“The Voice in Your Head Is Lying to You (And It’s Killing Your Confidence)”

Let’s just say it:
 The voice in your head? Yeah… she’s a liar. And she’s got opinions.

In this no-fluff, call-you-out (with love) episode of Breakthrough with Mallory and Julie, we’re diving straight into the messy, unfiltered reality of negative self-talk, inner critics, and the voices that shape your life—whether you realize it or not.

Because here’s the truth:
 You are listening to someone all day long…
And most of the time?
It’s you. And you’re being kind of a jerk about it.

We’re unpacking:

•  Why your inner monologue is probably more toxic than you think 
•  How that voice is quietly sabotaging your confidence, decisions, and success 
•  And how to stop believing every negative thought that pops into your head 

Oh—and yes… we’re naming her Nancy. Because sometimes you’ve got to call it out to shut it down.

But we don’t stop there…

We also get real about:

•  The impact of social media comparison (hello, highlight reels 🙄) 
•  The truth about feedback—who to listen to and who to ignore
•  Why positive affirmations are overrated… and what actually works instead 
•  And how to shift from negative thinking to powerful, confidence-building action

Because this isn’t about standing in the mirror pretending you believe something you don’t.
 This is about taking your power back through action, awareness, and a whole lot of honesty.

🔥 What You’ll Walk Away With

1. A Reality Check on Your Inner Voice
If you wouldn’t say it to your best friend, WHY are you saying it to yourself? It’s time to recognize the trash talk—and shut it down.

2. A Better Filter for Feedback
Not all feedback is created equal. Learn how to separate emotion from information so you can grow without spiraling.

3. A Game Plan for Real Confidence
Confidence doesn’t come from hype—it comes from action. We’ll show you how to move from self-doubt to self-trust.

🚨 Call-Out Moment

If you’ve been:

•  Overthinking 
•  Playing small 
•  Talking yourself out of opportunities 
•  Or believing you’re “not enough” 

👉 It’s not your life that’s the problem… it’s the voice you’re listening to.

And guess what?
 You can change the channel.

🎙️ Listen Now

If you’re ready to:

•  Take back control of your thoughts 
•  Stop self-sabotaging 
•  And actually start showing up like the powerful human you are 

Hit play, subscribe, and share this with someone who needs to tell their inner Nancy to zip it.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:14

You've got voices in your head, and they suck.

SPEAKER_01 0:17

Here's why.

unknown 0:17

They do.

SPEAKER_01 0:19

Welcome everyone to Breakthrough with Mallory and Julie. I'm Julie Birch, professional speaker, author, now podcaster. I'm a happy wife and a mom to an amazing four-legged furry little kitty that I've named Merle Haggard. She's my doll. I love her to pieces. And I am all about self-abdication. I'm all about my war on getting people to take back their power. So my hope is when Mallory and I share some things with you today, that they will resonate, they'll make sense, and maybe it'll give you just a little bit of a kick in the mindset that you might be able to take it, take some back some action, some things that you can do to make yourself more effective as well.

SPEAKER_00 0:58

I'm Mallory Heron, wife, mom, CEO, speaker, author, dog mom, and now podcaster. And my goal here is to really help start a movement of people that are taking back their power and control in their lives so that they are healthier and happier. Love it. And today we are going to talk about those voices in your head that suck. We're also just going to talk about generally who is it that you listen to? Who is listening to you? Are you leading by example?

SPEAKER_01 1:29

Those are big things. Very, very important.

SPEAKER_00 1:32

I think that generally everybody, most everybody, has a bit of an inner monologue that we're listening to. So we're talking about, yes, people externally that you're also listening to, but we need to start with ourselves. Yes. Now, if you don't have an internal monologue, because there are people that don't, I don't know what that's like. I can't imagine that. This is just constant in my head all the time. It's my own voice telling me things, mostly mean things.

SPEAKER_01 2:00

I narrate. I narrate to myself. I tell myself what I'm doing as I'm doing it. So I'm just gonna go do this and then I'm gonna add this to this.

SPEAKER_00 2:07

I wish that I could do that more often because I walk into the kitchen and forget why I'm there too much.

SPEAKER_01 2:14

Uh well, we do that all the time. The older we get, the more we do that.

