliver ones that brings back having gone to college in London for a semester, the British accent and all the little things that he does that are using the measurements, et cetera, et cetera, that there's that connection to it.

SPEAKER_00 50:17

So it can also invoke memories and nostalgia.

SPEAKER_01 50:21

And I think it also is one of the major connectors. I think media is one of the big things that we as humans connect over because it's one of the few times that we can share an experience. We share experiences when we're together with people and we experience things at the same time. But it allows us to have read or watched the same thing. So it's a shared experience that we have with another human being, even if we didn't do it with them at the same time.

SPEAKER_00 50:55

I see this constantly with my brother-in-law because he'll always tell us to watch a show that he's super excited about. And unfortunately, half the time we forget and we don't watch it.

SPEAKER_01 51:05

Sorry, Mario.

SPEAKER_00 51:06

And then we see him a couple weeks later and he's hey, did you watch that show yet? And he's so excited to talk about it. And we let him down and didn't watch it. Well, he's looking for that connection.

SPEAKER_01 51:18

And I'm just my brain is just keeps firing off on things. I remember Hannah, you talking about how exciting it was to watch each episode as they came out of Game of Thrones. There was almost an event type thing to it. I would say the Super Bowl works the same way, where there's a there's like a social gathering, and everyone's been theorycrafting about what's about to happen in the story next, and then the episode happens, and then when it gets done, everyone talks about the implications of it. And I think it really is one of the great ways that we connect with other people.

SPEAKER_00 51:56

Oh, absolutely. The last four seasons of Game of Thrones, whenever it was going on every Sunday night at seven o'clock, you had a party. You were drinking, you were eating, you were hanging out, and then you'd hang out afterwards and talk about it and watch the trailer for the next episode. It was crazy.

SPEAKER_02 52:13

It's interesting. It just got me thinking about when I talked about what I shared with what I was doing with my fitness dance ladies, and we kind of had the the conversation around you can certainly do it by yourself and have your own experience, and it's still a very positive thing, or you can include that social aspect of sharing it. And then I feel like now we're talking a bit, and right now we're talking technically more like movies, shows, things like that. I liken it very much like to a book club too. You could read a book and you could really get intense things out of it in so many different ways. And it was just you and yourself and the experience that you had with it and do all those types of things. But there's also a possibility that you could then do that piece where you, with a shared group, have that similar experience and then have those conversations and develop those relationships around that.

SPEAKER_00 53:10

I feel like a TV show club would be very fun.

SPEAKER_02 53:13

I'd be down for that. Didn't they used to have that about I forgot what that show was, that reality TV thing?

SPEAKER_00 53:22

Love Island. It's Jersey Shore.

SPEAKER_01 53:24

Oh, Survivor was a big one. Or I've also heard from The Amazing Race. I know a lot of people would do that.

SPEAKER_00 53:31

Funny fact, there was a guy from my church who was on the amazing race. So every week that he was on, the church actually, this is back when I was like maybe eighth or ninth grade, the church would have a huge watch party in the church chapel so we could cheer him on. It was pretty fun.

SPEAKER_01 53:50

I know American Idol was like that too. Yeah. Big time. We did that with So You Think You Can Dance for a while.

SPEAKER_02 53:56

Oh, American, yes, we'd watch it together.

SPEAKER_01 53:58

And this is having me reflect on sporting events. I think for some people, that's that you connect every Sunday. Some people just really enjoy watching it on their own. But then there's the people that like every Packer game, they get the people together. It's it's like we're all on the same team. It's almost that tribal, like us versus them mindset. It's like, yeah, rah, all together. And I think that's one of the reasons people really enjoy going to the games because they might not even see the game as well at the game as when they saw it on TV, but they feel the crowd, they feel the energy. And concerts are probably like that too.

SPEAKER_00 54:36

One thought though.

Binge Watching Versus Weekly Rituals

SPEAKER_00 54:37

Do you think with the way that media is being portrayed in regards to all being released in one go so people can binge the season on their own? Do you think that's made a big difference in how we consume television in regards to, I think back 20 years ago, The Office came out, I believe it was 20 years ago, which is crazy. And every Tuesday night we would either record the episode to watch all together later on when the whole family could be available, or we would make a point to all be home, eat dinner before, get downstairs, watch the show together. And it kind of made it like a almost maybe more of that scheduled kind of book club interaction. But nowadays I think there's a lot of people who just binge watch a ton of TV and kind of miss out on that social aspect that it could be.

