Making Friends With Choice to Change Your Life

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ABOUT THE EPISODE

Feel stuck but unsure what choice to make? Know something is off but not sure what you want instead? Tired of sitting on the fence between decisions? 

This episode is sure to have some gems in store for you because we’re talking about embracing a life of choice.

Tune in to learn:

💋🎙 What a choice point is and how to use them to make your life easier. 

💋🎙 How to see more possibilities (even if you feel overwhelmed in responsibility)

💋🎙 Tips for identifying what you really want

I also share:

💋🎙 Ways social media impacts our perception, choices you have to take back control, and how I’m personally using social media right now

💋🎙 How I came to the decision to quit the PhD program years ago

💋🎙 How I dropped my procrastisnackin’ habit

After you tune in…

Where are you sensing you want to change or shake something up? What are some choice points you may not have been seeing?

!Let me know in the comments!

Never miss an episode.

Alyssa Patmos 0:04
This is Make It Mentionable. I’m Alyssa Patmos and this is the show about being human in a world that encourages us to be robots. I invite you to join me as we journey through the mess, the magic and the mania in between. Because what we can talk about, we can manage. This honest conversation extravaganza includes free flowing conversations and high doses of vulnerability to remind you that you aren’t alone. No topic is off limits, and episodes are designed to leave you smarter, aka more self aware than when you came. I am so glad you’re here.

Hello, Hello. And welcome back to another episode of Make It Mentionable. I’m your host, Alyssa Patmos. And if you have ever felt stuck, but unsure about what choice to make, or if you know something is off, but you’re not really sure what you want instead. Or if you’re tired of sitting on the fence between decisions because that is a very uncomfortable place to be, then this episode is sure to have some gems in store for you. Because we are talking all about embracing a life of choice. So choice is one of my top values. I live for choice. But that can mean very different things to different people. And so it requires knowing what you want, which is something I have found that so many people struggle with. And it’s something that I got interested in because it was something that I struggled with for a really long time as well. And I ended up spending a crap ton of money as a result. So we’re talking about knowing what you want. And we’re talking about choice. And for context, I’m going to start with with a story. So when I was in my undergrad program, it turned out I could graduate in three years instead of four. And so I was supposed to graduate in May, and December rolled around and life had thrown some curveballs. The guy was dating at the time, we’d been together for years, and I was close with his family and his dad was diagnosed with cancer. And so I think things were just shifting and they were unknown. And I wasn’t spending as much time like figuring out what I wanted or like enjoying the end of school because we were doing a lot to help take care of him. And I was splitting time between being up in Phoenix versus being down in Tucson for school. And so December rolled around, and grad school applications are due. And my parents, neither of my parents went to grad school. I grew up with entrepreneurial parents, they were less on the academic side. The guy was dating his parents were both academics. And so I realized like, oh, grad school is possibility. And so December rolls around applications are due. And I just decided to apply. Mostly if I’m being completely honest, because I had no idea what job I was gonna get. And so I was like, well, I’ll just have backup plan. It’s December I graduate, may, I’ll at least have a backup plan of going to grad school. So fast forward, I get in. And I like to joke I don’t know if you’ve you might have seen this in a bio I’ve written somewhere. But I joke that I was born out of a social science love triangle because I studied psychology and sociology. So psychology is the individual sociology is the group. And then my master’s program, I decided, probably honestly, because the guy was dating, dad was a communication professor to pursue communication. In retrospect, I’m super glad that I did, because I use it all the time. And I loved that field of study. So for social science left triangle, then communication was like the missing piece, because communication is the bridge between how we deal with our inner worlds and process it to the outer world with a group. So I get in. And throughout the grad program, his dad ends up passing away, and I was still splitting time between Phoenix and Tucson. It was very, like transitory period in both of our lives. And so it was kind of chaotic. And again, graduation time comes around, and I’m like, What am I going to do? And I would have discovered through this process that I really like teaching, and I know I want to write a book, and I’m working with authors. And so I’m like, do I need a PhD?

