Embracing Unknown & How to Become Comfortable With it

In this episode I discuss realizing and understanding that discomfort with the unknown is a sign of growth. 

That every discomfort is asking us to look within and expand.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Hello, sweet souls. Welcome to Minding My Manifestation, where I take you along with me on my manifestation and spiritual journey while also helping to guide you through yours. If you're ready to create new habits, discover deeper truths, expand your mind, and become the best version of yourself one day at a time, then this podcast is for you. Each week, I'll discuss my inner standing of the world around us, manifestation, and how you can shift your current patterns of thinking and being to align more deeply with your soul's purpose. Think of this podcast as your weekly dose of how you can change the world around you by changing the world within you. So grateful you're here. Let's get into it. Hello, sweet souls, and welcome back. So today's episode is going to kind of be just some, maybe some soul lessons of what I've learned over the last few months. If you haven't listened to a little bit of a story time on the last episode, just go back and listen to that. I kind of talk about how I was really uncomfortable and some of the challenges I faced. And then now we're trying to take that and move forward. So today's episode, we are talking about the unknowns and how to get comfortable being uncomfortable. I kind of just made that one up on the fly, but that kind of feels like the truest title for what I'm trying to talk about. As I mentioned in the last episode, I moved across the country. I'm sorry, I moved across the world, back to the States from Japan. And wow, life was kind of wild and a little chaotic. And again, as a military family, there's like so many unknowns. There's so many things that could change last minute, so many things that is kind of out of our control, in a sense. So there was a lot of things that was very uncomfortable for me. And I had to confront them. And instead of confronting them, I kind of avoided them. And I just, I put them off and just was wishing for the best, right? Like I kind of never really brought my feelings and my concerns for the service, if that makes sense. And not in the way that like I never discuss it, but more in the way that I don't give myself space to feel what I'm feeling. I probably seemed really calm on the outside and maybe to those around me, but like inside, I know that I'm panicking. I know that I am having a little freak out party because things aren't going the way that I like or the way that I know and the way that I feel to be familiar. And familiar is comfortable. And I was so uncomfortable. Not having any clear direction of what is next, not having any idea of like an end date of when we could potentially move into a military house, right? That sort of thing. It kind of just gives you so much anxiety inside because you don't know what you don't know, right? And especially with my children, I just want them to have somewhere safe to be and I want to feel secure in that. I want to parent them in like a safe environment. I don't always want to be in a hotel. And so, again, with the military, there was just like so many things that were just unanswered and that no one had an answer to, really. It was kind of a broad answer of like, we'll let you know when something becomes available. And it's like, that's not really good enough, you know? Again, if you haven't listened to that episode, please go listen to it because this will make so much more sense if you know what I'm talking about. Honestly, it was so stretching for me. Like it was very uncomfortable. I was in like panic and anxiety mode, maybe 90% of my day. And I'm gonna give myself grace because I know there was a lot going on. But how you are and how you're being affects those around you, right? And so because I'm this way and I knew I was this way, I know that that was rubbing off on my kids. And gosh, that sucks, you know, just to be so overwhelmed and overstimulated and also mothering. It basically got to the point of me like just kind of high anxiety, panicky type of feelings inside that I had to like really stop and pause and I had to ask myself, like, okay, all of this is going on for a reason. Why? Right? What does me being uncomfortable do for me? How does it benefit me? And what could this season and moment be teaching me? And basically, after sitting with it, thinking about it, also looking up some things that could be helpful, I kind of came to this realization that discomfort isn't always a sign that we're on the wrong path, right? Discomfort is literally a lesson for the soul. It is teaching us something. And I just didn't know what the clear message was in that moment. Being uncomfortable is a sign that you are in the middle of growth. Our brains naturally prefer predictability because familiar situations equal less energy and they just feel safer. Oftentimes, when something feels unfamiliar, notice that you pay more attention, right? It's kind of one of those things where you're learning to drive for the first time. So instead of you having this muscle memory where you just know how to maneuver, your brain is on high alert, paying attention to all the details because there is no familiarity. It feels crazy uncomfortable. So again, when I sat down and got clear and asked myself these questions, like, what is this trying to teach me? When I'm looking at everything from a zoomed out perspective, where I was clinging on the most to, what made me feel so uncomfortable, showed