How To Keep Your Conscious Wits About You!

You have to keep your conscious wits about you right now at this time of year.

Let me explain why it’s particularly important right now. It’s a funny one, there are a few things usually going on.

You’ve (hopefully) taken some decent time off. Eaten all the food, drank all the wine or mocktails.  Or just had a week or two outside of your usual routine so it just feels super difficult to get back into.  Particularly if you also stopped doing the things that you know usually make you feel good.

You might be taking an extended break and you’re seeing people all over socials talking about goals and resolutions and going what appears to be ‘all in’, but you’re struggling to get your bottom off the sofa and allowing the guilt to take over.

Or maybe you’re TRYING to go ‘all in’ but you’re just not feeling it!

So what the fudge to do?!

Firstly, GIVE YOURSELF A BREAK!

I don’t necessarily mean literally, you’ve probably just had one or still having one…I mean mentally! 

Stop beating yourself up for doing/not doing what you’ve decided you ‘should’.

I’m technically still off right now, until the middle of January.  I had a rule that I started back when I was working in Corporate that I’d always take the first week of January off without fail.

I’m doing a couple of little bits and bobs here and there as necessary but I’m off for calls or anything like that and my schedule is MY schedule and it feels GLORIOUS and I don’t feel the slightest bit ‘behind’.  

Because really, what meaning does that even have except the one you’re giving it yourself?

So I’m getting the most of my membership at the spa gym right now. Doing classes, hopping into the pool or the hot tub, then up to the manor house for a cuppa, do a little work if I need or want to, then home.  Glorious.

Then my first official week back of work is The Mentorship retreat.  Pretty nice start to the year in my eyes!

Now, here’s the thing.  While I’m swanning about, the world and his wife seems to have woken up on social media and it’s LOUD.  

Not only are we seeing business owners getting back to it with a little fire in their bellies after a break.

We’re also seeing the new year new you shame based marketing eeeeeeeverywhere. 

Hence the title of this episode. 

If you don’t have your conscious wits about you right now some of that pesky online programming might very easily come and bite you in the bum.

What do I mean by this?

You might be scrolling, scrolling, scrolling….all good when you’re doing it with the intention and consciousness of curiosity, staying in your own lane and doing your thing.

But if that slides…oh helloooooo my old friend comparison, how NOT delightful to see you here!

Then come the ‘shoulds’.  Urgh, I’d planned to take this time off but this person’s doing this and that person’s doing that…OMG i’m already behind!

You might allow some of that shame based messaging to wangle it’s way in too which is never a good thing.

Stop.

Behind in comparison to what or who?!

Let other people do their thing.  I guarantee you a lot of what they’re doing won’t be sustainable and you’ll see it drop off. 

I’m very much a sit back, watch and do my own thing kinda gal. I like to treat things as an experiment and think ‘ooooh I wonder if this would work?’  I marinate on things and don’t tend to do anything knee jerk. Which is why it has taken me so long to create my membership and it’s in a totally different format to what I’ve seen.  More on that in due course! 

I’m a manifesting Generator by human design meaning I don’t love feeling tied into things or that I ‘have to’ do something and things have to feel ‘right’ for me so I kind of lead with that a lot in what I launch and when.

Remember, A lot of the people going ‘all in’ will be going into the year thinking ‘i’m going to do X, Y or Z EVERY DAY this year!

Post on socials, go to the gym, eat healthily, read, meditate.  Whatever it might be.

But guess what, although a few people WILL be able to stick to it and form the habit, most of us…we’re not really wired that way so you’ll absolutely see people drop off.  And they’ll feel super pants about it too!

This is one of the big reasons resolutions don’t stick.  It’s going against our current identity.

We shame ourselves into them, looking at all the things we think are ‘wrong’ with ourselves and then attempt to go all in on doing something different and inevitably fall off the wagon when our nervous system and brains go ‘woooooah nelly, this isn’t familiar, we don’t like it, this could be unsafe!’  

Then comes resistance, excuses. Then some MORE shame for ‘failing’ or ‘quitting’.

So focus on what is actually sustainable for YOU.  And just get as consistent as possible with that. Sure get inspiration from what others are doing but do NOT let it make you shame yourself for what you’re doing or not doing.

You also might also just not really be ‘feeling it’ just yet. That’s ok.  You can get curious with that. This is one of the benefits of consciousness and unearthing the bits that are underneath the behaviours, thoughts and feelings.

This has come up in The Mentorship this week and I’ve seen it on socials too. That’s why it’s SO important to have people around you who support you.  This is part of being a human and part of being a business owner. You’re going to have wobbles and ups and downs but having somewhere to voice it and have others help you figure out what might be going on for you is utterly priceless.

Another thing that might be happening unconsciously right now is that you might be putting pressure on yourself to nail everything straight out the gate!

Life just doesn’t work that way.  Sure some people might have a totally innate, natural ability for something, sure, but mastery is always about improvement over time. ALLOWING yourself to have a beginner’s mind.

Today I did my second power hoop class. And I suck! I’m not going to sugar coat it, I’m awful.

There were people in the class just hooping with ease and there was me in the corner dropping it left right and centre, stumbling over the steps and literally falling over at one point. 

So, in that situation you can have the mentality to get frustrated, think you ‘should’ be better, be jealous, wonder what’s wrong with you, assume you’re just awful at it so there’s no point trying, compare yourself to the other people in the class who are nailing it…

OR you can acknowledge that you’re a beginner and you’re going to suck but you WILL get better if you keep going and practicing. 

So I watched the other people in the class to see what they were doing differently and kept adjusting my technique and even in the class I made improvements. 

I also didn’t allow the unconscious thoughts to take over and sought evidence that I was right where I needed to be and I asked them how long they’d been practicing.  One was 3 years, one was 2.  

I also asked what they were like when they started.  They said ‘actually I was way worse than you, I could keep the hoop up for more than 2 spins’.

Do you see the difference?  I gathered information and evidence that my brain and nervous system needed to stop sending me pesky thoughts. So I’ll go back next week and I’ll improve again.

It’s part of what I’m doing in the January Jump Start too.  Getting people to be a little more in their conscious mind throughout the day and flexing that conscious muscle. 

I’ve been LOVING having people message and email me about the results they’re seeing and what a huge difference it’s making.  You can still join, the link is in my bio on instagram @imfranexcell, in the show notes or you can head to https://bit.ly/fransjumpstart  It’s running every day in January.

So hopefully you can see how having your conscious hat on and awake can save you a LOT of unnecessary heart ache and mean inner talk.

So here’s to a conscious 2022!

Fx

Fran Excell, Success Mindset Mentor at www.franexcell.com – Helping Business Owners Overcome Stress & Self Sabotage so they can get back their time and feel more in control. 

RESOURCES:

Check out The Positive Pants Podcast here

Download your FREE Stressed To Success Meditation here

Join The Positive Pants Toolkit App hereBook In a Free 20 Minute Discovery Call here