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Feeling stuck? Break free from anxiety, depression, and the patterns that hold you back. Join me as I share my recovery journey, along with practical coaching tools to help you grow stronger, feel capable, and create a life you love.
You are listening to Break Free with Becky, your go-to podcast for real talk, real tools and real freedom.
Well, hello there, my gorgeous friends. Welcome back to the podcast. Before we dive in today, if you've been enjoying these episodes and finding value in what we talk about here, I would be ever so grateful if you take just a minute to leave a quick review. It truly helps more people to find this podcast and to get my workout into the world and help people who really need to hear the message that I'm sharing.
All right, let's dive in today's episode. I've got a good one for you. This is one I've been thinking about for a really long time, and I'm excited to share it today. So what if I told you that everything you've been through, every struggle, every painful moment, every obstacle that's ever brought you to your knees wasn't happening to you, but for you?
And what if the person you are right now is specifically designed to handle all of it? Now, some of you might be completely rolling your eyes at me right now, especially if you are in the middle of something really difficult. If you've had incredibly painful, traumatic things happen in your life. But stick with me because
I'm about to share something that completely changed how I see my struggles, my pain, and my purpose, and it all started with a sentence I accidentally wrote down in my notebook one morning. And before I start, I wanna give you just a little background on me so you understand my perspective and where I'm coming from.
I'm a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and some of what I'm gonna talk about next includes my spiritual beliefs about why I am on Earth, what the purpose is here on Earth, and what my afterlife will be like. And if you don't share my same beliefs, it's no problem at all. No worries at all.
Okay. If you don't relate to the words that I use, just please think about the concept that I'm gonna teach in a way that is in alignment with your own beliefs and your own, your own spiritual beliefs. So, let me tell you how this all came about. I was in my basement one morning working out and I was listening to one of my favorite life coaches talk about confidence.
And she was offering some thoughts that you can think to generate the feeling of confidence in your body. So if you remember your thoughts, generate your feelings in your body. And so we're trying to generate the feeling of confidence. So she said, I was born for this, I got this, I was made for this. The last thought just really struck me.
I was made for this. And I ran over really quickly to my notebook. I think I was in the middle of doing some bicep curls, and I just dropped my weights. I ran over to my notebook and I wrote it down, and then I ran back to my workout. Later that day, I looked back over my notes and I saw that instead of writing, I was made for this.
I had written, I was made for me. I chuckled for a second. I was like, that's kinda weird. Like that's a funny thing to write down. I wonder what I was thinking about in that moment. I was made for me, but I kept staring at that thought. I was made for me. And it wouldn't leave my mind. And the more I thought about it, the more profound it became.
I was made for me. My eternal spiritual self was sent down to this earth to gain a body to go through challenges. To struggle, to suffer, to go through disappointment, to use and misuse my free agency, because I was made for me. M y earthly self was made for my true self, my spiritual self, my eternal self.
It was made so that I can grow, I can learn, I can evolve, and I can become like my Heavenly Father. Every struggle, every trial, every pain, and every trauma was made for me. And the best news is, I was made for it. I was also made for all of that struggle, pain, and trauma. Now, I'm not suggesting that all of our trials were handpicked for us.
I'm not suggesting that God sends down, you know, specific trials to make us suffer so we grow. I think we come by many of our challenges and our experiences often because of our own agency, our own choices. And then we definitely come across so many of them because other people have free agency on this earth.
Other people can make choices that violate our p hysical bodies are, , mental and emotional health. I do believe that God helps us to do the best with what we experience in this life. And while I don't believe that he purposefully strikes us down, you know, with cancer or death I do think that the point of being here is to go through trials and challenges so that we can grow by overcoming.
Because it's in the overcoming of a challenge of an obstacle that we gain so much wisdom and strength. And I'm not suggesting that our challenges are easy at all. They can be incredibly painful and they can be very dark. When I was in the depths of depression, I often felt like I was at the bottom of a pit.
It was totally black. I was surrounded in dark and there was absolutely no way out. I couldn't find my way out. I couldn't see anything. Suffering is very, very real, but I want you to know there's a point to it. There is purpose in our pain. So often when I share my story with people of the depression experience
Anxiety, suicidal ideation, the suicide attempts, the eating disorder, the addiction. They will often say, I'm so sorry, like, I'm so sorry. I feel so bad for you. I feel so bad that you went through all of those experiences and my genuine responses. I'm not, I have so much gratitude for it. I have so much gratitude for it, like, please don't feel sorry for me.