And here’s the thing like school was easy for me. So in a lot of ways, it was just easier to To keep saying yes to more school than to figure out what I would do differently. So, obviously, knowing PhD is the last level you can go, I was like, Okay, I’m gonna apply, and I applied. And I got in. And I mean, it was easy to keep saying yes, because I wasn’t paying for it. And I was really good at it. I mean, I had full scholarships, I love teaching, and I was good at it. But I hadn’t taken the time to articulate what I truly wanted for myself. And so I get into this program, and at least this one’s at a different school. So it’s a different setting. And it’s a different environment. And I love the people I’m going to school with, many of them have been on this podcast, or at least a few of them. And at the same time, though, I’ve been building my business, I had been starting to work with clients and freelancing. And so it was like these two competing worlds in a lot of ways. And I didn’t love the culture of school, honestly, like grad school is, is intense, it depends on the program you’re at. But in this program, it was like, if you’re not spending all of your time researching, like you’re doing something wrong, I just didn’t like that. So this pivotal moment came, this pivotal moment in my 20s came when I was like, I don’t want, I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to be here at all. And so it was December, like things have happening in December. And in December of that year, I decided I wanted to quit. But but but that next semester, there were three classes that I had really wanted to take. And they ended up fitting into the picture of what I did for the next few years. And one of them was creative nonfiction, with like the godfather of, of the genre, and health communication. And I ended up working with healthcare startups for quite a while. And then organizational communication. So I stayed, I stayed one more semester. Even though I knew I wanted to quit, I made the choice. I was like, Yes, I don’t want to be here, I don’t want to quit, but these classes are important to me. So I made the choice to stay. And still I was like, Okay, well, I don’t have a job. But I have freelancing clients, and I convinced my dad to be a client. And so I was on a trip in Austin and I loved it. And so I signed a lease for a way too expensive apartment. But I had been doing work and I had been accumulating clients, I had faith that I could do it. And so I didn’t worry about getting a traditional job. And, and it’s at this point where, where this like age long debate of security versus safety comes in like a traditional job in a lot of ways it prioritizes a sense of security, even though you can get fired, but it’s a stable paycheck versus this like search for new clients all the time. And, but there’s a freedom trade off. And so for me a life of choice, especially growing up with entrepreneurial parents has always meant being able to pursue what I wanted and work for myself. And so that’s semi the appeal of academia, because you know, you have summers off, there’s a little bit more flexibility in the schedule, but decided I didn’t want to be there working for myself. And, and so for me, a life of choice has really meant the freedom to pursue what I wanted to work for myself. But for other people, a life of choice might be more synonymous with a stable paycheck. So because when you have that coming in, it might be that you think that the financial security, knowing when the next paycheck is coming in, and it being predictable increases choice for you. And so these two perspectives around around what it means to live a life of choice. And I don’t think it always has to be one against the other. But the way that we work often pits them against each other. And this is an it’s a larger conversation around security and safety and passion. And I think safety is oftentimes one of the reasons why do we feel like we don’t have as much choice. In a lot of ways school, like I said was the Safer Choice for me, because it was predictable. It wasn’t unknown. And like even though the stipend is minuscule, there’s still a stipend, and I could afford my apartment.