SPEAKER_00 2:18

That's true. And it's not limited to just the kitchen anymore. Nope. When you think about who has influence over you and who you have influence over and who you're listening to, starting with yourself is very important. And I want everybody to take a minute and think about what that inner monologue is like. Is that inner monologue nice to you, or is it really critical of you? What do you think, Julie? What about you?

SPEAKER_01 2:45

I think most of our inner voices, I think statistics actually bear that out. That most of the things that we say to ourselves are negative. My mom is hilarious, and my mom has always said to me that your your inner voice, that your inner voice cannot take a joke, right? So when you tell yourself that you're stupid or you're not smart enough or you don't have the skills or whatever it is, that we tend to believe that. So basically the stuff we're saying to ourselves is trash. We are really speaking trash to ourselves. We do it all the time. We tell ourselves all the things we can't do, all the things we don't have, all the things we're not good at, we're not smart enough, we don't have the right education, we don't we're not attractive enough, we're not thin enough, whatever it is. And and really, my mom's right that we when we hear ourselves say that, we start to buy in. So we gotta stop listening to the trash.

SPEAKER_00 3:36

It even goes as far as like science proves it. Again, I don't have the data because I it's just science. It's science. It just is. It's just science. That you can actually think yourself sick if you the power of your thoughts is real it's intense, it is very powerful. If you think, oh, I'm sick with XYZ thing, you can get sick with that thing or some other thing. I think there was a quote, I don't remember who said it, but you know, whether you believe you can or you can't, you're probably right. Yeah, and it's true. And when we talk about this in the context of self-abdication, how many times have you not done the thing that you wanted to do because the voice in your head said, Oh, you won't be successful at that? You can't do that. You shouldn't even try. You'll be terrible at it. Look at all the mess that it's going to make. And it's not that's not true. We're so mean to ourselves internally. That's right. And so do you have uh challenging thoughts? Do do you say, Hey, wait a minute? I've heard somewhere that if you actually name your inner monologue, it's a lot easier to stop thinking so negatively. So if you call let's call my inner monologue Nancy. So let's say that there's something I want to do, and Nancy's in there saying, You would be so bad at that. No one is gonna listen to your podcast. No people are gonna just hate anything you post on social media, all of those thoughts, right? If I challenge Nancy, I I give Nancy a name and say, that's just Nancy. She's talking shit all the time. That's just that's just how Nancy is. It's easier. Sounds silly, but it's easier than to be like, no, I don't have to listen to that.

SPEAKER_01 5:15

Nancy.

SPEAKER_00 5:16

It could be Karen, Dave, whatever you want to name your inner monologue. But the point is challenging it. So recognizing when it's happening and saying, hey, no, pump the brakes here, stop it.

SPEAKER_01 5:30

Right.

SPEAKER_00 5:31

I can do what I put my mind to. I can be successful at this. Worst case scenario, maybe I'm not, but at least I can respect myself for trying.

SPEAKER_01 5:42

That's right. I do think it's about changing how we talk to ourselves. I love naming it. I always say my evil twin is Judy, because I'm Julie. And that's the one name I don't like being called is Judy. So I I think that makes sense. But I think it's changing how we how we talk to ourselves, right? So it's we understand that that might be the default, that's where we lean, but we have to, like you said, recognize it and correct it. Because we beat ourselves up over the craziest things. It can be the simplest things. You're driving down the road and you make a wrong turn. You're like, oh, I am so stupid. I'm so stupid. I've been here a dozen times. I can't believe I missed that. It's so stupid. But again, if your self-conscious can't take a joke, right? You're your subconscious is hearing that and it believes it. We have to stop and have to say, no, I'm not stupid, but I don't, I wish I hadn't made that mistake. Or even when people, this is one I get a lot, especially when we talk about the idea of emotional intelligence. And it's like, oh, they make me so mad. They just make me so mad. Why do I care what they think? I'm so stupid for even caring about them. Why do I care? Slow your role, right? Put on the brinks a little bit there. Instead of saying, I'm so stupid for feeling this way, or I'm so stupid that I let this happen, we need to say, I don't like that I feel this way, or I'm not happy that it went this way, but I'm gonna take action to fix it. And I think that's where really the power is, is it's moving from just telling ourselves that subconscious all the things that are negative, because it really does that trash in our head. We tend to believe it. And a huge percentage, um, like you said, science. I think science, I think it's like 122% of the things we say to ourselves are negative.

