#1793 F**k Your Feelings (Or Maybe Not) - Unna Goldsworthy

to Geelong, not left the country. And there was a competition to try out to be part of one of the above amateur geelong netball teams and the night before because I just couldn't get enough of Neddie, like just any time when I could get it, I got it, and someone asked me to fill in the night before in a competition, some blazing around the court doing my thing. Goldfence was my favorite team. You cannot get any better than the feeling of an interception, like the timing's perfect.

tiny little prawn to wow wow within seconds. And I don't know if there was any crunching or cracking because I'd done that ankle before and that it passed, and yeah, it wasn't the best.

was training away from the training. So when the other kids would do Monday night Tuesday Night footy and play on the weekend, like training and then play on the weekend. I would train pretty much every other day all the time, for a range of unhealthy reasons, right, but it got me very very very fit and pretty fast and reasonably skillful. So I took my very mediocre baseline talent and genetics and kind of tweaked them as much as I could

with the amount of expertise I didn't have. And yeah, and so I think we had about thirty or forty players in our team, obviously not that many on the field, but and they picked four to go and try out for what was called the interleague team, where they picked the best players from all the teams in the comp And I did all right, And I think I made the first cut and the second cup, but not the

final cut. And so I was but I was well aware of how good I wasn't so I was kind of pretty happy with that I went because I went from being the fat kid who never even got a game too, through nothing but just focus and commitment and a little bit of resilience. So it's good what we can do when we optimize. We've got to work with what we've got to work with. Speaking of that, let's talk about grown ups. Let's talk about grown ups. I

want to talk about a few things today. Just remind people who are or just either remind listeners who've met you but can't remember exactly what you do, or new people because new people will hear you today. Give us the quick snapshot of your job, your quals, and kind of what you do in this space.

And then there's transitions where we go, okay, this I'm redundant or I'm being put into a new role, and we start to get this weird human experience where we doubt ourselves all of a sudden because we've defined ourselves by what we did for fifteen years, and then who am I when I'm looking for something new? So I help people define that space and get rid of old habits and patterns that are serving us anymore. And that's

done in a couple of ways. It's well on a movement, the name of my business is a movement is part of it because I'm an exercise physiologist, But the movement part of it is more a collective or mindset movement that we need to have a really good understanding of who we are and how we get in our own way before our health can come on board. So in three we can do that with exercise to some degree.

But it's not an amazing tool, and it's not a tool that many adults commit to for long enough time to really test or stretch their capacity.

or I would be the beginner. So exercise doesn't teach us that. In exercise, we absolutely stretch and create capacity in our will and I can do hard things, and we within that process we make our brains stronger, and we do all these things at health performance in the long run. But I think the challenge is that most people don't actually engage, or a not of us, not enough of us engage in exercise in the way that would create that. And what we have to generally do

first is get out of our own way. And usually what happens in a six or eight week period of working with someone is we get behind the reasons we make decisions, and then we haven't actually talked about putting exercise in yet, and people often just come back and go, hey, I just went to an exercise class last night for the first time because I felt like that's what I

wanted to do now. Because you just we create more time capacity, We create more capacity to get out of our own way and our own narratives and stories, and we make more room to make health decisions outside of fitness decisions.

enjoy it, or you'll have a mind shift. So like, it's amazing how much people's attitude and thinking and outlook an emotional state and level of optimism changes once they've got six, eight, ten weeks of something constructive and consistent under their belt. So I don't think it's one or the other. I think it's probably and also, as you and I both know it, different approach is going to

work for different people, isn't it. It's like some people just dive the fuck in, but for some people, some other people, it might be maybe go away and figure psychological and emotional stuff out a little bit, and then maybe when you genuinely are ready to do the work and roll up your sleeves, then come back. But it's probably not a three step plan for anyone.

