How do you develop a sense of humor? Because just like, I had to unsnap the hold that the body suit had. It created so much freedom.

When you unsnap the judgment and the seriousness and the got to be perfect and act like a robot mentality that so many of us have.

You're missing out on one of the greatest joys in life, which is learning how to laugh at yourself. It's one thing to not give a shit about what other people think. For those of you interested, we did an incredible podcast about the art of not giving a shit. Hugely popular. You can check that out. We'll link it to the show notes. But this is about something else. It's about allowing yourself the freedom to be human and learning how to laugh at yourself.

Yeah.

And Amy, I want to bring you into this because you are a stand-up comic. You do improv. You actually perform on stages.

Yeah, at an amateur level. But yeah, because Because becoming someone who looks at the world in a funny way is not just something that you're born with. You can really get funnier, and you can develop a sense of humor beyond anything that you think that you have right now. And I think it's worthwhile.

Oh, I do, too. I think if you unpack that story, which it's pretty funny, but I think it's funny because it's relatable. And it's also funny because it's the things that we don't talk about. And I think when you make fun of yourself, you allow people to bond with you over the shit that's relatable in life. Yeah.

I'll do it.

Yeah. And so I think that that's a piece of it. If I had to give any advice about it, because this is something that I've been working on because I've always been so hard on myself and learning how to laugh at yourself, not in a condescending like, oh, but more like, that's fucking funny. That's funny that I just constantly do whatever it is that I do. And And it allows other people in. And I think that's the thing that people miss.

Yes. Well, that's the thing that I admire most about you. And I think that's the thing that stood out to me the most in this story is that you don't keep it to yourself and just say, oh, gosh, this is really funny. I can't believe this is happening. You do not do things in a whisper. You do them out loud and let everybody in. I can just imagine all the women at your table and you're saying, Like, Guys, anybody else have a thong problem right now? And then people are not thinking about their own insecurities or judgments or what's happening to them in that moment. They're thinking about your stuff and laughing about it. To share laughter like that, especially with people you don't know or just getting to know, I mean, what a gift that is. And it goes like social media.

You posted it. Oh, of course. Other people would be like, Oh, God, I can only show the pretty pictures where I'm all done up. No one's going to know that I've got a massive thought. I'm not going to talk about it. Mel is like, no, no. Here's my art outfit with a wedge, with it hanging out. Yes.

And that's also why I post the ridiculous photos of myself, where I'm just in real life, hideous, because I laugh at myself. Yeah, it's funny. It's really funny. And here's the other thing that I just got, that the metaphor for not allowing yourself to laugh and not sharing that with other people is your whole life becomes like you're wearing a bodysuit that's too small. It constricts you. It suffocates you. It cuts off your life force and your circulation. And that there's something available to you when you lighten up. And we did do a little bit of research very quickly. We'll link to the studies, but just the things that I jotted down are really important. First of all, people respect leaders that are funny more than people who aren't. And the research shows that a sense of humor, when we meet somebody with a sense of humor, we believe that somebody with a sense of humor, I'm not talking about an inappropriate one, an appropriate sense of humor. We believe they're confident. We believe they're more powerful. We immediately raise up their status. We think they're intelligent, and they tend to be somebody we like more because there is this bond that gets created between somebody that cracks jokes, makes fun of themselves, makes fun of a situation that feels relatable and true.

It's like letting you in on something personal. Yeah. And here's another thing. When it comes to work, this is really interesting. 98% of executives, according to one study, said they would prefer an employee with a sense of humor. Wow. And 84% of those same leaders believe that people with a sense of humor do better work.

Those are high numbers.

High numbers. And I think it goes beyond that class clown thing. Somebody that's just funny is really likable, and that funny is cute and funny makes time pass and funny. It's like attention. Yeah. Yeah. Funny begs attention. Yeah, for sure. It's funny is a power. It's a superpower that you can have. It creates a dynamic that two people or many people join in on that really changes your perspective of the world, which I think is fascinating. I love it. I love how you could have just had this wedge and felt really angry with yourself.

Thrown the skin out in a trash can in the parking lot.

Oh my God. It just could have ended there. But instead, we all get to laugh at it. You're laughing at the table with all the Ladies, we're laughing about it now. It's brightening my day, and it's making my mood a little bit better. It's a gift.

It really is a gift. Well, I think that's the invitation to you listening, is as you go through your day Today, something embarrassing or funny is probably going to happen. Just notice it, and then notice whether or not you're laughing at yourself or you're laughing at other people. It could be as something... You know what happens to me all the time? I spill on myself all the All the time. All the time. And when I do, I don't change my shirt or my pants. I just make a joke of it. Why? Because it's funny. We can all relate to it. And so there is an invitation here, whether it's a wardrobe failure, or it's something that you do at work today that's super embarrassing, or it's the fact that you're talking to your kid's teacher, and all of a sudden, you belch in the middle of the sentence, and then you both burst out laughing. Or what about the time that I farted at work? And I thought Jessie was going to lose her mind. She was laughing so hard. We had to stop down work for three minutes, you guys, because she could not get control of herself.

Yeah. And so you know what I did next? The second I felt one coming, I actually pushed it out because I knew if I did a second one, she would lose her goddamn mind, and she did. And so I just feel like, Stop taking yourself so damn seriously. Yeah. Learning to lighten up and loosen the grip and unsnap the life bodysuit you got on yourself and be a little human. It lets people in. It lets up the pressure on you. It makes you more relatable. It makes you seem smarter and more confident because you are, because it takes a confident person, the ability to look at life and those dumb ass situations that happen and turn it into a joke instead of something to ruminate about. Yes. All right. I'm off my soapbox now. Thank you. Yeah. Welcome to my TED Talk. Let's go to question number four. I bet you've got a great answer for Anne-Marie. Hi, Mel. This is Anne-Marie calling from Guilford in the United Kingdom. Absolutely adore listening to your inspirational podcast. Thank you. Can you advise people who perhaps have a chronic illness and can't exercise or work full-time how they, too, can lead a happier and more fulfilled life?

Sometimes we feel trapped and just grateful someone will even hire us. It's often a job to make ends meet rather than do something that we love and find fulfilling. How do you stay motivated and hopeful and keep joy in your life? How do you prevent yourself from spiraling and thinking the worst because you're sick so much of the time? Thank you so much, and sending all love.

It's very tough. And I faced that last week when my heart wasn't doing well or whatever was wrong with me. And I thought, it's so much easier to feel... I actually looked outside the window, and there was the security guard outside the hospital, and I so much wanted to be him. I wanted his life, where he wasn't caring about health. So this question hits home, where someone has to think about their health all the time. And I think that recognizing that that makes it hard. I used to write in books, when I'd sign it, I'd say, Happiness is a choice, Sean. I don't do that anymore, because I actually still do believe happiness can become a choice eventually, but not in an immediate moment without any practice, and it's okay when it doesn't happen. And that takes way too long for you to write into every book. I think that there is a recognition- I have an idea.

