The Questions That Are Quietly Keeping You Stuck

Hey friends, happy Wednesday or whatever day you are listening to this.

I'm actually recording on a Wednesday over here.

And whether it's been crazy or new guys, it's like it's, I don't know, May or June.

But very unusual for this time of year.

And I'm loving it except for the fact that the allergies are about to do me in.

But that's not actually true.

They are kind of taking my butt off.

Anyway, that's where I am today.

And I hope you're doing well.

And let's dive in.

So today I want to talk about something that is so normal and so automatic.

It's like blinking or something that involves our on atomic nervous system.

And most of us don't even realize that it's happening because it's so on auto pilot.

And this is it.

We are constantly asking ourselves questions all day long.

What should I be doing? What's the plan? Am I doing this right?

What if this doesn't work?

What if fill in the blank?

And for most of our lives, this has worked fairly well, right?

It's gotten us to where we want to be.

We figure things out and make decisions and you build pretty great lives.

But there comes a point.

And if you're here, you might already be noticing it.

Where the way that you've always figured things out.

Stop creating clarity.

And instead.

It starts creating more pressure and confusion.

And if there's one thing I know about high achieving capable women in life is that they are not lacking intelligence.

You and me are not lacking intelligence. Most people, nobody's really lacking intelligence.

It's just we choose not to.

Yeah, I'm not going to go down that path.

Anyway, they're not we're not lacking intelligence. We're trying to solve a new season of life.

The same internal patterns and belief systems that worked in the last season of life that we created.

And one of the biggest patterns I see is how we question ourselves or the questions that we ask ourselves.

I've shared a lot of times about the season where I left my job as a school superintendent.

And from the outside, this made no sense to anyone.

Had a stable career, had good income, security.

I had invested years into the education to this of training into this.

I had degrees in this field.

I checked all the boxes.

And yet there was this deep knowing for me that it was time to move in a different direction.

But instead of seeing that as a new calling or a tap on the shoulder necessarily.

Fear came rushing in.

And I started asking myself questions that were normal, but not helpful.

But in a lot of time, what will I do for income? What about insurance? Is this crazy? What if things don't work out?

What am I thinking? I've worked so hard to get to where I am. What will other people think?

The list was endless. And those questions felt very responsible, very smart.

They felt like I was being thoughtful about this whole idea of a transition.

But I didn't realize at the time is, is those questions were actually a lot of the problem because they were a lot of what was keeping us up.

And I actually created language for these kind of questions now. I call them clouding questions because they cloud our ability to see clearly.

Because they narrow our focus down to fear.

And keep us circling in the same thoughts.

They make everything feel heavier and more complicated and more risky than they really truly are.

And the tricky part is that our brain really thinks that they are helpful.

You've heard me say before that our brains are wired for survival.

It's not wired for creating fulfillment or new goals or dreams that stretch us into new directions.

At least not that critter or lower part of our brain that's always searching for love, seeking belonging.

And that is the part that runs the show.

It's not directing it.

And the quality of the questions we ask help direct it.

So when you start thinking about doing something different, especially something uncertain.

Your brain starts scanning for what could go wrong.

What might you lose out on?

What doesn't make sense here?

What are other people going to think, right? We've all done this.

And one of the ways it does that is through questions.

But questions like this aren't designed to move you forward. They're designed to keep you where you are.

Because again, familiar feels safe.

So what happens is you think you're figuring it out, but you're actually just looping.

And ask the same kinds of questions and get the same kind of answers.

And you feel the same kind of uncertainty and nothing changes.

Hey, but what changed for me.

Was not finding better answers. It was realizing I needed to ask myself better questions.

Because not all questions are equal.

Okay, the ones that I just shared with you.

As I said, they'll keep you stuck and.

But other ones will move you forward. And I'm going to share some of those here pretty quick.

Some of those that I started asking were things like,

will I be okay financially if I leave this job?

And when I answered honestly, the answer was yes.

Can I handle the worst case scenario.

And at that time, the worst case scenario was getting another job and education.

And again, the answer was yes.

And then this one, what am I believing that's keeping me here.

Now that question really opened up a lot because now I wasn't just looking at the situation.

I was looking at my thinking and my belief patterns.

Which led to.

Other things that I could question, right.

And there's another layer to this that I think is really important.

Clouding questions don't just keep you stuck.

They actually create stories in your mind that start to feel like truth.