SPEAKER_00 7:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:18

I don't know if that's accurate.

SPEAKER_00 7:20

But it's something like that, science. By and large, negative. That's my default programming is what I'm hearing up here is going to be negative and not as gentle as the oh, I missed my turn. I'm so stupid. No, mine's like, you fucking asshole. God damn it, you're so you're such an idiot. Like that, why? I would not talk to my husband that way. I wouldn't talk to my kids that way, I wouldn't talk to coworkers that way. It's not how I would speak to anyone because I respect people and people I care about. Absolutely, I never want to speak that way to them. Why why am I talking to myself that way?

SPEAKER_01 7:59

If we wouldn't talk to another person like that, why is it okay for us to talk to ourselves like that? And yet we do.

SPEAKER_00 8:04

And that the issue is when you let it become a barrier, so you don't do the thing you want, you don't take the action that needs to be taken because you're believing that inner monologue. So just be like, Nancy, shut up. I am awesome. You can even then, now I don't know if this gets into like uh personality disorders, but you could then say, Oh, hey, all right, so Nancy's really mean to me. So um Stacy's gonna come in and be like, Hey Nancy, you're wrong. And then to me myself in my own head, you're amazing. Right. You're fabulous. I like it. This doesn't necessarily matter. It's just a simple thing. It's the devil and the angel on the shoulder. Yeah, I mean, but again, that might be a little too much. Stacy can talk you down off the ledge. Wow. I like it. But giving a name to at least the negative aspect of it can help you separate it a little bit more because what we want to avoid is believing it. I like it. And we are programmed to believe it in this negative way. That's true. And that's just the voice in your head. That's not the only voice that you're gonna hear from in your life.

SPEAKER_01 9:06

I just think that the voices that in our head, the things that we like how you talk to yourself matters. Now, I will say just one last thing on this is that I don't, you know, I I'm not into like positive affirmations. I'm not the person that's gonna ever tell you that you should stand in front of the mirror like Stuart Smalley style and tell yourself you're good enough, strong enough, and dog on at people like you. Uh I think those are generally pretty stupid because you're saying them because you don't believe them. So I'm not sure how effective they are. I don't think it's about positive affirmations as much as it is about positive action. So when you say that you're telling that voice, you're naming it, and you're saying no, you're giving yourself a a way to redefine it. You're bringing in the other side of it. Let me let's redefine this, let's re-evaluate this. I think that is much smarter than doing the fake things because you're you don't you're saying that because you don't believe it anyway. And just because you say it in the mirror three times doesn't mean you're gonna believe it after you've said it. So I think that it's not about positive affirmations, it's about positive action. So what action can you take? So when you say, Nancy, knock it off, you're wrong. That's don't not, I'm not even gonna go there. What can you do? If you're telling yourself, if Nancy's saying, you can't do that, you're not smart enough, you don't have the education, you don't have the skill, you don't know how, if Nancy's saying that, then what do you have to do is you have to say, knock it off, and then what action could I take to to look at it? What what what's the actual positive action? That what do I need to learn? What what's the truth about this? What what's another way of looking at it? And I think when you start to change it from positive affirmation to positive action, I think action builds comfort, action builds uh confidence. So the more that we do something, I think the better it becomes. So it is important. It starts with the voices in your head for sure and how we talk to ourselves. So tell Nancy to knock it out. You should call your good voice, Julie.

SPEAKER_00 10:56

Yes. I I will say though that um starting with positive affirmations, that could be a good starting place. So you want to have some kind of positive view of yourself and then you have to back it up. So I've done that because I I do feel weird standing in the mirror and be like, I am amazing. But if I if I think to myself, which I think this is a therapy thing that I learned at some point, but if I think to myself, no, the voices in my head are wrong. I am actually awesome, I'm list 10 things that I'm good at, or how I am perceived XYZ thing, and I I'm using evidence to support the statement. So then it's not just a it's not just blown with smoke. Yeah, like I'm not gonna stand in front of the mirror and be like, you are the most beautiful woman in the world. But I might be able to say, here here are ten things I I like about the way I look.

