Why Doing Everything “Right” Still Feels Wrong

Welcome to Outside the Script. I'm your host Amanda Cooqueroo. And this is where I'm sharing one of my learning, building and figuring out and real time. Thank you for being here and welcome back. Today, I think we'll explore, I think, and just talk a little bit more about the different realizations and revelations and insights and things that are coming up for me and just thinking about the deep fault path and a lot of ways that we have been handed. You go to school, you're told to get good grades, go to college, get a good job. And then your life, you build your life around that job. Your schedule revolves around work, your energy revolves around work, your decisions revolve around work. And somewhere along the way, work stops being something you do, it becomes something you need to build your whole life around. And then burnout becomes normal, be entire all the time, coming down to the weekends, your notifications and feel like there's never enough time in your own life. You normalize being exhausted, we normalize not having enough time in our own lives for ourselves, for our children, for our family, our friends and our significant others. And if you're a mom, you're expected to lay a motherhood on top of that system. And you are, you need to come home, be a fully present mom, you need to do everything, fully show up for everything and you're expected to somehow have time for yourself. There's just like, I feel like an unspoken expectation that you just need to hold everything together, be patient, nurturing, organized, keep everything running, keep this ship sailing. And I don't think enough of us are talking about that there's no space left for you in that equation. Your needs come last, you run an empty and somehow this is considered normal. And many of us don't really question it. And a lot of ways. Every around us is really just doing the same thing. It looks normal. It's a responsible thing to do. It is what everybody is doing. It's I guess what life's supposed to be. But at some point I feel like for a lot of us that something starts to feel off and even know you're doing everything right, it doesn't necessarily feel right or good or this is not what I want for the rest of my life. And for me, it wasn't like one big moment. It's many moments and I've always questioned things to begin with. But I think I still fall victim in some ways to what we have been told to do and what is right. And I feel like there's many moments that I have really happy for me and almost trapped or overwhelmed. But my life always has looked decent from the outside. Like I have a chill home life. I have a wonderful husband. I have happy kids. I'm a happy person. I know when I never really know anything's wrong, especially with me. But internally, I felt like there's always so much pressure and circling and feeling like I need to figure this all out and I need to do this and that. And it almost just feels like a hamster will. Like just go and do and everything and take it on everything and take in this training and in that training. And me and my oldest used to laugh. And we felt like our life was like Groundhog Day. I'd go to work and I go grab him at school. We drive around, drive around, listen to his crappy music. And it was just like on repeat every day, after day, after day, after day, on repeat. Groundhog Day, baby. Yeah. And another thing I think too is I fall victim to and many of us do is we don't really know how to ask for help. We don't communicate what we need and I think many of us just do it alone or in silence and just always need it to be strong and plug in along and you just do what you need to do. You don't question it. You just stuff it down, just go. Just do it. I think even the last couple of years my body's become a little bit more tired and even from like pregnancies and breastfeeding, gears are not great sleep and not fully feeling what I need to feel. I'll I want to tell you this little story. So when I was 17, I found this book, You Can Heal Your Life by Louise Hay. And the premise of it is basically your thoughts, create your reality. There's a whole section in the back if you're experiencing something, this is probably why and then use this affirmation and you say it over. And you know what the book really has served me really well and has changed my life and has shifted my mindset and the way that I view life. And many ways and many miracles and synchronicities and I would just feel like I would always be at the right place at the right time. I'd always run into the like a right person at the right time. And it was really beautiful and also if any of you are familiar with the secret, the movie and there's a book to it. But when the secret came out, I would watch that movie on repeat. It was all about the law of attraction. So in a lot of ways, I still truly believe that thoughts do create reality. But I'll tell you like when something might happen or off of like, oh, my mindset wasn't right. My energy wasn't high enough. My vibe wasn't high enough. I need to think better. I need to be better and then everything would fall into place. But what I didn't realize is that I was using this like positivity to avoid what is actually feeling in that I think has a big problem because then it turns like that was like years of suppression. I've not truly allowed myself to feel and to be human, you need to feel. You need to feel it all, right? Like positivity, just stuff it down like just kumbaya it away definitely has caught up to me. I definitely still believe in the power of thought and positivity. But I also need to know that I'm human and I need to feel the anger, feel the rage, feel upset that I'm not a bad person. It's not that I wasn't positive enough or X, Y, Z because this thing happened. And also another thing that I feel like I've been realizing as I'm getting older is that life is just really short. I don't know what it is, but something happens. I feel like when you turn 40, like when I turn 40, like a lot of things just sat at shift and for me like internally and like I'm just like I want to start living my life. So if the age expectancy is 76, I will say and I only have 36 years left on this planet, I don't have a lot of time left. And I really want to make good. I really want to make the best of these years. I want to go for things. I want to experience life. I want to see what life has to offer and it's crazy as the world is right now. I still think that life is so beautiful and there's just so many beautiful opportunities and so many beautiful people in the world and just so much out there for us to explore. So yeah, and I feel like on paper or like in general, like my life was fine. Everything was good. Like I said, when I turned 40, like there was like this, like I got to start living this life that I truly want to live and not be living for other people. And then I got sick, the mold and needed to move and my daughter getting sick and that was like