The Heroine's Journey Part 3: Resisting The Call

So welcome everybody.

Today is the third in a 12-part series that I am offering live on Insight Timer.

Women,

Food and Forgiveness the Heroine's Journey and this is based on the teachings that I offer in my Women,

Food and Forgiveness Academy which is a 12-month program in-depth deep dive that I do with a very small and committed group of heroines and we go deep into healing the spiritual roots of yo-yo dieting,

Binge eating,

Sugar addiction,

And body shaming.

And today what I want to talk about is the resistance to the call.

Resistance,

Who's got resistance?

Just give me a little,

Give me a little thumbs up,

Give me a heart.

Just let me know I'm talking to the right women here.

So in the Heroine's Journey,

I'll just recap briefly in case you weren't here.

There go those hearts floating up.

Okay,

The Heroine's Journey begins in the ordinary world where things are going well or well enough but there is a sense of what I call the blessed discontent that arises.

There's a sense that the Heroine begins asking herself,

Is this all there is?

Am I going to be stuck with this body weight forever?

Am I really going to just try one diet after another and never really have a breakthrough?

It's a kind of holy or sacred discontentment that arises where the Heroine is sort of pushing against the boundaries of her life as she knows it.

So that's part one.

Part two is the call to adventure.

This is when the proverbial slap upside the head occurs and life comes in and maybe pulls the rug out from under our feet.

And this can be like a medical diagnosis.

My Heroine's Journey really began around 2015,

2013 actually,

And I was a chef and I was a culinary arts instructor and I loved my work but I felt like I just needed to go deeper.

I loved talking about soups and stews and stocks and sauces and I loved all that but there was a part of me that my soul basically was calling me and saying there's a whole deeper level of teaching that you have to get into.

And you know I heard that like okay well that's interesting but I love what I'm doing now so and then shortly after that I lost both my culinary arts instructor job,

My chef job,

My relationship broke up,

My cat disappeared,

My house like I finally lost my house and I got priced out of the bay.

I mean it was like one thing after another after another after another over the course of several years.

The scaffolding of my life just got scattered to the winds,

Ruins all around me.

So the call to adventure can follow that blessed discontent in the ordinary world and sometimes that call to adventure,

I have to say this,

Can be very uplifting.

It can be very inspiring like there can also be like one way the call to adventure occurs is like when your life gets blown apart but another way can be like oh I have this vision maybe I'm going to travel for all of next year or wouldn't it be wonderful if I started a podcast and really used my voice to help other people.

I would love to be an artist and just spend my days in my studio making art.

I'd like to run a marathon and now here we are in the resistance to the call where we have this inspiration or we have a crisis of some kind but either way the resistance it's like it's like a rubber band being stretched and then it snaps shut and the way the rubber band will snap shut often is with excuses.

Excuses.

Oh I can't do it.

I would love to lose 40 pounds and run that marathon but oh remember the last time I tried to do this and I twisted my ankle two weeks before the marathon started.

Oof.

I would love to travel around the world.

Oh but I haven't traveled in years.

I don't have the money to do that or I would love to become a podcaster.

Oh but you know people like me don't do things like that.

Do you see?

So we have this inspiration and then we we resist.

Here come some chats here.

Let me just see what you're all saying.

Me.

Hi Shachi.

Welcome back.

Hey Jennifer.

Welcome back.

I would love to sing but I'm not good enough.

There's one.

Uh-huh.

Ginger's saying it sounds like the more conditioned we are the more likely we are to override the sacred discontent and require the the rug to be pulled out to follow the call.

Yeah Ginger's making a great point here that yeah like for me for example you know I was in this world this culinary world that I really loved but it was like I was being called to teach at a deeper level and I I kind of ignored it.

You know I bookmarked it like oh that's interesting that I feel that way but I didn't take any action toward it.

I just kind of let it go and then what happened?

Boom boom boom boom boom you know.

So yes the universe will knock more loudly on your door if you're not paying attention and it will give you the conditions it will give you conditions that are more adverse and maybe not so much in your favor.

You know the tide gets a little harder to swim against to realize your dreams.

Patty Marcella.

Oh yes I am with you.

This topic is right where I am in my life.

Welcome Patty.

Great.

The resistance to the call.

Okay so here is what is important to understand about the resistance to the call.

Like so many other things we as women tend to beat ourselves up and blame ourselves for our resistance or for our fear or for our doubt right?

