Episode 195 - 5 Most Powerful Questions To Ask Yourself
When stress is weighing you down, the simple act of shifting your perspective can help lighten that load. In this episode, I share 5 powerful questions I use with my clients to help them move away from beliefs that create unnecessary suffering and find a bit of peace. Each question serves as a handy tool to de-dramatize situations, challenge limiting beliefs and break free from those thoughts that keep you feeling stuck—empowering you to embrace a more relaxed and resilient mindset.
Topics
Powerful questions to ask yourself To regain inner peace and shift perspectives.
Creating distance between you and your thoughts.
Recognizing beliefs as choices.
Links
👉 Want to dig deeper into what you learned in the podcast? Go to selfgrowthnerds.com/school to work 1-on-1 with me! 👈
Transcript
[AUTO-GENERATED]
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:00:06]:
Welcome to the self growth nerds podcast. I'm your host Marie, a courage coach, creative soul, and adventure seeker. Since through hiking the Pacific Crest Trail in 2019, I'm on a mission to help you embrace your most confident self so you can achieve your dreams too. If you're eager for deep conversations, big questions, and meaningful connections, join me on the quest to discovering how we can create a more magical and memorable life. Hello, nerds. How are you? I'm doing really good. Today we have an exciting episode. I wanna share 5 of the most powerful questions I ask myself and my clients when they are very attached to a thought that's making them suffer or when they're stuck in a spiral and need to shift their perspective in order to find more inner peace, in order to think about the situation they're in in a way that's going to make them feel better.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:01:18]:
So let's jump in right away with the first one, which is what do you make it mean about yourself? Let's say you go on a date with someone and they don't call you back. Your mind might go straight to, well, I must have done something wrong, I was not interesting enough, I was not pretty enough. But when you ask the question, what do I make it mean about myself? It highlights the fact that your thoughts about the situation are just one interpretation, that you're making up a story in your mind. So when your date doesn't call you back and you feel anxious, ask yourself what do I make it mean about myself? Well, I make it mean that the people I like never like me back. I make it mean that I will never find someone because I'm deeply flawed. These four low words I make it mean are really powerful because they create distance between you and your thoughts. You get to be the observer of your thoughts and that's going to allow you to start questioning where your brain automatically goes. This leads us to question number 2 which is what else could it mean or what else could be true.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:02:43]:
This question helps you open your mind to other possibilities that you might not have considered because you're so focused on the one that's making you suffer. Let's take the dating example, the person ghosting you. You're making it mean that you did something wrong and that you were not interesting enough. Well, what else could it mean? What else could be true? Maybe they were not ready for the kind of relationship that you're looking for, for the kind of commitment that you want. Maybe for some reason that you cannot see, you actually dodged a bullet. Maybe there is someone better out there for you and it's actually a good thing that they're not texting you back. Another example that we can play with is let's say you got fired from your job unexpectedly. Your brain might make it mean that, again, you did something wrong, you're flawed, you're disposable, you don't matter, they didn't care.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:03:46]:
Often our brain is going to go to the scenario that reenacts our deepest wounds from the past. So when you ask the question what else could it mean, what else could be true, You might answer something along the lines of, well, maybe the company was running out of money. Maybe they owed someone a favor. Maybe their values are out of whack. I didn't even like the job this much. So maybe it's an opportunity to find a better one. They showed me who they really are, and I don't want to work with people like that. Had a falling out with one of her friends and she was worried she would go and talk behind her back to her other friends and that they would also leave her behind.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:04:39]:
When I asked her, well, what else could be true? She said, well, my friends know me and they have a mind of their own. They can decide for themselves. They're independent thinkers with a backbone. Plus, if they were to leave me for this, then they were not real friends to begin with. This question forces you to zoom out and see other perspectives. But sometimes if you're very attached to what you make it mean, if you're stuck in a powerful spiral, what you can do is use this third question which allows you to borrow someone else's way of thinking. The question is what would someone else say? So it's kind of like those bracelets that people have, what would Jesus do? But it's, what would my most loving and confident friend say? Or what would someone I look up to say. You want to come up with a specific name.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:05:42]:
It might be someone who has done what you want to do, it might be someone who has the qualities you wish you had. How would they think about the situation? Personally, I use this one when I'm feeling insecure and unsure. I ask myself what would my partner do? He's, he's very smart. He's very confident, and he doesn't worry much what people will think about him. If he thinks his work is worth x amount of money, he's just gonna go and ask for that salary. He's not going to worry about, well, am I gonna seem greedy? Are they gonna think I'm selfish? No. None of that. So when my conditioning as a woman who grew up being taught to people please wants to take over, then I consider what he would do.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:06:34]:
