In this episode, it's another dive into my book Think Unbroken Understanding and Overcoming Childhood Trauma. As you may know, one of the things that I wanted to do is take the audiobook recording of my number one best-selling book and give it to you...
See show notes at: https://www.thinkunbrokenpodcast.com/e153-no-excuses-just-results-trauma-healing-podcast/#show-notes
In this episode, it's another dive into my book Think Unbroken Understanding and Overcoming Childhood Trauma. As you may know, one of the things that I wanted to do is take the audiobook recording of my number one best-selling book and give it to you guys for free. You can buy the book if you want on Amazon, or you can also download it for free, go to book.thinkunbroken.com
Today, I'm going to give you as an episode of the podcast a chapter of the book that was super meaningful that will create massive value in your life on your healing journey. If you are going to change your life, step out of trauma, and into healing, you will have to make a decision to stop making excuses. You will have to get honest with yourself and identify all of the areas in your life where you are riddled with excuses.
NO EXCUSES, JUST RESULTS.
Just get focused, listen, come prepared, come ready to learn, and I'm going to do my best to bring massive value to your life and your trauma healing journey.
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NO EXCUSES, JUST RESULTS
If the truth offends you, it only means one thing, you're living a lie. – Trent Shelton
Enough is enough. You have lied to yourself, cheated yourself, out of greatness, and wasted the power of who you can be. You've allowed your potential to cease to exist. You have allowed the vortex to eat your spirit. You have chosen to negatively affect your family relationships community, and put your talent on a shelf, aren't you tired of it? Aren't you tired of always letting yourself down? I replayed those words in my head for years. It was those words that echoed as I made the decision to take up the sword and battle for my life.
I was so incredibly vehemently and overwhelmingly ashamed of the person that I had become as I stood in front of the mirror that day. The truth is, I was tired of my own bullshit, I had a full choice in my actions, yet I blame the world for my shortcomings. I chose every good and bad decision action and the motives behind the events that were happening, but I had not admitted that to myself.
When I failed I blamed everyone else but me, I was a prisoner in my own body and mind because I chose to be. I suffered so much torment at my own hands. There was no other person in control over my actions, except me, but I didn't have ownership over my shit, there were some bright lights in my life. I had reliable friends, a solid business, and a partner that had my back but what's good and have those things when I hated myself and was sabotaging my life at every turn?
Since I was a child I have lied, cheated, stolen, hurt people did things to hurt myself and worst of all, pretended that it didn't matter. I thought that my life was not important and that it was destined to live a fruitless existence, filled with anger and sadness.
It took me a very long time to come to the realization that my actions were rooted in my past, and that I was the sum total of all of my experiences. I was playing the predetermined role of victim nothing was ever my fault and I made excuses for everything that happened.
Admitting to myself that I was the one responsible for everything happening in my life was incredibly hard because for the first time it meant that I had no one else to blame. That was scary because admitting fault meant that I had to take accountability for myself.
Here is a list of my excuses;
Making excuses was easier than actually dealing with the truth that I was fucking my life up. After identifying the outdated excuses, I used to protect myself, I had to make a decision to become brutally honest with myself and the people in my life.
Excuses are lies and I was a masterful liar. I could lie out of any situation and I have found that being a liar carry certain perks, like vicious panic attacks, sleepless nights, trying to remember stories, hurting myself, and the people around me.
Lying is a coping mechanism built-in survival. We have to lie to protect ourselves and the most extreme cases to save our lives. I used to have to lie to teachers the police and other adults because if the truth about my home life surfaced, the beatings I received intensified.
You may have had to lie for similar reasons and because that is your baseline, the behavior of making excuses has carried into your adult life. The difference is that as an adult, you likely do not need to lie to protect yourself, and instead of self-preservation, you are faced with self-destruction.
When your excuses and lies become your truth, then you are faced with a moral quandary.
Who Am I?
Who am I, is the hardest question you will ever have to answer.
The silver lining of understanding why continue to lie as an adult forced me to re-evaluate, who I really am as a person.
I made a declaration and promise myself to stop lying.
My values also began changing.
My number one value used to be money now it is honesty.
Being honest is the cornerstone value in my life and it also is the fulcrum and measure for everything that I do.