I have gained so much wisdom and knowledge and experience from everything that I went through. It was horrible, horrible, and I wouldn't, I genuinely, I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy. I honestly have no words for how bad it was at times, but I am genuinely so grateful for it Because of my experiences
I have so much compassion for people. People who are like me, people who struggle with what I struggle with. I also have compassion for people who are different than me. People who think differently than me. Whenever something happens in the world that kind of alarms me a little bit or I think, Ooh, what's going on?
It's really easy for me to get into empathy because I can understand their fear. I can understand the pain they might be coming from. B ecause of my experiences. I have so much strength and so much wisdom.
I overcame, and I overcame, and I overcame. And every time I did, I got stronger, stronger and stronger, and I especially got stronger every time I found gratitude for all the ways that I grew through the challenge. Also because of my experiences, I get to help so many incredible people, so many incredible people.
And one of my favorite things is, is when I meet a client who is feeling hopeless, who's feeling stuck, insecure, overwhelmed, and you know, unsure about their future, it is so easy for me to believe in them. It's so easy for me to see their strength, to see their power, because I can see their future.
Because I've lived through my own personal hell and I've pulled myself out, I'm not scared for them. I'm not scared for them at all. I see their strength and I love to remind them that they're not a struggler, they're not a failure, what they are as a fighter. 'cause if they weren't a fighter, they would've given up a long time ago,
so if you are someone who has just struggled and struggled, and struggled. I wanna invite you to start seeing yourself as a fighter. You are a fighter. Those of us who have just a lot of challenges in our life, we are fighters.
Whether we get knocked down and we get back up, or we get knocked down and we stay down for a while, just the fact that we're here, we're fighters. Okay? There's purpose in our pain and there's purpose in our challenges. But listen, we have to get out of victim mentality in order to see it. If we're in a place where we feel like we are at the effect of the world, meaning that other people are in charge of our feelings, other people are in charge of our experiences, that we are powerless or helpless, or we can't see, a way out, that we won't be able to see the purpose in our pain.
We won't get the experience of overcoming and building strength. Pretty much we will stay stuck in the bottom of the pit, hoping someone will pull us out and never realizing that we're the only ones who can do it. So no one can pull you out of that pit but you. No one. A n excellent coach, an excellent therapist can give you the tools and the support you need to start climbing.
And if you're in that place where you feel like you're in a pit, I highly recommend that you definitely reach out for help. But ultimately you have to do it. The coolest part is, is I don't want that to scare you because it is the best feeling in the world when you do, when you pull yourself out of that pit and you do the work to get yourself out of there, it is the best filling of the world to climb out and to come out on the other side so much stronger and wiser.
So let me give you an example for my own life. Okay. So during my addiction, when I was addicted to prescription pain pills, I used to get really mad at my husband. I felt like it was his job to make sure that I didn't abuse pills. I was like, Hey, I'm the addict. I have no control. I can't stop. You have to stop me.
That's your job. And when I look back on it now, I think it's something that I probably picked up from, you know, television or books, maybe from like some intervention show where we always talked about the, you know, the addicts are outta control and you have to stop them. But ultimately it never worked.
It doesn't work. Okay. If he kept the pills for me, I would just find another way to get them. It never worked. No matter how many times he tried to hold onto them, I would just figure out a different way. So basically I had to get outta my victim head. I had to get outta my victim mentality that said, oh, you have to stop me.
And I had to stand up in the bottom of that pit and start clawing my way out. And I fell so many times, I would start crawling my way out of that pit and I would fall and I would get back up and I would go again, and I would fall and I would get back and I would go again.
I had to take full responsibility for my decisions, my feelings, my beliefs, and decide that I was in charge of my life. Like no one else could do this for me. No matter how many groups I went to. No matter how many people I worked with. Ultimately I had to make the decision to get myself sober, to get myself not using these pills.
And that was really hard for me because I felt so outta control. I felt like I was so much at the effect of this medication. Like I didn't have a choice in it. But really when I started. Seeing myself as responsible for it, seeing myself as capable of overcoming it, and also getting the tools from my coach to be able to learn how to feel my feelings, learn how to think differently, learn how to get through a craving.
That's when I started really climbing out of that pit quickly. All right. That's empowerment. When we are empowered, when we take full responsibility and we're empowered, we are no longer at the effect of our cravings, our brain chemistry. Other people's opinions, right? That's where we get leverage and we start to climb out of the pit.