Yeah, go ahead. What if you wrote, Happiness is an option?

I like that because choice seems to add a burden, where I don't want there to be a burden, but a recognition that it is an option. I love that. I think I might use that now. That's great. I think that when we can't do something, we're outlining something that's a deficit. I can't exercise. But we know that most of these habits don't involve exercise. So there are things that we can do in those moments that can raise levels of happiness. I think the choice is just harder. I think the choice is harder when you're being racially discriminated against, or when you have a health issue, or when your kid is depressed. I think the choice becomes harder within those moments. But still, it's an option, as you're describing. Where I think we get meaning, even when our own body becomes our prison, is from other people. I know that because I've done work with the National MS Society. We did a whole campaign with them where we got them, the person who is experiencing MS, and a caregiver, to come together. They heard about these habits, and then we did it together, and then we videotaped their experience for the next six months.

As an encouragement for other people, so they weren't just hearing someone who's a happiness researcher talk about this. They could hear about it translated into the life of someone who's dealing with a mess. What I saw was that as a researcher, I study people. I just study this not because I'm amazing at happiness, and I need to tell everyone about it. I study the people who are able to create happiness even when it would be very difficult for me. If I lost one of my children, I did not know what would happen on the back side of it, regardless of all of this this work. I don't know who I would be, but I do know people on the opposite side of trauma and grief who have done incredible things with their life that are incredibly positive. I just met someone who lost his daughter and is the head of a hospital system in the midst of COVID, and was just one of those people that just you walk away feeling like life is worth living. So I know it's possible. So given that you can see that people are doing that, I think it becomes, to your point, an option And then meaning comes from other people.

Now, when you say meaning comes from other people, I want to be very clear, everybody, because we are also saying you have to stop thinking you'll be happy when you get in the relationship or lose the pounds or you finish the PhD or you have your first song playing on the radio, the I'll be happy when or thinking that some achievement is going to make your life fulfilling? No. And I think most of us have heard that it's about what becomes fulfilling in life is working on this thing, climbing the mountain. So I want to be very clear that Sean is not saying that other people are the source of your happiness. What Sean is saying is that connection, meaningful connection with other people, creates feelings of meaning and joy and happiness in your life, and that serving others and helping other people creates meaning and joy. So this is not trying to counsel you that somebody else holds the key to your happiness. It's another one of those ways to think about happiness differently. Am I saying that correctly, Sean?

Yeah, I think saying it, and it's a very important thing to say. And also that if you're in a relationship with somebody that's harming you, you do not need to be in a relationship with that person, or you need to be able to find safe spaces outside of that. That being the case, we did work alongside that. We were We're working in Flint, Michigan, in the midst of inequality, and discrimination, and racism, which are real, and visceral, and pernicious negatives within the society. They could easily... When we came into the community, I was worried people would be like, We will talk about happiness when the jobs come back, and when there's not lead in the water. We will talk about happiness when there's not racism. We only had money to work with the teachers. So we were trying to raise levels of happiness for the teachers, so they'd stay for more than two years. And if their story was, I I live in the midst of this society that's broken. I can't wait to get out of here. Then, of course, they would want to get out of there. What we found while we were doing this, is that only in the classrooms, where we were able to raise the levels of happiness for the teachers, the teachers, students, parents, or guardians' well-being scores started improving dramatically.

We were measuring the community, but we weren't doing anything we thought, for them. We were only working with the teachers. And yet their well-being scores were improving. The student's test scores in those classrooms were rising, and we weren't working with the students yet. We were finding that if you could change the mindset behavior of some of the individuals within an ecosystem, you could actually measure the impact of people two, three, four degrees separate that they never even met. The reason I highlight that is one, that makes us feel good about ourselves. But two, it's the reason for taking that next step. If doing this gratitude journal is just about me, it feels empty and vacuous. It's just about my happiness. This is just like going to the gym so I could look good, but why am I going to look good if I don't have someone to look good for? You could get stuck in all those ideas. What we were finding in the midst of this is that when people were able to raise their levels of happiness, joy, meaning, it caused other people to see that happiness was an option. But at the same time, that gave them the fuel for why my work is meaningful as a teacher.

We had this one day where they did a random act of kindness. We took teachers that are doing everything in their power to try and hold this community together. We had them do one more thing. We had them on one day all come together and do a random act of kindness for the community. We didn't know there was going to be a blizzard that day. So at four in the morning, they were giving donuts to road construction crews. They were going out to hospice centers, hospitals. This was their day off, the teacher in service day. They even went to the DMV to pass out happiness kits that they made until they got kicked out. Because one of the managers actually said, This is just not part of our culture, which I thought was hilarious. But in the midst of this, you talk to those teachers who give everything all the time about that day, they immediately light up. Their joy, and my mom was a high school English teacher for 30 years, it was very hard to get her to do something for herself. But if she knew that doing something for herself could raise the levels of happiness for other people, it felt meaningful.

And so what I'm hoping for is not that my happiness exists in somebody else, but like you're describing, that you can't... There was a study that came out about, It's better to live a meaningful life than a happy life, which I thought, as soon as you split meaning and happiness, we've already made a mistake.

Yeah. Isn't it the same thing?

Yes, they should be, because it's very difficult to stay happy when you feel like your life is meaningless. And it's very difficult to keep doing meaningful activities if you don't feel any joy doing that or any return. On it. You have to have the two melded together. And I would say grit alongside that as well. And so what we're finding was that that meaning was coming from our participation positively in creating a better world that was outside of just the individual. And then when you enhance and expand the power out and let people be part of your life as well, that's when we start to see those larger gains in people's thoughts of happiness.

Now I want to talk to you because you're an amazing person, and You have the ability to impact so many people's lives. And I don't know if you realize just how powerful you are. That your energy, your love, your enthusiasm, being radically generous with it, it can change absolutely anybody's day. And when you change somebody's day in a positive way, that great day can become a great week, and that great week can roll into an amazing month, and that amazing month can turn into an incredible year. You just have no idea what somebody's dealing with. My friend Ed Mallett, who is amazing, you should follow him. He's one of my favorite people on the planet. He told me this story about how there is a person out in the world who was there when his father was struggling with alcoholism, and this stranger got his dad help. And Ed said, If it weren't for that stranger, Ed wouldn't be here. And that one act of kindness from one person can change somebody's entire life. And you have that power. And so I want you to think as you head into your day about the image of blowing bubbles.

