A Change in Story

QuickTip: Who Inspires You Most?

Here's a quick, three-minute tip where we break down a mental health or personal development topic in 180 seconds to help you shift or reframe your perspective. Today's topic explores an easy, fun way to identify some of your values by looking at the people who inspire you. As a quick refresher, values are essentially an internal guidance system that help us to decide what to move toward or away from based on what we find important or meaningful. Because they're more internal, and not right on the surface, values can sometimes take a little bit of work to figure out or to get clear on. So to try this exercise: * Identify three people you look up to. They can be people you know, like family members, friends, people in your community, or they could be famous, maybe an athlete, a musician, actor, artist, or a well-known entrepreneur. * Reflect on each person, thinking about what characteristics or qualities they each embody that you appreciate or respect. (Maybe it's their work ethic, or their sense of humor, or maybe their sense of community, or their creativity and how they express themselves, etc.) * Jot down those qualities under each person's name to create three different lists. * Once you've gotten a number of characteristics down for each person, cross compare among the three lists and see if you notice any similarities or even the same qualities between two or even all three people. You can circle those or make a new list. * Next, identify at least 3-5 overall values that you might have based on what you've written down. You can also use a list of values available online to help give you some ideas. * Finally, test it out. Notice how you spend your free time for the next several days, and see if it's reflective of those values you identified. Or, you can intentionally use those values to make decisions about how to spend your free time, and that can help you to further clarify what's really important to you. *** Want to reach out, be a guest or have a question? Contact email@achangeinstory.com [email@achangeinstory.com]. *Disclaimer: The information contained in this episode is for the sole purpose of being informative and is not considered complete. It should not replace consultation with a qualified professional.

QuickTip: What's the Difference Between Values and Goals (And Why Does It Matter)?

Here's a quick, three-minute tip where we break down a mental health or personal development topic in 180 seconds to help you shift or reframe your perspective. Today's topic explores the difference between values and goals and why it can be helpful to take both into account as you're working toward things you want to achieve. Goals, for one, provide a destination, like the end point on a map, which is typically something we want to achieve or experience. Values, on the other hand, are more of an internal guidance system, kind of like a compass, telling us what to move toward or away from based on what we believe is important or valuable to us. So, goals provide more of the "what" or the destination—where we want to end up—while values provide more of the "how" we're gonna get there and the "why," or the motivation to get the destination. And this can be important because if we default to focusing more on goals without also considering our values, then we can experience things like burnout or achieve things that feel unfulfilling or empty. It can also make it more difficult to achieve a goal because if we don't know why we're doing something or why it's important to us, it can make it much harder to enjoy the process and stick with it. *** Want to reach out, be a guest or have a question? Contact email@achangeinstory.com [email@achangeinstory.com]. *Disclaimer: The information contained in this episode is for the sole purpose of being informative and is not considered complete. It should not replace consultation with a qualified professional.

QuickTip: What To Do With the 'What Ifs'

Here's a quick, three-minute tip where we break down a mental health or personal development topic in 180 seconds to help you shift or reframe your perspective. Today's topic explores what-if thinking and one way to help manage the "what ifs," especially when we're worried about the future. "What-if" thinking can creep in when things feel unknown or unpredictable, and our minds might start to overreact or go into protection mode by trying to figure out what's going to happen and even try and anticipate worst-case scenarios. Anticipating the future, or at least trying to, can also sometimes give us a sense of control in times when we may feel like we don't have that much control. But if we're overly concerned with all of the potential negative outcomes, we can experience an increase in things like stress, anxiety, self-doubt and even indecision. One way to disengage from these types of thoughts is to try and come up with a possible solution to whatever you're worried about by using the phrase "If … then." So if you're having the thought what if I fail the exam, can you come up with a plan of action that you could take? Coming up with a plan doesn't mean you're going to fail or even have to act on the plan, but focusing more on a solution is going to: * help you feel more at ease because it provides a sense of agency; * make a decision, which should help you to feel less stuck; and * help you to ground because your focus is now more on what you can do about the situation or on tangible action steps you can take rather than on all the potential or hypothetical worst-case scenarios that may or may not even happen. *** Want to reach out, be a guest or have a question? Contact email@achangeinstory.com [email@achangeinstory.com]. *Disclaimer: The information contained in this episode is for the sole purpose of being informative and is not considered complete. It should not replace consultation with a qualified professional.

What If the 'Right Path' Isn't Right for You?

Today's episode features an interview with Prasant Nukalapati, founder of What Comes Next Ed Consulting, which supports young people launching into adulthood. This is the second time Prasant has joined the podcast to talk about life after high school and some of the different paths that are available, and in this episode he shares his own personal journey of taking a nontraditional path through college. You'll hear how an unplanned year off became a turning point, helping Prasant shift from following others' expectations to pursuing what felt personally meaningful to him. He explains how that change in perspective shaped his academic experience and eventually led him to his personal purpose and career. And while his path wasn't without obstacles, Prasant challenges the idea that choosing a different route is the second-best option. Instead, he invites listeners to see alternative paths with the same excitement and possibility often associated with a traditional four-year college experience. For more information on Prasant, check out his website whatcomesnextconsulting.com [https://whatcomesnextconsulting.com]. *** Want to reach out, be a guest or have a question? Contact email@achangeinstory.com [email@achangeinstory.com].

QuickTip: Naming the Brain

Here's a quick, three-minute tip where we break down a mental health or personal development topic in 180 seconds to help you shift or reframe your perspective. Today's topic explores the idea of naming your brain and why this can be a helpful strategy for reducing stress and even improving self-confidence. If you've never heard of this strategy before, naming the brain is a technique that can be used to help distance yourself from unhelpful or negative thoughts. These are the thoughts that tell us that we're not good enough, that we should be better at xyz, that everyone thinks we're a phony or that something terrible is definitely going to happen, and so and so on. This is where naming the brain can come in handy. Because by naming the brain, we are creating distance between us and what is happening in the brain. The negative thoughts now become their own entity, which when separate, or a thing over there with a name, becomes easier to control or, at least tell it to be quiet. When you create space between you and the negative thoughts, it's going to help cut off the emotional response, and if you don't give negative thoughts your time and attention through your emotions and continued negative thinking, then they will quiet down. To give the strategy of naming your brain a try: You can give it a human name or name it after an object, a color, a place, whatever works for you. Or, if naming your brain doesn't resonate with you, you could try instead to personify it or create a character around it. Once you have your name or character, try using it when your mind starts chiming in with negative or unhelpful thoughts. *** Want to reach out, be a guest or have a question? Contact email@achangeinstory.com [email@achangeinstory.com]. *Disclaimer: The information contained in this episode is for the sole purpose of being informative and is not considered complete. It should not replace consultation with a qualified professional.