where you get to go. So what got in the way? So a good example, and to your point, right, maybe nutrition is the first point. Maybe that's the block that's blocking our access to you know, there's lots of windows to look through, but The one that pops up for me that might be helpful for people is working with someone the other day and they had engaged in going to the gym fantastic and the leave it that they needed to pull. We're looking to have fun and take

the perfectionism away. So part of that was that they were going with a friend so that they could keep the friendly, the playfulness about it, all that kind of thing. So they're cruising off to go to the gym and they're meant to be meeting up with this person and they get a text last minute that their training partner can't arrive, and they were out of the car on foot about to walk in the door, got the text, turn around and didn't go in. So that was the

perfect session for us to peel away. Why did you choose that you didn't belong in the gym at that moment without that safety blanket. Why did you choose to abandon your goal of what you need physically, mentally, emotionally

in ten years time. Why did you take away that little moment to give yourself that So it was a wonderful deep dive, and now they've got skills so that when they're at the door and they're getting that whatever they feel that has them procrastinate in you know, in air quotes, because most of the time procrastination isn't a

lack of idea or a lack of capacity. It's to me, it's a narrative that's boiling up that you just haven't figured out how it's presenting, and that feeling that you go, I felt this before and it's uncomfortable and I don't want to deal with it.

that's just fear based bullshit. It's understandable, but really, do we need do we need to be holding people's hands so much to get them to walk in? Like can we not just go, hey, you're a fucking adult, walk in it's okay. You'll be uncomfortable. A couple of people might look at you, Probably not in truth, nobody get everyone thinks right, I've had this so much that and this is a bloke who spent his life in gyms. People who don't go to gym's think that when they

go to the gym, everyone's gonna stare at them. I'm like, you are not that fucking special, and everyone in the gym is pretty much looking at themselves, looking at their phone more and more these or thinking about themselves. So just go the fuck in, get through, and if you feel uncomfortable, that's fine. Guess what life's uncomfortable like when we have to be given therapy to people about just fucking turning around at the gym door. I'm like, what how much resilience don't we have?

to get over that line. But I think the bigger thing there is that people are operating at a capacity where they actually just don't I don't know how much shit they've got on their plate and if they had room for it. So we're from a nervous system point

of view, we'd call this the window of tolerance. And when we've got so much on our plate, from a nervous system point of view, I've got this stacked up, this stacked up, this stacked up, and we don't give ourself enough space to go, oh, I'm actually processing thoughts that aren't helpful for me at the moment, or of taking my feelings really seriously. And it's more about I'm sensing a feeling, not that that feeling is correct or helpful.

That we're so bombarded that we can't make those distinctions. So we kind of get bossed around by our internal dialogue and our sense of our body, and then before we know it, we've turned around and we're back in the car, before we've even done a gym session or given ourselves that chance to knock on the boss's door like.

the world right now, in the world. I don't mean in Australia, I mean around the world, living in horrible fucking situations, who every day have to deal with harder things than most of us will deal with once in a year, and every day that like they don't have time for a breakdown, they don't have time to turn around and walk the other way, like they just find a way. Now, I'm not saying where we can shit,

we're not. We're all human. But I just wonder if you know, like when you don't for example, if there was no option but to walk in the gym, that person will just walk in the gym. But they have an option. Ah, I'm not gonna nah, I'll come back. And when you were always giving yourself a get out out a jail card, it's like people say to me, oh, I just can't do whatever fill in the blank. Now

we're talking about something that is actually quite possible. Well, the truth is you can, and the other truth is you won't though. There's a big difference between I can't and I won't, right like, and I'm not saying you should. I'm just saying, let's be clear about what is true. You actually can walk ten thousand steps a day. You can because you're not injured, you're not morbidly obese, you're not you know, you're not a weirdo. It's like, you can, but you won't. And I'm just using that as a

practical example. We're so preoccupied with finding reasons to fail and excuses to avoid things, but we're not solution focused. And I feel like we're molly coddling everybody who you know, Oh god, I don't know. I know I sound harsh, but I'm like, fuck, what has to happen. It's like, when you've really really got like terribly horrible, real hardshit going on, what happens then if we can't deal with the day to day stuff, Am I being insensitive? No?

decision made like you're stuck. But I think the challenge is that our operating system, i e. Our brain, which we never got given a manual for, is actually preoccupied with making sure that we're safe. And for some people, they don't even they're not even aware or conscious that they're making these decisions. And then you add up a couple of years and I still haven't asked for that raise, or we still haven't gone for that holiday, or because

