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In this episode, Dani discusses the differences between saying "yes" to ourselves and saying "no" to ourselves. She suggests how we can take back the power in these situations.
See full episode notes for recommendations & links.
Dani is honest and refreshing in her takes on the world and society. Listen as she explains how she’s come to understand the world through kindness, both towards ourselves and everything else.
[0:00] Hello friends! Welcome to Understanding Kindness, a podcast hosted by me, Dani! I’m someone who approaches life by learning from everyone around me, and I’ve decided to write it all down and talk about it here with you. I’ve learned that in order to create change in this world, we need to understand ourselves and the world around us, all while infusing kindness into everything we do. If I can do it, you can do it, and we can do it together. Welcome to Understanding Kindness.
[0:29] Hey there! In today’s episode, I’ll be discussing the differences between saying “yes” to ourselves and saying “no” to ourselves. Though on the surface these differences may seem obvious, I’ve learned that there is a much deeper connection with these words and our lives. With a bit of work, we can begin shifting what we say to ourselves and when to help ourselves live more fulfilling, pain-free lives. I’ll leave it at that for now. Let’s get into it.
[0:55] In light of the recent uncovering of thousands of Indigenous Children buried at residential/boarding schools in so-called Canada, I’d like to highlight an episode of Indigenous Action for today’s Native segment. In episode 10 of IA titled, “From the Ashes: Boarding/Residential Schools, Historical Trauma & Radical Reconnection”, hosts Klee, Bonn, and Anthony talk with Remy about their experiences with residential/boarding schools and “discuss how we cannot address the brutal horrors of assimilation through forced education without facing how its colonial legacy continues to fulfill its vicious objectives.” For a bit of background, residential or boarding schools were used from the early 1800s to the late 1960s as a form of assimilation; attendance was mandatory for Indigenous youth from 1894 to 1947. Whether the Children wanted to go or not, whether their parents wanted them to go or not, whether their Tribe wanted them to go or not, Indigenous Children were forced to go to these boarding schools operated by the government and the Christian church. The idea of boarding schools for Indigenous youth came as a financial and military strategy to “kill the Indian, save the man.” Bluntly, it was cheaper and more efficient to steal Indigenous Children and beat, abuse, and assault their culture and language out of them, rather than going from Tribe to Tribe and attempting to slaughter them in combat. In this way, colonial imperialism could seclude and destroy Indigenous Children and populations, while in the meantime assimilating these Children into the colonial settler Christian lifestyle. These schools are not relics of the past. They are very much fresh in People’s minds and histories. In the IA episode, each host and guest discuss how they’ve personally been impacted by boarding/residential schools in their lifetimes. Their stories are maddening and show the implications of these schools, directly and historically. Years and years of losing their youth to colonial thieves and murderers leaves a lasting impact on an individual and their Community. This recent uncovering of thousands of Indigenous Children whose lives were stolen from them and their Communities still has effects today. Not only is it proof of the Indigenous genocide that has been continuing to occur throughout the history of so-called Canada and the so-called United States, it reminds Indigenous Tribes and Communities of the continuing harm caused by these imperial governments. This continuing legacy of these imperial governments is evidenced with the current MMIWG2ST movement and the fact that Native populations are in such poverty. The legacy of schools as a system of assimilation continues too with every school in the imperialist state (Witch, Please Book 4, E6: The Return of Pedagogy breaks this down very well). The uncovering of the thousands of Indigenous Children buried at residential/boarding schools is not surprising to Indigenous Communities. They’ve known this history and have been awaiting for the day their genocide will come to light. All of us, as members of the society and culture who perpetrate these horrific actions against the Indigenous Peoples of these lands we’re occupying, have the responsibility to learn about these atrocities of our past and present and do everything we can to restore peace and justice. To do that we must listen to those we affect. I’ll link this episode of Indigenous Action in the episode notes, along with the episode of Witch, Please to help your understanding of how the legacy of assimilation continues to this day.
