In this episode, Scott Stabile discusses how to be enough as you are and how to grow without shaming yourself. He explores how self-love and self-acceptance can support meaningful change, as well as how to practice self-compassion when it feels out of reach, recognize the small ways you already care for yourself, and loosen the grip of other people’s judgments. Drawing from his book Enough as You Are, Scott offers practical ways to build a more loving relationship with yourself, even when you’re struggling, making mistakes, or wishing you were further along.
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Key Takeaways:
- How to recognize everyday acts of self-care as evidence that you’re already practicing self-love
- Why “I’m willing to love myself” can be more helpful than an affirmation you don’t believe
- How to accept yourself as you are while making choices that support growth
- What it means to have your own back, especially when you fail or face rejection
- How to work with envy and jealousy without adding shame to already difficult feelings
- Why your past disappointments don’t have to determine what’s possible for your future
Through writing and speaking, Scott Stabile relates profound experiences as well as everyday struggles and triumphs in ways that are universally applicable, uplifting, and laugh-out-loud funny. A passionate love advocate and the author of Big Love: The Power of Living with a Wide-Open Heart, Scott runs transformational breathwork and empowerment workshops around the world.
Connect with Scott Stabile: Website | Instagram
If you enjoyed this conversation with Scott Stabile, check out these other episodes:
Choosing Love in a Divisive World: Empathy as Our Guiding Light with Scott Stabile
Perfecting Self-Love with Scott Stabile
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Episode Transcript:
Scott Stabile 00:00:00 If I know that my relationship is solid with myself, it matters much less what choices I’m making, because I know that I’m going to be there for myself no matter what.
Chris Forbes 00:00:19 Welcome to the one you feed. Throughout time, great thinkers have recognized the importance of the thoughts. We have quotes like garbage in, garbage out or you are what you think ring true. And yet for many of us, our thoughts don’t strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity, self-pity, jealousy, or fear. We see what we don’t have instead of what we do. We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it’s not just about thinking our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make a life worth living. This podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction how they feed their good wolf.
Eric Zimmer 00:01:03 Years ago, Scott Stabile had a realization that felt really heavy at first. No matter what he chose, someone was going to judge him. But a few minutes later, it flipped. If he was going to be judged either way, why keep living inside a box built by other people? I know that flip. For a long time, Ginny and I went back and forth between her mother and Atlanta, who needed help, and my mother in Columbus and wherever we were. One of them was unhappy. And the day that I recognized that, and I admitted that I simply could not, it was impossible to make them both happy. The strain eased up. Scott has been on the show several times. He’s one of my favorite guests, and his book is enough as you are, and it’s the best of what he’s learned. I’m Eric Zimmer and this is the one you feed. Hi, Scott.
Scott Stabile 00:01:57 Welcome back. Hey, Eric. Thank you so much, man. Happy to be here.
Eric Zimmer 00:02:01 Yeah, I was saying, before we start, I’m not sure how many times we’ve had you on.
Scott Stabile 00:02:06 But these three.
Eric Zimmer 00:02:08 At least three. And I don’t know whether one of those was for, like, a short episode or.
Eric Zimmer 00:02:12 I don’t know, but it’s been a number of times and I have always enjoyed it. So when I saw you had a new book coming out, I was I was thrilled to be able to get to have you back on.
Scott Stabile 00:02:21 So I so appreciate it. Thank you.
Eric Zimmer 00:02:23 Yeah, yeah. So we’ll start in the way to which you are accustomed, which is I’m going to read that parable and ask you what you think about it. And I have no idea what you said any of the other times, and probably no one else does either. So whatever. All right. So there’s a in the parable, there’s a grandparent who’s talking with a grandchild, and they say in life there are two wolves inside of us that are always at battle. One is a good wolf, which represents things like kindness and bravery and love, and the other is a bad wolf, which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And the grandchild stops. Think about it for a second. They look up at their grandparent and they say, well, which one wins? And the grandparent says, the one you feed.
Eric Zimmer 00:03:09 So I’d like to start off by asking you what that parable means to you and your life, and in the work that you do.
Scott Stabile 00:03:16 Yeah. In this moment, as I’m hearing you recant that what I’m what I’m feeling is the essence of the work I’m doing the most right now, which is built around self-acceptance and self-love. So for me, as I hear the parable, it’s loving the good wolf and the bad wolf, understanding that no matter what is coming through, no matter what compulsions, desires, thoughts, feelings, words that is within our power to show up for ourselves, with love, with grace, with compassion. And the more often we do that, I find that the more inclined we are to make choices that are more aligned with love and kindness and compassion and all of the quote unquote good wolf ways of being. Because for me, love is just energy. And it’s an energy that is alive within us and outside of us. And it is a pure, positive energy, in my experience, which means it is always in service to everything.
Scott Stabile 00:04:18 So I know that I am human and that part of my can we swear on this show or I don’t remember.
Eric Zimmer 00:04:25 Yeah. It happens. I try not to turn it into an Andrew Jackson remix. In general, yes. The occasional swear.
Scott Stabile 00:04:32 Word.
Eric Zimmer 00:04:33 Occasional swear word is fine. Yeah.
Scott Stabile 00:04:35 Just so I know. Yeah. Okay. No, but generally it’s it’s understanding that sometimes we show up like a jerk. Sometimes we show up without compassion. Sometimes we make choices that are clearly not the healthiest for us. And can we still, rather than shaming ourselves for these choices, for these actions, recognize that shame is not the thing that’s ever going to lead to healing, and that is within us to love ourselves no matter what. So I want to love both wolves and trust that by giving my love to both, I’m naturally going to be energizing the good wolf more often.
Eric Zimmer 00:05:12 I love that idea, obviously, of self-love and for me, self-compassion. Self-love. Learning to do that for myself, forgive myself has been one of the most important things that I have possibly done for my own well-being.
Eric Zimmer 00:05:30 And it is a very difficult thing to do at points, right?
Scott Stabile 00:05:37 Like, absolutely.
Eric Zimmer 00:05:38 It’s interesting, like if you if you read the science on affirmations, right. It appears that affirmations seem to help the people most who don’t actually really need them Because they kind of already believe. They’re awesome.
Scott Stabile 00:05:53 Absolutely.
Eric Zimmer 00:05:55 When you don’t, a lot of the stuff of trying to love ourselves or be self compassionate feels difficult. Like in my Spiritual Habits program, self-compassion is one of the core attributes because, like you, I believe it underlies everything else that we do right without it, when we don’t live up to whatever it is we’re trying to do. And in my program, it’s like practice spiritual principles more in our lives, and we don’t do that. If we don’t have self-compassion as a base, we just have another thing to feel bad about. And that’s not the goal.