You know when a kid is blowing bubbles and the bubbles catch the sunlight, and they float around, and they fly away, it feels so good, doesn't it? It makes you smile. And you can stand there on a beautiful sunny day and blow bubbles, and they drift off into space, and who knows how far they go. Your energy is just like that. You can spread good energy, and you should. How do you do that? Be generous. Be super generous with the I love you's. Be super generous, telling people, I appreciate you. In fact, I have a habit every single day. I make it a habit to tell somebody that I appreciate them. And I do that by either reaching out to a friend and telling them that I miss them and I'm thinking about them. I have a friend who's going through a really challenging moment right now with her dad. Hospice has been called in, and I'm texting her every morning, telling her that I'm sending her a hug and that she doesn't need to text me back, but I just want her to know that I'm here for her. I tell it to people that help me in the grocery store.

I tell it to anybody Honestly, because we all need to hear it. Thank you for helping me. Thank you for being here. I love complimenting people's nails or their jewelry or their hairstyle, or their socks and smiling, smiling. And don't forget your family. When somebody walks in the door, how do you greet them? Do you put a big smile on your face? Do you run to the door? Do you say, Welcome home. Oh, my God. I hope you had a great day. I always, always, always give our son, Oakley, the biggest hug, and I hold it extra tight. And I tell him, I'm so happy to see him. Because every time you do this, you smile, you wave, you high five somebody, you give him a hug, you tell Tell them that you love them. You text somebody out of the blue. You are a force for good. If you're staying in a hotel like I'm going to be tonight, leave a note for the person that's cleaning your room. A thank you, a smiley face. Tell them you appreciate them. We all need to hear it. And when you become radically generous with your positive energy, with your compliments, with your enthusiasm, with your love, it spreads unbelievable waves of joy and positivity, lifting people up in ways that you'll never know.

So can we agree? We got our force fields up when it comes to the negativity, but we got our positivity generously flowing around the world. Now, I want to talk about the third aspect of happiness. We're going to unpack this with a question from a listener named Steve.

Hey, Mel, this is Steve. Mel, I just wanted to say thank you. Thank you for being you. Thank you for being your authentic self right there in front of us, changing lives.

And you truly are amazing. And I really want you to know that.

I was wondering today if you could talk about inner peace and the difference between that as opposed to material possessions, money, status, job titles, you name it.

And instead, the feeling of happiness within yourself to be comfortable with.

Thank you, Mel.

Steve, first of all, thank you for saying such kind and heartfelt things about how I'm showing up. I really, really appreciate it. It makes me feel warm. Second, this question about happiness with yourself, inner peace, as opposed to chasing those material possessions, job titles, this is really front and center in my life right now. And so I've been thinking a lot about this person and what he means to me, the person that he was. How he made me feel as a friend. At the end of the day, that's what truly matters, right? I mean, you're never going to see a Hearse limo pulling a U-haul to a graveyard. Because we can't take all that shit that we've been chasing down in life with us. And it truly doesn't matter. What matters is how you feel about yourself, the person that you are. And what we know, based on the research, is the quality of the relationships that you have. And the most important relationship is the one you have with yourself. I say it over and over and over again. And that is very closely tied to inner peace. Because if you're beating the hell out of yourself, if your dialog about yourself is super negative, that's not going to make you happy.

And inner peace, the term that you used, it is defined as feeling content and secure. Dr. Daniel Gilbert, who is a professor at Harvard, he did this huge study that close to half of our waking moments are spent thinking about something other than what we are doing in the moment. And so when you talk about inner peace, study after study shows that a wandering mind, thinking ahead, worrying about what's next, I'll be happy when this happens, not being present, that a wandering mind is deeply connected to unhappiness. Because if you're always wandering ahead or worried about what's next or chasing down something that hasn't happened, I'll be happy when, you're never actually in your life. A wandering mind is the opposite of inner peace. And when your mind wanders, and look, you are able to think ahead. You're able to look back. It's one of the amazing things about being human. But when you live in a state where you're never present, you rob yourself of the extraordinary ordinary moments in life. That inner peace, that contentment, that security, that you're okay, that you're aware of what's happening, that you're present to it. And here's where it gets even more interesting.

Research shows that the amount of time that you think you have left to live, it shapes your priorities now. If you think you have a ton of time, you're often thinking about the future, but you're not in the present right now. Yet, research Research shows that the nearer you get to the end of your life, the more you begin to appreciate the present, which is why despite the fact that most of us say, Oh, old people are grumpy, that's actually not true. That's a myth. Research shows the People are their happiest in the later years of their lives. Why? Because older people, everyone over 70, they're much more likely to be present and not worry about the bullshit that you and I wrap ourselves around the axial about. They're more present in the moment, to just be happy with the extraordinary ordinary aspects of life. I was just with my parents. It's so funny because they're in their 70s, and I You've noticed, their life is very simple. They get up, they go for a walk, they see their friends for breakfast, they play golf, they play Mahjan, they read a book, they watch the sunset, they go to a friend's house.

They're in the moment. They don't need some big thing to chase. They're just in the moment enjoying the feeling of living. I want to say that again. Part of inner peace and Being present and being alert in your day-to-day life is the feeling of actually living. It means you're no longer an autopilot. You're able to pay attention to what's in front of you. And the Real superpower is being able to do that no matter how old you are. Mindfulness just means connecting with the present moment. Inner peace is just about being present. So how can you bring this into your life? There are two ways I'm going to suggest that you do this, okay? Number one, when you are around other people, actually I listen to them. I didn't say, Hear them. I said, Listen to them. There's a big difference between hearing what somebody says and listening to them. Listening to someone is when you actively give the other person the experience that you are present, and your attention is the most basic form of love that you could give somebody else. Practice listening and being present and making somebody feel like you are right there with them, nodding your head, being in the moment.

It is an act of love, and it is a way to cultivate mindfulness and to cultivate that warm connection. The second way that you can tap into this is that when you're doing a task, just something in your ordinary life, hyper focus on it. I call this moving meditation. And I'll give you two examples. Number one, I love to eat nuts. Okay? Little confession. I like the blistered peanuts salted from Trader Joe's, and I love myself some smoked apples. So I'll grab a handful of those. And one way that I practice being present and mindful is I eat them one at a time. And I try to notice the difference in taste between one nut and another. And it's pretty surprising. You eat a handful of nuts, you don't really taste a big difference of anything. You eat them one at a time, it's amazing how it pulls you into the moment. The second thing that you can do is I love having a flour right at the kitchen sink because I love flowers, and it pulls me right in, and I will stare at that flower and be in the present moment. A third way that I practice this inner peace, I practice this eudemonic type of happiness in my day-to-day life is savoring the moments.