[4:41] {Singing} *Shooouuuuut-Ooooouuuutttttsssssss*
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[5:06] Alrighty Friends, let’s get into the topic today: the difference between saying “yes” to ourselves and saying “no” to ourselves. I’ve struggled with this a lot as an adult. It’s something that I’ve noticed in my own life and with those around me once we’ve entered this phase in our lives where no one else is really responsible for you anymore. All the decisions about your life come down to you; there’s no one there telling you you can or cannot do something. Like most teens, I hated being told what to do and when to do it. I desperately awaited the moment when I turned 18 and would be able to make all the decisions about my life myself. As you may know already, I hated having to go to school day in and day out. Before I turned 16 and was able to drive, I hated not being able to hang out with my Friends who lived a half hour’s drive away. Many of my Friends were older than me, too, and this only added to my desire to make all the decisions for myself. So, once I turned 18 and had my own car, I felt like I was finally able to live my life the way I wanted to.
[6:07] Going off to college essentially on my own, I was still really responsible and went to all my classes, went to bed early, and generally didn’t stay out late on school nights. Come the weekend though, I partied well into the night and paid for it the next day. In my eyes, that was my release, my time to spend with my Friends, and my Friends were spending their time partying so I spent my time with them partying. At this point, I really didn’t see this as a decision I was making. It was just, my Friends are doing this so I’m doing this. I’ve always been an easy-going Person so I never felt like I wasn’t doing something I didn’t want to do, I just didn’t see that I could choose something different. Perhaps something that didn’t make me feel like shit the next day.
[6:54] A little later into my college career, when I was a little older and really feeling that adult life, I did start to see more of the decisions I was making as choices. In these cases, it would be something like, “I can eat lots of sweets and generally not-very-nutritious food! I’m an adult, I make my own decisions!” or “I don’t really need to care about exercising or making sure my body feels good. I’m an adult, if I feel like being lazy, I can do that!” I’d say “yes” to those impulses for comfort as if they weren’t even decisions I was making at all. See, for me, even though I was an adult in college, I was still just going with the flow of what you “should” be doing. I hated school so much in my teen years and, although there was a sense that college was different because I was “choosing” this and I was an adult, I was still forcing myself to go to these classes, get this work done, and aspire for a grade that would allow me to pass onto the next step. Although I was finally with my Friends most of the time, I was still just doing something because that’s what I “should” be doing, rather than doing the things that I really wanted to do with my life. Though, at this point I really didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life, but I didn’t even really understand that myself. Even though I didn’t understand this myself intellectually, deep within me it was known. I can say that now retrospectively because I can look at my behaviors to see how strong my will was to take care of my mind, body, and soul.
[8:32] Throughout college and my early adult life I looked at adulthood as a big “I can do anything I want since I’m an adult”. Party all weekend, despite that fact that I will feel like shit the next day? I can do that cause I’m an adult! Eat all the highly processed, sugary, garbage food I want? I can do that cause I’m an adult! Spend all my free time lounging around watching tv? I can do that cause I’m an adult! Neglect those who were closest to me throughout my life to find acceptance in Friends? I can do that cause I’m an adult! Some of these were decisions that I knew were conscious, others I didn’t realize I was making. All of these were questions that I was saying “yes” to all because I was an adult and could. In the little free time I had from school and work, I was like a kid in a candy store. I’ve got all the power over my destiny and can do what I want, in fact, what I deserve.
[9:34] Honestly, I never worked extremely hard at school. I tried to an extent, but I never put an exhorbitant amount of effort into it. That is, unless it was something that really interested me, which occurred later in my college years as I began choosing my own classes. Gen eds and the classes I thought I wanted to take to eventually get a degree that would make me lots of money were the bane of my exsistence, and I event- I eventually rid myself of having to partake in them. The job I had throughout half of high school and through college was extremely easy as well. I’d get there and either be around Friends and goof off, or be able to turn my mind off and just get through the night. I never worked hard at it. That didn’t change the fact that I was still giving my time away. I was giving it away by either sitting in a classroom that I didn’t actually want to be in or running around carrying 40+ pounds, destroying my body, for a few hours a night. Neither of these situations are ones that I would’ve elected to be in had I not grown up in and lived in this modern US society. Most of my finite amount of time was being spent doing things that I had no interest in doing. What I really wanted was to spend my time with loved ones or learning what I wanted to learn about or writing. Because I wasn’t able to do those things, and because I was exhausted after having given my time to things that I didn’t actually want to do, I deserved to do what I wanted in my free time.