Scott Stabile 00:06:26 Absolutely.
Eric Zimmer 00:06:27 But it is also the thing that most consistently people say, I hear what you’re saying. I know, and yet I can’t seem to feel it.
Eric Zimmer 00:06:39 Voices keep coming that tell me I’m bad. The shame is embedded. What I’m hoping is that you can, in five seconds, give us a tip that will dispel all of that once and for all. If that’s in this. If that’s in this book, I’m going to recommend it to to F. No, I know it’s a long term process, right. But I would just love to hear when you must hear people say the same thing to you, given how much you write about self-love and self-forgiveness and self-compassion.
Scott Stabile 00:07:08 Yeah. I mean, I agree with everything you’re saying 100%. And and for me, what it comes down to often is just about bringing more honest awareness to the choices I am making in my life and taking the time to acknowledge those that are actually aligned with self-love. I think we take for granted a lot of the things that we do for ourselves. And I’ll give you very basic examples, like brushing our teeth or cooking food that tastes good, or putting on clothes in which we feel good moving through the world.
Scott Stabile 00:07:42 Every time we’re doing these things, we’re actually acting in alignment with self-love. We’re taking care of ourselves in a very specific way. And for me, one of my practices that has helped me a lot is just not taking all of those choices for granted, in part because I give a lot of workshops on self-love, and I meet a lot of people who tell me they don’t know how to love themselves. And I feel that we actually are loving ourselves. We’re just not acknowledging it. And so one thing I would recommend to people is, it may sound corny, I fear it’s going to sound corny to some, but it’s helped me is just take the time to acknowledge the small things you’re doing throughout the day that are reflective of you caring for yourself in a loving way. And the reason I recommend that is then we’re living. Even if it’s five seconds, even if it’s 10s, you’re putting your hands on your heart and you’re thinking, this is me loving myself right now as I brush my teeth.
Scott Stabile 00:08:38 I could go through the day without doing that. This is me loving myself right now as I prepare this meal, this beautiful food for myself and for me. What that naturally does, because I do see everything as energy, and energy does generate momentum. The more we’re carving out these moments one, the less time we’re mired in self-abuse and this idea that we’re not worthy, even 10s of connecting to the gratitude for care is 10s less of I’m a piece of crap, right? And that matters. And then also, I feel like these choices invite more opportunities for self-love and self-care, because in general, what we’re what we’re committing to is the acknowledgement and the intention around loving ourselves. I want to speak to affirmations as well because I’m someone who uses affirmations in my life, but I’ve what I discovered for myself is what you were speaking to is it’s one thing to say I love myself just as I am. But if that’s not my truth, if that’s not what I’m actually feeling. My experience is what I’m feeling in that moment is always going to trump the words that are just coming out of my mouth, so I can’t love myself with words if what I’m feeling inside is self-loathing.
Scott Stabile 00:09:58 Yeah, but what I can do in my affirmations and what I encourage people to do, is to land on the most honest statement that you can make. So if I can’t honestly say in this moment I love myself as I am. Can I honestly say I am willing to love myself as I am? I’m willing to give energy to the practice of self-love and self-care. And if that feels honest, if that stands true in your body, that is a statement. I feel like that will be helpful because it also reflects self-love. Even if you’re not able to say, I love myself, being willing to, being willing to give energy to it is the same thing. It’s all about the energy of you getting in a more harmonious relationship with yourself. Another thing I would say to what you brought up is that it’s never too late. With everything, not just with self-love. I feel like if you’ve spent 30 years of your life mired in self-loathing, but there is a part of you right now that wants to create a different relationship with yourself.
Scott Stabile 00:11:01 Even if you don’t know how do you know that it is always what you do from this moment on that’s going to matter the most? Which is to say that the choices you make, the practices you integrate, the podcasts you choose to listen to, the way you’re choosing to talk with yourself and be with yourself, is going to impact what you do. From this moment on, and in my experience, self-love has proven to just to be a skill. And like any other skill, the more you practice at it, the better you become at it. That’s what I believe and the things I’m saying. I feel like they can be applied to any sort of spiritual practice, even beyond just self-love. We’re talking about the journey of growth, the journey of healing, right? I also want to speak to the shaming aspect, because that’s a real, a very real thing that happens for many of us on the spiritual path. We end up judging ourselves against a more evolved version of ourselves that doesn’t yet exist.
Scott Stabile 00:12:04 So we’re judging ourselves against a fictionalized version of who I am. And I’ve done this a thousand times over. As someone who’s been on a spiritual path, was in a cult, was chasing enlightenment, and was continuously shaming myself because I wasn’t living the life of the enlightened version of Scott that has never existed and may never exist. And part of. And I think this is the essence of a lot of writings in enough as you are. What I’ve come to learn is that it is within me to honor my humanity, which is to say, to remind myself consistently that I am human when I am not showing up and making healthy choices, when I’m not looking in the mirror and thinking I look beautiful, but looking at all the spots I’d like to change. All of this is a part of our human conditioning, right? And so I’m less interested in transcending my conditioning, though I am interested in that as much as possible. Also, understanding I may never transcend some of the conditioning because it’s so deeply rooted.
Scott Stabile 00:13:07 But even beyond that, what I’m interested in is offering myself grace when I’m unable to transcend my conditioning to remind myself this too, is human. Every other human being on the planet with the human mind has been conditioned in similar ways and is struggling with all of these same things. And it is entirely okay that you are where you are with them. So instead of doing the shaming thing or feeling. I don’t look at my spiritual path as pressure anymore to achieve something, so I’m not putting that pressure on myself that you were speaking to, and then feeling disheartened by my inability to show up the way I would want to write. Instead. The practice that I’m doing is I’m approaching all of this with a bit more curiosity and a bit more nonchalance. And so for me, what that looks like is when my mind is doing its insane dance yet again, trying to tell me I’m a piece of crap and worthless and all the things that my mind wants to tell me. Instead of internalizing those things the way I used to.
Scott Stabile 00:14:14 I kind of look at it now with this. Oh, okay, that’s interesting that this is what my mind is doing right now, and bringing a sense of curiosity and a sense of nonchalance and an understanding that every other mind on the planet is doing. This also has helped me feel a lot more okay with my own insanity.
Eric Zimmer 00:14:59 There’s so many different things you said in there we could touch on. I mean, you know, the phrase that I don’t know where I heard it, but what we practice, we strengthen, right, is a really powerful idea. And you touched on that in all aspects, right? Every little thing and this idea of looking at the ways we are practicing self-love is interesting. Because I had a conversation, I went on, I joined a hiking group, and I went on a hiking conversation that day and just ended up with a PhD in psychology next to me, amazingly. And so we had we could have talked for 30 hours, but one of the things we ended up on is we were talking about how people actually change behavior.