But but but but there there’s this there’s a trade off when we’re trading security and safety and passion and Esther Perel even talks about this in mating in captivity, in terms of relationships, like oftentimes when You settle down in a relationship, there’s a cost or a trade off to passion. And so it’s something that has to be curated intentionally. And so intention becomes a huge piece of, of embracing a life of of choice. And often, the status quo encourages us to lean towards safety. But it’s not the only option. And so what does choice look like to you? And the first thing is like, it starts with recognizing, we have a choice. And there are times in business when I felt like it would be so much easier, just like go get a job. But I had made this choice to work for myself, and I have the conviction, I had the conviction in that from a young age. And so I show up, and I ignore that shiny corporate carrot. And on the flip side, there are people you know, who are in cubicles and feeling stuck and saying they hate their job and not feeling challenged. And they feel like it’s their only choice. Because there are people relying on you, you have kids, there are bills to be paid. What about the car payment? What about all these things. And so ultimately, what embracing a life of choice means to me is it’s not about what each individual decision is in the moment. But it’s about remembering that, in fact, in every single moment, I have a choice. In every moment, we have a choice, whether it’s easy to think that we do whether it’s easy to see the choice or not. And embracing that allows me to pivot with flexibility. When something isn’t working. It allows me to recognize areas where something might need to be switched up. It allows me to take responsibility for my life, in a way where I stopped giving my power away to other people. And there was a time definitely, when I continuously gave my power away, I was paying coach after coach after coach, I was looking for strategy after strategy. And there was a running joke that Alyssa has bought a course for that. And it’s because I didn’t take the time to know what I wanted. It’s so easy to fall into other people’s ideas, when you don’t take the time to know what you want. And people are happy to write the script for us. You know, we grew up used to our parents doing it for us. And there’s a time when when it has to switch. And so like rather than looking inward when I was doing that when I was buying strategy after strategy, like thinking that that was the answer. Rather than looking inward, like when I finally quit the Ph. D program, or like when I moved to Austin, or like when I moved to Denver, like these times when I really knew what I wanted. It was at that point, I wasn’t taking the time to turn inward, and to know what I truly wanted. And so it just began trying on other people’s strategies one after another, instead of cultivating like my own sense of wild and what was possible for me and exploring what I even believed was possible. And sometimes we definitely need to know what we don’t want. But that also traps us in reactionary land, where we’re just responding to everyone else’s ideas, or their dreams or success instead of shaping our own. So 1000s and 1000s of dollars later, that was a really frickin expensive lesson. It was a lesson, mostly in learning to cultivate my own wines. Because a strategy works when it’s aligned with what you want. The problem I had is I kept like looking for other people’s strategies, but it wasn’t like I knew deep down, it wasn’t what I wanted. So it’s not going to work. Because I’m not committed to it. I don’t have the conviction in the same way. A strategy is great when you know what you want, then you can be like, Okay, I know what I want. And I have a specific skill gap in this area. Like maybe you’re trying to you’re like, Okay, I really know I want to start an email list, or I want to start a podcast, but you have no idea what microphone to use, or you have no idea what email provider to use. And so there’s a skill gap and you go and you get that information. And you can test on a strategy, but it’s rooted and anchored in this sense of, I know what I want and I have recognized here’s a barrier between where I want to go and what I know right now. That’s a great time to invest.

