![Two Things Can Be True At The Same Time: Part 5 [The Mini-Series] (Normalizing the In-Betweens and Healing From Extremism) (Outweigh) - podcast episode cover](https://assets.metacast.app/images/episode/artwork/hUoxSDWi)
I won't let my body out be outwait everything that I'm made done, won't spend my life trying to change.
I'm learning love who I am again. I'm stan I feel free, I know every pardon me, it's beautiful.
And then we'll always out way if you feel it, but you are, She'll some love to the vio Why get there?
Take you one day?
Anta?
Did you?
And die out Way?
Happy Saturday? Outweigh Amy here and Leanne Ellington. Hello, Hello, we are back together. Leanne has been doing some other episodes, but we're continuing our two things can be True at the same Time mini series. So we did four parts of this a few weeks ago and now we're going to do four more. So definitely encourage you to go back and listen to those if you missed them, because
I think that there's a lot of in between. There's like, wait, this is how I'm feeling or that's how I'm feeling, and Leanne is the best one to help you understand and me understand, quite honestly, how well all.
Of this stuff can exist at the same time and it's okay.
And today we're touching on how you can be self endorsed and you can be super confident all the things, and you can also still care what other people think about you or fear judgment.
And I think that it's important to remember that.
One thousand percent.
Yeah, So the topic of self endorsement first kind of presented itself to me when I had this moment of awareness where I was like, Okay, if somebody's not telling me that I'm amazing, or telling me that I'm smart, or telling me that I'm pretty or anything like that, I didn't know who I was. I felt like a shell of a version of myself without relying on somebody
else to give it to me externally. And that was such a big awareness for me, because I felt like my brain was being hijacked and it was at the discretion of what other people thought, and not just what other people thought, what I thought other people thought, so my perceptions of their perceptions. And so this concept of self endorsement, like what would it look like if I, you know, really started paying attention to what I think and what I feel and what I say and who
I'm being in my own eyes. And as I started further studying the brain, specifically the female brain, specifically the female self image, that anterior singular cortex, that ACC that I talk about all the time. It just kept coming up and it made me realize, you know, because you've met people, you hear people being like, well, I don't really care what they think. And I do agree that the older you get, the more you really care what or I should say, the older you get, the less
you do care. But it's not practical or possible to never care because we have an entire part of our brain that is looking for the acceptance from other people.
Do they like me? What do they think? Are they judging me?
And we've talked about this too, that specific part of the brain, it's bigger and more active in females than it is in male, so especially at.
The younger years, like teenage brains exactly.
Especially that ACC really starts developing around puberty, so even as early as like ten to eleven for some girls, you know. So it's that awareness, and it's why the opinions of their friends matter so much more than the opinions of their parents, or their authority or their teacher,
right or it. Again, it just depends where that person lays on their version of the social hierarchy, whether they deem them more important socially, that's whose opinions will care more, right, And so self endorsement especially, I believe is important at as we as we are young to till forever. But that being said, it's not practical to not care what other people think, right, But again, we become a victim to other people's opinions all the time if that's all we're relying on.
So and I love that you mentioned a minute ago perceived perceptions. Yeah, because we're filtering something through our brain, or we make up stories and then it loops in our head and we feel like that's absolutely the truth.
And it may be, yeah, sort of the truth, but we make it far worse.
Yeah, it's a truth with a lowercase TA, which is really like a belief or a story or a meaning that we're giving it versus the truth with a capital T, Like what is the end all, be all truth?
And sometimes we'll never know, right.
But some things we do know, and we can also choose a new, more empowering truth to live by and new beliefs to step into. And that's where self endorsement comes into play. But coming back to the whole, two things can be true at the same time, like you can be self endorse you.
Can love who you are, know who you are, be really assured in who you are.
And so there's again multiple distinctions within here, and still care what other people think about you, right, And you can also care more about what you think about you than what other people think about you.
And so that's that's the bottom line.
If I were to say what self endorsement is, it's like caring just a teeny tiny bit more about what you think and what you say and how you feel about you and your value system and your integrity. Then you care about what other people think about you. But notice I didn't say not care what other people think about you. And then of course that goes into not relying on other people to fill you up internally for you to feel filled up yourself.
What if words of affirmation or your love language?
Sure?
Absolutely, And I'm a big believer in meeting yourself where you are.
So for the record, I'm telling all of this words of affirmation absolutely my number one love language.
Yeah, big time.
So you know, I think it's it's about again having both, not either or so for me, it's knowing that I also really like to have words of affirmation but I don't need it. So it's the difference between desire it versus require it. And then every once in a while you might require it in order to feel what you
need to fill yourself while you're filling up your own cups. So, for example, if there's something that you haven't yet stepped into, and an example of this would be I might call you and be like, hey, Amy, I am stepping out on this new ledge right now. I've never done this, I've never tried this, I've never witnessed myself being successful at it. I have faith and I know I'm still into it, but I'm a little bit wobbly right now.