SPEAKER_01 11:56

Do you remember Stuart Smalley? No. You're not you don't you're not at as many pop culture references. So for our audience, I'll bet you there was quite a few people that know exactly what I'm talking about. It was an old Saturday night live skit, and it was where he would sit in front of the mirror and it was Stuart Smalley, and he was a motivational, like person. And he would say, I'm good enough, I'm strong enough, and doggone it, people like me. But nobody really did.

SPEAKER_00 12:25

Well, when it goes back to how you were taking power back, how you're like even on the last episode we were talking about how you stand up for yourself, how you speak up for yourself. It's gonna be a whole hell of a lot harder to do if you don't have a positive view of yourself. That's right. If you believe that you don't have anything worth saying, then it's gonna be really difficult to speak up for yourself.

SPEAKER_01 12:47

That's exactly. So, and if you think about kind of the purpose of this episode was the voices that you listen to. And so I think it's extremely important that that's the first thing we start with is the your own voice, because your voice is the one you're gonna hear more than any other voice. Ultimately, your voice is your biggest influencer. So, how are you talking to yourself? What are you saying to yourself? And what actions are you taking from that? And I think when we start to to pay attention to it, we start to think about it, I think it makes a difference.

SPEAKER_00 13:20

It absolutely does. And again, we're on autopilot. These are not things that we typically have top of mind. So if you're intentional about it, you can start noticing what's being said and challenging it. And then from there, it's also about well, what other voices, what other influences are you bringing in to shape the way you view yourself, the actions that you take, how you show up in the world. Especially with social media, we are constantly being influenced, whether you know it or not. And look, those influencers, they make like millions of dollars.

SPEAKER_01 13:55

That's insane.

SPEAKER_00 13:56

I don't know, which is why I think a lot of kids these days, that's like their their dream job that what they want to do when they grow up is be an influencer. How is that a job that blows me up? See, that's that's how you know I'm like, but they get like brand deals. So they make millions of dollars. Brands, we're not above a deal. Right. I'm talking to you, brand. I'm there. It's it I find it annoying because I do feel like now every time I open my phone, I'm being sold something. If it's a podcast, if it's a video, if it's an Instagram reel, whatever it is, I feel like I'm being sold something and I don't like that. But even when I'm not being sold something, I am, I'm just not recognizing it because we're being influenced. And outside of social media, we have plenty of other voices that we listen to too. Our family, our friends, our enemies. Our yeah, the Nancy's of the real world.

SPEAKER_01 14:49

That's right. They're out there, and we do listen to them. We're hearing, we're getting messages or receiving messages all the time. And it is true, the the feeling of being sold to. But social media has been such a fascinating uh journey. I mean, I'm really grateful that when I went to school, we didn't have social media because heaven forbid what would be out there now. But it's it's remarkable the impact that it's having on people, and it's not just kids. I mean, we we certainly know that there's challenges with kids being on social media and being on, you know, screens all the time. But uh even as adults, and I find it fascinating because it's a comparison. So what we tend to naturally do, and this is part of the way that we talk to ourselves, is we compare. So when we go on social media and we look at it and we're, you know, doom scrolling, whatever we're doing, we're we're comparing ourselves. Do they look better? Do they have are they doing something more exciting than me? Are they more successful than me? And it's this kind of subtle comparison that can happen. But we need to understand that you can't compare your real life to someone's highlight reel. And that's exactly what it is, because people only post, and I know we've actually talked about this in other episodes, that people only post the good stuff. I mean, most people don't post the bad, and the ones that do, quite frankly, you're even more annoying. I'm scrolling past your sad, sad story. I don't want to hear it. But but we look at that, and I always joke, this is always the example I use, is that I have a lot of friends that travel a lot for work. Never one time have I ever had a speaker friend post a picture of their boarding pass when they're sitting in the back. When they got that upgrade and they're sitting in 3E, they're all about it. Look at me. But when they're in 32F, you don't see that get posted. So we do have to be careful about those, those things that those subtle comparisons and those subtle things that seep in because they certainly do. I mean, that's it's out there.

