You’re listening to The Work Of Becoming podcast! My name is Dr. Karin Nordin. I am your host as well as a behavior change expert and self-proclaimed tornado girl. I spent years of my life struggling to change before I finally got my PhD and learned the psychological tools that I needed to actually make those changes happen. Now, I’m bringing you five-minute sneak peeks of how I’m applying the real science of self-help to my life. Let’s get started!
All right, everybody! Welcome to this episode of The Work Of Becoming podcast where I have an exciting announcement! So, I’m recording this on Thursday, April 27th. So you’re hearing it obviously later, but I, today, made the decision to enroll in Alliance Coaching as a behavior change coaching client, and I wanted to talk a little bit about what brought me to this decision, why I chose this, and hopefully give you some insight as to why people might choose to coach with us, why someone might need or want a behavior change coach.
So, for some background, a really quick overview, in the month of March I took 30 days off social media. I had an amazing month. I established incredible routines. I was feeling better, feeling like the best I have probably in my entire life. I was feeling so grounded, so peaceful. I was so productive. It was an amazing month. And then in April, shit kind of hit the fan a little bit. I had a family emergency that I dealt with right after I got back. So, I had to do a week-long emergency trip to Pennsylvania to deal with that family emergency. When I came back, literally the day I came back I went viral on Instagram and then I went viral with another post on Instagram, and then I went viral on Facebook. I gained 100,000 Facebook followers. It was freakin’ nuts, and I’ll talk about some of that stuff in another episode.
But I had a very chaotic April, and I was really struggling to hop back into my routine and to bounce back. I think that when things happen, we absolutely need to give ourselves grace and we need to give ourselves time, but in that onramp back to reality, it is important to, number one, have that onramp kind of mapped out so you know how you’re going to fall back into those things that are really supportive for you, and two, to be critical with yourself — not critical, but to be carefully watching. “Is what I’m doing right now really serving me, or does it feel like it’s serving me but it’s not,” okay?
So, when I went through all of that (I came back, I went viral, etcetera, etcetera) I had this sort of week-and-a-half-long chunk which has ended today, essentially — the last two days — where I was struggling to get on the onramp, and I was struggling to fall back into those behaviors, and I was skipping the gym. I was working from home. I was not getting dressed in the morning. I was just kind of sitting in my pajamas all day, which I can do, right? And it’s totally okay to do those things, but I was at the point where I had done those things so many days in a row where it was starting to be really unsupportive for me, and it was starting to kind of reinforce my funk. I started asking myself, “Why is this happening? What is the block here?” I had this amazing routine. I learned a lot about myself. My stress level went up, and I, for some reason, am having difficulty adapting to the higher stress that’s in my life right now. I couldn’t figure out why, and then I realized (and it really hit me) that I was not an objective viewer of my own life.
I’ve talked about this before, right, how you can have read every study out there on behavior change, you could know all of the research — and I don’t, but I know a good chunk of it. I have all these skills. I’ve been building these skills for years, but there might be a point where you want something for your life, you want something for yourself and you don’t know how to get there. You don’t know what needs to change, and when you look at your life, you feel like you need another perspective, and that is the moment where I suggest you apply for coaching because for me it was like I want an expert opinion to come in here and to observe my behavior with me and to plan a future version of myself that is even more capable, is even more resilient, is even more able to deal with the growing stressors in my life. I want to elevate myself to a new version of me, and I have kind of reached what I feel like is a ceiling of what I can do by myself without that external opinion, right?
I also think it’s really important to note that sometimes it’s difficult to see when we’re being self-compassionate versus when we’re being indulgent. But a coach, most of the time, is going to be able to see that line more clearly and to maybe nudge you towards self-compassion when you aren’t being self-compassionate enough, and to call you out a little bit and gently nudge you towards pushing yourself when you need to push. I felt like I am in a moment where I could really, really use that objective perspective, that reflection, and that concrete container to grow my life.
So, that’s the other thing is that right now I am very, very busy. We have a lot going on at BBA. We have a lot of travel happening in my personal life. There are a lot of things going on, and I know if I don’t carve out a container, a specific time in my life for me to focus on me, that I will get lost in the wave of busy-ness that is about to come. I know that when shit hits the fan in a lot of areas, it’s hard for me to prioritize myself, but having a coach essentially holds me accountable to showing up for me, and looking at the next six months of my life, I want to show up for myself in big ways and I want to show up for other people in my life in big ways. And so, having someone on my support team is going to be really, really important.
So, that is why I made the decision. I applied for Alliance Coaching. I will be an Alliance Plus client for the next six months, and I’m sure you will hear about how that’s going on future episodes. As always, if you have questions that you want to ask me about, feel free to put them in the Q&A box. It’s linked in the show description of every episode, and I will see you and talk to you in the next episode!
PS: if you are on a journey to become a better you, and you want to learn the tools and techniques that will actually help change your life, make sure you check out my Change Academy Membership. Each month, we do a 1.5-hour workshop on a different psychological topic, but we also provide resources like journal prompts, worksheets, and trackers. We host community events and more. If you’re struggling to close the gap between knowing what to do and actually doing it, this membership was built for you. Go to www.karinn4.sg-host.com/change-academy to learn more!