Eric Zimmer 00:15:42 And we landed on this topic that he believes this fundamental, which is around identity. And it’s this idea, it shows up in behavior change literature, many different kinds. Let’s say you’re trying to quit smoking and you’re standing outside and somebody comes up and offers you a cigarette. If you say, no, thanks, I’m trying to quit. That’s one thing. If, on the other hand, you say, no thanks, I don’t smoke. That’s a that’s an identity you’ve taken on as a non-smoker. Right. Now, the obvious problem with that is what if you’re not living into that identity, right. So it’s like, all right, I want to see myself as a person who moves my body every day, like that’s what I that’s actually how I see myself. I’m a person who moves my body every day and at every opportunity I can because I know it’s good for me. But if I’m not doing that, I mean, I’ve got years of sort of reinforcing that behavior. It’s an easy identity, but very early on.
Eric Zimmer 00:16:38 You may not be may not be doing that. Or if you’re if you’re trying to quit smoking, you may be sort of successful and sort of not successful. So your identity doesn’t line up. And he said something very similar to what you said. He said, what I do with patients is I try and focus on the ways in which whatever they are and however small they are, that they are living that identity.
Scott Stabile 00:17:02 Yeah.
Eric Zimmer 00:17:03 If you want to be a non-smoker and you’re trying to say, I don’t smoke as an identity, you look at the times you didn’t smoke. Don’t look at the few times you did like look at the progress that’s being made. And you were saying the same thing with self-love, right? If I focus on what these small things are that I’m doing to love myself, then I can begin to take on the identity of somebody who does love themselves. And I will continue to act more and more into that identity over time. And so I loved the way you said that, because I think it it really lines up a lot with the importance of identity, because it is it’s an important thing.
Eric Zimmer 00:17:38 We can have the identity that I’m someone who hates myself. I mean, many people do, right? I’m neurotic. I’m any number of different things.
Scott Stabile 00:17:47 Absolutely. And I think one of the one of the reasons that, focusing on the times you are showing up the way you want to be or focusing on the times you are loving yourself. One of the ways in which that’s helpful is because it is much harder for your mind to convince you of something when you are showing up the opposite way, which is to say, we become more aware of the ways in which our mind is lying to us about who we are. As an as an example, like the last book, Big Love. As soon as I signed the contract, there was ten minutes of joy and then panic like, I have to deliver this book. Am I going to be able to write it? Literally, I had ten minutes of woo And I was showing up every day to work on the book, and my mind was still saying, you’re never going to do this, but day in and day out, I was doing it.
Scott Stabile 00:18:37 What I was noticing is my mind was continuing to get quieter, because it couldn’t convince me that I can’t do the very thing that I am showing up and doing every day, which is transfer that to self-love or to any other thing. If each day you’re giving a little energy to focusing on the ways you are showing up, it’s going to be harder for your mind to make the case to you that you don’t know how to love yourself, or that you hate yourself because those things are not true. They are products of the mind, and it is only when we are committed to believing our thoughts that we get locked into these lies. And so another practice for me that is has helped me come to a better place with myself is really. And I know you’ve talked about this a lot on your show, the idea of bearing witness to our mind and bearing witness to our thoughts, internalizing the truth that we are not what we are thinking. We are not our minds. It is possible to create that detached separation to the metaphor I love the most is become the sky and allow your thoughts to be the weather.
Scott Stabile 00:19:42 The sky is expansive enough to hold whatever’s happening, whatever insane thoughts are playing through our mind. When you’re bearing witness, you’re not becoming any of it. And what that creates for me is distance from those self-loathing thoughts and those self-abuse of thoughts. And it allows me to look at them with a bit more curiosity and nonchalance, because I am not them. And I think a lot of people don’t know that they really believe everything that’s happening in their minds when so much of it is untrue.
Eric Zimmer 00:20:10 To be able to do that is a profound practice and is a beautiful thing to do. What I have noticed, I’ve had some of this recently, is that I can do that when the emotional scale and the thought scales around like a three to a four to a five, Maybe even I can handle a six on a good day if I’m at my best. But once it’s up at like 8 or 9 like that, separation feels almost impossible. It’s so overwhelming, and I love that you talk in the book some about distraction or numbing, right? Because I think that in the program I teach called Circle of Connection, one of the things we explore is working with difficult thoughts and emotions.
Eric Zimmer 00:20:58 And I created probably an overly complicated flow chart. There’s a point in it where you go, I give up like I’ve done everything that I’ve tried to be this guy. I’ve tried to work with my thoughts, I’ve tried to think about what’s true and what’s not true. I give up like, can I find some non-destructive distraction? And I think that we’re often told, like, you just sit with whatever you’re feeling. And I think that’s good advice in general, like feel what you’re feeling, but there are times that we don’t have it in us to do it. We just don’t. And being willing to pull the ripcord into another frame of mind somehow. Again, I encourage non self-destructive, but sometimes self-destructive might be all you got in your bag right now. You talk about a doing that in your own life, and you also talk about forgiving yourself when you do it in a way that maybe doesn’t fully align with the choices you want to make. Say more about that.
Scott Stabile 00:21:51 Yeah, it’s such a great point you’re bringing up, because sometimes, even with all the tools that you and I and probably many of the listeners have in our tool toolkits, tool baskets, can you tell about two? No one talks about.
Eric Zimmer 00:22:05 A tool belt much anymore.
Scott Stabile 00:22:06 Or tool belt. Even with all those things, sometimes the mind takes over. For me, the words I come back to in that moment when I know that I’m just in it and there’s nothing I’m going to do. You’re right. I can’t become this guy in this moment. I really go to one of my favorite mantras, which is this too shall pass. That’s that is one of the only things that offers me any sense of peace in this moment is just knowing it’s not going to last forever. So I’m just going to have to ride it out. And then as far as numbing or escaping, I used to judge myself so harshly when I would check out and I don’t, I really don’t anymore. And I check out a bunch if I need to, and I don’t even feel the need to forgive myself for it. It’s not even something that needs to be forgiven. It’s really just something that I need. Not shame myself for the way I used to recognize that this world is so intense and so violent and so overwhelming, and there is so much information and opinions and news coming at us from every direction all the time.