I've committed over committed myself to things. So it's but I get that, but I think we also need to be sensitive to the idea that the broken leg is visible and it's obvious to us. The challenge of internal mind crutches is harder for even us to forgive ourselves and then go on. So we end up in these loops that feel more cognitively comfortable, and then that's how

we abandon our health. And again it's you know, not everyone needs it, but I think for those that we can hold that space for, we then create big capacity for them to go, oh shit, I've I've got way more in me. I've got way more. And I think that's why I sometimes exercise doesn't work. First. Yeah, sometimes for people because they can't even get in the door.

all right, well you can lose weight. Have you ever done anything clever or yeah? Well then you're not an idiot? Right, And I think and it's it's difficult because it's we need different things for different people, of course, but everyone wants to be resilient. Nobody wants to be weaker, nobody wants to be less functional, nobody wants to be less healthy, nobody wants to be physically weaker. So if you sit a hundred strangers in a room and say, listen, don't

overthink this, but put up your hand. If you'd like to be more resilient, more mentally and emotionally capable than you are right now, I would think every hand would go up. I've done similar things, and typically every or nearly every hand goes up, and then cool. How do we build mental and emotional resilience? How do we become

more capable of performing under pressure? Well, not by avoiding pressure, not by taking the wide path instead of the narrow path, not by choosing easy, not by turning around at the fucking gym door when you're dressed to go to the gym, and the gym's in front of you, and you remember, and then we go, oh, I understand, Like really, when do we go? Hey, I'm on your team, I'm all for you, but you're forty and it's not my job to tell you what you want to hear, or rub

your back or make you feel okay. It's your job to be brave, to do new things, to try to improve and learn and grow if they are your goals. If not, then forget everything I'm saying. But like this thing that when you mollycoddle people five years down the track. It's not a good outcome, Like there's no they don't get magically better.

My son graduated from grade sixty other day and they asked them what do you want to be known for? Majority of them said they wanted to be known for being kind and we're being rough here because they're water they're twelve and eleven type thing. But I just sat back and thought, Wow, a lot of you little shits are actually really bullies. You've been problematic through the year, so what about you know I'm kind, Let's just be realistic. You're kinder than you were the other day. But when

you've lost you know, we've pushed yourself. You haven't slept enough, you didn't go to the gym to clear your head, you haven't been eating right. Your kindness slides a little further back down, like you're not kind. Your variations have kind based on the choices that you make. So when you go, okay, when you flip exercise, I'm not doing exercise just to be an exerciser, and that's how I get healthy. When you flip and you go. If I don't exit size, my capacity to be kind and how

I want to operate in this world goes down. Then is that an easier way to walk through the gym. I'm not doing it for my body or the fear of what other people think, and my judgments of them are also my judgments of myself. It's like, hey, I'm walking into the gym to work on my capacity to be available and kind because I know if I don't, I slide down the scale of kindness. So we think of ourselves in absolutes. I am and it's ah, I'm

having the thought that I am. I notice I'm having the thought that I am kind, But I was actually a bit rude to the supermarket checkout person. Then, because I'm in my thoughts.

fucking terrified and also courageous. That's a choice. So how do I be brave? And being brave is for some people, being brave is running into a burning building. For some other people, it's looking someone in the face and having a conversation, and it will promote the same fear response in each person. So it's not a generic global thing. It's an individual thing. But yeah, I think just that

and that I want to be kind really. I mean, that's what people say when they've got to say something publicly, Like it's like, what's the right thing for me to say? You know? What's really the brave thing is to say, look, I'm pretty fucked up sometimes I've done good stuff and bad stuff. I'm a work in progress. I'm pretty flawed, but I'm trying. You know, that's more real. I mean, that's like, well, that's all of us. Like, let's not

pretend that your overarching goal in life is kindness. Sounds beautiful, but it's just not fucking true because all I've got to do is stand back and look at you and what's your behavior. There's very little kindness going on.