And, and knowing what we want though, can be challenging because I’ve talked about this in other episodes like we put so much emphasis on our eyeballs. If you even look at how Facebook and Instagram have evolved from from having more static tax based features into into like full blown Instagram where everything is is image based or video based. And so we so we see like we we are I shape so much of our experience, but we can only take in so much information and it gives us a pattern. And it limits our perspective of what we can actually what we can actually see and perceive. And so it’s so easy to take in other people’s images. That do we actually take the time to consider what it is we want, you know, you see pictures of beach vacations on Instagram all the time, depending on who you follow and what your view looks like. But in general, you know, laptop lifestyle, and and all these things we see quite a bit. And so I love a good beach vacation. I love it. I like reading a lot. I like hearing sounds I like being by the pool. My mom gets bored. That is not her idea of vacation at all, like she wants some more activities. And it’s changed slightly throughout the years. But like no, she gets completely bored. I think she’s gone on a true like leisurely. do very little beach vacation like twice in her life. And so does someone else’s picture of success actually aligned with what you want? Or do you just feel like you’re supposed to want it? Because if it’s not what you want, and you try it on, you’re gonna spend a bunch of time realizing that like, oh, wait, no, this isn’t actually what I wanted. This, isn’t it. And this, isn’t it? This isn’t it. And you keep trying keep trying what other people are doing to see if it works. And if you never take the time to turn inward and recognize, what do I want, what choices are available to me, then we end up in reactionary land. And that just means that we’re spiraling based on what everyone else is doing. And we’re only figuring out what we want after we’ve spent a bunch of time reacting to other people. And so a life of choice is about taking responsibility. And recognizing that I always have a choice, I have a choice every minute, no matter what’s going on. Even if even if people are dependent on me, even if it’s hard, even if even if I don’t see all of the options available to me yet I have the choice. And again, I’m not saying it’s easy at all. Because if you’re miserable in a relationship, and I’ve been there, but you’ve been in that relationship, and you’ve built a life, like it can be hard, it can be hard to recognize that there are other choices available to you. If you have kids, it’s even harder. But the fact of the matter is you still have a choice. So you can choose to accept that you always have a choice or not. But that’s the difference between people who make change and people who don’t. And here’s where here’s where I think people get stuck, because you might be listening. And you’re like, okay, yeah, I know that something is untenable. I know there’s an area where I want to make a change. I might even know what I want. But what choices are available to me, because I feel like I’m stuck here. And this is struggle. And there are like a lot of practical implications of making a change. And so I call these choice points. And identifying choice points can be difficult. Like I’m not saying it’s easy at all, especially when it’s clouded by multiple factors. Being in a relationship, if we continue that example, and you’re unhappy, but you’re thinking about your kids and how they might react like, yeah, what are the choice plans available to you might feel like there are none, there are none if you’re prioritizing the kids over your own well being, but by not choosing, like we’re choosing the default. And so it’s better to consciously be aware of this and make a choice for ourselves. Otherwise, it’s just really easy to start feeling like everything is happening to us. And it’s the difference between, you know, let’s say you’re in a relationship you’re not happy with or in a job you’re not happy with and you’re letting all of the other things take precedence over what you actually want. Your choices like you can say, you can leave you can have a conversation about why you’re unhappy. Those are choice points.

A lot of times when we put when we value someone else over ourselves, it’s just easier to blame the person and be like, well I don’t really feel like I can leave because What about the kids? Or Or we’ve spent all of this time like I just want it to be better. And we just leave it there. We leave it at this point. A swear no choice has been made. And so you’re by default, staying in the relationship. But you’re not actually allowing yourself to make the choice of saying I’m staying in this relationship and taking responsibility of what that means. And so there’s a huge difference when we can flip this feeling of like, Oh, I’m stuck in this relationship that I don’t like, and you’re complaining to your friends all the time. Versus like, Okay, I have looked at the choice points available to me, I can stay, I can leave, I can bring up a conversation right now. Because I value my kids. Because I value the potential. I don’t think you should be in relationships solely on potential, but it’s something that comes up for many people. So if you value, if you value certain things about the relationship, then it’s like, okay, I’m making the choice to stay. And then it’s and then for right, then it’s done. And it’s not this waffling. It’s not blaming other people, it’s not feeling like everything’s happening to you, it’s giving yourself the agency back, to recognize that you had a choice, and you have a choice in every moment. And in that moment, you’re deciding to stay. And it’s the switch from the unconscious to the conscious, that opens up more possibility and opens up more perspective for you to see other things. And I’m by no means perfect at this. When boundaries has been something that I’ve been working on for years and and Jeff has been great about dri since the day I met him. And so he has to remind me at times that I have choice in the moment. And it’s something that I that I constantly am working on and and it for me it was like what are the choice plants, we get into a conversation and and boundary needs to be set in. It’s like I didn’t know what was available. Because I wasn’t as experienced in boundary setting. I didn’t know what options were. And so this is identifying choice points is one of the steps along the path where people can trip up at night. And it makes sense to have some support. It’s part of the work that I do helping people see the possibility and how they can pivot. And it’s because these choice points lead to pivots. And pivots over time lead to transformation. You don’t have to overhaul your life overnight to make a simple change. Or to make even to make a big change, you can change your life with a single pivot. And that starts with identifying choice points. And knowing what you want. Because there’s so many people who are willing to write the script for us if we don’t choose if we don’t choose and reading digital minimalism right now by Cal Newport. And seriously reevaluating my relationships with social media. I’m in the middle of it. I finished the book, but I’m in the middle of this, like social media, not even a detox, but like declutter, I’m not on it right now. So that I can identify what I want. And what’s important to me about each platform without the distraction of it. And YouTube for me doesn’t count because I love putting having the show on video and I don’t get sucked into YouTube. Like, I don’t watch a ton of YouTube videos. So to me, it doesn’t feel like social media. But I’m not on Instagram right now. Not on Facebook right now. I’ve barely looked at Pinterest. And I haven’t been on Twitter for years. And so it’s kind of strange, because because I did two extremely Instagrammable things recently, I’ve walked on the runway for three nights of Denver Fashion Week, which was so fun, and I love the designers I got to walk for and then I went to Coachella which I feel like Coachella is designed for Instagram, it’s very visually appealing. There are tons of photo spots. It’s it’s, it’s super fun. So doing these two, like very social media driven things you know, where you can post you connect things that like generally get a lot of likes. And it’s it’s, I’m not posting about them, I’m not sharing them. And it’s been interesting because it was actually really fun at both not having to worry about it and not having to worry about my phone or feeling the pressure of like,