Scott Stabile 00:23:14 I do not believe there’s a person on the planet who can experience it without checking out whatever that checkout looks like for you. And so, yeah, I don’t think I’d be around. I think I’d be in a cave somewhere if I couldn’t do my Netflix binges and whatever else it is that I do to just forget about things, I think it’s totally okay. And part of that, again, is coming back to this idea that we don’t have to be making the healthiest choices for ourselves all the time in order to be worthy of our love. Right at that. Some misguided conditioning we’ve grown up with and taken on so many of us that, like our worth, is predicated on something other than the fact that it’s inherent right, or that we are lovable simply because we are. We’re born lovable, not because of the choices we’re making, or because of our looks, or how great our family is, or any other thing. When you really come to understand. And again, I don’t know how to get someone to understand this.
Scott Stabile 00:24:19 I don’t know how I came to understand this, other than probably my commitment to loving myself, my commitment to not listening to the voices of shame. Suddenly, gradually, over time, I embraced generally this idea that I am a worthy human being. Period. And no matter how my mind wants to tell me otherwise. Every baby born on this planet today is as worthy as every other baby. Every human being dying on this planet today is as worthy as every other human being, in my experience and my understanding. And so why would I not be a part of that worthiness story? Like, why would I be the one person who is not worthy when I see every other being as worthy? What that does for you, when you really start to inhabit that sense of worth, that sense of enough, this is, it allows you to move through the world with much more openness, much more expansiveness. And then I believe that what you invite from that place into your life is wholly different than when you’re moving through the world energetically shut down and believing that you’re a piece of crap who doesn’t deserve love or doesn’t deserve these things.
Eric Zimmer 00:25:38 Yeah, there’s a real nuance in this, right? Like, let’s apply it to checking out or escaping and numbing. Yes. On some level there is an understanding of like, of course I have to check out. Everybody does sometimes. And there’s a there’s also a recognition perhaps, that the ways I’m checking out aren’t actually restoring me in any way. Right. You know, I’m actually checking out in a way that doesn’t do what the purpose of checking out is, which would be to allow me to come back less frazzled than I left.
Scott Stabile 00:26:15 Right? Well, then that would be a different definition for me than numbing or escaping. Because for me, I feel like when we’re numbing or escaping from what it is we’re feeling, that thing is always going to be there on the other side of the numbing and escaping. Right. That’s speaking to what you’re saying because I’m not doing anything about it. I’m just like smoking pot right now and watching Netflix. And I also think.
Eric Zimmer 00:26:40 That’s fine sometimes.
Scott Stabile 00:26:41 Yeah.
Eric Zimmer 00:26:42 Yeah, exactly. I mean, and this is the holding the both thing. And if I do that all the time then nothing changes, right? And so I love this idea in Buddhism of like true refuge and false refuge. True refuge is things that bring you back more restored. False refuge are things that just check you out for a while, and you come back and everything’s exactly the same as it is. Yeah, we all need both, right? We all need both of those things. So what I’m looking at is how can I? And all this is without judgment and shame. Do I need to be adjusting that balance? Am I numbing more than is useful for me in being the person that I want to be? There’s a phrase that has been going through my mind as I’ve been reading your work, and it goes through my mind very often because I feel like I’m somebody who’s holding sort of two things at once. And nobody has summed this up better than the great Zen teacher Suzuki Roshi, who said, you’re perfect exactly the way you are, and you could use a little improvement.
Eric Zimmer 00:27:52 And I love that line, because both those things are absolutely true. And if I don’t have both of them, it’s problematic. If I only think I need improvement, then I’m going to be trying to improve out of a sense of shame and unworthiness and less than this. And that may provide fuel for a while, but it’s fuel that eventually gulps up the whole engine and everything turns crappy. So if I don’t have the self-love, if somehow I were to able to be, I’m perfect exactly as I am. I suppose if you could actually inhabit that 100% fully, you would probably be okay. But given that, I think part of our role in this world is to live according to our values, right? Like, I want to live according to my values, which means I do need a little bit of improvement. And I need to love myself. And I just I find that balance of really like many things that we talk about are really nuanced thing in the same way of like, should I try and eliminate those negative thoughts? Should I try and listen to them? Should I try? And the answer is at different times, but little of all of that.
Scott Stabile 00:28:58 Absolutely. For me, there’s always value. I think, in looking at the choices you’re making and how those choices are making you feel and are affecting your life and as much as possible Direct yourself into choices that have you feeling more meaning, more connection, more love in your life, more wholeness, and start eliminating the choices that are depleting you and have you feeling like crap and disconnected. 100%. I’m a major processor, you know, but I have fun with it. Like I am always looking at why I’m doing what I’m doing and like, yeah, but for me that is, it’s it’s entertaining. It’s I’m curious about that and.
Eric Zimmer 00:29:38 It’s part of who you are.
Scott Stabile 00:29:39 It’s part of.
Eric Zimmer 00:29:40 Loving yourself as you are.
Scott Stabile 00:29:42 Absolutely.
Eric Zimmer 00:29:43 Exactly.
Scott Stabile 00:29:43 Absolutely.
Eric Zimmer 00:29:44 You know that self-love. Like that’s who I am. Okay, great.
Scott Stabile 00:29:47 Exactly. Like, but what’s important about what you said, too, is like, if we can get in the practice of not doing any of this with shame, it’s like if you’re numbing in an unhealthy way that isn’t going to serve you, there’s still no need to shame yourself for that choice.
Scott Stabile 00:30:04 And that’s really the practice I’m focused on in my life. So much now is understanding. No matter what choices I make, I can be a voice of love for myself. And by doing so, it’s not to justify my actions. I don’t believe it takes away in any way from the possibility of making healthier choices down the line. It just allows me to live into. Ultimately, what I’ve discovered is that one of the things I desire more than any other thing, which is to be in a good relationship with myself, because if you’re in a loving relationship with yourself, if you know you’ve got your back, if you know you’re going to be there no matter what, you’re likely to feel so much freer to take risks in your life, to fail to be rejected, to make choices that are in alignment with your heart. Because you know that no matter what happens, rather than being a voice of shame on the other side of it, you’re going to be a voice of compassion and love on the other side of it.
Scott Stabile 00:31:10 And so yeah, if I know that my relationship is solid with myself, it matters much less what choices I’m making, because I know that I’m going to be there for myself no matter what.
Eric Zimmer 00:31:51 Check in for a moment. Is your jaw tight? Breath shallow. Are your shoulders creeping up? Those little signals are invitations to slow down and listen. Every Wednesday, I send weekly bites of wisdom. A short email that turns the big ideas we explore here in each show. Things like mental health, anxiety, relationships, purpose into bite size practices you can use the same day it’s free. It takes about a minute to read and thousands already swear by it. If you’d like extra fuel for the weekend, you also get a weekend podcast playlist. Join us at one UFI newsletter. That’s one you get newsletter and start receiving your next bite of wisdom. All right, back to the show. If shame actually was an effective agent for change, we probably would have very little addiction in the world, right? Like.