So last night, I taught Oakley, our son, how to make his absolute favorite recipe, which is from the cookbook, 6 Seasons, that my mom bought me. And it is called beef with lots and lots and lots of onions. It is the easiest thing on the planet to make. You take a hunk of beef, you brown it, you throw some garlic in, you throw some thyme in, you throw a little butter, little wine in, and lots and lots and lots and lots of onions. That's it. And then you bake that sucker at 300 for five hours, and the whole thing melts into this soupy messy, amazing goop where the onions disintegrate, and it's like, shredded beef in a French onion, such and such. And we just had so much fun. I was so in it. When we were cooking. And because I was in the moment, I wasn't wandering ahead, I wasn't thinking about anything else. I was with him. I was happy. And so let's go back to our metaphor. Being in the present moment is a lot like walking on the beach. Whether it's a stormy day or the ocean is still, whether it's raining or the sun is rising or the sun is setting or there are amazing waves that you want to surf.

When you're walking on the beach, a great walk is one where you are fully present. You feel the sand between your toes, the wind in your hair, the salt on your skin. You're staring at the ocean and gazing at the beauty no matter what day it is. You're not thinking ahead. You're not reflecting on the past. You're just in the moment happy. That's what happiness is. And so when you are thinking about happiness, always come back to this metaphor because it embodies 84 years of research and studies around the world. The waves remind you to have fun. Get off that blanket of yours, grab your friends, and jump in the waves and play. The big still ocean, swimming, floating. It reminds you to get into the deep end, and it's way more fun in there if you're floating around with your friends. Nothing like a warm day. You want those warm relationships. Spend more time with them. Invite them to the beach with you. That's who you want on the sand, on the towels, in the water with you, the people that make you feel warm. And finally, walking on the beach, being present, being in the moment, constantly coming back to these three fundamental things.

And the fact is, you never know how much time you have. You just don't. So now more than ever, I just want you to not only appreciate the moment, I want you to take these small steps to truly enjoy the moment and be happier in your life. What do you want your life look like? How nice would it be if you had freedom? You were free to work when you wanted, where you wanted, that you took the time to design your life to work for you. And for those of you that have never thought about this before. You always thought, Okay, I just got to get a job. I got to get a job. We're unpacking a concept called unbossing yourself, because I personally believe this is all mindset. It's all mindset. And you've got two strategies to emboss yourself. But before we get to those, I want to go back to the story. Because you had this wake-up call. You're like, Whatever these dudes are doing to make money online, I'm figuring this out. Because I am not free if I work for somebody else. And I really see and have a taste of what they have, and now I want to figure it out.

And so takeaway number one, everybody, pay attention to the wake-up call. Takeaway number two, yes, you can sort this stuff out. And takeaway number three is, what did you do next?

So that's That's when I started to think, what could I possibly do? How do I need to unboss myself? How do I need to think in order to step into what I want? Got it. So I really did start with my mindset. So this concept of unbossing, really understanding that you could lead yourself and you do not need anybody else to tell you what to do, make the decisions for you, or lead you. So once you start to think, okay, how can I lead myself? I had to take some steps to get me there. The first thing was, again, I talked about, what do I want? And I went on social media and started following a bunch of people that had the businesses that I wanted. Total emersion. You did an episode a while ago that you talked about when you, let's say, got a new car and you started to see that car everywhere. It's the same concept. When I decided I wanted to start my own business, I started to see bosses everywhere doing what I wanted, but I was intentional about it, and I cleaned up my social media.

Okay, so takeaway number one, you have this wake-up call. What do you want your life to look like? Get serious about curating your social media right now so that you are immersed in the world that you want to step into. That is step one. That is what a leader does. That's what you're going to do. We all have boards of advisors. We all call experts, like I call Amy on speed dial when I need help with marketing. You're going to do social media, and you're going to use social media in a very intentional way to start to create that community and that mindset around you. What's the second thing you can do to change your mindset unboss yourself?

Start asking for advice. Find the people who are doing what you want and find out how they did it. And I actually have a great story about this. So when I was still at Tony Robbins, I knew I wanted to create courses and help people do their marketing and build businesses down the road. I wasn't ready for it yet, but I knew I wanted that business. So I went online and I found a bunch of people doing what I wanted. And there was this one woman who absolutely had the business I wanted. I did not know her at all, but I watched her online and I thought, that's the business I want. So I went to her contact page on her website, wrote her a little email and said, listen, I know you don't offer this, but can I pay you for an hour of your time? I just want to ask you all about how you built your business. I'm new to all of this. I don't even know where to start. Will you share some insight with me if I pay you? And she said, Yes. Wow. Yeah. So you got to ask.

You got to ask. And all the advice is in there. And another way you can get people to respond to you is you can present them with some challenge that you're probably sitting there, notice, you have a employee mindset. Yes. Say, Could you give me... I need some help making a decision. I'm facing this challenge. Here are two or three things that I'm thinking about doing. Which would you advise? Because then you've done the work. You've thought like a boss. You haven't come somebody to solve your problem. So that's another way that even if you're working for somebody else, unbossing yourself is a mentality. Don't expect your boss to solve your problems. It's not their job to solve your problems. It's your job to come up with the solutions to recommend to mend for the problems that you're facing in whatever your role is. And so that's a way that you can take this philosophy into your current job while you figure out what you want to do. So you stuck with this job, and you chipped away at the job While you changed social media and you started asking people for advice, you started chipping away at learning things, what else did you do in order to step by step march toward building something you had no freaking skill or experience to do?

Yes.

I had to get unreasonable. And by the word unreasonable, I mean, I had to start thinking in ways that I had never done before. And so with the call with that woman that said, yes, I was still at my office. I had to crawl under my desk because the walls were thin. I don't want anyone to hear me at my lunch hour. I'm whispering to her on the phone, How did you build your business? What did you do? And she's whispering back to me. I'm sure she thinks that's weird that we're whispering, but I needed to make it happen. So I had to start putting myself in places that I was way out of my element because I wanted something bigger than my life at the moment.

Now, how do you keep that present? Because I think this is what separates people in life.

Yes.

We all want it. Who doesn't want to make a million dollars? Who doesn't want freedom? Who doesn't want to figure out how to make money online and check their balances while They're sitting on the toilet. I mean, who doesn't want to make money while they're sleeping? But what separates those of us who do and anybody who doesn't is literally the action. That's it. That is it. If you're willing to go one step further than the person that just quit, you, my friend, have the secret formula. There is no fucking secret formula. You have to stop listening to the bullshit that is stopping you from taking action. I mean, this woman is sitting under her desk ask. I'm literally at an event I'm not supposed to be at because we wanted something more for ourselves. What did you do to keep that freedom, which is this big ass word, what did you do to keep that front and center other than having your social media feeds reminding you that this is the world you wanted to step into. It's like a kid who decides, okay, I'm going to go to this college. And the first one that popped into mind I'm from Michigan.