That's when we can find the purpose in our pain and we start seeing our growth, our strength, and the coolest thing is when we find our growth and our strength, that's when we can use it to help the world, help those around us, whether it's our children or our best friend or a loved one, a sibling, or if we wanna go out in the world and do some, you know, work with people in the community.
Alright. This is when I really discovered the I was made for me.
And here's the thing, this is the best part, is I was also made for it. I was also made for all of my trials, meaning my brain, my body, and my spirit was designed to handle great struggle.
It's designed to handle trauma. It's designed to handle challenge, obstacle. There's a lot of popular psychology out right now that talks a lot about trauma, and I'm so glad that we're talking about trauma because it is real and it does affect the brain. But in the discussing of it, in the focusing on it, I feel like we have lost sight of how strong we are as humans.
We focus on the trauma and what happens to our body and our emotions and our brains when it happens, but we haven't focused on the strength of the overcoming of it. Strength in what can happen in our brain when we start to overcome it, how that part of our brain will actually change.
So there's a reason why our brains react the way that they do when we go through a trauma. It's protective. It's designed to keep us safe.
We may go through an experience that was very traumatic to us. Then we may find ourselves being kind of jumpy around noises, or we might visually see something over and over and over again, and that's our brain just saying,
i'm trying to alert you to any danger that might be around you, because the last time something happened, it was really, really bad and I wanna keep you safe. Okay? But the cool thing is, is because your brain is neuroplastic, meaning that it can change, adapt, flex, recreate, rebuild. That means that over time we can reestablish
safety in our bodies. We can rewire our brains for safety. We can rewire them for the overcoming and for the strength.
I just don't believe that a loving, heavenly father, that a loving God would send us down to this earth where he knew that we were gonna experience challenges and trials and traumas, and great struggle without giving us a brain and a body and a spirit that were designed to go through hard things. He absolutely gave us a brain and a body and a spirit that were designed to go through hard things.
And we have evidence of that in science, right? Not only just in my belief system here and what I'm talking about, but in looking at how your body can adapt. For example, um, this is one that just pops into mind. I didn't realize this, but people can actually live without a stomach. You can get stomach cancer, have your stomach removed, and your body can figure out how to actually eat and have food in it without a stomach.
So that is an example of your body's ability to overcome, adapt, change, flex, recreate, rebuild, and handle the obstacles and the challenges that you have on this earth. Your brain does the same thing, and I believe your spirit does as well. I love remembering this for my own children as well and for other people as well.
So I was made for me, but my children were also made for themselves. And I heard a coach talking about how her son's trials were really good for him and she was discussing how he was going through some really hard things and she wanted to rescue him and she wanted to save him.
But you know, he wasn't here for her on this earth. He needs to go through hard things and I wanted to blurt out. I don't remember what her son's name was, but let's say her son was Noah and I wanted to blurt out. That's because Noah was made for Noah. Like it hit me so hard. That's because your child was made for themselves.
My children's struggles and my loved one's struggles are good for them and me trying to prevent them to prevent their pain actually hinders their ability to struggle and build strength. It's kind of like if I wanted my kids to, have strong muscles and be able to hike, but I'm like, Ooh, I don't want you to go through the, the pain and suffering of, weightlifting.
Let's not do that. Like I'll do the weightlifting for you. And then I try and take them hiking and they're so tired they can't do it 'cause they never went through the pain of actually building the muscle . So when I started thinking about it further, I realized that ultimately my children. Who they feel like, you know, we even say my children, like they're mine.
They weren't sent here for me. Like I get be a steward over them when they're young, but they weren't made for me. They're not a reflection of me or a product of me. They're not here to make me happy or to make me satisfied or to, um, behave really well. So I can pat myself on the back and tell myself I'm a good parent.
As hard as it is to let go of trying to prevent their suffering, their trials and their pains. It, stops them from growing. It stops them from getting stronger.
I have to get out of their way. I have to let them struggle because my son was made for him. Not for me, not for his dad. He wasn't sent here to be the perfect boy so that I could have a really relaxed life and have him set the table while I cook dinner and have like the, the picturesque parenting life he was sent here for himself.
All of his trials and his struggles, are for his greatest good. And he has a lot of them. He's autistic and he has a lot of struggles and sometimes that's really hard to see why some of those struggles would be for his greatest good. But I have great confidence that they are,
because even if they don't serve him here in this life, I know that they will serve him in the next. They will serve him at the highest level, at his eternal spiritual level. And same for my daughter, and same for all of us. There truly is purpose in our pain. So here's a practical tip I wanna leave with you today.
