Join me as we take steps toward actual change in your mental health and relationships.
Cadre family, spend a few minutes talking about actualized living. The idea that you are not your thoughts becomes very important. We can give ourselves the space to still act on the things that we want to do.
What's going on? Cadre family, coming to you live from the target parking lot. We're here this Saturday morning to just spend a few minutes talking about actualized living. This phrase I'm using for the series of live videos I'm putting out here on the Cadre sphere, when we talk about actualized living, you know, phrases, whatever. It's a. It's a. It's a term. It's a. It's a title. It's something that has a little ring to it, but there's also some intention to. To that phrase. There's. There's two things.
One is act. Act, acceptance and commitment therapy. And that's kind of the approach to, um, mental well being that I model my practice after as a clinical counselor. And the second thing is actualized. And the full word there, actualized. I intentionally put in the title for these live series because often we can get stuck up here thinking and trying to problem solve all the things that actually happen out here, that happen in our experience, our life, and in the situations and events that we find ourselves in.
And so how do we get to this place of actually having some actualized change coming into who we are and the directions in life that we choose to find important? How do we get to that place? Because often it feels like, well, until I get everything sorted up here, I can't take action on the things out there. I can't take those steps because I'm not sure what's going to happen, and I'm not sure if I'm ready or if something unpredictable is going to come up, and I can't handle it. And so there's one key foundational part of giving yourself the space to maybe consider how our perception, idea, concept of who we are and these things going on in our life might be wrong, is the fact that you are not your thoughts.
And take that in for a minute. You, as a person, are not your thoughts. Why am I saying this? It's not just a fun little phrase that I throw out there, because oftentimes, what gets in the way of us taking action towards the things that we want to do towards. Towards these directions, these values, these paths that we want to explore, is the thought that maybe I'm not good enough. Maybe I'm a loser, maybe I'm fill in the blank. Maybe I'm too good for it. Or what if I fail? Right? The idea that you are not your thoughts becomes very important, because if we can understand this from an experience standpoint, we can give ourselves the space to still act on the things that we want to do, even when those thoughts exist within our mind.
And so what I'm going to encourage you to do here this morning, to exemplify how you yourself are not your thoughts, and rather just an observer of your thoughts, I want you to close your eyes. If you're somewhere comfortable, you're not driving or, you know, doing something that you can't. And if you are, you know, as much as being safe and whatnot, keeping your eyes open, if that's, that's feasible. And what I want you to do is something very simple, and it might feel a little bit silly at first.
I want you to simply describe a white horse in as much detail as possible. But there's a few rules here. The first thing is, you're not going to describe it out loud, so no audible noise or language coming out of your mouth. And the second thing is, I just want you to describe in as much detail as possible. So describe, you know, the hair, maybe what the horse smells like, what it looks like, where you see this horse frolicking. I don't know. Right. And so, once again, a little silly, but bear with me here.
There's a point to it. So in these few minutes, close your eyes, do what you have to do, and start internally describing a horse. What does it look like? What do horses eat? Maybe. Maybe an image comes to mind. So, at this point, you've probably described a horse pretty thoroughly in your mind. I want you to notice a few things. The first thing I want you to notice is that in that experience of describing something in your mind, not out loud, there was one part of you giving the information a thought, and there was another part of you receiving that information.
And so what we're leaning into is that self is able to observe those thoughts as they come in. And so why is this important? Well, let's take this to something, a thought that comes up maybe a little bit more frequently. I can't do it. I'm not good enough. Right. If we have this preconceived notion that I am my thought, and all of a sudden that thought of I'm not good enough pops into my head, well, I'm gonna avoid doing the thing that maybe I want to do because I'm already attached to this idea that who I am as a person is not good enough.
And here's a little change in the language. What if instead of we said, because I have this thought that I'm not good enough, I'm not good enough, we just recognize I'm having a thought that I'm not good enough. And then we take the action, knowing that a thought is simply a thought and not a description or an evidence of who we are. And so this week, my encouragement to you is take opportunities to observe your thoughts and feelings as they come up. Notice that it's information being given and then information being received, and see what difference that maybe makes when you have to make a tough decision, when you have to take a step into something uncomfortable, uncertain, out of your control, and how maybe it changes the way you see yourself and what you're capable of in those moments.
Thanks for everyone who hopped on this morning, and I hope you have a good rest of your weekend. m. Continuing on this journey of taking some actual steps of change in our lives. All right, adios. See you next Saturday. Bye.