Why do I post this and what’s the intention behind it? And so So reading this book has opened up some perspectives for me in that realm, but in relation to embracing a life of choice. There are a lot of overlaps, because his basic premise is that if we’re not conscious about our use, if we don’t pay attention to how we want to leverage the platform, then it is so easy for us to fall into the way that they want us to use it to use it. And their entire business model is based on the number of people who are are on there and how many hours we spend on there because they sell our data. And, and so they want us getting sucked in, they develop features to get us sucked in. And so all of a sudden, you go on to like, check one thing about your friend’s baby. And then four hours later, you look up and you’re like, what happened? Like, where did the time go. And so if we don’t design, if we don’t look at what choices are available to us, someone else is very happy to write the script. This the normal script of opening of opening and Instagram is you go on, and it’s like, okay, top of the feed. Here we go, What’s New, and then you scroll until you see the last thing that you had seen the last time you sign in, or and you like everything along the way. You got to check your DMS, what’s going on in stories like they want you looking at all of those things. But through reading digital minimalism, one of the things I loved is how many choice points cow elucidated throughout the book. It’s one of the reasons why I liked the structure of the book so much because it posed an argument. But then at, it highlighted what choices were available in a different way. And getting from the point of like, okay, I know, I want a different relationship with social, but what options are available, those are the choice points. And that’s where people can get can get hung up. But that’s the important piece. That’s the piece where it’s like, what is what is actually possible outside this frame is pattern that I’m constructing the world in. And so in the book in digital minimalism, he talks a lot about it. So it requires intention. And there’s this one line in there about intentionality is deeply satisfying. And like I just lit up when I read it, because I love intention. And I do like, I just resonated with that so much, I find intention deeply satisfying. So why not be intentional about social media use. And so it requires intention, which requires knowing what you want. And he has a lengthy discussion about knowing what you value, because he says, you put the rules in place to support your highest values. And so if the platform supports your value, and it’s the best platform to support that value, then you use it. And you put some rules around how you experience it so that you’re not sucked into the distraction. And so it’s the choice points is the choice points and seeing what is possible. If you decide you’re going to use it, then it’s like, okay, well, when you sign in, you don’t have to like things. I really liked this point when he brought it up, because I naturally find myself forgetting to like post, but then my friends who are business owners, I’m like, Oh, wait, that probably actually helps them. So I need to scroll back up and go like that post. What I naturally find myself doing is if I really like a friend’s post, I’ll text them and be like, Hey, I loved this and start a conversation about it. So I naturally found myself not liking things as much. And then this gave me more understanding of that and further reason to not feel like I have to do it. I don’t want to just willy nilly fire off dopamine hits. Another example is okay, you only look at direct messages for a half an hour, in the afternoon, or you only sign in on Thursdays, or you use something like later to post instead of actually signing into the app so that you don’t get distracted. These are the choice points available. And then you determine what works for you and for your values. And the sometimes choice points are hard to see. Because we do things the same way. We’re wired to do things in patterns so that we’re not having to relearn how to tie our shoe every morning. But when we’ve been doing something the same way for so long. Sometimes we need help in seeing new perspectives and new possibilities.