It helps me put my emotions aside and think in a more neutral rational way. When I work with creative clients who want to write a book or become freelance writers, for example, but they're worried that they're not good enough or that it's not working yet, I tell them about Elizabeth Gilbert who's the author of Eat, Pray, Love. She was a waitress until the age of, I think, 37 when her book became a massive success. But from quite early on in her twenties I think she was committed to writing every day. She would send her stories to tons of people and would get rejected again and again and again until she was not. So let's say you started a blog 3 months ago and only 3 people are reading it or you sent articles to 5 different magazines and they didn't message you back and you're making it mean that you're not good enough and you should just give up, well, what would Elizabeth Gilbert say? She might say, honey, this is the work. You are developing your craft. You have to keep going.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:07:48]:
Find the magic in the process and trust. I don't know. Just get her book, Big Magic. It's amazing. This actually speaks to the importance of filling your mind with the perspectives of people who have the life you want. You can read books, listen to podcasts, work with coaches, so you can borrow their beliefs, borrow the way of thinking that got them where they are. Okay, powerful question number 4 is inspired by a song I love by Pink and it's so what? This simple two word question is gonna help you de dramatize the situation that you're in. It doesn't always work in your favor though.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:08:35]:
Sometimes it can make it worse so you have to be careful when you use this one. But I'll give you a few examples to show you when it's when it's great. Recently my partner and I were babysitting his sister's kids, so his nephews. They were playing with a big branch and one of them got hurt. I felt super guilty. I thought my sister-in-law and my brother-in-law are gonna think I'm so irresponsible. But then I asked myself the question, so what? What's the big deal? And the answer that came to me was, I guess family members have negative thoughts about each other all the time, doesn't mean they don't love each other. I was just thinking back about me growing up and about my aunts and my uncles and how I'm pretty sure my parents had negative thoughts at one point about each one of them, but it did not negate their love for them in any way.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:09:33]:
It's just kind of like the price to pay to be a family. I can be very annoyed with my sister and it doesn't mean I don't love her any less. That shift in perspective calms me down so much. Another example I have for you is from a friend of mine who wanted to reach out to someone important in her industry and she was worried they would think she was needy and annoying. And I asked her: so what? So what if someone you don't know thinks you're out of your league? Number 1, they probably won't think that because they're busy and probably not even the one looking at their inbox. But even if they did, so what? It's a it's a passing thought that has no impact whatsoever on your life. The worst thing that's gonna happen in in most cases is you're going to experience an uncomfortable emotion like disappointment or sadness or embarrassment. But that's okay because like the, the coach Carole Lowenthal says this is just like the emotional equivalent of a leg cramp.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:10:49]:
It passes. Unless you ruminate and you make it mean awful things about you as a human being, the emotion is just gonna move through you. Emotion is for energy in motion. If you just allow it to pass without attaching a bunch of stories to it, it's going to be temporary. Okay, last question is who would you be without that thought? This is a question from the work by Byron Katie, which I highly recommend. I love this question because it helps you see that the thought you're so attached to is a choice, that someone else with a different background might not go there. It's kind of like a piece of clothing that you have been wearing for years years years that you could remove if you wanted to. Let me give you an example.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:11:50]:
As a high achiever when I'm working, especially with other people, one of my beliefs is I need to be as helpful as possible. For most of us high achievers it doesn't even seem like that's a belief, it's just a fact, a way of being. But when I asked myself the question who would I be without that thought? The answer that comes to me is I'd be a much more relaxed person. I would do what I can but I would let go of the rest. I wouldn't take as much responsibility on my shoulders. Of course I'm not going to make this belief disappear overnight, especially if it's been woven into me since I was a little kid, but the more I ask myself these questions, the more I consider different perspectives, the less rigid those beliefs become, and slowly but surely that's how you start thinking differently. That's how you rewire your brain, but it takes practice. It's kind of like building muscles in the gym, but it's a gym for the mind.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:13:03]:
Having a regular journaling practice and working with coaches has been so helpful for me to think in a way that helps me go after what I want instead of letting my conditioning and my fears lead the way. If you're curious about what it would be like to work with me on this, book a free discovery call at selfgirlnerds.com. We'll be able to get to know each other. You can tell me about what you struggle with. I'll tell you more about the ways in which I can help you and you can make a decision from there. So just go to selfgirlnerds.com and there's a button there that's gonna lead you to my calendar where you can pick a date and a time that works for you. Okay. That's it for this week.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:13:48]:
It was a short but sweet episode. I hope you enjoyed. Please message me on instagram at self girl nerds if there's any insights that you would like to share. I would love to hear from you and otherwise I will talk to you all next week. Bye everyone. If you love what you're hearing on the self growth nerds podcast and you want individual help finding a new direction for your life and developing the courage to make your dreams a reality, you have to check out how we can work together on self growth nerds.com or message me on Instagram at self growth nerds. My clients say they would have needed that support years ago. Ago.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:14:34]:
So if you're tired of feeling like you're wasting your life, don't wait. Get in touch now, and I cannot wait to meet you.