[11:03] This is where the “yes” comes in in this story, and in most adult’s stories. We spend so much of our precious time here doing things that we don’t want to do, but have to do in order to stay alive in this society. When we’re forced to give most of our time to things we’d rather not be doing if we had the choice, our bodies and our minds continuously ask us for breaks. This society is also exceptional at showing us how to brush these signals from our minds and bodies off and continue to “persevere”. Of course that’s what this “great American economy” and US society want us to do, so we can continue working for it. But it is precisely the fact that we’re being forced to work our minds and bodies tirelessly that we begin saying “yes” to ourselves, when we really should be telling ourselves “no”. Telling ourselves “yes” to ease the exhaustion we feel from all the work we’ve been doing feels great in the moment. We’ve worked our asses off for most of our day, given our time to someone else for a paycheck to sustain our independent, shiny lifestyle and any reprieve from that exhaustion is deserved. After all, it is not our faults for creating these conditions for ourselves. Saying “yes” is so easy because we feel so exhausted.
[12:23] Although it feels great in the moment, saying “yes” to our exhausted body’s and mind’s desires usually ends up hurting us further in the end. It allows this cycle to perpetuate. We sell our finite amount of time to someone for a pay check to further our independent lifestyles; we become exhausted from all the time we’re giving to someone else and deprived from our seclusion from our loved ones; we turn to those readily available sources of comfort like couch-potatoing or stuffing ourselves with sugary foods or partying and downing alcohol and drugs; we feel that momentary sense of relief and freedom from the constraints of this society; and we end up feeling even more like shit the next day when we have to get up and do the same shit again. The cycle perpetuates itself. Although this specific way of saying “yes” to ourselves and allowing this harm to occur does hurt us overall, I believe there is another way to say “yes” to ourselves and allow our minds and bodies to heal.
[13:26] Saying “yes” to ourselves can be beneficial, when it’s done in a liberatory way. By this, I mean when we listen to what our minds and bodies are trying to tell us. Though I believe we are inherently born with this ability to listen to ourselves in mind, body, and spirit, it is taught out of us by this US society. We’re taught that if our minds are crying out because we’re overwhelmed or feeling deprived or mentally fatigued or traumatized that we need to suppress it and continue on. You are not strong “enough” and you need to toughen up if you can’t keep pace with what’s expected of you in this society. Strong People are able to push down their emotions, pretending they don’t exist, and soldier on in the name of the “great American economy and society”. We are taught this from a very young age as well. Many kids don’t enjoy school, but are literally forced to go for almost their entire adolescent life because “that’s what we do”. In my experience, my dislike of school came from not being able to spend time with loved ones and with myself. I “got” school, I understood what they wanted me to do while I was stuck behind those walls. I love learning, but hated the way I was being forced to learn. My mind continually cried out in desperation of the confines I was restricted to and I became depressed early in life because of this. My mind and body (as I was always tired and slept through classes only to come home and take hours-long naps) were screaming for help, but I had to continually ignore their signals to push through in this society and culture.
[15:07] We can also look at this in adult life as well. The foundation for how we are to behave in society is set up during our schooling and we take this with us into the workplace. When we feel exhausted or deprived or even traumatized from the constant grind we’re forced to participate in to continue living in this society, again, we are told to shove it down and soldier on. There are deadlines to be met, tasks to be accomplished, and money to be made (*whispered* for someone else). We are constantly told to tell ourselves “no” when our bodies, minds, and spirits are calling out for help. We are constantly telling ourselves that we are not as important as the “great American economy and society”. And by telling ourselves this, by saying “no” when we’re calling out for help, we further perpetuate that our bodies and lives are here, not for us, but for the constant and exponential gains of capital and this “great American economy and society”.