Eric Zimmer 00:32:48 Right. I mean, it’s the engine that drives it, right? There are things that cause it that are not shame based. Right. The traumas and all that different stuff. But the engine that drives addiction is shame, and it tends to be the engine that drives most of the choices that we make that we don’t want to be making. And I love that idea, which is like I think you said, I absolutely have my back. We’ve interviewed a guy named Aziz Gazipur, and I’ve been on his show, and he has a phrase like, be on your side. And I love that because you can always be on your side. You can always have your back. You can have that. And you can look at the choices you make and evaluate them and say, oh, I would like to do more of this or less of that. Wow. At the exact same moment, being 100% on your side, having your own back. And that sometimes again is a nuanced thing to sort out.
Eric Zimmer 00:33:40 But it is the way, in my experience, that sustainable change in both our well-being and acting according to our values, that both those things happen best in that fertile soil.
Scott Stabile 00:33:52 Absolutely. I mean, I’ve never shamed myself into healing, and I have often loved myself into a better place of being, into a more healed place of being. For those of you listening who are thinking, and I know there are some of you like, well, I don’t have my back. It’s very this is like self-love. It’s very easy to say, have you can always have your back. But if you’re someone who’s like, I don’t know how to have my back, I don’t. I’m judgmental of myself. I’m critical. Small steps. Like for me, again, I really love the word willingness, because for me, willingness is an invitation when we’re not able to show up in the place. But we have a general energetic intention about being there. Like, are you willing to have your back? What would that.
Scott Stabile 00:34:37 I would grab a sheet of paper. What would that look like to you? To have your back write down very specific things, like when I have my back, it looks like this. Or if I were to have my back, it would look like this. Make a list for yourself and then from that list, start integrating some of those practices as best you could. Maybe it might. Maybe it looks like having your back after a long day of work. It might look like preparing yourself a beautiful cup of tea and being very intentional about it. Maybe it might look like sitting for ten minutes staring at a wall in total silence. These are little examples of how we can go about taking care of ourselves in tangible ways that actually matter. They’re actually impactful, and I really encourage anyone who goes to a place of, well, I don’t know how to do that, and I can’t do that. And I haven’t done that to really ask yourself generative questions, not questions that are yes and no, because your fear, your insecurity is going to take you to a no, but a question that generates the invitation to look at how you can go about doing it.
Scott Stabile 00:35:43 Like, what would it look like to have my back? How can I go about having my back in a more proactive way in my day to day living? Those questions are an invitation for responses that align with the yes that you’re seeking?
Eric Zimmer 00:36:00 I like that. That’s great. Let’s change directions a little bit here because you’ve got all sorts of stuff in this book. But focusing sort of on the self-love piece, you have a line that I really love, which is you can’t paint your self-portrait with someone else’s hand.
Scott Stabile 00:36:15 Yeah. What do you love about that line?
Eric Zimmer 00:36:18 What do I love about that line? It’s like many statements that once you hear them, something becomes extraordinarily clear. Right. And what becomes for me in that statement, extraordinarily clear is, oh, yes, if I’m going to paint my self-portrait. Who else could do it? It’s a self-portrait. Like it’s an obvious like. Oh, yeah. Okay. Well, only I can do that, you know? Only I can do that if someone else is painting something.
Eric Zimmer 00:36:43 It’s not my self-portrait.
Scott Stabile 00:36:46 Yeah. I mean, for.
Eric Zimmer 00:36:47 Me, portrait, it’s their portrait of me, right? Which is a completely different thing than my self-portrait. So I love it because it’s a sort of like when you hear the wolf parable, you kind of immediately get it. You’re like, oh yeah. My choices and how I matter. Right in that line it becomes very clear, like, oh my, my image of myself can only be generated truly by me. Now, I may be borrowing other people’s images. I may be looking at other portraits that have been painted. At the end of the day, it’s mine to paint.
Scott Stabile 00:37:15 Yeah. And for me, it speaks a lot to conditioning. I’d say a lot of the work I’ve been doing the last few years, too, is really looking at what responses are conditioned responses and what are authentic responses. And as much as possible, when I recognize that I’m aligning with just a conditioned way of being that doesn’t even feel necessarily true to who I am right now, or may never have felt true to who I am, then do I have the courage to align myself with what feels more true, even if by doing so and sharing that I might get judged more harshly because it’s outside the bounds of what we’ve consider to be okay in our society.
Scott Stabile 00:37:56 I might be misunderstood. I might be rejected. And and for me, part of this, this path, this journey, should you choose to take it in, in a more like healing consciousness way, is looking at what is real, what is what is true inside of me. In understanding, one of the most liberating moments I had years ago was when I had the realization that no matter what choice I make, I’m going to be judged by other people. And that realization felt really heavy in the moment of it because it was like, oh my God, we are all so judgmental. We’re all criticizing each other all the time, and it feels heavy to know that you can’t do anything without being criticized. But a few moments later, I’m like, wait a minute, that is the most liberating realization I could possibly have, because what that means is, if I choose to live in this restrictive box of conditioning, I’m going to be judged. Or if I live in the full expansiveness of my truth and freedom, I’m going to be judged.
Scott Stabile 00:38:59 And knowing that both those choices are going to lead to judgment. Why would I ever choose this restrictive box? Right?
Eric Zimmer 00:39:06 Yeah, because the people were being judged by and the restrictive box of the people closest to us at that time. I mean, I think that’s why that choice can often seem like the more appealing choice. But you’re absolutely right that like judgments coming from anywhere. I use this example just yesterday. So hopefully these episodes don’t get released right on top of each other. But it’s top of mind for me and it speaks to exactly what you are saying. It also speaks to the obviousness of you can only paint your own self-portrait. For a long time, Jenny and I went back and forth between Atlanta and Columbus. Her mom was in Atlanta. Alzheimer’s. My mom was in Columbus, had other things. And when we were in Atlanta, my mom was unhappy. And when we were in Columbus, her mom was unhappy. And that caused me a lot of strain until one day I went, wait, it’s impossible that one of them’s not going to be happy.
Eric Zimmer 00:39:51 Like I can’t make them both happy. Like, literally cannot do it. Yeah. What a freedom.
Scott Stabile 00:39:57 Yes.
Eric Zimmer 00:39:58 Right now, I’m not saying I didn’t still try and think about their needs and who needed what and when they needed it, but I was able to just let go of an insoluble problem. Right? Absolutely. And and in the same way, for you, when we’re talking about being judged as an insoluble problem, right. It’s going to happen. You are going to be judged by the people around you. And, you know, again, given that point. Wouldn’t I rather be living truer to who I really am?
Scott Stabile 00:40:26 Absolutely.