However resistance is a natural archetypal part of this process.

It is baked in to the archetypal framework of the heroine's journey.

Okay so if you're having resistance rather than thinking there you know oh geez I'm having this resistance what's wrong with me?

I should be getting up and starting that podcast but but instead I'm here sitting on my couch eating jelly beans watching you know Oprah reruns.

Don't beat yourself up for it.

Okay the universe is still at work but there might be a framework for understanding the resistance that could be helpful that I want to give you.

You know I've talked about this in several different ways in different live events over the past several months and I'll give you another framework for it but if you think about what you know what it takes to make big change in your life.

What it takes to really heed the call to adventure.

You have to step outside of your comfort zone.

You have to.

You can't change and be comfortable at the same time.

So like if you've been working a nine to five job and you clock in and you get your paycheck every two weeks and you know exactly how much to the penny is going to be in that paycheck and you can plan your money perfectly and you do all that but you really have this dream of being an entrepreneur.

Well yeah you're going to have to step outside of that.

At some point you're going to have to leave that whole little comfortable framework of that nine to five job behind and you're going to have to step into this unknown of like okay gee I'm going to start marketing my business and I don't know where my clients or my money is coming from but you know I'm going to have the leap of faith which we talked about last week.

So comfort and growth can't happen simultaneously and of course as human beings our need for comfort in that competition between comfort and growth.

Comfort will always prevail.

We have to really rouse ourselves to to commit to that growth and it's kind of like this.

So if you think about think about your heating thermostat on your wall of your house or wherever it is right let's say you set that thermostat to 72 degrees and that heating system does its job where okay so the homeostatic point the homeostasis is 72 degrees if it's hot outside and the temperature starts creeping up 75 76 it's going to kick in to cool it back down right or it's going to turn off until it cools back down you know if it starts to get colder 72 71 69 68 it's going to bring the heat on to bring it back up so that thermostat is always working to bring you back to that 72 degree set point.

So what does this have to do with the resistance to the call?

If you let's say you want to be an entrepreneur and you start taking action toward that okay so you buy your url right you get your website and maybe you start to make a plan for your ideal client and maybe you are starting to think about okay you're starting to get your visions of how I'm going to do this work what happens that's where like the point of resistance can come in if you are veering too far away from what we could call your comfort zone right that set point then you're going to procrastinate something will happen oh gee that's not working anymore oh no I don't have the money for this it goes on the shelf do you see and by the way this happens also metabolically so I'm talking about a kind of psychological or spiritual set point but this also happens in your metabolism when you are following a diet so you know you bring your calories down you're mindful of your portions you're tracking you're counting you're doing this you're doing that you lose five pounds you lose ten pounds your genes feel a little looser you feel good but then it becomes harder to keep it up right but then it becomes like oh am I going to have to do this for the rest of my life is this really the way I want to live back you go to the set point the pounds come back on okay so tell me if I'm speaking your language here and let me know if you're relating to what I'm saying I've recently sold my home and decided to change my life I'm 68 and need adventure I hear you girl I work seasonal in the national parks oh wow I'm going on my first solar road trip in three weeks this plan has unfolded over several years patty you are really speaking my language I'll tell you one of my calls to adventure is to get a teardrop trailer and to spend the summers going through the national parks and the hot springs around here in the western U.

S.

