Are you feeling defeated?

"I feel so defeated."

Multiple times in the past few weeks, people have told me, "I feel so defeated." I have felt that way myself.
We are all working towards some goal:
losing weight, reading more, getting faster, better, stronger in some way.

And despite hard work and creative thinking about this goal, there are times when we just can't seem to get any momentum.

In fact, not only are we not moving forward, we might even feel like we are worse off than when we started.

Mid-way through most anything I've ever done (any big project, a long hike, a new class), there comes a point in time when I say:

"Whose idea was this?"

Mine. Of course it was mine. I have moments where I chastise myself for having such grand ideas or for thinking that something could be done in the first place.

Sigh. 😩

(That's the actual intervention, btw).

Think about something that feels frustrating or overwhelming to you right now, take a breath in through your nose and then make a long, loud sigh while relaxing your jaw.

Doing this periodically will actually help reduce feelings of anxiety and overwhelm and trigger relaxation.

Think of this period like the boxing 10-count. After a hard punch, boxers might get knocked down, and they have 10 seconds to get back up or they lose the match. You will often see them with an arm on one knee, head down. They stay there while the ref is counting 1.....2.....3....
And the fans on the sidelines are yelling "GET UP, GET UP"

You might be feeling pressure to hurry up and [insert motivational quote here]

But what you might not notice is that during this time, boxers are not in a hurry. While they are in this classic "defeated stance" you might notice that there is at least one (probably 3)
big sigh breaths.

SIGH.

(whose idea was this?)

SIGH.

(Okay, this is harder than I thought it would be)

SIGH

(Ready you've got this!)

But in dramatic movie fashion, they wait for the ref to get to 9 and then with a final sigh, stand up and come back to deliver the knock-out punch.

Are you feeling defeated? Is there something that you are working on that you just want to run away from, toss aside, throw in the towel, or just plain quit.
Me too. and that's so normal.

There are times when quitting is a good decision (remember when I canceled my event in Philadelphia a few weeks ago), but the majority of the time, what you really need is a

deep sigh

and then stand up and get back in that metaphorical ring.

Are you currently feeling defeated in some area of your life? Name that thing. If you're currently on a winning high (awesome!), think about a time in the past where you wanted to give up because something felt too hard.

Now, think about a character strength that you have.
Persistence, Humor, Courage, Kindness, Compassion, Curiosity, etc

Write about a time that you have used that character strength in the past to overcome a challenge. How can you invoke some of that strength to help you today?

Read back over what you have just written, take a big sigh breath and then write one more sentence about one tiny step that you can take today to get back up and keep moving towards your goal.

As always, you can respond directly to this email to let me know how this works for you.