are not always true and helpful. And that the control agenda that I can control all my feelings, i e. I have to feel good about walking into the gym is an illusion. So there's the paradigm shift. I can still walk into the gym and be feeling nervous and judged at the same time. Right, it's not that we're sitting on the couch and going that, you know, that's the paradigm shift. It's that not all thought, thoughts, and

feelings aren't good or bad. It's how I operate around them that is defining my health and the path and the potential that I take. And then we're just looking for patterns that pops up. It's the same thing, but it pops up in seven of my relationships or five of my environments, and I say I want X, y Z, but I end up operating in a way that completely ham strings hamstrung. Is that the phrase I hand.

that was a thing, and that triggers this. But then before you know it, you're in an argument, and then you've taken on a role at work that you don't need to and now, all of a sudden, you're working till six and that was the time you were meant to be at the gym, and you've got no problem walking walking into the gym. But we've responded to a thought or a feeling in a way that then has increased our workload on our nervous system or our literal workload.

And we're working by a lamp when we should be at home with our family. So it's how we're responding to them, and how do they flow into how much energy I've got left in the day to look after myself and how effective have I been doing the things that I'm meant to be doing all day?

done quite a bit and doing more. I'm sure now that when you step up in front of a group that even though you're doing the same thing, you're talking to a room full of people, same person doing the same thing essentially, which is talking about stuff to a group of people that are listening to you talk about stuff, the experience is quite different, not because it's a radically different situation, but because your relationship, the way that you

think about that, your feelings about that, your paradigm with that, you and that have shifted, right, And so it's the same with as you said, with you know, the first time someone goes to the gym, maybe they're terrified. And I'm not saying, hey, don't be terrified. I'm saying, I understand it. I understand it, and I get that it's scary, and I get that to you. This is for me, it's very familiar and comfortable, but I understand it's the opposite for you. And I'm not saying be more like me.

I'm saying, be exactly you, but come in anyway, because you need to get in shape, because we spoke about that. And then the second time it's less terrifying, and the tenth time it's it's a two out of ten, not a nine. And the twentieth time you're fucking excited because you met three people the bloke who owns the joint or the lady who owns the joints great, and you know what the machines are called, and you've got a bit of muscle, and you're a bit fitter and your

heart rates dropped and bibbitdy bobby boo. Same person in the same environment, completely different experience because they did the brave thing up front.

the first place. So the avenue that I come from is some people are able to get through the door and get that happening and then start working on these other things at that point versus sometimes we've got to come in from the other or and go, Okay, you've got a relationship with perfectionism that means that you never actually take the loop to manage your nervous system at work in a way that allows you to even get in the door because you've used all your time at work,

or your energy at work, and you've got fatigue that you know is apparently unanswerable for anything. No, it's because you're at work with your gearbox in neutral, reving the crap out of your nervous system car and running out of fuel while we're getting nowhere. So that's what I love. We can come in from and create change at a brain and nervous system level from exercise. We can do it from a mindset point of view, or you can mix the two together, but ultimately, for me it ends

up being one or the other. Door it presents itself through your behavior and then we figure out which way to go with it. But it's yeah, it's an interesting space to be in where people are willing to care for themselves. I think, ultimately is the perch that I sit on. It's just sometimes we get stuck on how to do it.

know them, but we're not best mates. Anyways, talking to them and I found he's a fuckingbarrassing. They said something and then I said something which could have been almost interpreted as you know, I caught a fish this big, And then I went, I caught a fish this big, right, It was a little bit of that, and as it was coming out of my mouth, I kind of laughed at myself and I said to him, that's embarrassing. I think I just tried to impress you, and he laughed.