I love that okay Debbie we support you patty Jennifer that's awesome patty I'm thinking of my own solar travel okay oh gee maybe we need a whole new live series on women traveling okay and yes I experience self-doubt but I keep moving forward sometimes slowly and you are inspiring me to move forward perfect okay yes I'm going to talk about that in one second patty that's great ginger is saying did you say comfort and growth can happen simultaneously yes yeah it's it's hard to grow and be comfortable at the same time think about a little toddler learning to walk you know I um one of my oldest clients just she became a mom a couple years ago and she sent me a little video of her her baby you know and and dad's over here and mom's over here and you know the look it was it was really cute this little baby putting her hands up and walking but it's like every step that little baby is taking she she doesn't know is she going to fall down she might fall she could get hurt something could happen if she's just in her crib with her pacifier she's never going to learn to walk you see comfort and growth they can happen at the same time ginger saying patty that is amazing I met a woman working at parks pulling an rv around the country this summer she was having a blast ah go patty oh this is good so we have this thermostat we we try to take action toward the call to adventure and our set point pulls us back what is the antidote to this how do we work with this ah before I get into that I want to say one of the biggest ways that we get pulled back to our set point is the question that we ask ourselves or that is like rumbling in our subconscious mind anybody have any idea what it is who do you think you are who do you think you are when I was a little girl in Catholic school as you can imagine I was a rather rebellious maiden I often would stand up in the middle of the class and challenge the nuns especially when they were saying things that I thought were abusive I would just say you know you can't talk and who do you think you are Miss Friel who do you think you are so what I have learned over the years is that that is actually a great question that is a great question who do I think I am I mean if you take the the thorn of the sting out of it you know you take the kind of scornfulness out of it who do you think you are well okay who do I think I am so I want to ask you who do you think you are who do you Patty who do you think you are who do you think you are to be traveling around the national parks like this Jennifer you are also thinking about solo travel you know who do you think you are and maybe the other side of the question see this is like we're kind of doing a little Byron Katie with this but another side of the question might be who do you think you're not who do you think you are who do you think you're not mm-hmm okay so I want to invite you to just ponder that for a moment you get negative feedback all the time mm-hmm okay Tiziana is saying do it ladies solo travel is fantastic yeah I mean the solo travel that I have done I've loved it it's one it is wonderful it's wonderful to be your own traveling companion it's really fun okay Shachi saying I am the soul with unlimited potential yes yes see isn't that interesting when somebody speaks the truth the only answer to it is yes yeah I am brave and excited to join the to enjoy the life I am in Jennifer right on nice okay well let's do some EFT tapping let's work with this call to adventure let's start the tapping here with just just placing your hands on your heart and uh really tuning into your call to adventure and the way that I like to do this we've played this game before here is to just say wouldn't it be wonderful if you know really seeing yourself in that teardrop and toodling around the national parks wouldn't it be wonderful wouldn't it be wonderful to just be traveling around the world feeling free whatever it is that you want wouldn't it be wonderful to start a family wouldn't it be wonderful to run that marathon that I've been fantasizing about for years wouldn't it be wonderful to build a house in the woods and then what is it that holds you back from taking action toward this vision well what if I'm driving around visiting the national parks and I'm in the middle of nowhere and my my vehicle breaks down what if it all crashes around me in failure okay consider that your fear of failure is really fear of success what if I'm what if I'm really happy and successful at this what if I do make all the money I want to make okay and then just see how strong that fear is because it's usually comes in the form of what if okay what if okay so once you've got this all dialed in what if it works and I love it exactly what if it fails what if it succeeds perfect let's do some tapping so if you're new to tapping just say as I say and do as I do and feel free to use your own words if mine don't resonate with you okay even though in my heart and soul go ahead and say that I am hearing a heroine's call to adventure another part of me is resisting that call this is a completely natural part of the heroine's journey I totally honor it good okay let's go up to the top of the head oh yes I have beautiful visions of adventure good inside the eyebrow beautiful visions of my heroine's call to adventure here side of the eye I can see myself fulfilled and happy under the eye I can see myself being of beautiful service under the nose I can see a bigger world opening up for me under the mouth and it feels very inspiring and exciting collarbone it also feels really scary and under the arm and that scared part of me wants to shut it all down top of the head who am I to do something like this mm-hmm inside the eyebrow who do I think I am to do something this fulfilling side of the eye people like me don't live lives like this under the eye what if it's all a colossal failure under the nose what if it's all a wonderful success under the mouth what if something really bad happens what if I'm outshining somebody else in my tribe okay under the arm all these fears yeah okay top of the head and everything they mean to me okay inside the eyebrow and all the ways I use my fear to hold myself back side of the eye this resistance to the adventure under the eye it's perfectly natural to ask all these questions okay under the nose I send love to all of it under the mouth I send love to myself good collarbone for even being brave enough to consider this under the arm regardless of what happens I am brave simply for being here and tapping with Marcella okay