I don't care where you are from, how you were raised, how much money you have, who you know, who you don't know, where you've been or where you are.
There are no excuses for not living on your terms.
Every single moment of your life up until right now is your foundation and your baseline.
We can agree on that, however, blaming the circumstances of your life for being unhappy, unhealthy, and in the vortex is bullshit. Lying to yourself and making excuses will not help you become the person you want to be. Yes. I know that is hard to hear but it's true, you can and you should acknowledge your past to leverage it, but you cannot use it as an excuse anymore.
In a very literal sense, I should be dead or in jail. I should not be writing this book, traveling the world, or being happy. I should have never made it out of high school, found success in Corporate America and my own businesses, or dug myself out of the grasp of the vortex. I like you were set up to fail 99 times out of 100, I don't make it out, but I don't need those other 99, I only need one, that is all you need to.
You have one chance at life and in a single choice, everything can be different.
Even today as I look at the community in which I was raised, I see never-ending chaos. In fact, in the last three years, three of my childhood best friends have been murdered and over the year’s countless others have died or are imprisoned.
The environment I came from was hell for me and so many other children. I can't help but think that environment gifted me with stubbornness and pride and never giving up even in the darkest times. I refuse to quit, that's my resiliency.
Everything that is next in your life is a choice.
You hold the power to manifest, act on and create the exact life that you want. I don't know about you but I don't want to die wondering what if.
If you are not moving towards your health, then you are making excuses and lying to yourself. You owe it to yourself to leave nothing on the table. You owe it to yourself and no one else to get out of the vortex. Do it. It's not rocket science. Do you want to be happy, healthy, prosperous, and stable?
You need to define these goals and move towards them, I've laid the steps out.
Now, you have to take the first step. You have to hold yourself accountable. You have to move forward and find community, give yourself permission to heal, be excited about what's next for you and stop making excuses. This is how you take the first step you decide to be healthy.
To be honest, I don't believe that you can name a single valid reason for why you cannot have the life that you want. I don't believe there is a reason you cannot be happy, healthy, and live a sustainable life.
If you truly believe that if you truly, truly believe that you have a valid reason, that keeps you stuck, email me at michael@thinkunbroken.com
Here's what's going to happen.
I'm going to respond and then I'm going to call you on your bullshit.
There is not a single reason in the world that you cannot be whatever it is that you want to be in life.
If you want to be a great mother, lover, friend, speaker, businessperson, rider, leader, coach, brother, and the best version of you it is possible and you can, it's that simple. Now I'm not saying that moving towards those things is going to be easy because they are not but they are possible.
I believe in you, isn't it time that you did the same?
BECOMING UNBROKEN, NO EXCUSES JUST RESULT
If you are going to change your life, step out of trauma, and into healing, then you are going to have to make a decision to stop making excuses.
You are going to have to get real with yourself and identify all of the areas in your life where you are riddled with excuses.
In this exercise, you're going to get very honest with yourself.
What are your excuses?
What is holding you back?
Writing your excuses gives you a better understanding of the beliefs that keep you trapped. Not only in the vortex, but prevent you from becoming the person that you want to be.
Writing your excuses is not about judging or persecution.
Writing your excuses is about acknowledging and creating a clear and concise understanding of the language and beliefs that are getting in your way.
In this exercise, you're going to write every excuse that you can think of that is keeping you trapped in the vortex.
This exercise, as you step into it needs to be done with grace and courtesy and understanding that this is not about shame, this is not about guilt, this is not about putting yourself down instead, it's about acknowledging the truth of the reality that part of your mindset is in your way.
Those negative self-talks, those places of saying I can't, those things are keeping you stuck right now and look, you come by that, honestly, I will never argue that there is a part of us that exists in that narrative on that plane because of the experiences that we've had leading up to this moment.
And we understand that from a subconscious level, we have to reverse that, we have to reframe our understanding of who we are and the only way to do that is to first understand where you are at.
This may seem very challenging and it is meant to because it is through this place of being uncomfortable that we grow and in that growth, we create change and in that change, ultimately, what happens is we become who we are.
So, take a moment and with grace, and with honesty, and with truth, step into this and then step through it understanding that now, everything is in your hands.
Coach
Michael is an entrepreneur, best-selling author, speaker, coach, and advocate for adult survivors of childhood trauma.
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