[16:08] So, what I suggest we all start learning and begin working on is flipping this dichotomy of when we tell ourselves “yes” and when we tell ourselves “no” because it- because it is not this society which knows what’s best for us, it’s us who knows what’s best for us. We need to begin listening to our minds, bodies, and spirits again. At times it may seem difficult because we’re going against the training we’ve been put through our entire lives. Many of us use medications like ibuprofen or acetametophin to calm our aching bodies so we can continue on. If or when you’re able, try taking a break instead of putting these chemicals in your body to get you through the next shift. When I first started cutting pain killers like these from my re- repotoire, it was difficult. I’d learned that whenever I had an ache or pain, all I had to do was take this little pill and I wouldn’t feel the pain anymore. What I learned after foregoing them and resting my body instead was that the aches and pains didn’t just go away when I took those pills, they were just numbed in the moment and would surely come up again worse later on. This mechanism of continuing to feel pain and many times even stronger than the original pain is a signal that our body is sending to us. Physical pain is our body telling us something is wrong and we need to stop. Equate it to touching a hot stove. When we feel that searing pain, we don’t just pop a pill and continue touching the hot metal. We stop. If we kept touching it despite our body’s pain signals, we’d irreparably damage our skin. If we continue to keep pushing these physical pains away with pills and soldiering on, we will damage our bodies irreparably in the end.
[17:57] Mental and spiritual pain work slightly differently. When we continue to cover it up or shove it down our minds continue to bring up those pains, and in return many of us continue pushing it down further and further. These pains work themselves out differently than bodily pain. Many times these ones bubble to the surface and make us lash out at our loved ones. These pains manifest in our behaviors and we tend to take it out on those closest to us. Sometimes, we’ve been trained so well to push these feelings and traumas and pains down so much for so long that our body uses a tactic that it knows will get us eventually. Fibromyalgia and other seemingly unidentifiable pain has recently been researched as the physical manifestation of our mental and spiritual pains and traumas (There’s a podcast called The Cure For Chronic Pain which talks about this further, specifically in episode 112, which I’ll link in the episode notes). This explanation for these chronic pains makes a lot of sense to me. When our past traumas and mental and spiritual pains aren’t being dealt with because we keep pushing them down and avoiding them, our minds begin signaling that our bodies are in pain, chronic pain that can be debilitating. Our minds are saying, “fine, if you won’t deal with us in this way, we’ll call out in a way that you won’t be able to ignore forever.” Our minds and spirits are crying out for help and we need to listen and say “yes” to them.
[19:33] Whether it started and ended with strictly physical pain, began as mental traumas and morphed into physical pain, or is a mental or spiritual pain that makes us unable to cope with our realities, we need to understand that listening to ourselves is the only way we’ll rid ourselves of these ailments. We need to begin saying “yes” to ourselves in mind, body, and spirit because we know what’s best for ourselves, not the society that got us to this point in the first place. This can be difficult at first, but with practice we will continue to get better at it. For me, when I’m trying something new, first I need to understand why I’m doing it; then I can begin recognizing the thing I’m trying to change, in this case recognizing the signals my body, mind, and spirit are telling me. This isn’t perfect right off the bat. I go into new situations with the intention of recognizing these signals but since I’m new at it, I don’t always know what they are or how they manifest, but I continue to keep in mind that I’d like to recognize them so I can listen for them. Eventually I’ll get to a point where I recognize some of the signals in the moment and act differently or advocate for myself. Mindfulness comes in handy a lot for this type of thing. Sometimes I won’t recognize a signal until the moment’s passed, but this is still important! It doesn’t matter if you recognize it while it’s happening or after it’s happened in the beginning. The recognition is what matters. So if I recognize a signal after the moment’s passed, I can still learn from it. I can realize that that was a signal and look out for it next time. I can’t change the past, but I can keep it in mind for the future so I can know better when to say “yes” to myself.