good okay let's just take a break right there shake it out yeah I read your mind Ginger yes I'm sure I did yeah that's another one that especially for women we get to do where it's like oh somebody else if I'm too bright if I'm too brilliant if I'm you know my life is too big and I'm too happy and I'm too fulfilled like somebody else is going to feel like shrunken and miserable and jealous and all that and and oh you know yeah it happens okay how was that tapping for everybody sometimes the tapping like we can open up a Pandora's box and things get more painful but what was the tapping like for you please just feel free to let me know Patty feels energized love that good we're going to do another round here Marcella I am wrecked a big truth but now big freedom Aina it's so great okay what I want to say to that is girlfriend you are not falling apart you are falling together Ginger I realize how much colleagues confusion or disdain for what I'm doing affects me like uh Ginger say more about that like okay others are confused about me changing and looking down on it talking about me um Ginger I want to invite you to bookend that and okay you can't stay hidden though okay so this is your crossroads right you can't stay where you are and you can't move forward here you are at the crossroads perfect it made rethinking my plans about changing going back to the university Noah oh I love it so let's go back to this question for a moment about the set point that we're talking about if this set point is at a hard 72 degrees how do we move it we have to move it incrementally and Ginger this might be helpful for you as well in what you're what you're bringing up here think about like crash dieting how crash dieting works like okay I'm gonna I'm gonna crash diet I'm not gonna eat for two months and I'm gonna squeeze myself into that dress in time to show up for my niece's wedding well okay wrecks your metabolism destroys your metabolism makes weight loss infinitely harder in the future okay not a good idea however you do it and you're successful but then everything just comes right back right so you you crash and you go on that crash diet you not only regain it but oftentimes with more so just as with that with this with following the call to adventure the idea here is that you take consistent daily action or not even daily but just consistent action it could be consistent weekly monthly whatever so that you can calibrate that set point as you go so you know you have a big vision and you try to gobble the whole vision down all at once you hear this call to adventure and you think you have to do it all today it all has to happen right now and then you get overwhelmed and then you shut it down or you think who do I think I am and you shut it down or my colleagues are going to make fun of me and you shut it down your dream goes to that place where dreams go to die the other the other thing too about the consistent action is again the you know going back to dieting dieting wreaks disaster metabolically on your body however it doesn't mean that all is lost but the path of repair is the path of like daily consistent or you know regular consistent actions of you know all the self-care things we know to do eat well sleep movement emotional processing all those things like you know living a vitality lifestyle you know and having an identity as someone who cultivates her vitality including going for her dreams okay this is all good information good okay patty thank you all righty let's do one more round of tapping here we go so even though i can hear my call to adventure a little more loudly okay tell me if this feels true i feel less resistance and more inspiration and excitement i know that resistance will come up again and again and again okay here we go so now that i know that this is a natural part of the process and i don't have to blame or beat myself up for it i can choose to meet it with love i can choose to gently bring my resistance along as i go okay top of the head yeah maybe i still feel some resistance inside the eyebrow i still wonder how it could all work out okay side of the eye i'm still trying to figure it all out under the eye still trying to control and manage the whole thing under the nose but what if i instead could have faith okay here we go under the mouth okay this call to adventure is in my heart for some reason collarbone this call to adventure is a call from the universe good under the arm calling me into a bigger and more adventurous life okay top of the head what if i could honor this call good inside the eyebrow step up to the call side of the eye and take small consistent actions to go forward good good under the eye i don't have to conquer this all at once under the nose i can just take the next right step that is in front of me under the mouth and trust that that step will lead to the next step collarbone and even though there are no guarantees that it's all going to work out under the arm i am willing to be on the adventure for its own sake anyway okay great let's shake it out whoo okay take a drink of water if you have water available what for you feels like the next right action what might a next right action look like for you it feels good to know the resistance is normal and part of the process yeah oh with food but i want to change i would add not take away i can use that in life absolutely that's right yeah so you're not depriving yourself but you're giving to yourself yeah patty you had mentioned earlier in the chat thread about you know you're taking small incremental steps sometimes slowly slow and steady is a good way to go when it comes to fulfilling your heroine's call to adventure because of course it's the journey as well as the destination the journey is the destination in many instances what does it take so here we are at this point and we've you know acknowledged the blessed discontent we've heard the call to adventure and we have resisted the call so now once we overcome or once we i'll say it this way once we make friends with that resistance and we are willing to move forward that is where the mentor appears so meeting the mentor is the next stage in the heroine's journey thank you i love thank marcella and all of you such gratitude for all of you thank you ladies this was a wonderful gathering feel free to message me through insight time or if you just have any questions or just want to reach out have a have a wonderful week noah i'm sending you peace and love vera my heart feels lighter yay debbie take care ladies ciao ciao all righty bye for now