Good day podcast fans. It's bonus episode day. And today I want to shine a light on something

that our brain does, that is both absolutely brilliant and also a right pain in the backside

when it gets things wrong. And that's the ability we have, through repetition, to move something outside of conscious thought

and into an emotional and unconscious reaction. Sometimes called muscle memory, where things just

seem to happen without thinking, but also often called gut instinct, where there's a feeling

that something is either right or wrong about a situation.

And it's all to do with repetition.

And the problem we have is that if there are hundreds of previous times where we've told ourselves that we can't do something,

that's going to mean that whenever we try to stretch our comfort zone,

it will feel wrong. It will always feel wrong, which means we can't wait until something

feels right before we do something, no matter what it is. Whether that's waiting for the right mood before changing the bed

sheets or to send a message to an old friend because you're feeling lonely and want to reconnect

with somebody. It's too easy to do things only when it feels right. And that's just how the brain

and body works. So if you're feeling lazy, it's going to feel

right to do nothing. Because repetition hardwires, the wrong feeling into our brain and body,

and overriding it means doing things that feel wrong. And our brain has only got one way of making

something feel wrong, and that's anxiety.

Whether it's just a funny little feeling of, I'm not in the mood for that, or full on anxiety.

We can't trust our feelings. They tell us things are scary when they're not and things are safe

when they're scary until they're taught otherwise.

Babies might be frightened of sudden noises, but they're not frightened of social situations or heights

because they don't have the thinking that with repetition creates the feelings.

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