[21:16] Once I’ve begun advocating for my mind, body, and spirit by saying “yes” when they’re telling me to stop something, I can begin learning how to say “no” to things that will harm me before my body, mind, and spirit need to call out for help. Here’s an example from just the other day: I was at my sister’s house-sitting while they were on vacation. In the morning I brewed a cup of coffee, as I do many mornings. The difference here was that my sister only had caffeinated coffee. I usually drink decaf or half-caf so this cup of fully caffeinated coffee was really making me jittery. I could really start feeling it after about halfway through the cup. As I sat down to start reading, I absentmindedly grabbed the cup of coffee and gulped some into my mouth. In that action, I was able to question myself, “Wait. Why am I drinking this? It’s making feel really jittery. I don’t have to swallow this or drink anymore of it.” In that second, I stopped myself from drinking more, spit out the coffee that I’d absentmindedly gulped into my mouth, and poured out what was left in the cup. This is such a tiny example, but to me it showed me that I was really learning this concept. I’ve been practicing listening to my body, mind, and spirit for a while now, months probably. I’ve been practicing mindfulness in my daily life for years now. The combination of these two skills culminated in this little example that ultimately helped me to avoid something that I knew would not make me feel good in the long run.
[22:47] For me, at this point in my journey, saying “no” to myself is a bit more of a work in progress than saying “yes” to myself to stop harming myself and to follow my dreams. Though our society teaches us that “no” is a bad word and something we want to avoid, I think it’s actually the most powerful. It shows that we know our limits and we’re not willing to cross them because we understand why we have those limits. To me, I see learning to say “yes” to ourselves works as a building block to saying “no” to outside forces. Listening to our bodies, minds, and spirits and saying “yes” when they cry out for help allows us to learn those limits we have. Once we’ve learned them through deep understanding and vigilant listening, we can begin identifying things that our bodies, minds, and spirits would say “no” to before we begin doing them. We can advocate for them before the harm is done. The key here is the deep understanding of our limits, because without understanding we may find ourselves just going with the flow.
[23:50] It has been a journey for me, one that I’m still working on every day, to combat the training that I’ve been forced into by US society. I still find myself wanting to give in to those pressures to lay in bed and watch videos all day when I know what would really help me is a walk outside or playing with Ghost. I still find myself pushing the limits of my b- mind, body, or spirit because I am still learning them. I’m trying to listen more closely every day, every moment. That can get a bit exhausting sometimes and in those cases a break from being mindful is helpful and rejuvenating. Understanding that exhaustion and getting lost in a moment is also a way to listen to ourselves. We can’t be “on” 24/7, especially when we’re still learning how to resist this life-long training we’ve all been put through. Through the work of understanding ourselves and finding our limits, we eventually begin to learn how to say “yes” to ourselves instead of to the pressures of society and “no” to the pressures of society instead of to ourselves. At the Heart of it, we need to understand our own limits so we can advocate for ourselves and know that we know what’s best for ourselves better than the society that trained us away from listening to ourselves in the first place.
[25:07] {Singing} *Recommendaaaationsssss*
Today’s recommendations include The Cure for Chronic Pain episode 112: Real-Time Heal- An Alcoholic Home, Fibromyalgia, and Social Anxiety for how our traumas manifest in our bodies. Then there’s Witch, Please Book 4, Episode 6: The Return of Pedagogy for a deeper understanding of how schooling functions as assimilation. And finally Indigenous Action episode 10: From the Ashes: Boarding/Residential Schools, Historical Trauma & Radical Reconnection to learn more about the history of boarding schools and their lingering effects today.
I’ll link all of these podcast episodes in the episode notes.
[25:55] If you enjoyed this episode, help support the podcast! All this content is free and I’d love to make it my job one day, so if you’re financially able join our patreon or send a one-time or recurring donation through paypal! You can also share an episode with family or friends, and give UK a kind rating and review!
Check out UnderstandingKindness.com for all episodes, transcripts, and blog posts. And why not take a listen to my other podcast, Better When Awkward, co-hosted by my childhood best friend Jasmine!
Get in touch with me by emailing UnderstandingKindness@protonmail.com, or through social media. You can find all links in the episode notes.
For now, be kind, be compassionate, be understanding, and question everything. I’ll be here. Thank you for listening to this episode of Understanding Kindness. [End transcript]