SPEAKER_00 16:33

You can't avoid it. And it's subconscious a lot of the time. So you have to have a strong enough self-view, a a positive one to know that you're still awesome even if you're not in first class. Right.

SPEAKER_01 16:46

But not as awesome. Like I forget there's even people back there.

SPEAKER_00 16:50

I've never been in first class, but someday. Someday it'll happen for you. I believe it will. I uh so far though, I've just haven't been able to justify this bend. But I get it. I also hate flying in general, but I digress.

SPEAKER_01 17:04

You're right. That's a whole nother that's a whole nother issue.

SPEAKER_00 17:06

That's a different topic. We'll go there another day. When we are taking in information from others, feedback, we're getting it on a daily basis. It's not all like we have the luxury of when we're speaking, there's a survey that people will fill out and they'll tell us if we suck or not.

SPEAKER_01 17:24

They do and they will.

SPEAKER_00 17:26

Yeah. So and w we'll have specific questions. Even if we're at a conference and it's not our own survey, the conference has questions because they they want to bring back good speakers. So if they're like, oh yeah, this lady was terrible, she didn't know what she's talking about, then you're not gonna get booked again. And we're able to take that feedback and apply it. And look, constructive criticism, it can hurt my feelings, it's still criticism. But it's necessary if I want to do better and improve. And you are constantly taking in feedback. Sometimes it's formal, like the way we get it, sometimes it's informal. When you say to your spouse, you just need to calm down. The feedback you're gonna get after saying that it's not real positive.

SPEAKER_01 18:16

I want to know when in the history of the world somebody said to someone, now calm down, and they've responded with, Oh, now that's an option I hadn't considered.

SPEAKER_00 18:23

Right? When is that has that ever worked? Has anyone done this to you? I I don't know who started it, but one time this this happened uh to me. I was really mad, and my husband at the time took a towel and put it around my back and was like, No, you're super mad. Now we're divorced.

SPEAKER_01 18:41

So that is not a good technique. That's not one, that's not a takeaway. No. That's a cautionary tale.

SPEAKER_00 18:47

But you are constantly getting feedback from others, other drivers on the road. Sometimes that's a finger gesture. Um, sometimes it's just the the hey, thanks for letting me in wave. You're getting feedback from your family, from your friends in the way they respond verbally and with their body language. You are always getting feedback, which is important. Right. What you do with that feedback, that's another story. So that's up to you. But you do need to be open to feedback.