I said, that's called self awareness, you know. And it's so funny because you know, I still do stupid shit where I'm insecure around some people and I want some people's approval and I want I want to you know, and I'm like, oh, but just in that moment and anyway, we chatted. Then I walked home and as I was walking home, I was thinking, not in a self loathing way, just in a curious way. I'm like, why did I

just do that? I almost never do that. I almost like, I rarely try to be impressive, because I think trying to be impressive creates the opposite result. Firstly, it's not a good idea, but then I went, oh, yeah, and it's just that I encourage people to think about how they think. You know, that metacognitive deep dive on what's going on in my mind with curiosity, not with judgment, but just what's going on in my mind? Why is that going on in what's going on in my nervous system,

what's going on in my body? More broadly, speaking of that, I want you to explain to us in regular, normal speak, not bloody on a exercise physiologist, academic genius speak, what's happening. I know there are a multitude of things, and then I've got a couple of specific things I want to ask you about. So if you could do a few minutes on this, this would be great, or as long as you need to. But when we are stressed and or anxious, and they somewhat work together, what's happening in

our body? What are some of the things that are happening in our body? And I know there's no three step fix, but talk to us around all that stuff.

love that, skip ahead. Little mouse, and they gave it the smell of let's say, lavender. I don't know what the smell was, but they gave it the smell of lavender. And then after a while they associated the smell of lavender with a shock. So they stressed that little mouse's nervous system out.

did was. They continue to train that mouse's nervous system with the smell being associated with the shock, and then that little mouse went off and had baby mice, and then with those baby mice, they tested the mice's nervous system so they would give it the smell of lavender, and the baby mice had the same nervous system response as the parent mouse getting a shock, but with no shock.

So what ends up happening is at the time of making a memory, there are two pathways that our brain can do that that then informs our nervous system about how safe we feel. So one is if we're breathing too fast and we've not got enough oxygen on board, and the other one if we tend to maybe hold our breath, which is a strategy we do when we're in shock or we're preparing for something. So our CO two is going up. So there's two pathways in the brain that then lock in that experience as a code

for don't do that again. It wasn't nice. So then we get these nervous system or these sensation or we've said before, the word interoception, this sensation that we get in our body from our nervous system about what's safe to do and what's not safe to do. So sometimes part of that walking in the gym is retraining our nervous system at a conscious or awar level that that thing isn't happening to me. It's just a sensation. So that here again, as you said, is it fact or

is it just a sensation? And that part of this process is helping to detach the body from what we would call a predictive system. This has happened before, so my body is predicting it to happen again. So it follows that system until we get to break the cycle. So it's that wonderful phrase of I notice it as it is versus it's not as it's saying it is. So the fear might say I'm in danger versus you go, no,

I'm just having a sensation and everything's okay. I'm going to keep pursuing my goal as I take this feeling with me, And as you said before, people can deal with that in different capacities. So that's where breath training can be a really powerful tool. But again with variations on you know what, trauma comes behind it or yeah, so an interesting quick story I can give you quick, quick quick as I had that pathway recently when my father passed away. It was a sudden, sudden that he

was going to be passing. So I had to jump in the car and drive probably about an hour and a half, not fully knowing what was going on, not knowing how much time I had. So in that state, my sense of what my body is telling me while I tell you this story is that I was breathing fast and shallow, so not enough oxygen on board, so which locks in the lactaate system in my brain to use energy. So then that locked in a little pathway

in terms of locking in memories in my brain. So then fast forward to when my father passed away, passed away, the next day he has Then I've gone back to do exercise. Eventually, you know, I went through appropriate grieving and eventually I felt like I wanted to use my body again. So then when I was exercising, the lac tape from my muscles was passing into my brain and unlocking the memories. So I would exercise and as soon as I got my heart rate up, I would burst into tears.

I had no expectation. I was just going there to do some work. Actually, and I've been to lots of lots of countries. I was excited to go there, but I wasn't. There was no expectation of anything, particularly other than people say it's nice. It was weird because I felt like I had come home. I felt a real sense of familiarity with like and a knowing with Irish people with the Irish accent. I stayed most of my

time in a country town called Tullamore. I don't know where my grandmother grew up, But bloody hell, it's like everything is so weirdly familiar and comfortable for me, like I could be here. Yeah, I don't know. And it's not that it wasn't like I didn't create it with my mind because I wasn't expecting it. I was just going to just like it's probably the twentieth country I've been to, right, so it was just another country. But I'm like, wow, have I been here? Did I used

to live here? Is this? Why? Why are these people? Why do I feel like I'm one of these people? I don't sound like them and they don't sound like me, but you know, yeah, amazing, there's definitely something that gets handed down.