me exactly where I was attached to. It was showing me what I was clinging to. And that was a routine. That was familiarity in the things that I do and how I show up. And because I didn't have my routine, it kind of felt like I didn't have my identity. And stripping away your identity, especially in a new city, in a new place, not knowing where anything's at, it feels scary. And I realized the very thing that I was trying to control, I had no control over. And so it was kind of hard. You know, it was kind of hard for me to go from a place of routine knowing what's next to absolutely not having a clue as to what is going to happen next. And I was so, so, so invested in the routine that I had back when I lived in Japan, and then to move to a new space, a new place, and just have that completely shrift away from me. Like this may sound silly, but because my brain was looking for familiarity, the only thing that I could do to fulfill the need of like, I need something familiar was going to get coffee. And that might sound so silly, but looking back at it now, that is maybe one of the only things from my routine that I was able to kind of implement in this like new area. And honestly, although it was a really rough few months at the time, looking back on it, it was really building this self-trust with myself. Okay, we can handle hard things. It was collecting data on myself to say, you know what? Things are hard, but they won't be hard forever. And you know how to handle it, you know how to move through it. So let's do it. You know, the only way to get through something is to get through it, right? Like to get on the other side of it, you have to go through it. And being so uncomfortable in a new space and a new place with no familiar anything, you guys know that that feels scary. But at the same time, it kind of feels liberating. You get to do a new thing, you get to learn new things, learn new routes, learn new places, create yourself a new schedule, a new routine. And when I kind of got clear on the bigger picture of just, hey, this is for my greater good and everything has always worked out for me, and this is no different. Once I kind of like shifted back into that mindset, I kind of thought, like, well, whatever happens, I'll figure it out. It's okay. It is okay. Like, it's okay to feel uncomfortable. In fact, I want to feel more uncomfortable because I know that that means growth. And the way that you can maybe pinpoint out why you feel uncomfortable is to ask yourself questions, right? What is this trying to teach me? What is this discomfort trying to show me? What do I need to learn here from this situation? Because it can open up a lot of things. And maybe those answers don't come to you so quickly and so easily. But let it sit with you, journal it out, get some peace and clarity on it, and you will figure it out. Whether it be teaching you to have some patience, to be a little more courageous, to set your boundaries. Or maybe it was one of the things that I mentioned, which was trusting yourself or even letting go of control and maybe even switching your mindset, right? Like to thinking that discomfort isn't always something that I need to avoid. Even though our bodies and our mind thinks that's something we want because we're looking for safety, it's trying to keep us safe. Maybe instead of thinking discomfort is something that I avoid, you can shift it to sometimes it's something to investigate. Maybe the discomfort is showing me something that I need to look more into. I need to get more curious and figure out why I feel this way and what I can do about it. And let me just preface really quick that not all discomfort is the same. Okay. Sometimes discomfort can be about learning or healing or stepping into something meaningful. But on the other hand, discomfort that comes from being mistreated or staying in an unsafe situation is a signal to pay attention and protect yourself. Okay. So the goal isn't to seek discomfort for its own sake, it's to learn to tell the difference between discomfort that's helping you grow and discomfort that's telling you something needs to change. Okay, so I want to close out the episode with just becoming comfortable with the unknown. And the way that you can try to do that is notice when your mind is trying to be a fortune teller and predict the future. Slow down your breathing, come back to your breath, be in the present moment, focus on the now and trust yourself, listen to yourself. Like literally go inside your mind and just hear yourself. Sometimes we need to be heard by ourselves because the outside noise is so distracting. And I truly, truly mean this. I know firsthand that when life hits you, it can hit you. And sometimes it's scary, sometimes it's uncomfortable, sometimes it's both, sometimes it's all of it, right? All the things, all the feelings. And one of the things that I know to be true, especially with this sort of awareness and understanding, is that we need to learn to listen to ourselves more and trust ourselves more. The answers, they show up in different ways in your body. And I invite you to get curious on how that looks for you and what that feels like. Thank you for being with me today. All right, sweet souls. Until next time. If something I said today resonated with you, take it as a sign. You were meant to be here. I'd love if you'd subscribe so we can keep exploring the truths beneath the noise, unlearning what we've been taught, and remembering who we really are. If you want to connect more, you can find me over on Instagram at Minding My Manifestation. Alright, sweet souls. Until next time.