Okay. So I want you to notice when you are going through a challenge or an obstacle, when you're in the middle of that challenge, I want you to notice what types of questions you're asking yourself. Typically, we ask disempowering questions like, why me? Like, why, why me? Why is this happening to me? Why does it have to be me?
And I want you to just notice how that question feels in your body when you say, why is this happening to me? Why me? Like when I say that right now, like, oh, I feel so like crushing and despairing. I feel like such a victim. And also notice that there are no good answers to those questions. If I say, why me?
There's no good answer to that question., I can't think of a single reason why you, right? So instead, we wanna ask ourself empowering questions. Instead of asking why me? or Why is this happening to me?, I want you to just change it a little bit to How is this happening for me? It's the slightest little shift.
I only change two words in there. How is this happening for me? Looking at the question that way makes all the difference in the world. But here's the thing, you can't be in victim mentality when you ask it. If you're in victim mentality, thinking that you're at the effect of the world, that you're powerless.
That you're hopeless. If you're in a lot of resentment, that question is gonna feel yucky to you. You have to be in an open, curious brain, right? So sometimes when we're going through deep, deep struggle, it's not the time to ask how is this happening for me? Sometimes we need to go cry. We need to feel our feelings. Sometimes I even allow myself like a little pity party.
I'm like, okay, you got 24 hours to just be in your pity party. Or if I'm going through something that's, deeper, like grief, I'm gonna give you lots and lots of time to experience your grief, to sit with it, to be with it, and nurture and care for it. But once you're through that, part that's heavier and more emotional, then we wanna get ourselves out of.
Like when we notice that we're in victim mentality, when we're feeling sorry for ourselves and we're in that pity party and we're done with it, that's a great time to start asking, how is this happening for me? How will I grow in this obstacle? How will I grow in overcoming this obstacle? Who do I wanna be in this experience?
I can go into this experience kicking my feet, dragging them being drug along, or I can go in fully and choose how I wanna be in this experience. I can create the experience I want with it. Okay, so just remember I was made for me and you were made for you and your children were made for themselves and all of your loved ones as well.
And that experiencing pain, experiencing suffering, we don't have to prevent it. We don't have to try and stop it. There's purpose in our pain.
Going through all of that pain and trial and challenge can actually help us make a better world because it can create more compassion and empathy and strengthen us to be able to turn around and help other people.
Another thing I like to really just remember whenever I'm going through deep struggle is it's not permanent. Sometimes when we're having a feeling or and a going through an emotion, it feels so permanent. But I like to just remind myself that nothing is permanent. I always feel better. I used to program that into my phone.
I always feel better. So every day on my calendar, I would get this note to myself that says, you always feel better. And it's so true. It's so true. Even when we go through the deep, deep sorrows of life, when we lose a loved one, eventually we will feel better. Eventually we will feel better because I was made for me and you were made for you.
So that's everything I have for you for the episode today, and if today's episode resonated with you or any of the work that we're doing here on the podcast, and you are ready to do the deeper work of changing your life, of climbing out of your own pit, to taking full responsibility for your life and really stepping into your strength and your power, I would love to work with you in private coaching.
I have a couple of spots open in my one-on-one coaching program, and I love helping individuals just like you move from feeling stuck and overwhelmed and hopeless to becoming empowered, confident versions of yourself.
I love helping you go after the things you really want in your life and teaching you the tools and the emotion work to be able to do that. I love helping my clients to rewire their brains and create emotional, mental, and physical freedom.
If you're ready to dive into this work I want you to head to becky garner coaching.com. I'll put a link in the show note. You can learn more there and you can sign up for a private coaching consult. We just meet for about an hour and we can just discuss what's going on in your life and how you want your life to be.
And I can't wait to meet you. I can't wait to help you create a life that you love living. It's one of my greatest passions in this world, is taking people from completely stuck to the place that they wanna be. And just thanks for listening today, and I will see you in the next episode. Bye .
Thanks so much for listening to the podcast. If you're stuck and ready for change, grab my free course. Get unstuck@beckygarnercoaching.com slash stuck. It goes straight to the heart of what's keeping you stuck and gives you real tools to shift you out of it. Once again, that's becky garner coaching.com/stuck.
If this episode helped you today, don't keep it to yourself. Follow the show, leave a review or share it with someone else. And remember, you're stronger than you think, and you're more powerful than you know, and I truly believe that. I'll see you next time.