a huge catalyst. I feel like this year for me and my family for sure and it forced everything to the surface for me. So just so much has been brought to the surface in lieu of the mold for sure. I needed to slow down. I needed to start feeling the things instead of pushing them away. I needed to get real with my husband. I needed to learn how to communicate that's a process like I am like especially more so with like my husband. I feel like I'm going to be a little bit more mature. I feel like I can communicate pretty well when I think overall, but there's something like me and my husband definitely needed to work on that. And I also realize I've been carrying so much in my life. And I've been a person who does everything by herself because I can and I'm capable and that's just what I've always done. I've always just done everything myself. I've been growing up when I was younger. In second grade, my mom already had left for work so I'd get up every morning by myself. I'd get myself ready, I get myself dressed, I'd feed myself, showered out the door when I would come home. My mom still wouldn't be home so I'd come home. I'd cook myself a little snack, do whatever I need to do. And then I'd go out and play and then when I'd come in, my mom finally be home, but then I would cook myself dinner. And like second grade. Like I've just always relied a lot on myself and have just always been super independent and have just been able to, I don't know, just do it. But it's not necessarily healthy either. Like I don't need to be strong all the time and I'm not weak if I ask for help. We all need help for sure and we all need to learn to ask for help because people are not mind readers. Your husband's not a mind reader. I can't read my husband's mind. So if we don't communicate or tell each other what we need, nothing's going to move forward. The needle's not going to move forward. And yeah, it's just things are not going to go where they need to go. Yeah, and I just think over the winter, I'm just like really been thinking about there's another way to live. There's so many ways to live outside this cookie cutter path box script that we have been fed. But I think the hardest part is for a lot of us is that we don't even realize that we're stuck because this is just what life looks like. This is just what we do. And everyone around us is like basically doing the same thing. So we don't really question it. You just think this is what life's supposed to look like and if something fails off, it's just, yeah, you're fine. Just plug along, go get your kids, do what you need to do. And I think another big piece of this is fear. Fear of the unknown, fear of instability, fear of doing something different than everyone else is doing, fear of embarrassment, fear of being uncomfortable. The list goes on forever when it comes to fear and I'm definitely guilty of that fear. Fear really has a chokehold on pretty much all of us. And we can't see another way. So we just stay where we are not because we want to, but because it feels safe, because it feels safe. And I also think that we've been conditioned to believe that we don't even have that much power. And the truth is that we have way more power than I feel like we're led to believe, way more power. And we don't realize it because like also we've never been shown another way. I think this is where everything's starting to change for me and my life and what I'm doing is like, I don't need to have it all figured out. But when I just start to become aware of something, aware of how it actually feels, aware of what's not working for me anymore, aware of my patterns. And I think that's a big one is being aware of patternings. We all have patterns. And because when you see it and you realize these things, you can't really unsee it. And it doesn't mean like we need to blow our life up overnight. And it doesn't mean like we need to pack our bags and move to Baham is tomorrow. But I think that it means that we just start asking different questions. Like, does this actually feel right for me? Does this actually, do I actually want this? Or is this what I've been taught to want? Or even just asking questions like, I think just even asking questions starts to shift something. Things are coming up and don't judge it, but meet it with curiosity. Like, okay, that's interesting. Yeah. And so not getting too caught up just like when things come up, just feel them allowed to come up and just meet it with curiosity and be like, oh, hey, like a friend. Oh, this is interesting. And for me, a big part of that shift is I think learning to slow down and to stop trying to force everything. And I think that's key. Like we can't force these things. There needs to be like some type of organic. I think flow, it's like a step by step thing. And I think you just need to put in the reps. And I do believe in the power of like compound effect in slowing down, stop. I'm trying to stop forcing everything, actually like listening to myself, like really just learning to listen and to feel what's coming up inside pushing it away, especially if it feels quote unquote negative. Because when you're in consistent motion, I don't feel like you give yourself this base to actually hear what you need. And like that is something I'm really quite guilty of in a lot of ways. And I think there, that's where clarity does come from, not from the doing more, not from the productivity, not from the go-go, not from the grind, but creating from space, space to feel, space to think, space to question. And I really believe that's where a different kind of life starts to open up for us. I think that's what it is. Learning to be a little more present, to slow down a little more. I do think that it becomes more clear, it becomes more evident of what you need to do. So that's been interesting for me and I think it's a big one. And so I just like to say just because something is normal, it doesn't mean that it's right for you. And you don't have to have it all figured out. And this is one of the biggest things that has kept me in a loop for years. And a lot of, I think, the reasons of why I have not propelled myself for it in a lot of ways because I didn't have it all figured out, but I stayed in this loop of trying to figure it out. I stayed in this loop of pressure. I stayed in this loop of thinking everything needed to be perfect. And then I would fully put myself out there. It just doesn't work that way. It just doesn't. For me, it doesn't work that way. And I think for a lot of people. And I think that I can work for people in the beginning, but I don't think it would be sustainable long term. So I would say just stay open and stay curious because you really don't know where life can lead you when you start questioning what you've always assumed was the only way. So yeah, thank you for being here. Thank you for listening. If this resonates with you, I would love for you to follow along. And I will see you in the next episode. So much love to you.