Control, and Why It's a Sucker's Bet
There are 2 types of people in the world: people who instinctively like being in control and...ok, there's 1 type of person in the world.
Joking! Also, not at all joking. đ¤Ş
The world, after all, is a place where things can change in a heartbeat, and when we're kids, that can be fun and exciting, but also annoying and terrifying. The solution? Being in control!
Screaming when that jerk kid at school takes your favourite toy. Then bopping them in the head with it. (Note: no children were harmed in the making of this post. Also it goes without saying but we'll say it - we're not advocating hitting kids because they took your toy.)
Control makes us feel good. It makes us feel SAFE.
And it drives us crazy.
The thing is, control works beautifully until we realize that:
1 - it is stressful as all get-out to have to try to be in control of All The Things and
2 - the world doesn't let us be in control of All The Things.
So we naturally try to hold on tighter, control things more...and get increasingly agitated, disappointed, and confused.
Now, in a world where we do stuff from The Black Belt Mind, there's a nice swap-out where you go from being in control to being in charge.
Being in control is reactive and aimed at ONE thing ONE way.
Being in charge is responsive and aimed at getting where you want to go.
Being in control says Thursday is taco night, so I am making tacos tonight come hell or high water. Which means if the taco shells break, you go to the store for new ones - or send your partner, who then gets annoyed because they were about to beat that level on Candy Crush and now they're going to the stupid store - so they get upset at you and you get upset back at them because for the love of Pete, do you have to do EVERYTHING around here and fine! you'll go to get the taco shells yourself because it's freaking taco night although apparently you're the only one who cares about that!
See? Crazy-making.
If you're in control and it's taco night and the taco shells break, you aim for what's important, what the purpose is. Let's say the purpose is "I would like to not reinvent the wheel for dinner and also there's nothing wrong with a vaguely-Mexican meal that tastes delicious and is easy". From that criterion, you can now switch to having taco bowls with the crunched up shells on top. Or taco soup with crunched up shells as croutons.
Pretty basic stuff, we know, but the point is getting to the thing that's important, not making sure that every. single. detail. is the way you imagined it.
The need to be in control can be one of the oldest trauma responses that most of us have.
If you're using your conscious mind - swap it out for being in charge. But if you've still got it running in the background (and most of us do) then you'll want to clear that out before you're having a screaming match about taco shells.
That's why Control is the Night 1 topic in our (Free) Hypno-Somatic Cravings Audios.
Night 2 is about Cravings as Control, because ONE way that control trauma comes up is with cravings. But really, it can show up in a million different ways. It can be fighting with your partner as control - loading the dishwasher a certain way and only a certain way - staying up late because dagnabit, nobody can make you go to bed early, YOU control you, THEY don't.
The 3 nights of Cravings audios are FREE - no tricks, no credit card needed. The 3 nights of Stop Pain audios and the first 3 nights of Unweighting are free too.
Yes, we'd love your opinion about what to do next, and we wouldn't be sad if you got excited about the Unweighting audios and bought the full 3 week program - after all, being excited is fun, and we're really loving the results from ALL of these audios - it's The Fun Little Side Project That Exceeded Our Expectations.
We're getting messages about the audios saying:
"I don't know why, but I'm just...happier after listening to these."
"How do I genuinely not care about chocolate now?"
"Is it the NAP that make these work? Because these work."
and one of the most entertaining ones...
"I did these audios and my husband stopped being annoying. I wish I could say it was because he listened to them too but nope. He's just not annoying anymore." đ
So if you'd like a little help letting go of control in a safe way - why not try it out?
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