Everybody loves either Michigan State or Big Blue. And so kids would wear the sweatshirts, and they'd look at the school, and they'd follow people, and they'd buy the swag, and they'd been wearing it all over. And so they're immersing themselves in this world before they're there. How the hell do you do this for yourself when it's about a side hustle or who you want to become? Because you're talking like, recreate your whole damn life. Stop getting a job and get serious about what you want your life to look like.

So I started to change my identity. I'm going to be a I'm going to be a boss. What do bosses do? They listen to podcasts about building businesses. They buy the books about how to change your mindset, how to start a business, how to get things going. They buy the digital courses. I never bought a digital course in my life. I bought my first digital course while I was still at my nine to five job. It was all about how to do video marketing. I had no idea how to make a video.

Can I give everybody a pro tip? Yes. A lot of companies, as a perk, give a login to Masterclass and some of these other places. And so you can be Use it. There is so much free education. You're hearing Amy go, buy, buy, buy. Khan Academy, YouTube. All this stuff is free, everybody. You got to be willing to look for it. If you've gotten laid off, the Harvard extension school has free resume templates if you're willing to freaking Google it. So we have to get out of this mode of stuff being done to you and damn that job, and I'm embarrassed. Bullshit. That job was not a And you want to know why it wasn't a fit? Because you got fired, because you got laid off. And yes, it sucks. But you get to decide now what it means. Are you going to pivot? And are you going to take this as a wake-up call? Or are you going to sit there and feel sorry for yourself.

It's so true. So yes, get resourceful. You don't have to pay for any of this. There's tons of free resources out there, even more so now than there were when I even left. But I started to, again, total emersion, fuel my mind with the right things. But here's another thing I I started a side hustle. And I think this is an important conversation for people right now. If you're afraid of getting fired, laid off, or you're just not making enough money, a lot of people listening, they think they're staying in their nine to 5:00 job, but they know they're not getting paid enough. They know they're They're valued. So the best next thing you can do is start your own thing in the mornings, nights, weekends to bring in a little extra money. Let me tell you about a student of mine who did this.

Yeah, give me some examples.

So one of my students, her name was Rachel. She was a pharmacist. And She did this job as a pharmacist because her parents wanted her to have that job. It looked good. It sounded good. And here she is as a pharmacist during COVID and hates every minute of it. Her life was miserable, what she went through. And so on the side, she decided, I'm going to learn how to buy real estate. She didn't have a lot of money, but she said, I'm going to learn how to just buy a little bit of real estate and turn it into an Airbnb and see if I can make a little extra money doing that. So she researched. She started saving. She She bought her first piece of real estate, and it did really well. And she told her husband, One day I want this to be my full-time thing. And he laughed at her like, No, you're a pharmacist. You're not going to do that. But she kept at it, and she kept at it. She made $300,000 last year when she figured out how to get this real estate and get the money to invest and all of that, quit her pharmacy job and never has looked back.

So is this somebody with a trust fund?

No, not at all. This woman was scrappy. Let me tell you another story of someone who didn't have a lot of money, okay? Because I know some people- Because most people don't have a lot of money. Most people are paycheck to paycheck. Most people are like, That sounds great, but I got no money for a course. I'm definitely going to pick up the book, two weeks notice, that you just wrote Amy for the step-by-step guide, but I don't- I don't have a lot.

I don't have a lot. By real estate? What are you talking about? Okay, let me give you a better one. So this one is from my student, Tara. And she was an accountant for 15 years in a very small town. And she's a single mom. And she said, I need a raise. I'm not making enough money. She went to the company and said, I'd like a raise. And they looked at her with blank stares like, that's not even in your future at all. And she realized, I've got to do something. So she was really good at making wreaths. She made these beautiful wreaths. Wreaths? Yes. You mean those round things that we hang on our doors? Yes. She makes these beautiful wreaths. Okay, so she's really good at wreaths. So I want to go back to something. Remember how Amy said, you got to go through the sweet spot exercise. By the way, tons of resources linked all in the show notes on every single platform. Yes. But I want you to hear this. This is a person who has been told by people forever that she does a good job making reels. Yes. I know what you're thinking, everybody.

You're thinking, Mel, I have a mortgage to pay. Mel, I have student debt. Mel, I am not starting a fucking business making wreaths because I will not be able to pay my bills doing this. Here's what I want to tell you. You You have no clue what you're capable of.

But what you're capable of right now is shooting down every single idea. You're putting all your energy into coming up with reasons for why not, why it's stupid, why you can't. What if you put half the amount of energy into why the fuck not? Why not make Reese?

Why not see where this goes? Why not, instead of flopping down in front of Netflix tonight because my soul is sucked dry from my job search or my job that I go to or worrying about why not invest that same time that I procrastinate at night into creating a little bit of a side hustle, tasting a little bit of freedom, saying, yes, in a little way.

Why not? Just to start her idea. That's all she had. She just said- That's all she had. Yes. So she wasn't saying, I'm going to quit my job tomorrow because I'm making wreaths. She just thought, I got to bring in some extra money. I better get scrappy. So she started making these wreaths, selling them on Etsy, and she was doing really well, bringing in a thousand dollars a month extra.

That's pretty good. That's like take the kids to Disney money. Exactly. That's pay the bills money. She's feeling a little bit... That's another thing. You start to feel a little confident when you start to take some action and get some clarity like, this is actually working. So what happened was her friend started seeing her make money on Etsy, and they were making crafts, and they weren't making any money on Etsy. And they said, teach us how you're doing that. That's That's what I want to know. And that's where it started to click for her. Her starter idea was not going to pay the bills. However, she took action, got some clarity, started to listen to what people were saying, and they said, teach us how you're doing that. So she created a little mini-course teaching other people how to put their crafts online and make money with Etsy. A hundred thousand dollars later, this woman never in a million years thought she'd make a hundred thousand dollars teaching other women how to put their crafts on Etsy. So how long of a period of time from The idea of, oh, I could... Because first it becomes, I want everybody to pay attention because I'm trying to open your eyes to the fact that your whole life can change because of one wake up moment and the willingness to lean into something that you naturally do well or you're naturally interested in.

I'm going to put an example into this in just a minute. But this willingness to lean into what you're naturally good at and other people compliment you on. I've I've never thought about it this way. Not so that it pays your mortgage, but so that it gives you a taste of freedom, and it taps into this power and resourcefulness and moxie that is inside you. Yes. Because when you start feeling that, you'll start thinking even bigger.

And so I'm thinking about this because, and I'm going to offer up an example, because it literally could be anything.

I think about my daughter Sawyer, who constantly is complimented for her interior, decoration style and skills. No training. And I keep thinking to myself, boy, she could do a whole Instagram strategy of designing on a budget. She could do a whole thing about how you design a killer dorm room for X number of dollars, or how you design your first apartment. I'm thinking about another kid. I have a neighbor whose son, senior year of high school, no joke, made It was almost $30,000.