Eric Zimmer 00:40:27 And again, and I think the reason that choice sometimes feels harder is that the people right around us are often the one people who are closest to us currently are the ones who will judge the choice to break out of the box. Once you’re out of the box, then it’s a different story. But getting out of that box to does take a tremendous amount of courage.
Scott Stabile 00:40:47 And even when you’re out of the box, like, I’m not going to pretend to be someone who’s always living in my authentic truth. I would say I’m more authentic than I’ve ever been, and that continues to grow. And sometimes I cower to my fear. Sometimes I make a choice that is probably more conditioned because I don’t want to feel the backlash. I don’t want to be judged. I’m not in the mood for it in that moment. And that’s yeah, that’s part of this journey as well.
Eric Zimmer 00:41:12 There’s two lines that you wrote that I really love about the future, which is also informed by the past. And you say do not limit yourself based on past realities. And you also say, I will not set myself up for a future I don’t want by convincing myself it’s the future I’m going to get. I loved both of those. They’re twins to me in a way, you know. Talk more about that.
Scott Stabile 00:41:39 I just think we do ourselves such a disservice. I know I’ve done myself such a disservice, looking at my life through the lens of my past and using my past as a means to prevent me from moving forward in alignment with my heart, instead of as a means to support me in moving forward in alignment with my heart.
Scott Stabile 00:41:56 Let’s say I submitted a screenplay that got rejected ten times, and so I’m working on a screenplay now, and my mind is going to tell me you’ve already been rejected ten times. Like, this isn’t going to work for you. Like, why are you even bothering? My mind’s going to come up with a whole host of reasons why I shouldn’t do this. And. And so I could use my past to prevent me from continuing to write and continuing to try to share my writing in a bigger way. Or I could look at my past and say, well, wait a minute, I have the experience of trying this ten times in the experience of those ten times is fueling what I’m doing right now, and with every time why there’s no reason to believe I’m not getting closer to what my goal is, right? It’s like, how do you want to frame your past? And for me, if I catch myself using my past to limit me. I know I’m doing a disservice to myself and it’s not necessary.
Scott Stabile 00:42:53 Right? And so. And the same thing about the future. So often we’re not doing things because we’re so afraid of how it’s going to end up looking in the future. We’re always, we’re not always, but we’re often going to worst case scenarios. And it’s those worst case scenarios that prevent us from even taking the first step toward creating the reality we want to take, because we’re certain we’re just going to flounder and it’s going to explode, right? So for me, it’s about recognizing that there are a whole host of thoughts we can give our energy to that are not that are not doing us any good in the moment. We have awareness that we’re locked into those thoughts as the moment we have an opportunity to either reframe them, create different thoughts around them, or just think about something entirely different that has nothing to do.
Eric Zimmer 00:43:42 Right, right. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I love that I would encounter this with coaching clients a lot. They would come in and they by the time you hire a coach to help you change behavior, you’ve probably failed at changing it a bunch of times.
Eric Zimmer 00:43:56 Right. That’s not your first choice, right? Sort of the last resort. Like, oh, God, I’m going to hire a coach. So they’ve tried many times and haven’t been successful, or they’ve been successful for a little bit. So there’s a story there which is like, I can’t do this. I’m not going to be able to do it. And so we’ll get off to a good start and their brain will be saying, yeah, you’ve started before. You never can stick with it, which becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy if you’re not careful. Right. And so there’s a real there’s a real art in doing exactly what you said, which is like, well, hey, we’re going to we’re going to talk about and learn from what didn’t happen before. Right. B, you’re a different person than you were then. Like, you’re not the same person. And C we’re going to bring new resources to bear that you didn’t have before. Right. You’ve got me. And so we can all apply that same thing to.
Eric Zimmer 00:44:44 To whatever it is. Like you said, it’s a screenplay, whatever it is. Which is saying, oh, I’m going to learn from what happened. I’m going to recognize that I’m not the same person. Ideally, I’ve changed and I’ve grown, and I can use that energy that’s telling me that to ask myself, well, what else could I get now that would support me in doing what I want? What are other resources I could avail myself of that would make me more likely to be able to do this thing in the future, and so it can be helpful to reflect on those things, to learn and change, but not to predict the future with.
Scott Stabile 00:45:23 Absolutely. You sound like a very good coach.
Eric Zimmer 00:45:26 Yeah. Once. Yeah. Every once in a while. Every once in a while.
Scott Stabile 00:45:30 I’d hire you.
Eric Zimmer 00:45:31 All right, well, let me know. So I want to talk about jealousy and envy. They show up a number of times throughout the book. You say you’re sort of a jealous person.
Eric Zimmer 00:45:42 You’re sort of an envious person. I’m going to ask you to rethink your labels about yourself. No, I actually don’t think you say that. I don’t actually think you say I’m a jealous person. I think you say I often have or whatever.
Scott Stabile 00:45:54 Or my mind is.
Eric Zimmer 00:45:55 Yeah, in my mind is. Yeah, yeah. So tell me more about those energies in your life and how you’ve learned to work with them more usefully.
Scott Stabile 00:46:03 Yeah. Well, I mean, they’re two of the most uncomfortable energies for me anyway. My mind can be incredibly envious of everyone for everything. And I’ve learned in the past couple of years just how jealous my mind can be. You think you like to think that you’re. I don’t know if you think you’re beyond something or something isn’t as heavy. And then you’re you’re handed a circumstance that shows you, oh, no, honey, you’re not even close to being beyond this.
Speaker 4 00:46:32 Yeah, you’re every bit as insane as you were.
Eric Zimmer 00:46:36 What my therapist said about that.
Eric Zimmer 00:46:37 Because I was asking recently about this. Because I had this sort of like I thought I was past this, right. And he said, when you’re dealing with these deeply conditioned, traumatic sort of things that are driven out of that, he’s like, you’re never fully past it. What happens is you can handle more and more circumstances without it coming up, but there will always be some circumstance triggered enough that it will. It’s still there. And I thought that was a really useful way to think about it. Instead of thinking, oh, I thought I was beyond this. I’m not. All this work I’ve done doesn’t mean anything. It’s because I handle lots of circumstances way better than I ever did. And when the ante gets high enough.
Scott Stabile 00:47:21 Yeah. There. With the little treat for you. Yeah, but I like the way I’m in relationship with my envy and jealousy more than I’ve ever been. Which is to say, with envy. However, many years ago I was talking to a good friend.
Scott Stabile 00:47:35 He got a great job promotion and a lot more money. And I knew he had been working for this for a long time, and I was genuinely really happy for him for a minute.
Speaker 4 00:47:47 Probably. I mean, there was genuine happiness. I got the word, I got the word.