And until I've figured out how to really believe myself, can you just remind me about what you see in me and what you say about me?
And there's nothing wrong with that, there's nothing wrong with getting endorsed by other people.
And so again desiring it but not requiring it to always need it, kind of like a drip feed of a drug to be able to manifest it within you for yourself.
So like if someone's having the body image thoughts, food thoughts and they're thinking negatively of themselves, a form of moving in the right direction to get past that would be who's someone you can call that could say, hey, can you tell me what you see in me?
So I have a question too.
About that, because, like, you don't want to comment on someone's body, but I guess hearing a friend or a loved one comment on all the things they love about you that have nothing to do with appearance, right, right, be a step in the right direction. And asking for that from those that are close to you is okay.
Yeah, such a great question, and you brought up some great distance. So first of all, yes, it's okay. What I would say is making sure that that's not all you're doing to fill up that self endorsement cup. And
so another way of looking at endorsement. Self endorsement is one of the kind of distinctions I teach my clients is, or I should say, when they come to me, the majority of their thought process is spent looking for what they're not doing, who they're not being, what's not working, what they don't like, what they don't have, what they're not proud of.
Right, So it's going in the opposite direction of endorsement.
It's really moving in the direction of shame, blame, guilt, comparisonitis, perfectionism, all those things.
Right, So, if that's what your brain space is used.
To looking for, it will continue looking for that until you need teach it a new pathway, and then you're kind of left to Okay, if I want to feel filled up, I need somebody else to kind of again drip feed me that dose of filling up my own self esteem or self worth cup. So one of the things I invite my clients into is this concept, so specifically with the body image. And again I'm never saying like, hey,
just take what I say as gospel. I'm always like, try it on, see how it fits, see what resonates. But to certain clients, I might say to them, hey, what if your appearance and your weight and what you look like was actually the least interesting thing about you.
What if there is so much more.
That is interesting about you that you just haven't explored and looked for because you've been kind of thinking about your weight. And so one of the things I invite them to do is start like a very specific self endorsement process, which is and it goes beyond the scope of what I'll share right now, but the meat of it is just start looking for what you are doing, who you are being, what is working, what you do have,
what you are proud of. Right, it's like the proud of side of it, because it feels so great if you told me, like Leanne, I'm so proud of you. But for me to manufacture feeling proud of myself, it's a stretch because there's cobwebs on that part of that brain.
Maybe it's never been used, maybe it hasn't been used in.
A very long time, and it needs the cobwebs need to be cleared, and that new pathway needs to be built. This is for the record, one of the most challenging things my clients is to start acknowledging, bragging on like a humble brag, so to speak, acknowledging themselves, celebrating themselves, being proud of themselves. But the reason I invite them into that part of the conversation is because it's literally the recipe for self endorsement. And it's not just about
the doing. It's not just about Okay, I checked off that box I wrote in my journal about three things I'm proud of today. It's about little by little, teaching your brain every day to go down that path to look for what you are doing, who you are being, what is working.
You know.
A metaphor for this is if you are metaphorically getting in your car every single day and driving south, right and south, meaning shame, blame, comparison itis, the opposite of self endorsement, what you're not doing every day. I mean, you don't even have to think about it. You could just get in your car and all of a sudden
you'll be heading south in that car. But once you switch into this mindset of what I'm what I'm sharing, it's you're not going to magically get in the car and it's all of a sudden going to turn around and go north.
Right.
At first, you're gonna have to, you know, get in the car, assume that it's going to automatically start going south, because that program in your brain just you know, start driving the direction that you always would.
And it's gonna take a lot of momentum.
And energy at first to literally like hit the brakes on the car, turn the car around, and then start driving north in this new direction that you don't have a map for right, So at first it's a lot of energy to go from south to north right north in this metaphor being who you are, being what you are doing, what you do, have, what you've created, what you're proud of, what you love, what you like.
But little by little, that car you're.
Again, it's not going to just automatically go north, but little by little it's not gonna take so much resistance to turn it around. And all of a sudden it's going southwest, and then northwest, and then all of a sudden it is going north. But it's about teaching your brand this new path as opposed to just okay, check that off. Wrote my gratitude journal, wrote my proud of journal.
Right if you did give me that homework assignment once, and I do think it's a good one to, like you said, have people do, but it's not the end all be all. But you were like Amy ought you to get in your journal, and I want you to brag on yourself to yourself and celebrate.
And that's what I did.
I wrote, I celebrate that I did this, and I celebrate that I am this way, and I celebrate these parts of me. And so my encouragement being someone that has done that exercise and has had similar thoughts to where I want to rewire.
I want to dust off.
Those cobwebs, would be absolutely do that, and then also just be patient with yourself, knowing that if the cobwebs are there, like something's blocked and you don't even know your fullest potential. You don't even know those parts of you yet that Leanne mentioned that are really awesome that have nothing to do with your looks.
You might be like, well, I don't, I don't know that I have anything.
