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If you're tired of feeling never enough, of constantly being derailed by your own fears or the reactions of others, then you are in the right place. I'm Deb, a licensed psychologist, and this is Blooming Outside the Lines, a podcast dedicated to women who've spent their lives trying to stay within the lines of what's acceptable, who've never felt good enough and who are ready to break free and bloom. Let's talk about how you can build a solid foundation connected with your strength and your wisdom. Before we start, I need to make sure that you know that the information I share with you is just that. It's just information. It's not meant to be a prescription for what you should do or meant to replace the advice of any of your healthcare providers. It also doesn't mean that we have a professional client-therapist relationship.

Hi there and welcome. This episode is in some ways related to my last episode on inertia. I thought I would talk about the ways that we support that law of motion through the certainty that we feel or develop when we have tipped into a stress response.

So, how uncertainty breeds conviction and the problems that that causes for us. I've actually been thinking about this topic for quite some time now as it relates to the division and unrest here in the US, how polarized we've become, and how very certain we are about what is right and wrong.

Please hear me in saying that I'm not meaning to infer that there are not wrongs that need to be righted or causes that deserve fighting for. And actually I want to completely steer away from that subject, as I think for so many it can lead straight to a tip. And once that happens, our ability to listen learn and consider other possibilities goes right out the window.

We become very certain about our views which can cause problems for us personally and for our relationships. Have you ever had times while tipped when you were absolutely sure that something was true? Maybe that someone was upset with you, was no longer your friend, that you couldn't do anything right, or that no one loved you. Most of us have.

That's the certainty I'm referring to. Sometimes it's easier to see it in a spouse or a partner who's tipped, so sure that they are right that there's no possibility for a reasonable discussion.

Let me back up in case you're new to this podcast and explain what I mean by being tipped. Tipped is the word that I use to describe when our nervous system has detected a threat and has moved our system into defense. When that happens, a multitude of changes occur in the body, one of which is that dominance in the brain moves from our higher cognitive abilities.

 To the more primitive, emotionally driven parts of our brain. And this happens because the stress hormones inhibit our higher cognitive capabilities. They go offline. We lack those abilities when we're tipped, most often without realizing that we have lost them. We think we're thinking rationally, based on facts.

when in fact doing that is difficult, if not impossible, when we're tipped. Being tipped is a similar experience to being back in childhood, as our cognitive capabilities, or what I often refer to as our adult capabilities, take a really long time to develop.

Some say not until our early 30s. So before that time, the more emotional, primitive parts of the brain are all that we have. So one of the ways to get a picture or to think about the experience of being tipped is to bring to mind the type of thinking that children or teens have.

Both children and teens are usually very egocentric. Things are about me. If parents are upset, little kids often believe that they're the cause, or worried, that they're not loved, or not good enough. We don't yet have the ability to hold the both hand, that someone could be mad and still love me.

We also don't have the ability to consider other outcomes So we don't have the ability to put incidents into perspective.

And we're very certain if I lose my tennis match, I'm positive that I might as well give up tennis as I will never be good at it.

I'm hoping you're getting a sense of why this can be so problematic for us in changing our direction. For instance, in moving out of fear or overwhelm or even doing too much. Let me share a couple of examples of this misguided certainty from my own life.

Yesterday was a rough day. Twice I watched my Great Pyrenees try to take off running and watched his back legs give out. Both times his running had been triggered or initiated by my other dog's reaction to something that she must have smelled or heard in the woods. In that moment of fear and sadness.

 Watching this dog that I love so very much fall and not be able to get up. I tipped and I was filled with feelings of anger at my other dog. Now it is true that she has played a big part in the injuries to his back legs. She's also a large livestock guardian dog, and in contrast to my Pyrenees, her breed Is fast and agile. She can make turns on a steep hill that just aren't possible for my Pyrenees. And as she has led him on the chase down the hill, I have watched him slam into the fence countless times while she navigated the turn with both speed and ease. 

So, yes, she played a role. Are his injuries her fault? As I sit here writing this, clearly I know the answer is no. And yesterday in my tip state, I it felt like it was her fault. If she wouldn't be so reactive, he wouldn't be hurt. I was sure of it. He was all good and she was all bad. That is the certainty of our tipped world.

I often share the story of an embarrassing conversation with a friend when I had shared with her an opinion on something that I believed to be factual. And she had said something like, I don't think that's right. And in that moment, I must have tipped, which I didn't realize until much later. During that interaction, I couldn't figure out what the heck was wrong with her that she couldn't see the truth in what I was saying? And I couldn't understand why she kept bringing up something that clearly wasn't accurate. 

Because I had tipped, I only had the ability to see my side of the issue. My higher cognitive abilities weren't functioning limiting my ability to recognize or think about alternative perspectives. I was right and she was wrong. Well, until the next morning, as I was loading the dishwasher and realized with horror that what she was saying made total sense and that I owed her an apology. By that point, my whole brain had come back online.

When our lives are in immediate danger, we need the certainty that comes with being tipped. Being wishy-washy could get us killed. And for everyday stressors, that same certainty, that conviction that what we are thinking is the truth can cause us major problems. It can keep us immobilized in fear or stuck In depression or self-doubt. It can damage relationships both intimate and in our communities. 

We just can't trust the certainty that comes with being tipped. It's like saying, I'm going to trust the reasoning I had in childhood or when I was a teenager.

Things are rarely as clear cut as they seem while we are tipped.

And our thinking is rarely based on fact. It's something I try to remind myself when I'm of when I'm tipped. And that is to not believe what I'm thinking or feeling, or to not put much stock in it, because it's tipped thinking. it's thinking that's coming.

Without having my full brain on board. I know from my own experience that reminding myself of this is easier said than done. Our primitive brain is very strong and it pushes us to believe what we're thinking and feeling. If it didn't do that, we wouldn't have survived as a species.

And so thinking about it ahead of time when we're not tipped and being prepared is one way of giving ourselves a better chance of intervening. It can also help to listen or observe people you care about when they're tipped, or if you have children or are around children to observe and listen to the conclusions that they make.

Or you might imagine a good friend going through a difficult time who's making decisions about herself that you know to be false.

Maybe she's tipped because her relationship ended and believes that she is unlovable when you know her to be one of the most lovable people in your life.

Conviction is certainly valuable, and we want to be sure that conviction is the result of the type of thinking and evaluation that is only possible with our whole brain online. Rather than the conviction that comes from being tipped, which lacks perspective, is often catastrophic, Is devoid of hope or compassion and keeps us stuck and often leads to desperation and desperate actions. Often actions we regret. 

I'm gonna stop here. I hope that this has spurred your thinking on how uncertainty can lead to conviction that lacks a solid basis in fact. As always, I'd love to hear your thoughts and reactions. And until next time, take good care and bye-bye.

 This has been Blooming Outside the Lines, a podcast dedicated to supporting you in blooming into all you are meant and wish to be. If you enjoyed it and gained value, please consider leaving a review, as it will help other women to find it and please share it with anyone who would benefit from it. And if you would like to be notified when new episodes become available, be sure and follow on your favorite podcast app. Until next time, how will you light a candle of self-acceptance? Because you deserve to be you, even if others disagree.