Eric Zimmer 00:47:53 Congratulations out.
Speaker 4 00:47:54 I choked it out. And then exactly. And then my my excuse myself.
Scott Stabile 00:47:59 My mind started to go to that place of envy. Just like he makes a lot more money. He’s a lot more success. All these stories that my mind was coming up with and what I, what I was doing at that time in my life when envy would surface, was try to pretend it wasn’t happening. Like, no, I’m not. I’m not being envious right now. Like this whole ridiculous attempt at denying what is happening in a big way in my body and in my mind. Right. We try to push it down, and I and I think we all probably have the experience, those things we try to push down or put in the dungeon behind a closed door, they just make that much more noise pounding on the door.
Scott Stabile 00:48:35 So I’m really in the practice in my life now, more and more of just inviting it all in. When I’m feeling envious now, I don’t spend a second trying to deny it anymore. I’m not like speaking it to the person necessarily. I’m doing this internally, but it’s like, this is me. I’m this is just envy. And all human minds are envious at times and it’s totally okay. And it’s also rooted in a host of of fears and insecurities that are real, but they’re not true. For me, I like the distinction between what feels real and what feels true, because what my mind conjures so often feels real. It’s it’s creating a physical response to it, emotional response, but so often it’s untrue. And when I’m really aligned with my heart center, really connecting to love, that’s when I feel most deeply in my truth. And so that distinction for me is important. But I welcome my envy to have a seat at the table with everything else I’m feeling, even though I don’t like it.
Scott Stabile 00:49:38 It’s not. I don’t know that. I don’t think I’ll ever like my envy. It’s wildly uncomfortable. But what I’ve come, what I’ve come to learn is I can love it. Still, I’m not going to shame myself for being envious in moments. I’m just going to come here envy. You’re okay. And then I think there is a benefit in. Or there can be. If I’m able to get myself in this place of of really looking at, well, what exactly are you envying beyond just like they have more money or they’re more or whatever. It’s like, what are you envying? Exactly. And is there a way to foster more of that in your lived experience? Now, if that’s something you truly are desiring, how could you go about bringing that into your life in a bigger way?
Eric Zimmer 00:50:23 Yeah, I love that. And I think envy and jealousy are emotions that feel so yucky and think they’re so undesirable that we want to push them away. But like anything, you can learn something there.
Eric Zimmer 00:50:36 The other thing that I found to be helpful is to go, okay, if I’m going to envy that person for that thing. I also have to look at what they’re doing and having to do and go through and do in life in order to get that thing, because I’m like, oh, they have more money. And I’m like, I just want more money. Of course I want more money. I want more money. But that person may be doing a job I don’t want to do at all. Yeah, they may be taking on more commitment and responsibility than I want. So I think oftentimes we envy something because we see the shiny side of it. It can also be helpful to try and flip it around and go, well, what’s the not shiny side of it? What are the other realities going on here? I mean, it’s obviously like we all know that that’s what’s happening to us on social media, right? We’re being presented this shiny side, but we’re not seeing necessarily what the other pieces of that are.
Eric Zimmer 00:51:29 And that’s been really helpful for me. Like I made a choice, you know, five years ago to leave a really lucrative corporate career to do this. And I get by. I’m okay. I’m fine. But I don’t have the money that I used to have or the money I would have today in that job five years later, I just don’t. So when I start getting envious about money, I have to go, well, if I could get that money on my terms, great. But on those terms. No thank you.
Scott Stabile 00:51:55 Yeah, I hear you, man. Like, I look at my my life. I had a lot more money at different times in my life than I do now. And I’m also living a life that I want to be living. And I wouldn’t trade it, I guess, is what I’m saying.
Speaker 4 00:52:10 Yeah.
Scott Stabile 00:52:11 I think what you’re speaking to is very important about the full picture. Taking in the full picture sometimes helps us and also understanding. I think that like jealousy for me, it it triggers that place in me that isn’t confident about my worth.
Scott Stabile 00:52:27 Right. That that is the wound that gets triggered. Like I am someone who loves myself. I am someone who generally feels worthy, and I also have the places inside where I lack self-worth and struggle with it in in things like envy and jealousy, they push that button so intensely and that is, for me, one of the hardest buttons to be with to just sit with. It’s painful. It feels gross. It feels disgusting, you know?
Speaker 4 00:52:55 So it.
Eric Zimmer 00:52:57 Really does. And the shame follows for me very quickly on those emotions, particularly like the jealousy side, you know, envy to me can be slightly more benign if I’m envious. Like, and I can sort of reframe it and be like, oh yeah, I, you know, I do wish that my podcast career was as successful as that person. Oh, that does tell me something about what matters to me. Okay. There’s a way that I can sort of work with envy in certain cases, jealousy. That is, to me, like you said, it’s far more about core worth, you know? And that is the yucky stuff.
Scott Stabile 00:53:34 It’s the yucky stuff, but everyone experiences it. And that is helpful for me when I’m going through stuff like that. Because what our shame wants to tell us is we are especially disgusting because of our jealousy and and our shame wants to communicate on some level. Like you’re the only one who’s like this, who’s feeling this in this way. I like to remind myself everybody feels this to some degree. It’s just part of the human experience. There’s nothing to be ashamed of here, and it’s not going to last forever.
Speaker 4 00:54:03 Yeah.
Scott Stabile 00:54:04 Until the next bout round comes.
Speaker 4 00:54:06 When you think you’re over it.
Eric Zimmer 00:54:07 Right before you check out. Pick one insight from today and ask, how will I practice this before bedtime? Need help turning ideas into action? My free weekly Bites of Wisdom email lands every Wednesday with simple practices, reflection and links to former guests who can guide you even on the tough stuff like anxiety, purpose and habit change. Feed your good wolf at one you feed your net newsletter again one you feed your net newsletter.
Eric Zimmer 00:54:39 We kind of hit this before, but I want to hit it again because I think it’s a really important point. And you said this line almost word for word earlier, so why am I bringing it up again? I can’t help it. And it is that often the only comfort I can find in despair is the understanding that it, like everything else, won’t last forever. I mean, I think that is such an important idea of like literally there are times that we’re just going to feel awful and that’s okay. And in those moments, often the only solace for me, I’m bringing it back up because it resonates so strongly with me. Right? Is, oh yeah, this will sooner or later pass.
Speaker 4 00:55:23 Yeah.
Eric Zimmer 00:55:23 Actually even further to notice within it being here that it’s not always here. And what I mean by that is like, let’s say I’m in grief about something. I might spend three four hours that day deep in grief. And if you ask me how I’m doing, I would say, well, I’m deeply grieving, but there are a bunch of hours in there where I actually wasn’t right, where there was actually a little bit of a break.
