How to STOP Thinking About Work...Especially on Your Days Off!

Hello my friend, you cannot stop thinking about work. I've been an entrepreneur since 2018, keynote speaking and coaching business. I know how it feels that every minute of every day is spent problem-solving. There's always something to figure out. There's a to-do list that you have and 24 hours in a day is not enough to do it. Okay, so it can make us feel helpless and behind and like we're not doing enough. Even if we work all 24 hours every day and you can imagine that scenario my friend, it still wouldn't feel like enough. It still wouldn't be there. The completion, the satisfaction wouldn't be there and that's something to know. Okay, so I'm going to say, we're going to go through three things today. I'm going to reframe the question for you. The question that you're asking isn't helpful of how to stop thinking about work. So we're going to reframe that. Then I'm going to talk about the HPA axis, the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal axis. Okay, so we're going to get some neurobiology in here and then we're going to do an exercise and you're going to write down a few things you can do right after this video starting tomorrow or whenever you're working next and you're going to try it out. Okay, does that sound good? Okay, number one and there's no teleprompter here. I'm watching these YouTube videos and guys on Instagram and there's all the teleprompter apps. I've been making YouTube videos since 2014 and I know I can't do that. I can't. So thank you for staying with me over the mumbles and jumbles and if I get carried away, I hope we can just hang out for a minute. Okay, because the point of this channel is being human. It's a place for men to rest and transform. I believe that true transformation comes when we can be in a state of rest because then we're open to possibilities and our minds can float and have some adventures. Okay, that's my experience and what I teach. So what if the question is wrong? How do I stop thinking about work? The harder you try to stop thinking about something, it's going to pop back up, right? Like don't think about titties. Don't try to stop and suppress these thoughts. Let's ask a different question. The question is what makes you feel safe and why does that make you feel safe? That's what we're after. We're after emotional and physical safety here because when we feel safe, the mind relaxes, the body can turn off and shut off and we experience satisfaction and contentment and well-being that we are enough, that we're doing enough. Okay, so forget about the work thing for a second. Just think about when do I feel safe and that means when can I be myself? When do I feel like my authentic self? When do I feel like I am enough and I've done enough finally? When am I truly in the moment? That's a good one, huh? Because you walk around and every dude is trying to figure something out. No one's actually here. I walk around the city and I'm watching. I'm on the subway. I'm on the bus. I'm in the car and looking at people and they're all five minutes ahead, ten minutes ahead. They're tomorrow. We're always planning. We're always trying to learn from the past. So we're going back there seeing we could have changed. I get it. I get it. But there's a place in time where that can stop and that needs to stop and that's actually an act of self-compassion when you say enough. It's done. Okay, there can be firmness in that in the answer to some of these questions and the reaction and response to these thoughts that we have. We can be firm, okay? So think about that safety piece for a second while I go into the next part. Your hypothalamus, your pituitary gland, and your adrenal glands. They all work in this cool feedback loop for your stress response, okay? And once you learn this, you'll know it for the rest of your life and that's pretty cool, yeah? So your hypothalamus receives a signal of danger and then that sends a signal to your pituitary gland to pump up all these hormones depending on what's in front of us and that sends a signal down to our adrenal glands which sit above our kidneys here and then that's going to produce cortisol and then it's going to be all throughout our bloodstream so we're going to get sweaty palms, we're going to get tighter muscles, dilated pupils, higher blood pressure, heart rate's going to quicken. It's the fight or flight, right? We're in fight mode. So if you left the office and there's just a guy outside waiting to beat the ---- out of you every day and you don't even know why, it's just a guy outside with a bat and a whip. You're like, all right, here we go again. You're not going to spend time in your prefrontal cortex thinking this through, having 10 minutes to rationalize. No, your body's going to go, danger! Hypothalamus sends a message to the pituitary gland. Pituitary gland says, let's make some hormones, okay? Adrenocorticotropic hormone. That sends a message down to your adrenal glands on the kidneys and you get fired up. You get fired up. You're ready to punch, all right? That system was on when I was playing basketball last night. Okay, I was Larry Bird. I was telling my buddy, I was hitting some good shots and then I was like, I was Larry Bricks too. I was just hitting air balls and wow! And that actually caused more stress because I felt like an idiot. Invited to basketball and I'm throwing up these air balls. So that's the system. Danger, okay? So, why doesn't that happen while you're at work? While you're at work, you may feel stress but not that type of danger. Why is your mind quieter at work usually than when you come home, you're trying to figure everything out? If that's not you, continue to listen. There'll be some more things for you but for a lot of us, this is what happens. I saw there's a TED talk about it too because when you're at work, you have a sense of autonomy. You have a sense of control. If there's a problem, it can be solved like that. You can actually adapt to things and influence things in the moment. So there's a safety with control. So with the previous question, right? What makes you feel safe? I bet control is on that list. When you have a sense of control in your life, it probably makes you feel safe. It could be everything in the external environments out of your control but you telling yourself that I'm out of control is a thought of control. Okay? So at work, you have this sense of control and you can do things in real time. Outside of work, where's the control? 