And that’s why I write the type of articles that I write and the appeal. It’s it’s about opening up possibility and perspective so that you can pivot and pursue what you want. And other times when you stop looking for other people to give us the choice points and identify the choice points for ourself. And so a lot of a lot of what’s in there are questions back to you to help figure out okay, what are the choice points available to you? And this is where one of my concepts, my favorite concepts comes in, around discomfort, which is procrastinate snacking. So many times when something uncomfortable comes up, we end up going to the fridge and I call it procrastinate snack and it’s pretty are estimating by going to the fridge and getting a snack. And I, I recognized myself doing this a few years ago, I recognized it as pattern whenever I was going to sit down and do something that was new or uncomfortable or that like my brain just didn’t want to push the boundaries of, I would go to the fridge. And when I stopped that, or when I not even when I stopped it when I became aware of it, I could pivot in the moment and I could say, Wait, am I doing this? Because I’m uncomfortable? Or am I doing this because I’m hungry. Because what I noticed was over time, I was distorting my relationship with hunger. I couldn’t I couldn’t tell if I was hungry or not. Because I had wired myself to think okay, when I’m uncomfortable, go to France to get a snack. At least they were healthy snacks, but still not good. And so when I brought that to awareness, I was able to to give myself more choice in the moment because I was aware of it. And then I could say wait, yes, I am going to distract myself right now. But as soon as I go get that keto hazelnut butter cup, I am coming back and I’m gonna do this. Or I would be like, Okay, I’m gonna sit through this discomfort and then I’m gonna go get that hazelnut butter cup, or I’m not hungry. Dinner’s in two hours, I can wait, sit here, work through the discomfort. And it doesn’t mean that identifying choice points every time is uncomfortable. Like sometimes we see a choice point and instantly feel convicted. Like when I got a tattoo there. I knew I wanted it. And I messaged the guy wanted to do it. And I was like, Hey, can you do this, I knew I wanted an x ray of a flower. He drew it up. Two weeks later, I walk in see it for the first time and boom, two hours later habitat to other times, the conviction happens by having the courage to just make a new choice consistently for a few days or a few weeks. You know, currently, I’m trying to drink more water. And I don’t have a strong conviction around drinking more water, even though I know it’s beneficial. And so I’m having to make the choice to fill up a certain amount of glass water bottles in the fridge every day. And I’m just I’m just doing it, I committed to the change. But the conviction around it being amazing for me, honestly, it’s not there yet. But I’m committed to the change. And so I’m taking the steps consistently filling up my water bottles, putting them in the fridge so that I can cultivate the conviction as I see results. And it builds momentum. It’s okay, if it’s not there from the start. There is however huge power in flipping our mindset from feeling like this is happening to me. I’m stuck here. This isn’t working. I’m miserable. This is what life is destined to be like to I’m aware there are other options. And recognizing that you have a choice in every single moment. Every single moment, there is a choice. available, there are multiple choices available. And the ability to say, to go from that place. It’s like I’m stuck here. I don’t like this as well. I was destined to be like to, I’m choosing this right now. Like I’m I’m choosing to stay right now. Or, or you know, I know I don’t like this, which is why I’m choosing to do one thing differently every day. I know I don’t like that, that. I haven’t learned how to play the piano yet. So I’m choosing to practice five minutes a day. It’s not where I want to be. It’s not how much I want to be doing doing it. But I’m I’m making that choice. There’s always a choice available to us. And being able to flip from this is happening to me to wait, I’m aware of what’s going on. I’m aware how I feel about it. I’m aware, it may not be what I want. But I’m making this choice or so I’m making this choice.