Well, you do, but Leanne and I can certainly relate to the fact that you just haven't discovered that part of yourself yet or it was there maybe when you were a kid or before the food and the body image stuff started, and then that got suppressed and had to quiet itself because everything else was louder. And so we need to and I say we because I'm in the process of doing too. It's you're waking it back up.
Absolutely yeah. And you know we you could past present future. It's a great way to reconcile stuff from the past and then see what you're creating in reality. But the other thing, too, is like giving yourself grace that this is one of the most common I'm going to use the word fights that a lot of people slash women have is like knowing our worthiness, knowing why we're awesome, remembering it because I mean, when you think about yesterday,
what's the first thing that comes to mind? All the things you didn't do or all the things that you accomplished.
Oh, you know my yesterday.
I do know your yesterday.
Yesterday I was like, I don't know what happened.
But like, between might need external endorsement. I guess a baby.
Bird and a huge crack in my windshield and like, oh, we're taking care of our neighbor's cat. Couldn't find the cat. It's a black cat, by the way, And I thought, what in the world?
Like everything? And I don't like to get power to that.
I don't like to say everything's going wrong today, because then everything will continue to go wrong today. So I didn't do that yesterday, although I was very aware that lots of things were going wrong, but I tried to stay lighthearted about it and be like it is all going to work out all as well. And then today I'm trying to, you know, laugh about it more so that way I just can channel getting in the flow for good things.
But you know, I have stuff like that is just gonna happen, but it's part of life.
The main takeaway from this for me, speaking from someone that's done the celebration journaling, would be start to celebrate yourself.
And maybe you're not a journaler, well then I don't know.
When you're driving in your car, be like I am awesome because DA, or when you're at work, maybe you have to do it silently in your head and you know you just did an awesome presentation or turned in an awesome report, say wow, I am awesome.
I did that and it is good for sure.
And if that even feels like a far stretch for anyone, because you know, for some people that might be that might feel far away or braggadocious or whatever. Borrow the eyes of unconditional love. Borrow the eyes if you have somebody in your life that you're like, man, they always see the real me.
Borrow those eyes. You know, for me, I've borrow eyes like eyeballs.
Oh sorry, good distinction eyes I thought you're about to give us.
Yeah, I you know, borrow the letter eye on the alphabet acronym, you know, like let's go over all the eyes, like.
Yeah, I borrow somebody's pupils in metaphorical integrity.
What intelligence there you go, so eyeballs, yes, eyeballs.
Thank you for that clarification.
Go team, But yeah, borrow somebody's eyeballs ocular system and you know, just see yourself through them.
For me sometimes on in my journal.
And this is also me not coming from some high mountain of like, oh, I'm so self endorsed. I never you know, it's I'm constantly up against my own internal beliefs, and I'm always on the self imaging journey.
Because two things can be true to this in one thousand percent.
And I care what people think about me because I'm wired to care, right, But I also care what I
think about me, and I've placed precedents on that. But for me, sometimes I'll show up in my journal, but God, please just remind me who I am, show me who you see me as, because sometimes I don't have the strength or the resilience or the energy to pull from it myself, or sometimes I'm in the midst of something, you know, So even just borrowing those unconditional eyes of love, acceptance, grace, if you don't feel like you can engineer it yourself,
that's a great starting point, as well, but the bottom line is knowing, Like if you've ever said, man, I just wish I didn't care what people think about me, know that you're not wrong, broken, weird, weak for caring what people think about you. You are wired to care. But what we're inviting you into is just start looking for and paying attention to and starting to care about what you think and what you see and what you say in your opinion and view.
Of yourself just a little bit more.
It makes me think of the people that say that.
Do say, well, I don't really care what people think about me, and you might think, oh, I wish I was that way, But I would guess that they're saying that as a defense mechanism, because you're telling us that's sort of impossible.
We're wired to care, unless we're obviously going on the bridge of some sort of like disorder or sociopathy.
Okay, that's a whole nother podcast. So LeAnn, where can people find you?
Absolutely?
You can head on over to Stressless Eating dot com or I Am making my way on Instagram. Now welcome to twenty twenty three. So I'm Leanne Ellington over on her Instagram.
Her debut Leanne Ellington but I'm sure it's stresslessading dot com is there at Instagram icon they can click on?
If not, we should but walls okay, noted to do list. Did you hear that, Siri? Because you can you know you can put Facebook right?
Yeah?
Yeah you can't.
And maybe that she just double dog dareby people you heard it first. Yes, so we'll see see what happens.
I am at radio Amy and radio me dot com and actually I now want to go check radio me dot com and see if I have little icons because I don't know that I do, but I.
Appreciate websites that do.
Yeah.
So hope y'all are having the day that you need to have.
And Tuesday I'll be doing a fifth thing with Kat Thursday four Things. LeAnn has an podcast launching soon called What's God Got to Do with It? We're very excited, so more about that later and then of course we'll be back together to continue this mini series next Saturday.
All right, bye bye