You want to know how? How? I'll tell you how. He saw one video. One video. He googled how to make money online. One video of this business where you advertise a service of picking up people's stuff, like couches they don't want, and then you list it for sale on Facebook marketplace, and you deliver it to somebody else. Brilliant. Brilliant. And scrappy. I like scrappy ideas. And so I'm not suggesting you'll make millions. Maybe you will, because maybe you'll turn it into a junk removal business. Maybe you'll turn it into something else. But you are limiting what's possible, because you won't even lean into something like the wreath idea or the idea of starting an Instagram account that is about decorating on a budget because you tell yourself it's not possible. I can't do it. Somebody else has already done it. Do you have another example of somebody who just was either really old or really young that Did this? Yes. I have a great story. One of my favorite students, her name is Anne. And Anne worked in corporate at Gap and Old Navy. She was in her 50s at the time, and she got laid off, which tends to be a theme we're hearing a lot.

So she's laid off, and she thinks, okay, well, I've been in this business for a while. I'm going to dust off my resume, get it back out there. So she did. Months and months and months, couldn't even get an interview. And I hate to say this, but I think it was her age. Probably. People are hiring younger, so they're just looking over her and all of her experience that she had. One day, her husband said, You've got all of these different crafts up in our attic. You love to do these. Why don't you just play around there for a while?

See if it sparks anything.

And so she didn't have any other option at the time, so she started to get in there. And she does this one thing really well: surface pattern design. What the hell is that? I'm not crafty at all, so I really had to dig in to understand it.

Basically, it's this idea of drawing your own doing doodle and different graphics on, let's say, through a software, and turning those drawings of yours into wallpaper, into wrapping paper, into mugs, into journals. What? This is a business? Yes. Okay. And so she did this really Well, and yet again, people started to say, How are you doing that? That's why when you think of the sweet spot formula, the first thing you do is pay attention to what people think you're good at, because it's just a natural thing.

They're interested. And so she did it well. Other people wanted to know how she did it, so she started to teach them how she did it. Now, this woman went from literally not getting anyone that wanted to hire her, not even getting interviews, to doing launches of this new program she created, $100,000 launches over and over again. But I want to point out she's in her 60s. Wait, okay. You buried the lead, Amy. She's in her 60s, didn't know how to run a business, didn't know how to do technology, didn't know how to She got up a website, didn't know how to do a webinar.

She knew none of it. But what she did know is she wanted a different life, and she got honest with herself. I don't want to be begging for a job. They think I'm too old. Watch me. I love that, watch me. That's what I want. Watch me. Watch me do this damn thing. I cannot wait to send this episode to my kids. Can you tell me about someone on the younger side that went from nothing, telling their self, no skills, too young, I can't do this, miss the boat. There's already too many people doing fitness online or whatever the hell it is that you want to do. Too many interior designers. No room for me. Tell me about somebody on the younger end of the scale. I will. And I want to say, if you're looking around and you think, I want to do this, and you see so many other people doing it, and they're doing it well- Like podcast with me. Yes. The first thought is, there's no room for me. I can't do that. It's already been being done. First of all, there's over eight billion people in this world. There's definitely an audience you can reach.

But the second thing is if it's being done and it's being done well, that means there's money to be made there, right? It's a validation. Look at it and think, oh, great. Mel's a great example that I can make money doing this. Let me try it as well. Okay. Did you hear that, everybody? It's important. It's really important because somebody else doing this is a validation that there is a business and money. And more importantly, people want this. Yes. They want this in their lives. And so I want to also say something.

There are 8 billion people, Amy. And oftentimes, the expert that my kids like, let's just take online exercise classes. I feel demoralized when I'm looking at a 28-year-old's rear-end as she's doing the donkey kicks and the hydra thing. And I'm like, She hasn't had kids yet. I'm in menopause. I'm feeling like the stomach hanging down. This is not great. I want a different expert. Yes. I want what my daughters have in that market, but I want somebody that I feel represents me. Yes. And so you have a unique take on things. The 60-year-old woman that you talked about that launched her first online course, you know how empowering it is to see somebody teach you when you're in your 40s or 50s and they're older than you?

Do you know how empowering it is when you see somebody that has your background, your religion, your skin color, your body type, your experience? You are most qualified to help the person you used to be, and you will most inspire the person who sees themselves in you and your story. And so there are people out there. When I think about the podcast market, and I saw, there are five million podcasts on Spotify, five million alone. I'm like, It's already taken. What could I possibly contribute? I know that's what everybody's thinking right now. It's already been done. Bullshit. You want to know why? It hasn't been done by you. Amen. That's it. It hasn't been done by you. You have lived experiences that nobody else has, and you have stories and insights that you share that nobody else will. And you only need a sliver of the Internet to pay attention. That's the wild thing here. You don't need 100,000 customers to make money. A sliver of the Internet. You get 10 customers. Let's say this, Mel, when I teach people how to create side hustles, let's say you have a $100 program and just 10 people buy that, you've just made $1,000 that you did not have.

Ten people, that's all you need. So when you start to think, This is too big. I'm too overwhelmed. I don't know where to start, you start with your starter idea, and you just get into action. I want to give a huge shout out to my kid's guitar instructor, Dave Wade. So Dave Wade, he has made a huge difference in our life.

And I was always barking about how he should do something more.

He's a session musician, classical guitarist, plays on all these major stages.

And he started a music school in Boston, in the basement of a church, and it's slowly grown. And by just paying attention to that wake up call inside him, there's something more I could be doing.

I could be reaching more kids.

He figured out how to create an online course. Yes.

And he launched it before COVID. So all of a sudden, COVID hits, and he's done this thing simply as a side hustle to an existing business, a way to take something you're doing in real life and take that and put it online.

And he was positioned for COVID, and now he does nothing but virtual lessons with students all over the world, and in person in Boston. But it just changed his life. Why? It's not because he's smarter than you. It's not because he has more skills than you.

It's because he did one thing you're not doing. He's saying, what if it works out? What if I just take this kernel of an idea and I lean into it? And I don't do it overnight, but I start chipping away at it. Sure. Look for a job. Sure. I'll work on your resume. Don't forget the fact that 85% of jobs aren't even listed anywhere, and they're gotten by networking.

So make sure you're out there talking to people. There's another free tip. I want to take another question from Louise in the UK. Hey, Mel, it's Lou from the UK. I have a question for you. I am no longer in my corporate career after 25 years, and I really want to use this time to do something that I'm really passionate about, coaching other people. I've got the qualifications. It's just the confidence that's stopping me. How can I get past the fear of judgment of others to really put myself out there and follow my passion rather than making myself go back to a corporate career that doesn't light me up? Thanks. Oh, Lou, it's your lucky day, man, because you got Amy Porterfield in the house.