And it happens so subtly.

So ask questions like, what if this doesn't work and your brain answers it.

Yeah, it might not work. You're right.

You could go broke. It might put too much pressure on your relationship and cause issues.

Maybe you'll never be able to find another job.

You could regret it. People might judge you.

And what are you going to do if that doesn't work out.

Or you know it, you're no longer questioning that, but you are believing it.

And it starts to feel like this probably won't work. This isn't a good idea.

I should stay where I am.

And all of that feels true.

But it's not true.

It's all just a story that came from those questions that you ask, those clouding questions.

And really, what I'd like you to hear here is that your brain is incredibly good at answering questions.

But it doesn't check to see if that question is useful. It just answered.

So if you give it fear based questions, you're going to get fear based stories.

And those stories are going to feel real.

But when you ask, Larry, the questions, something different happens.

You open to new possibilities.

You open to new ways of seeing things to new stories.

And those stories are just as available to you as the ones created from the clouding questions.

So they're just as believable and just as possible.

But most of us don't access them.

Because we're asking some questions or some kinds of questions, those clouding questions on repeat.

I actually catch this myself doing this in small ways in my life all the time.

So just the other day I was at the gym.

And my workout was feeling really hard.

You know, those days where sometimes it can just feel harder.

And your brain started offering you an out.

I literally heard that you could just go home.

You could come back and do their day.

No one is going to care. No one is going to even notice.

No one's here to slap you on the hand. Right.

And here's the difference now.

Or most of the time anyway, right. I'm not perfect in it.

I just.

I don't just listen to that voice anymore.

I talk back to it.

And I literally said to this voice, Jenelle, is this even true?

And the answer was, well, yes, that's true that I could go home.

No one could stop me.

And that no one was going to care.

But then I asked a little bit better question.

What did I decide for myself today?

And the answer was,

I committed to showing up here at the gym and doing the workout.

So then I said, OK, I'm not going to let myself down.

I'm going to do my light in the weights,

but I'm care to do a workout.

And that is what I'm going to do.

And I finished, and it felt great.

But not because the workout changed,

but because I changed the story that I was listening to, right.

See how this is working.

And that might seem small, but it's the same pattern.

And then that becomes your experience.

And that becomes your pattern.

But when you question it, you created a different story.

And that becomes your experience instead.

These sneaky questions,

kinds of questions, these cloudy questions,

ran my thinking for years.

They kept me from everything that I wanted.

While pretending to be on my side.

So clarity questions are actually a great way to question your thoughts and beliefs.

For example, if I think I don't have time,

a question could be,

do I really not have time or is this a priority?

Or this just isn't working.

A question, a good question that I could ask that my nature more clarity might be,

how has this worked?

What have you learned that can be useful and move you forward the next time?

These questions ask,

you ask,

actually create the story you believe.

And the stories you believe become your experience.

What we decide is true becomes our experience, right?

Not because it's objectively true.

But because you start living from it,

you start taking action from it.

So if you're feeling stuck right now,

I don't want you to focus on the answers.

I want you to look at the questions.

Because changing your questions,

it's going to move your forward.

You don't need to stop questioning things.

Because questions are so powerful.

But the kind of questions you ask matters.

So start here.

Am I asking this from fear or from clarity?

What feels true right now,

even if I fully don't understand it yet?

Can I handle whatever happens?

What am I believing right now?

What if this is more possible than I think?

What are the pros?

You do not need a perfect plan.

You don't have to have it all figured out.

You just need to start seeing more clearly.

And sometimes that starts with one better question.

So this is exactly the work that we're going to be doing inside.

And the life clarity reset.

Okay.

We're going to slow things down.

We're going to look at what's actually going on underneath the noise.

And we're going to create clarity from there.

If you're asking or if you're starting to see how the questions.

You've been asking.

Might be keeping you stuck.

Then the next step is to learn how to shift those in real time.

So I'll be walking you through that inside this upcoming experience,

this upcoming class, the midlife clarity reset.

And this is where we're going to just take this work out of your head.

And apply it to your life.

So if you want the details from the reset.

And find me on Instagram at Janel Minto.

And just be a DM me the word reset.

And reach out and get you everything that you need to know about.

All right.

And as you go about your day today, just notice the questions.

Because the moment you start noticing things start shifting.

All right.

Love you all.

And I'll talk to you next week.

And I'll talk to you next week.