SPEAKER_01 19:16

Yeah. I think that's uh I agree when you it we understand the importance, like logically and analytically, um, when we talk about the idea of getting feedback or constructive feedback, that we logically and analytically can say, yes, we know that's important. That's how we grow, that's how we get better, that's how we improve. But the reality is that nobody really generally likes it in the moment. And I and some of us have a harder time with it than others. And I I true confessions, I struggle with it a lot. Write me a note, but if you say it to my face, I tend to get very um, I'm working on it, I'm working on it. But it is something that I struggle. See, I don't cry. I don't cry. I'll just get mad. I just get defensive. And it's not a it neither one of those are appropriate. So again, those are cautionary tales, not things to take with you. Uh but uh what I've tried to learn is that it is true. That's how we learn and grow. One of the things I always consider, and I'm I'm gonna share this, but I'm also gonna get you to kind of put your spin on it as well. But I always you hear when we talk about getting feedback, you hear consider the source. And and I know that that there's a lot of power in that because I understand that we were considering intention. Does this person have my best interest at heart? I have a little bit different take on it, though, that over the years I've kind of honed so that I am better about receiving feedback because I don't consider the source. I personally find that sometimes the people that love us the most, the people we would trust the most, they love us so much they don't always see the things that could improve. And so sometimes they're not our best resource. And I think sometimes the people that we dislike the most actually see stuff that we need to see. And I will tell you I learned this. I was gonna talk about getting feedback when you're speaking, and I had been doing, I've been doing a training, and it was actually a full-day training, and one of the things I had just been teaching was talking about different personality styles. So how you know these people, some of these people are super outgoing and they, you know, they're very creative and they use lots of you know illustrations and stories, and some people are very logical and analytical, they like charge graph status and number of information. And so I had just gone through kind of that idea, and it was time to take a break. So I was like, all right, 15 minutes, you know, we'll be back in 15 minutes, we'll pick up where we left off. There was a woman and I had a pretty good group. She was sitting all the way in the back. So I really had not even seen her. I couldn't even see her. And as soon as we took the break, I see her like stomping, like making a beeline for me, like coming right at me. And she walked up to me and she said, Now I know why I don't like you. Did you clap her? I was like, well, um, I said, um, excuse me. And she said that based on what I had just taught her, that she realized that I was much more of a you know, comedian. I was more, I was funny, I was I used stories and illustrations. And based on what I had taught her, she was much more specific and analytical and she liked more charts, graphs, data, and information. And so that's why she realized she didn't like me. And I looked at her and I said, so basically what you're saying to me is that you learned so much from me that you are able to determine my personality style and your personality style. And you can see how those two personality styles sometimes don't interact. And she said yes. And I said, Well, thank you for the feedback. And she stormed off. Now, here's kind of for me where the lesson came in on this is that it would be very easy for me to say, consider the source. What did this woman know? Right? Let her do what I do, right? She thinks she's going to be all charts, data, and for me. You stand up in front of a crowd for six hours and not just talk, but get them to listen for six hours. So, you know, you do what I do and then you come back with feedback. I could have very easily dismissed her entire feedback because what does she know? Now the reality is I was mad. But I had to get back to it. So I had to start back up. I had to compartmentalize my mad, put it in my back pocket. And as soon as I was done that day and I was packing my stuff up, then I let my mad out my pocket and I started, you know, stupid lady, what does she know? So I'm packing my laptop and stuff. Jerk, what does she know? I'll let her stand up here for six hours. But after I let myself kind of get over, like vent and just get over the mad, to me, that is when the real growth or the real work happens. Because I don't think the source matters. It doesn't matter who said it to me. I think what we have to be able to do, and I know for me this is what works, is I have to separate the feedback from the person that gave it to me. It doesn't matter who gave it to me, because at this point, what I'm doing is I've separated it. It doesn't matter who said it to me. I'm just going to look at the feedback. And now I can look at that feedback and say, okay, does it have value? Is this something that would make me a better speaker? Now I can look at that and I can say, no. I can say that my style is my style and my style is what works. And, you know, I've never gotten that kind of crazy feedback before. I probably am doing just fine as is. And I can choose to dismiss it. I can choose to let it go. Or I could look at it and I could say that, you know what? If I have one person in my audience who's more uh charts, graphs, data, I probably have more than one. And maybe that would be something I could incorporate that would make me better. And I can choose to take it in. Not because she said it, but because I chose to take it in. Or I might look at it and say, could I do a combination or could I do part of it? Or is there something about this that I could take in and use? And it's not because of who said it to me. It's not because of how it was said to me. It's because I separate the feedback from who said it and I choose what feedback I'm gonna get. When people tell you what you should do, we are way more resistant to take action, right? Nobody likes to be told what to do. But when we choose it, it's taking back our power. I'm not doing it because she told me to do it. I'm doing it because I choose it. And and that really has helped me to not to be able to accept feedback more openly, to be more open to making changes and to growth. Because I don't, it doesn't matter who told me that. Because sometimes the people you love the most do not, they're not the ones that are gonna give you the the most honest feedback all the time.

SPEAKER_00 25:30

Very true. I am gonna avoid the fight with my husband and maybe not tell him what I really think. But I so I differ a little bit. So it's kind of two parts. The first is I do consider the source and but I don't usually just disregard it. It depends. So if someone says, Oh god, Mallory, you're a terrible cook, but they've never eaten anything I've made, I'm not listening to that. Right. Like you really don't know at that point. Um, maybe I have a reputation for being a bad cook because I am, but still try it before you make that decision. Um, I listen primarily to those closest to me for things that I need to be most vulnerable about because they are deal with me day in, day out. Like if my husband says, You have a tendency to immediately be negative if I bring up an idea before you eventually come around to it. You know what? I'm probably going to hear him side with him after I've done some reflection. So I I give more weight to that. But that makes sense. There's another side to it too. So even if I don't have to agree with all the feedback that I get, especially if it's constructive, and I am sensitive. So I don't love it immediately, but then I'm thankful for it because it's gonna sharpen me. I consider perception is reality. What have I done to contribute to your reality, your perception of me being this way? Com bringing you to give me this piece of feedback. That's a great point. Because we all have some accountability within that. And may I don't have to agree, but I can at least put myself in your shoes and try to understand why you feel that way so that I can then do something about it. And yeah, that's powerful. Sometimes the best feedback that we get is the stuff that we don't agree with. Right. And it's it's valid information, it's data, and you can then do something with that information. I like that.