SPEAKER_02 55:27

That's very interesting. And David knows this that. So for example, the bear, I knew that this was going to be the last season. And I could have sat down and watched the entire thing. And boy, after each episode, I seriously wanted to, but I there was something within me that very specifically went, no, I just want to one at a time savor process, think things through all of that kind of thing. Plus, I didn't want to get to the very last episode as soon because I was going to be so sad when it was finished. But that was just me myself doing like parsing it out that way. But I do kind of wonder how some people gamble and if there are some people that might have difficulty with being able to have that constraint to be able to do that.

SPEAKER_01 56:16

I think a lot of people have difficulty with that constraint to be able to do that.

SPEAKER_00 56:20

So it is interesting how it's gone from that would almost force you to savor and enjoy and process each episode because you're forced to watch it week by week. And there are still some subscriptions services that still do the week by week episodes. But I have noticed that there is a trend of just dropping eight episodes all in one go. And I'm even I've fallen victim to this as well, where I just watch four hours in a row, and David could be like, How was it? And I'd be like, it was good. It was really good. But then he'd probably be like, So what happened? And I don't know if I could 100% be able to pull the full storyline out of that just because I had watched almost too much of it in one go.

SPEAKER_01 57:03

And I do think that has probably hurt the social aspect of it, like we were talking about before. It probably hurts people's memory of it. It stops you from slowing down. But I do want to give a little bit of a devil's advocate. There is something to the ability to binging where you get this level of immersion as you're just continuously going through the story that makes it feel almost even more like you're living it because you don't have these breakpoints where a whole week of work and whatever happens in between, you remember exactly what just happened. And you're like, you're with it and it pulls you in. So like I get it, I do enjoy really binging it. And my only other thing is there's some sort of in between with the most recent Stranger Things. Whenever they were dropping the chunks of it to be binged, we were binging those chunks with Anna and Will and Nora and Mario and looking forward to it and still planning it as a party. So I don't think that's totally gone. I think there are people that plan like binge parties now. So yeah, it is it's interesting.

SPEAKER_02 58:10

You lose the rush of a cliffhanger.

SPEAKER_00 58:14

True. I think it's a little different of a different personalities probably come into play a little bit. I know, David, you do tend to be more of a binger of TV shows. That was something I had to learn the hard way early in dating, where we would start a show together and I'd find out that David was watching it without me. But it is interesting how different people are going to want to absorb their television shows just in different ways. Like I I tend to enjoy the like waiting, forcing yourself to kind of take time.

SPEAKER_02 58:55

It's funny you say that because this is us was John considered it my show, and he would say, Are you going to watch your show? And if I had something that night, or if he had something that night, he would specifically ask that I wait to watch it so that he could see it too. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 59:11

He didn't really care about watching it. That's cute.

Finding Balance And Final Takeaways

SPEAKER_01 59:16

So I guess just to kind of round this out, it is easy to take media and view it as unproductive. There's a lot of you have to be doing productive things, taking action, all of this hustle culture that almost makes it seem like you're wasting your time if you're watching a show or if you're doing things that aren't quote unquote productive. But I think we've made a pretty good case for the fact that this can be a part of your life that is both helpful and healthy, but also can have productive aspects to it.

SPEAKER_00 59:56

Says the guy who's making me watch every Marvel TV show ever made before I can go see the new Spider-Man movie.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:03

I caved on some of that. We're just getting through the Punisher stuff, okay?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:08

So it sounds to me like with all of this, it's a balance. Like we need to be productive in life, we need to have opportunities to have the release, we need an entertainment, etc., etc. So it's pretty much finding that balance.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:23

Shades of gray, if you will.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:25

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:26

Thanks for joining me here today, guys. I think it was a great curiosity conversation.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:32

Yeah, happy to be here.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:34

Thanks for chatting. My first one, looking forward to more.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:39

And remember, you are enough. And you deserve to fill up your inner cup with happiness, true confidence, and resilience. Thank you for listening to the Sage Solutions podcast. Your time is valuable, and I'm so glad you choose to learn and grow here with me. If you haven't already, don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss out on more Sage advice. One last thing the legal language. This podcast is for educational and informational purposes only. No coaching client relationship is formed. It is not a substitute for the personalized advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional.