Episode 253 Minisode: My Coach Just Fixed My Brain
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As I shared in an episode last week, I was recently blindsided. I was unceremoniously removed from a coaching program that had been my home for over three years. I felt like I had finally found my people, my tribe. And then without warning or explanation, I was kicked out. And as you can imagine, my first thought was, this isn’t fair. This isn’t right. I don’t deserve this.
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I felt so hurt and I was convinced that I would be hurt for a really long time because it was a big damn deal to me. But instead of suffering in silence, I phoned a friend, my coach, and within an hour, everything had shifted for me. She used a simple NLP exercise known as timeline hopping and took me back to the root of the wound, which as you might imagine was a similar rejection that I had experienced in childhood.
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In that coaching session, in real time, I felt my body and my brain rewiring from the story that I have been wronged into a new story that I’m fucking free. So today’s episode is an inside look of what happens when you choose to stop wasting your energy trying to fix or figure out a problem and just let go of the problem instead.
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My name is Colleen and I’m a mindful drinking coach helping high achieving professional women permanently reduce their alcohol consumption by 80%. Join me each week for evidence-based holistic strategies to regulate your nervous system, balance your dopamine, and activate the growth mindset that makes you so powerful in other areas of your life so you can stop worrying about losing control and trust yourself again. Get happy, not sober. It’s not about the alcohol.
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So I’m going to give you a little update on the episode I released about how, oh my God, I just got kicked out of my coaching program after winning breakthrough of the year. It’s just dumped. And I shared that with you in real time as I was processing it two hours after I received the email. And I’m really proud of how well I responded and my immediate desire to move on, find the silver lining and not
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carry it with me. The song that I chose to have them play as I before I gave my speech and after and then when I won they played it was Shawn Mendes, There’s Nothing Holding Me Back. And I’m very committed to that. There’s nothing holding me back. But as you can imagine, the sting and the hurt didn’t completely go away. So I knew I was choosing to move on, but I was limping. The story was like a magnet in my head.
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And as much as I tried to focus on other things, it was still active. And while I did an excellent job moving through the next day, it was my daughter’s birthday, I threw a party for her that night, and I’d made a big, beautiful meal, and I was there and present, I also was hurting. And the reason I was hurting is very, very simple. Because even though I was willing and ready to move on, I had a belief that
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This was big. This was really hurtful. This was unfair. I had been wrong. And therefore, I am going to struggle to get over this. I can do this with my big, brave face, but it’s going to be hard. I knew that I would be OK, right? No doubt about it. I’m going to make it OK. I make everything OK. That’s how I roll. But it still sucks. And it is those beliefs.
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that I have been wronged, this sucks, and it’s gonna be hard to get over this. It was those beliefs that were holding me back, not the situation itself. And what made it even more complicated is everybody agreed with me. Friends were reaching out, some of you reached out after I published that episode, oh, that’s just awful, this sucks. And so all of us collectively were reinforcing this belief, and it was that belief
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that was causing me pain. It was that belief that was my emotional baggage, and it was heavy. And I was going to have to carry it around until, I guess, it faded. That’s what I thought. This will just fade. The sting will just go away. I didn’t really understand until yesterday that I could actually fucking let that shit go immediately, not just as a decision cognitively, but also emotionally. And I want to share with you how I did it.
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So after I got through my big, busy, beautiful day Friday night, I woke up on Saturday morning and I was suffering. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I kept my eye constantly hypervigilantly looking on my email to see if he responded to either one of the emails that I had sent, which were very kind and is asking for him to talk to me. I was waiting for a response, giving him my power.
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Like if somehow he said some words or talked to me, then I would be able to move forward. Then I could at least have closure or at least some sense of understanding. Then I would be okay. And I want to be clear. I was giving away my power. The power for me to be okay was dependent on the conditions being met that someone else say some words or do something different or change.