SPEAKER_01 27:33

I also think one of the things that when you said that, it made me think of is that we consider intention, right? So we consider intention. Does this person, what's their is do they have good intentions? And I think that makes a difference. And I think you go to different people for different things, right? You might depend, like you said, with they've never even eaten my cooking. How can they grade that? But different people were gonna give you different honest feedback. I had a picture that we considered using for social media that I was not crazy about. It felt a little, I felt really fake in it. If it was a little bit like it felt like it was a little AI me, not real me. And I wanted to get some feedback because my first reaction was, I'm not so sure about this. So I texted the picture to two people. I texted it to my sister and to my husband. My husband said, You're beautiful. My sister said, No, don't use that. That doesn't even look like you. And she said, I'm sorry. I I hope you're okay hearing that. I'm like, that's why I asked you, because I know that I can go to her and she'll give me honest feedback. So I think sometimes we we go to the people around us that for especially for certain things, because we know that's something that they're gonna be better about giving us real world feedback. And I think that's helpful. So you're right. I don't, it's not about dismissing, always dismissing the source. I think sometimes we just have to evaluate the source. So I think what you're saying is right.

SPEAKER_00 28:54

It's also important to be cautious with intentions because the road to hell is paved with them. And I've got I've gotten in some hot water with my intentions. I never want ever want to hurt my husband's feelings or my kids' feelings or friends' feelings, but even with a positive intention, if I'm careless about the way that I say something, the screw my intentions. I've hurt somebody.

SPEAKER_01 29:22

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 29:23

So I try to frame it as when someone else does have good intentions, I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt, and I'm going to try not to pay attention to, well, did they say it a particular way that felt like a jet?

SPEAKER_01 29:35

Right.

SPEAKER_00 29:35

And I hope that others would give me the same benefit of the doubt, but my default setting is probably no. So I'm gonna be thoughtful about this.

SPEAKER_01 29:45

Yeah, I think that's smart.

SPEAKER_00 29:46

And I I hope that I'm being a good example in doing that by having that thought. You know, when I'm really heated, I'm probably not thinking about it, but giving that thought to something before I go into a conversation before I send off that email. And I even like sometimes when I'm really pissed off, I'll write out an email and I won't hit said, I'll be like, James, that's my husband. Can you come read this and tell me if it's too snarky? And then they'll be like, Yeah, tone it down. Um I do give it a half an hour and then go back in the cut at it. Yes, type later. Uh for me, it's go smoke a cigarette first. But I try to be thoughtful about it and I hope that by doing that, I'm setting a good example for my kids, for my husband, for my team, for my friends, because you you do teach people how to treat you, and a lot of that has to do with what you tolerate, but a small portion of that is also how you're showing up. That's right. And let me tell you, when it comes to kids, especially, they are sponges. And going back to that negative in our monologue, yeah, that self-talk. Uh-huh. We are most of us, me for sure, I'm so critical of myself with the way that I look. Um and your kids, I've got a daughter. I had to kind of remind myself when she was smaller. If she sees me kind of picking myself apart in the mirror, if she hears me, I'm not gonna eat that, I'm just I'm trying to diet, I'm gonna skip this meal, or I'm just gonna have a protein shake, she's gonna internalize all of that and then have her own issues with her body and her relationship to food. And I would never, ever, ever want that for her. That's right. So being mindful about what you're doing and the example you're setting is very important too.