And this is like one of the most powerful things. I’m obsessed with self agency because it is it is people talk about empowerment a lot. And to me this is the most empowering thing because it’s not sourcing your power from an external source. It’s sourcing it from internal your internal battery your internal source and and recognizing that you have a choice and that you don’t have to do things the way that they’ve always been done. And it doesn’t even have to be like this grandiose choice point can be like a simple choice point of I’m trying to be healthier. So I’m going to eat celery with peanut butter right now instead of eating a peanut butter cup. SmartChoice points lead to pivots that lead to transformation. And that’s how we get to the substantial shifts, it doesn’t have to be this complete overhaul of, of, of structure all the time, it can be these small moments of taking radical responsibility and realizing that in every moment, we have a choice. And the last thing I want to add to this, because where we get tripped up, I’ve noticed from the social media conversation and reading digital minimalism is around like the fear of missing out then, because FOMO is real, it’s real. And when we make a choice, it means we’re saying, No, that’s why so many people have a hard time niching down in business, because it means you’re saying no to things. But saying no, often gives you more choice, saying more often gives you more freedom to explore things in a way that you want. And so, in digital minimalism Cal talks about like, the the maximalist approach is to try everything because you never know what could be good there. The minimalist approach is to say no to a bunch of things, to figure out what works for you, and be fine missing out on the rest. And that resonates with me a ton. And it’s cultivating confidence in saying no, though, and, and being able to start seeing the power of what saying no, and putting constraints can lead to. And so if you’re worried if you’re worried about how saying no, can influence it, I get it, I get it. And what I’ve recognized is that by saying no to certain things, it actually opens up more possibility in a roundabout way. Because we don’t have as much stimulus for other people’s ideas for other people’s versions of success. Instead, we’re going back internally more often. And recognizing like I’m saying no, here, but why am I saying no? I’m saying no, because I made this choice. And I feel grounded in that. And then it becomes way easier to say no, I’m saying no to getting coffee with you. Because I promised myself three days a week this week, I was going to write, and I am really want to write a book. And so I don’t have time for that right now. And I’m sorry, Your friendship is important. Can we move it out two weeks. And then you’re prioritizing yourself, and still focusing on building connection? That’s the power of saying no. And that’s where recognizing our choice points. And making the conscious choice allows us to get more of what we actually want. So I want to know, where are you sensing you want to change? Or shake something up? Where are you sitting on the fence? That uncomfortable fence that is poking you in the butt? Where are you sitting on the fence? And what are some choice points you may not have been seeing starts with knowing what you want and sitting down and cultivating that. And then looking for choice points. I know it’s uncomfortable. avoid the trap of procrastinate makin, try and sit through the discomfort and look at those choice points. Sometimes it might be really easy to see. And other times it might be uncomfortable. So what are some choice points you may not have been seeing. If you want to get better at knowing what you want, then sign up for the peel because I write about this pretty frequently. You can go to Alyssa patmos.com forward slash the peel. And if you want to join the conversation, I want to hear from you. I want to know where are you sensing what you want to change or shake something up? And what are some choice points you may not have been seeing. Come share them with me Join the conversation at Alyssa patmos.com forward slash show. You’ll see this week’s episode and leave me a note in the comments. I will see you next week. Thank you so much for tuning in.

You’ve just finished listening to another episode of Make It Mentionable with me, your host, Alyssa Patmos. If you’re looking for more in between episodes, then sign up for The Peel. It’s my free newsletter that gives tips for how to navigate whatever life dishes and it’s also the place where I share the juiciest of stories. To check it out, head on over to AlyssaPatmos.com/ThePeel. Thank you so much for tuning in, and I’ll see you next time.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

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