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situation. So I wasn’t in my power. And I knew that because my body hurt, like, you know, diarrhea, six stomach tension and tightness, and distracted brain fog, like all of the things my body was not okay. And this is where understanding that your emotions are your superpower, because they are informing you to where your own mindset, your own thoughts,
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processes. Your own expectations are causing pain in your body. And I didn’t want to carry this emotional baggage. I wanted to be free of it completely. So I did what you all do, what many of you do with me. I reached out to my coach and I sent her a text and I said, I know it’s the weekend before Christmas, but if you had any time at some point, I could really use some support.
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And she’s in the program with me. She’s been part of all these group texts. So I didn’t even have to explain what it was. And she immediately shot back. This was at 8.50 in the morning. She says, I will see you at nine o’clock on Zoom. Here’s the link. And once we got on, she said she knew exactly what we needed to do. And it was an exercise called timeline hopping that ironically, James is the one that taught us that.
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And was I open to that? And I was like, yes, I’ve done it. Yes. Like, whatever you say, like, I am, you’re the boss of me. Please help me. I will do whatever you say. And so she began to lead me through this timeline exercise, which is an NLP-based modality. NLP is neuro-linguistic programming. And I understand neuro-linguistic.
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programming, but I am not certified in it. I’ve never really studied the exact technique. And as you can imagine, I’m always looking for a new technique. But yesterday, I decided I’m not here to learn how to do what she’s doing to me. I just need her to do it. I need her to help me. And so I just surrendered into the process. And the first thing she established with me was that I needed to get clear on what I wanted. And I know how to pick a good goal.
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They’re all emotions, right? I knew how I wanted to feel. I wanted to feel happy and free. I wanted to be free, unencumbered by this story and this problem. I wanted to feel powerful, like I’m not waiting for anybody else to give me what I need or to change a circumstance. I wanted to feel completely 100 % in my power. And I wanted to feel excited about me moving forward in my life.
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So I wanted to feel happy and free and excited and powerful. And that’s a tall order when you’re carrying a big story that you’ve been wronged and it’s gonna take time to get over this because it’s really unfair and also hurtful. So she had her work cut out for her, but I just surrendered and NLP is often working in semi-trans states. They use hypnosis to access the unconscious mind. And so she led me into
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like a trance where I was just answering first thing that came to mind, what the belief was, where that belief had been formed. We went back into my childhood to find times when I’ve experienced this before. The one thing that came to mind when I was in seventh grade, I was a new kid in this Christian school, very small, very clicky, and I was the new kid and I was kind of an ugly duckling. I know that’s a story and I shouldn’t say that about myself, but that’s how I felt. uh Just really.
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not cool. And the other girls in this program were like full grown women prom queens. They showed up every day in full hair and makeup and had outfits and they had lots of money. And I was probably there on a scholarship and didn’t have the money. And every time I wore makeup to school, the teacher would be like, you were not allowed to wear makeup. You have to go wash that off. And I was like, everybody else is wearing makeup. why? And whatever. Like I just felt very othered and outed. And there was a uh musical that year. And I tried out.
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and I got the lead role, which felt amazing and also like, okay, this is how I’m gonna make friends with everybody, right? Because I’m gonna be the lead role in the musical and I’m gonna get to work with all these amazing people. I was in seventh grade, but it was fine. Only for a week later, that musical was canceled. They said, we’re not doing that musical anymore. There’ll be a new musical announced and new tryouts will be made. And exactly as you might expect,
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I was cast in the role of like girl number three in scene two. Like I was no longer the lead in the musical. And that created pretty big emotional wound. I decided in that moment, I adopted the belief, but I decided in that moment, it doesn’t matter how good I do. There’s a man behind the curtain who’s gonna take it all away from me anyway. And in that situation, I formed a lifelong belief that I’m an outsider. I’m never truly on the inside.