5 p.m. hits, there's nothing you can do or there is but you're tempted not to for sake of your relationships and everything else. So what do you do? Your mind doesn't want to be forgotten about. So you ruminate. So you can't control work there. So you're like I got to control something. Well, let's think about it. That's control. Okay, I'm thinking about the conversation I had. I'm thinking about that person. What should have been done that could have been done and then tomorrow that needs to be done. That's got to be planned out and there is a surge of dopamine, the reward transmitter or one that helps you achieve goals. It makes you feel good when you're moving towards something and guess what happens with rumination? You do get a feeling of well-being and feeling like you're making progress because there is some control there. You're solving problems in your mind and whether you're solving them, you know, at a construction site building something or you're building them in your mind. There's still that reward. There's still that sense of I'm doing something. So you have to see what you're doing to yourself here and you fail to notice what you fail to notice. Yeah? So at work, there's control at home. You got to control something and here's what you're doing. Does that make sense? And if that's you thanks a lot for listening. So let's get to an exercise. So remember ask the question where you feel safe and what makes you feel safe and I think for both of us we have that a sense of control that makes us feel good that we're in the driver's seat and we also can acknowledge what's not in our control, which is like 99.999% of life. Okay, but when we can't control we'll take ownership and we'll realize that brings safety. Okay on a practical point of view what you can actually implement is a pattern interrupt. Let's say where do you bring safety and control where it can translate from work into home and it doesn't have to be a rigid stop, but for now you can do that. So when I'm finished work, whether I'm at the home office or whether I'm at the office when I come home and I'm done I'm playing guitar. I'm playing some chords. I'm creating some new riffs. I'm doing some jams. I'm getting into my body again in a different way and having fun play to transfer that sense of control that way and you know what I'm moving that into now the evening. That's so important for people because we go from work to home in an instant. You walk through the door in an instant and you can't shed off what you've been carrying. So you need to make sure that that your nervous system is primed to let go of the stuff even if it was interesting even if it was awesome, right you can still bring that in with with a sense of joy and accomplishment of course, but when it continues to ruminate and ruminate and ruminate, you know, that's become a problem. So even if you're in the car before you get out of the car go on the driveway or up the elevator wherever you live take three minutes take three minutes and sit in the seat. That's it. See and when you can sit in quiet in the car or after you know, I'll play guitar and that's kind of my sense of meditation too, but when you're in silence you let what would ruminate in the future come up right now. It's kind of like getting things out of the way where you're sitting in silence and the day bubbles up see that happened. Oh, yeah, and I remember that. Oh, yeah, and that's a tomorrow thing. Okay, and you let it all come up in this space of awareness for you, right? That's all you're doing here. You're transferring, you know the personality of you at the office and that one who controls or wherever you're working and it's not a and I've talked about this so many times before. It's not a new identity that you bring outside of work. No, it's it's sure. This is YouTube Scott. This is coach Scott. This is basketball Scott. This is heavy metal guitar Scott. This is camping Scott. This is Beethoven classical music Scott and then this is classic rock Scott and this is all me because a golden thread connects all of them see so by you moving from one state to another you don't have to think of this in over complicated like on losing myself if I'm not the office guy at home because most wives don't want the office guy at home, right? You see the videos of these alpha men teaching you how to be in relationships and stuff. You can't be that guy all the time the alpha male with the gun and the sleeveless shirts and the muscles and the death and then the cold plunge in the saunas. It's all well and good but there needs to be the side of romance and emotional safety and listening and making your your wife feel heard and all of this and I know this video is going all over the place, but it's all connected because to bring work home. There needs to be that thread of safety throughout and by you making yourself feel safe and emotionally content and and like you are you've done enough and accomplished enough through the day. Guess what that means for your wife? Guess what that means for your girlfriend? Guess what that means for your dog? It means they can sense that safety and what are they going to do? Well, they're more prone to open up themselves and geez the relationship gets better. But when you are so in your head and I know this from experience and I've lost relationships because of it because I put work so far ahead of everything else and while she's talking I I'm spaced out. I've worked. I've worked a week already in the in the span of five minutes. Mm-hmm. I've planned out my whole schedule the next month and she just started talking presence is the name of the game. So as you move in transition, my presence is getting into that guitar. My presence is also taking five and doing some breath work, which is letting those thoughts just bubble with no judgment compassion for the self and letting that energy and that calmness and that relaxation and leaving the work where it was let that lead you into the home. Let that lead you into a new chapter of the day. Same book different chapter. Yeah, I think we we overcomplicate things a lot a lot and over complicating things and offering more information. I know sells things it does but it's dead simple and you know, a lot of the people I work with we just I swear to God people's lives would be in like I've seen it. I've witnessed it so changed flipped upside down in the most beautiful way possible if for five minutes a day you sit in quiet and you don't judge yourself and you don't judge the thoughts that come up man. So simple so simple. It's stupid. So don't overcomplicate the whole thing. And if you get home to work and from work and you know thoughts are coming and watch yourself be like all that Scott this ---- didn't work. I did the meditation the car. Oh my gosh. Now look at me think there you go. Wow, what a time to practice mindfulness. Uh-huh. Oh, well, I started. I actually started learning guitar because of that Scott video and I can't even play a damn chord one idiot. I wasted my time. What up? Oh, yeah. Wow. Look at that judgment and I'm thinking about the past because I watched that video day ago. Jeez. Mm-hmm. You see how a lot of the stress in our lives comes directly from the mind and the way we speak to ourselves and the way we process what happened and what may or may not happen. That's the game and it's so simple. Ambulance hold on. It's so simple. So again, our minds don't want to be forgotten about so they'll try to complicate things like there's got to be a new trick that Scott didn't tell us. There's got to be something I'm missing and that's me. Yeah, like with self-help and all that. Oh, there's got to be something I'm missing. I'm one book away. I'm one video away for knowing the secrets of the universe. Nah. Nah, take it easy on yourself. Enjoy the workday. Transition a home with a sense of grace accomplishment and just a little bit of calm and make sure that HPA access is working for you in a beautiful feedback loop. Okay. All right. Take care of my friend. See you in the next video. Subscribe. Links are in the description. If you want to chat, you know the drill. Bye-bye.