How do you deal with the fear of rejection? What are people going to think if I'm selling my reets? What are people going to think if I call myself a coach? Okay, so first of all, notice in that question, she said, I'm qualified. And then she just brushed right over it. That's the thing. And then she said, How do I find the confidence? You don't. It does not start with confidence. You have to tap into courage first.

And this is a mindset shift right here. Okay, stop. You don't tap into confidence, everybody. No. You're not going to feel confident is what you're saying. It's never going to show up in the beginning. Okay, so you got to tap into courage. So please explain what that means to Lou or anybody listening who's like, Okay, I got my idea. I got the wreaths. I got the streaming online. I got the coaching business. Now, I'm doubting myself. Yes. I'm looking for confidence everywhere. Confidence comes from a proven track record of something you want to do. You look and think, Oh, I've done this so I can keep going. You've never done this. She doesn't want to do what she did in her 9:00 to 5:00 job. She wants to start something new. That's uncharded territory. There's no confidence in that. So what she needs to do is first say, I'm going to find the courage to do this. Courage is taking the leap of faith, knowing everything I've done in my life, I've literally gotten to this point. I've overcome all of my obstacles. I'm alive. I'm here. She has a proven track record of being resilient, of showing up, doing the work.

She said, I have the experience. I'm qualified. So we're going to tap into courage saying, well, then I'm going to create something new based on the fact that my track record is I can figure this out. You know what I love about this? It's a way to basically just whack self that away. Because what you're saying is, all right, I don't know how to do this. I've never done this before. Not feeling that confident. Imposter syndrome is coming up. I have the courage I have the courage to try. I have the courage to keep going. I can tap into this thing inside me to say, I know I'm nervous. I know I'm this, but I'm going to fucking do it. I'm going to do it. I'm going to do it. Exactly. And so that part is so important. We're not going to chase confidence anymore. The other thing is, when I left my nine to five job, I got home. My first day on the job, I'm in my kitchen at my kitchen table, typing away, and freaked out thinking, what did I do? And I started to make videos, and I would make these videos about marketing and funnels and all this stuff and publish them nowhere.

And my husband would say, I see you making these videos, but you're doing nothing with them. Why not? And I said, I'm so afraid what my old coworkers are going to think about me doing this. They're going to see these videos where I'm not good on video yet, so I look like a mess. And they're going to think, who is she? She looks like a fool. Who does she think she is? She doesn't know what she's doing. So I didn't move forward in this dream I had because I was afraid of what they were thinking. And here's the truth. One, they're not even paying that close of attention. People are into their own lives. They're doing their own thing. And any opinion they'd have of me making videos is a direct reflection of their opinion if they could do it as well. They didn't leave their job yet. They're not going after it. So they're going to tell me all the reasons why I shouldn't or I am not going to make this work. Here's two pieces that I would add to that, okay? Lou, if you wouldn't trade your life with them, Yes.

Why the fuck would you listen to their advice? Yes. That's number one. Because people who have not done what you want to do have no clue what it takes to get there. So stop looking in the rear of your mirror. You're not heading in that direction. Second thing I want to say, the second that you decide that you're going to pivot your life, your social media is not for your friends.

Yes, that's good.

If you could get this concept into your head. Your social media is not for your friends. Your social media is for you and your dreams and your self-expression. And it's meant to put something out in the world intentionally so that people who are looking for you and who need you can find you. That is what social media is for. If you want to share photos of your kids with your friends, text them to them. But when you get serious about making a pivot in your life, the Your outbound of social media is your board of directors. It's your board of advisors. It's the way that you do total emersion, as Amy just said, into who you're becoming.

Your outbound, what you post, is meant to be something like a beacon that draws in the people that are interested in this. And when you can get clear, it's not for your fucking ex coworkers, it's not for your relatives, it's not for your family, it is not for your friends.

I think most of my long term friends do not follow me because I post three times a day, and it would choke their feed.

And if they want to catch up with me, they'll text me. And by the way, they're not into what I do. Yes. They're not into personal development. And so why would they follow me? I'm not putting it out there for anybody else but the people who find value in it. And when you can wrap that around your brain, it'll change your freaking life. So before we go downstairs, I'd just love to hear what did it feel like to write three pages. How can I make this easy? I feel like I just flushed a toilet. It's not a very profound way to put it, but it just like...

Spiritual flush, man. Good riddance.

Good riddance. I feel lighter. How do you feel, Jessie? I feel like I just went through my own little therapy session. I mean, I started off really crying writing it. Not really afraid, not knowing what to write. And then you ended it with like... I don't know. It's night and day with my first sentence, my first two sentences versus my last two, which is really cool. I hit every emotion in that, which I did not expect. Are you comfortable reading the first sentence? Yeah.

I said, breathe, be still, be present.

Hug your husband, hug Myrtle, my cat. Relax. Trust your gut. Why does that make you emotional? Because I need to say it more often. That's what I need to do. And just breathe, be still, be present. Hug my husband, hug my cat. Those little joys, I probably don't do them enough. Do them more... Do them as often, I don't want to say as I should, because I need to stop saying I should. Yeah, there's that. But just being still and being present. It's so I found, isn't it? Yeah. It's just the little things that we're not even present to because we're busy, should have done this, should have done that, that we're not hugging the people we love. We're not greeting the cat. We're not running out the door. We're onto the next. I feel that, too. Just even as you said that, I didn't really hug my husband as I left this morning. Yeah, I didn't either. Shit. I didn't either. Yeah.

And that's an easy change. Yeah.

But I started with that with literal handshaking, just because I didn't know how to start this, where to start. What is easy? It's easy to breathe.

It's easy to be still, and right now to be present with this pen and paper.

How did you end it? I ended it very confident. Wow.

I want to hear that. Yeah.

If I can read just like, the last- Whatever you're comfortable with. I want to hear it. We're around the holidays. Even though I know you said, don't read your papers. Yeah, I don't. But that's before you burn them. But since it's holidays, there's a lot of stress around holidays, just being with family. We don't live near our family, and they've never been a tradition. So I just said, it's okay to not be with family for Thanksgiving. It's okay to spend my first Thanksgiving in our new home together with FaceTime. It's all okay how it is. Stop putting pressure to make others happy. Are you happy? Yes. Be thankful for you and your language. Your new tribe starts now. Jessie. Wow. There's anger in here. There was frustration in here.