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and that other people more powerful than me get to decide if I’m good enough and if I’m wanted. And this has led to a lifetime of me trying to perform and prove and earn the validation of others. And my friend, my coach, asked me, am I ready to let this go? Because the only way that I could let this go
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is that I’m gonna have to see something different. And as I’m the only person suffering in this story, I immediately said absolutely yes. And what happened next was nothing short of like a movie where you can literally see your brain rewiring. I feel like there was smoke coming out of my brain. I could feel energy in my body. Like I had all this tension in my neck and chest and I was moving my
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head around and there was all this snap crackling and popping that is not normally there. I mean, you guys, it was crazy. It sounded like I was busting out of a cocoon or something, know, like breaking the shell that I had been living in. And so what happened next was like a repopulating of my mind on the circumstances of this situation. I went back through and looked at what had actually happened.
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was that I received an email from my coach who said that there were some comments made backstage while I was back there that made some of the finalists uncomfortable. And due to his commitment to having a positive and supportive community, he thought it best that we part ways in 2025. Now, you’ll remember from my first explanation, he’d never told me
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what it is that I said, which I found to be absolutely maddening and frustrating and the gall of that guy. And so I reach out to another of the finalists and get a bigger picture on the story that it was some comment I made about this being the last time that we would all be speaking for free because our businesses are gonna grow and we’re gonna get paid to speak on stage. And I was clucking around in the little hen house with everybody and.
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10 out of 10 people I talked to agreed. There’s nothing insulting or injurious about that statement. My intention had been to calm the angst because everybody was complaining that we’d been sitting there so long. So I was trying to motivate the troops. But the reality is he didn’t tell me anything except there were some comments made that made some people uncomfortable. And due to his commitment to positive and supportive community,
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He thought it best that we go our separate ways in 2025 and that he would be refunding my money and he wished me the best. And so the neutral, non-storied facts of this situation are that I immediately had more money in my bank account and my calendar was now open for three events. Normally I go to three events a year that take five days of my time and I now have a wide open calendar to explore
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new networking events, or even maybe book some speaking engagements where I’m actually getting paid. I also got to experience a bunch of texts from friends who care about me and who want to help me and who are worried and supportive and ready to go march in and demand an explanation and make things right on my behalf. A couple of them have even said they’re going to quit. And I’ve told them, please don’t do that for me because I know if the situation was reversed,
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I would be thinking, there’s always more to this story, and I need to do what’s right for me. And right up until two days ago, this group was right for me. And I wouldn’t have wanted to feel like it was a test of loyalty. And so I released everybody. I’m like, please do not quit on my behalf, because I’m choosing to leave. I’m choosing to let this go. I’m choosing to see this as a neutral event that’s redirecting me. And you guys.
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I was able to do this instantaneously. By the end of this 45 minute NLP coaching session, I had completely let go of the story. I remember it differently. I see it differently. I took my power back. I get to interpret the situation any way I want. And I’m not doing it from the lens of the seventh grade girl who didn’t get the lead in the second musical that was cast. And as I teach all of you, there’s no such thing as a true story. There’s just the facts.
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I didn’t get the lead in the second musical in seventh grade. And in this situation, my calendar just opened up for 2025 and I have even deeper connections with quite a few friends where I feel so seen and supported. I have the power to not only create the story I want, but rewrite any old stories that no longer serve me. I get to interpret
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the neutral circumstances of my life and I get to tell the story and I don’t need other people to agree with my version. I just need my body to agree with my version and my body feels fucking amazing. By the time I got off that call, I knew it was over. I had had a massive shift. Like I said, I felt the neural synapses in my brain firing and rewiring. I now see and feel
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this situation from a completely new perspective. And I have that because I asked for help. I got clear on what I wanted, which was to feel happy and free and powerful and excited. And I was willing to remove the resistance to those feelings by accepting full responsibility that I was the source of my own pain, which means that I’m also the source.
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and the creator of my own joy. Side effects of which include being unfuckwithable.
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All right, thanks for listening. And if you’re a high achieving, coachable woman who is ready to commit to manifesting your best life, and you’re going to need to reduce your alcohol consumption by about 80 % so that alcohol goes back to being a pleasure instead of a soul sucking problem, get in the show notes and click the link and schedule a discovery call with me or my team.