that drives my decision. So that's where metacognition becomes way way, way more powerful because oh, what was the thing that happened just before? And it's not that I need to control it. I don't control agenda is not helpful because you know George Clooney's behind you. That can't stop you all the thoughts. It's then going, okay, I've got to have a relationship with the sensation that then turned the alarm down from a red to an orange, and maybe

an orange to a green. And then I'm operating in a space where I can have air quote threats, but I'm still able to turn up, which is a bit like your analogy about public speaking. Mine was about getting over the wrong and right story personally.

so and some of the consequences. You know, this is your area more than mine, but you know hip flexion, So what that means everyone is at the hip at your hip where your kind of Your legs are in front of you, and your thighs are horizontal or parallel to the ground, so and your knees a bent, and your shoulders are a bit forward, and your back's a bit hunchy, and your head sitting a bit forward, and tell us about tell us about some of the potential

carnage that's happening being a person like me. Let's not use me as an example, though, because I know you'll throw me under the bus, So fuck that. Because tell us about the dangers and potential solutions of being an oversitter.

so outges my sleep cycle. That email or the fifty email I've got all the article that I'm trying to write or whatever it is I'm so in tune with it that my nervous system is driving that I'm under a threat because I've got to get this done in time. And now. For some people that means no, excuse me, no hunger signals, but for other people it will mean

fifty hunger signals. For one person, they're not eating enough and then realizing they're hungry at the end of the day, versus the other person's going, oh my god, they're doing all this and then they're eating excess carbohydrates or something like that. So it always tips out to that type of behavior response because there's no flexibility in the nervous

system because we're sitting too long. So the benefit of exercise when we get out of that shape and move around is that we're stimulating our nervous system to rev up, and then that teaches us to deal with stress at a brain level. So after we exercise, we're actually more likely to have a better emotional response to a trigger, particularly after a high intensity exercise about in the coming I think it's like twenty four to thirty six hours.

So the opposite to that is if we sit and consume information constantly, we're driving this false version of an upregulated nervous system that then tells our body we need more adrenaline, we need more cortisole. Cortisole is great for our immune system, but not when it's aligned with not being able to turn off or have a task to align itself with. So there's all these kind of funny ways. Even with the way we breathe, we can't. We don't

breathe deeply when we sit. Our hip flexes, particularly our so as the deep guy that stabilizes the front of the spine is attached to the diaphragm. So when we don't actually stretch it with a normal full breathing cycle, we all say we've got tight hit flexes. My argument would be, we haven't taken a full breath for twenty six hours, so that might be part of the process where our body is not getting that stimulus of on off chain shapes front back, just absolutely down to the basics.

So I would offer people the idea that put on a timer for twenty minutes and if you're not taking a break within twenty minutes, and it can simply be looking to the side, look for the horizon, get you know, two minutes, one minute of a different physical shape or a different perspective done throughout the day is an absolute tuning of the nervous system that could be mind blowing for some people's healthy capacity.

people that have disautonomias, it's really bad for them. But for someone who's needing more movement and trying to manage the glucose level from that perspective and they've got nothing over there. Great idea, twenty minutes standing, twenty minutes sitting, twenty minutes standing, twenty minutes sitting. But I think remember that the brain is at the other end of that standing. So our body is not great at cycling blood and

less we're moving. So if you're standing still, that's a long way away for your body to be pumping blood. If your routine exerciser your blood vessels aren't great at pumping that up to you. So if you're standing chucking some calf rais is, march on the spot, do some

you know, some star jumps or something. And I think there's a beautiful study that came up recently which was ten bodyweight squats every forty five minutes helps us to regulate the neurotransmitters in our brains and our blood gluecose level in a profound way. So I don't think it's as simple as sit or stand. I think it's about what do I need to do to regulate myself with my with my health knowledge on board. Yeah.

from Melbourne. I'm doing a breath work session at two Session Piece that starts this Thursday at the wonderful Private Seat. That's an evening session to help people out with their schedules. And there's a beautiful online course that I'm doing called Meet Your Mind, which is basically diving into how do I do the stuff that you and I have talked about today? Yeah, that's a four week, four week little deep dive.