There was doubt. And it just comes out of like, no, you're fucking happy. It's okay to be happy and not be pulling in the dark side because everyone else does it or it's easy to relate on the dark, or that's all you know. That's all you've been trained to do and communicate that way. That's what most of us are trained to do. Yeah. I can relate to my mom so easy off of guilt and off of bad news. What if I don't have any? I find it, and that's what I will talk to her about. So now it's changed that language. Only present the good that I have a lot of that I don't give love to. Whether it is my husband and my cat, or it is just being thankful for myself. It's beautiful. Yeah. That is really moving that you start off in one place and that you end in another, and you end with the Jessie that you want to talk to. What did you say? Well, you know what's really funny is I had a very similar theme to Jessie. Relax. Just relax. Just be in the moment and relax yourself.

I don't know. Yeah, it was a little bit about breathing, too. I mean, it's a really similar idea. Are you laughing? What about the end? What about the end? The end is, as I often find the end to be when I do this practice is like, All right, I can do this. Now that I took my emotional, what did you call it? Spiritual dump. I've got this, and I can do this. And I ended in the same spot about a totally different topic, but I ended in the same spot. I can do this. Wow. Yeah. Well, I started, obviously, with, I don't know. Screw you, Amy. I wrote, The cat is pissing me off. He feels hard. He's peeing in the bathroom. He's peeing on the floor of the locker.

He's scratching the new runner on the stairs. He's needy and loud in the middle of the fucking night. He draws, Homey, our puppy over, leans in to sniff him as if he loves him, then fucking swats at him like, What a dick.

Easy. So I go on and on bitching about the cat. Yeah. And then by the end of it, similar stuff about the holidays, because I always deeply miss my family around the holidays.

And yet I I asked my folks to come, and they said no, they wanted to be in Florida. And I asked them to come for Christmas, and they said no. And it just makes me so sad. And so I How can this be easy? Open the door. Let love in. Let them be exactly who they are and who they aren't. Just figure out what makes me happy and do those things. Take a breath. Tell myself, you're in a five-year experiment right now of healing, of happiness, and of creating a spiritual home base for yourself, Mel. How can this be easy? Let go. Stop gripping and just love. Oh, holy shit, Mel. Oh, yes. That's incredible. That's beautiful.

Same thing was true about the cat because I realized I'm so pissed off at him and I need to come from love because he's clearly in distress. Something's up. He can't fix this himself. So I got to rise above all of this resentment and anger that I feel and just shower him with love and help him figure it out. Because Chris is going to kill him.

He keeps peeing in the house. That was really cool. And again, I didn't think I could fill up three pages, but it just kept going. Once you really get into it, flush the toilet. Flush the toilet. Well, I'll tell you what I know from doing this, and this is just my experience is a lot of times you don't want to do it. There's resistance. You don't think you can do it. You can't fill a page. You don't want to talk about it, whatever it is. And then once you get going, it's like just the floodgates open. I think this is an act of...

I think about this like, reprogram your mind. I think one of the reasons why so many of us love prayer or meditation or Oracle cards or reading a book like the Book of Awakening that gives you a Daily Devotional is that it gives you a new thought to anchor onto when your old one sucks.

And this prompt, how can this be easy, forces you to have a new thought to anchor on instead of the old one, which for all of us, I'm going to say, is what's wrong, what's not working, what's hard, what's the problem, what do I have to complain about?

Yeah. Give your mind a different job. Your mind right now has a job of looking for what's horrible, cutting it down to make it the worst ever, not accepting joy, not accepting happiness.

That's the job that most of us give our mind. That's the job that I realized I gave my mind all the time. How can this be even worse? What's that getting me? Well, and here's the thing.

I don't think this is the wake-up call, everybody. You didn't realize that your mind was doing this job. It's been doing it for so long. It just runs on repeat. So now it's time for us to take control. Put down the damn sword, stop the campaign of misery, pick up the fucking pen, and write a new chapter for real. Train your brain to spot how things this can be easy. Train your brain. How can this be easy? How can this make me happy? How can I let love in?

Start writing a whole new way to think. That's what I'm going to do. Let's go burn this shit.

Let's go burn it. Yeah. You already crumpled yours up, which is great. I'm going to actually rip mine up because I just feel like that gets out a little extra emotion.

Yeah, Jessie's feeling it. See you. See you. I just felt something like I feel like a rip. Rip it up. Wow. Look at how that just landed. This be easy on All right. So sometimes that happens, too. Sometimes you really get a message even in that. So then I just light it, take a match, and I light Jessie's for her. Yeah. And sometimes it's more difficult than... Give me a hold, come on. Oh, thanks. Wow. And then I just have a habit of standing back from it and watching it burn and just saying to myself, let it all go. Just let all that complaining, shit you don't need and the stuff you don't want, let it be gone.

Wow. What do you do when it stops burning?

I'm now worried about yours. Mine? Yeah, I know. Sometimes that happens because mine's not lighting. It's funny. That crumpled, ashy remain is what that black tar wave of misery actually felt like.

You're right. That I felt this morning. Wow. Like that physical burnt paper that's left in that pyrox dish looks like misery. Yes. That's what I feel when I think, for example, about the kids all leaving instead of being present in the moment.

It's sad. Yeah. Oh, yours is smoking.

I know. I'm having some difficulty with mine. Not really. It's just taking some. Just taking a little time. Amy's burning hers. What are you feeling, Jessie? Very satisfied. I don't know why that happened so fast, and there's so much hesitation to write it. How do I start it? How do I do this? This is this.

And it was easy. Isn't that incredible? Right? It's easy. It's easy. And I feel so much better. If I do this again tomorrow, will I write most of the same stuff? Of course. I think a lot of it will be the same right now. But again, you keep burning it. Keep getting rid of it. It was easy. Chris will be out here in in his ice barrel doing the cold flunge, and I will be doing the fire ceremony. Yeah. With my thoughts. Yeah. Putting the sword down. What do you think, Mel? Yeah. What were your thoughts? Seeing the physically burnt paper is very helpful for me because now I have this image to attach to the thoughts and the feelings so I can separate from it because I just want I'm going to be happier in my life. And the only reason that I'm not is because of this battle that I engage in. Right. And so that almost honestly looks like a burnt sword. It just put it down. And I felt the same thing you did, too, Jessie, that it's a lot of work to carry this shit around. And it's a lot of work, even though it's subconscious to be griping and complaining and present to what's wrong and everything's hard.

That energy, it's a lot. It was pretty easy to let it go once I made a decision to.

What is so heavy, and it's the heavy thoughts, like you said, Mel, but it's really not. It's just that. They're just thoughts. Yeah. Awesome.

That was really cool. Well, Amy, thank you. Yeah. Hey, it's Mel. Thank you so much for being here. If you enjoyed that video, by God, please subscribe because I don't want you to miss a thing. Thank you so much for being here. We've got so much amazing stuff coming. Thank you so much for sending this stuff to your friends and your family. I love you. We create these videos for you, so make sure you subscribe.