SPEAKER_01 31:29

I think that is very well said. I and I think that actually kind of brings us full circle because our whole idea with this episode is voices that we listen to. So the our internal voice, our inner monologue, the the resource, the things that are just out there, whether it's social media, it's just what we see and we're exposed to in our culture, and then the feedback that we receive and how we navigate that. But I also think then the voices that we're that we're sharing, who who's listening to us? And I think with your daughter and just kids, I think that's such a great thing to remember. I don't have any kids of my own, but I have six amazing nieces who are my heart and soul. I love those girls more than life itself. And I think about that even with them is what do I want them to hear? And I think that there's a cautionary tale there when we talk about how we perceive social media and what that looks like for us, having those conversations with our kids, that how their relationship with social media, because they're seeing it too. And we can logically and analytically separate and say, well, I know I shouldn't be paying attention to this, but are we teaching them that too? So are we the voice in the world that we want others to hear? Because what you say matters. People are always watching.

SPEAKER_00 32:45

And it it's all again forms of data. I try to explain that to my kids like what you say. It's it's a highlight reel. So instead of comparing yourself, you can say, Oh, that's aspirational. I'd love to go to Bali, whatever, right? You just take the data and you do use it in a different way. And that's really the next step. Once you get the feedback, how you use it matters.

SPEAKER_01 33:06

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 33:07

But if you just take it and be like, oh, okay, and never do anything about it. Right. Never take action. I mean, that's a choice, you can do it, but you're probably not gonna improve. And I think that human natures that we're constantly evolving, and most of us anyway, even if we think we're great, we still want to improve and be better. I I know I do.

SPEAKER_01 33:28

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 33:28

And so it's a choice to to do nothing. I think that the best thing to do though, is take some time to really let it soak in and reflect on it.

SPEAKER_01 33:39

I say and marinate in it.

SPEAKER_00 33:41

Yeah. Just what what about this information can you use to better yourself or your situation? Why, even if I disagree with it, why would this person have been led to feel this way? Why are they giving me feedback? Because most people they're they're not just gonna come up to me be like, you so like they're they're very much like because of I come from a place of caring, I want to bring this to your attention. So uh choosing what you do after you've reflected on it, I think, is the next logical step. And it doesn't have to make you feel like you're a bad person or that you suck. It's you're improving. You're already great, you're just just improving even more.

SPEAKER_01 34:21

That's right. That's the moving from just the positive aspiration or positive affirmation to positive action. And I think that's where that's where the growth happens. The growth doesn't come from receiving feedback, the growth comes from acting on the feedback. And are we are we willing to take action, whether that feedback comes from your own inner monologue, whether that feedback comes from something you see on social media, whether that feedback comes from somebody coming up and giving you feedback. And and I think that I love that you are willing to say that you think most of the time people aren't trying to be negative. I think there are plenty of people out there that are just being bitchy and that do it just because they want to tell you the negative. Yeah. So I do think that that is being able to, like you said, kind of uh marinate in it, think about it, reflect on it, and identify is this something that's gonna make a difference for me? And then you make the choice. So who are we listening to and who is listening to us? And are we leading by example?

SPEAKER_00 35:20

It's important. And think about too the media that you take in. What who are you listening to in your life and what are their messages? I I bet if you get thoughtful and intentional about it, you're gonna start noticing it a lot more. And for your own inner Nancy. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 35:39

Tell Nancy to knock it off. That's what we should have called this episode knock it off, Nancy. Knock it off, Nancy. No offense to anyone named Nancy. I know all my friends that are Nancy. It's a lovely name. It is. We love it. Well, I think hopefully everybody feels like they've got some thoughts they can take with them today that they can use uh that will help make a difference for them as they look at what voices they're listening to and who's listening to their voice, because you don't have to be in a uh an official position of leadership to be a leader in your family, in your life, in your community, uh in the workplace. And so hopefully uh leading by example and the things we talked about will help you do that.

SPEAKER_00 36:16

Yes. And remember to believe in yourself because you are capable of so much more.

SPEAKER_01 36:21

That's absolutely right. You can grow, you can learn, you can do. You can break through with Mallory and Julie.

SPEAKER_00 36:30

Thanks for hanging with us. We appreciate it. Please, before you go, like, subscribe, share, comment, give us feedback, all of the things. We appreciate it.

SPEAKER_01 36:38

That's right. All the things we want to hear from you. Thank you, thank you, thank you, y'all. See you on the next one. Bye.