Eric Zimmer 00:55:48 That break might have been ten minutes, it might have been 3 or 4 hours. But not labeling our experience monolithic. Yeah. Allows us to see that grief in the broad sense will fade over time. You will heal. But even within now, there are pockets of things, and it sort of goes back to what we were talking about with self-love, like looking for or what are the ways I’m loving myself. What are the ways that there’s something other than grief here right now? Not to deny it, but to simply say, oh yes, my experience is always sort of is changing. Even hour to hour. Moment to moment.
Scott Stabile 00:56:27 Yeah. And we can trust that if there’s always so much more that exists in this reality than what we’re experiencing, and we can trust that if we’re focused on only one thing, and that one thing is creating for us a lot of internal misery or heartache or heartbreak, that we are shutting ourselves off to a world of other possibilities out there. And for me, when I remember that it’s just an invitation to do what you’re speaking to is like, well, wait a minute.
Scott Stabile 00:56:56 Within this, within this grief, there has also been moments of connection, in moments of laughter, if it helps to give energy to that beautiful. And also the idea of remembering that this too shall pass can also serve us in making courageous choices instead of putting them off. For instance, I have this whirlwind relationship at the beginning of the year and ended it and prior to ending it. Was so scared about it because I. We were both. We both fell hard for each other. I knew it was going to be super painful. Not only the conversation, but the fallout and the sorrow afterwards. And I reminded myself preemptively, it’s like, yes, that’s all true and it’s all going to pass. Just think about all the other times you’ve been through something similar, and it’s painful and heartbreaking and unbearable until it isn’t. And not only remembering this too shall pass when you’re in the muck, but even remembering it when you need to make a change in your life and you’re putting it off, putting it off, putting it off because of the potential painful outcome of it, knowing that these things don’t last forever.
Eric Zimmer 00:58:07 That makes a lot of sense. Similar to that topic, you have a line. You say, quit putting off the conversations you need to have. Whoo boy!
Speaker 4 00:58:17 Yeah, yeah, that what I just said speaks.
Scott Stabile 00:58:20 To that as.
Speaker 4 00:58:21 Well. Yeah, yeah, because we all know we all.
Scott Stabile 00:58:24 Do it, and we all know how relieved we feel when we finally have the conversation. Right?
Speaker 4 00:58:30 Yeah.
Eric Zimmer 00:58:30 Yeah. A question I ask myself. Lots of different things like that. Basically anything I don’t want to do is I ask myself, I try and be really honest. Like, will I ever want to do it? And often the answer is never, because my brain will tell me like, well, it’s not quite the right time. Or maybe you could, you know. And I’m like, Will it ever feel like the right time? Will I ever want to do this? And if the answer is never, then I try and go, well then just do it as quickly as you can.
Eric Zimmer 00:58:59 Because if it’s going to be difficult, whenever you do it all the time between now and you doing, it is just time that you’re worrying about doing it, that you could be you could at least cut that out. You can’t cut out the difficulty of the conversation. You can’t cut out the fear, but you can cut out the torment about it for the next three months while you 100%.
Speaker 4 00:59:20 Well, you put it.
Eric Zimmer 00:59:21 Off now again, that doesn’t always work because sometimes it takes a while to to summon the courage, right? Sometimes we just don’t have the courage to do it. I mean, there’s been plenty of times in my life where that’s been the case. Like I.
Speaker 4 00:59:32 Just often, for.
Eric Zimmer 00:59:32 Whatever reason, it took me X amount of time before I could do it because I didn’t have the I just didn’t have the courage and try and be forgiven about that. But that little trick there of like, will I ever want to do this often helps me get over the hump on those.
Scott Stabile 00:59:49 Yeah, I like that. And also, I think when we’re focusing on the dreaded conversations, we’re living in the dread of what we imagine that conversation to be and the potential fallout. And I think it it can be a good practice to go beyond with our with like focused kind of visualization of how if it’s something, you know, you need to communicate and you know that eventually you’re going to feel better by having done so. Take yourself to the place of feeling better. Maybe grab your journal and write down all of the benefits that you can imagine coming from having this conversation. So instead of living in the dread, you’re actually centering yourself in the reality of what your imagining will come from having had it, and that will help you potentially generate the courage to have it.
Speaker 4 01:00:40 Yeah.
Eric Zimmer 01:00:40 Can you walk us through maybe and again, you can say, I don’t I don’t want to unearth all this right now. It’s it’s too, too real and too fresh. But like, you knew you had to have a difficult conversation about ending this relationship.
Eric Zimmer 01:00:53 Right? And so in that circumstance, what sort of things would you visualize the positive that would come out of it, knowing that very much of what’s going to come out of it, it’s not like you’re going to have the conversation and you’re going to be like, okay, thank God we all feel happy now, right? So, so how do you do it in a situation like that where it’s like, oh, I’m not quite sure I can forecast the benefit of this one.
Scott Stabile 01:01:16 What I actually did in that situation, Eric, was, I think, no, I focused more on what actually wasn’t working. And so for me, the benefits were that these things weren’t going to be going on in my life anymore once the relationship was over. So it was it was a little more focused on the negatives within the context of the relationship. That would no longer be a part of my life anymore. Yeah, yeah.
Eric Zimmer 01:01:41 You know, that accomplishes the same thing. Yeah. Well, Scott, we are at the end of our time.
Eric Zimmer 01:01:46 I have enjoyed it. As always, you and I are going to continue in the post-show conversation, and I’m going to read just the beginning of the statement of what we’re going to try and talk about, which is let the violence and pain in your world root you even more deeply in your commitment to be kinder and love harder. So I want to I want to explore that idea because we can look around and see lots of violence and pain in our world. And so how do we use that to do that to make us actually better people, so we’ll cover that in the post-show conversation. Listeners, we’d love to have you join our community. You can get post-show conversations, ad free episodes. We’re going to be doing a community meeting. There’s all sorts of great stuff out there, and we really could use your support. So go to one. You bet. Scott, again, thanks so much. It’s such a pleasure. Till next time.
Scott Stabile 01:02:34 Yeah, for me too brother. Thank you so much, Eric.
Eric Zimmer 01:02:37 Thank you so much for listening to the show. If you found this conversation helpful, inspiring, or thought provoking, I’d love for you to share it with a friend. Share it from one person to another is the lifeblood of what we do. We don’t have a big budget, and I’m certainly not a celebrity. But we have something even better. And that’s you just hit the share button on your podcast app, or send a quick text with the episode link to someone who might enjoy it. Your support means the world, and together we can spread wisdom one episode at a time. Thank you for being part of the One You Feed community.
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