Here is the complete transcript of the podcast
Good morning, everyone. Welcome back to Success with Srini. Trust, your long weekend is going great. Today, I was thinking, you know, what should I do so many thoughts in my mind. And I was kind of thinking, about which way should I take the podcast, I went back to my inbox, and my email had not been working for some time had been some issues with it. And we moved the hosting servers and all but then I went to my archives. And as I was scanning through the inbox, I was looking for some questions to answer. Some emails, I could not access some. But I was able to find one email that I thought I answered on the podcast, but turns out I have not. So I thought I’m gonna take some time today on the podcast, and I’m gonna answer the question. And this has to do with stress. And from a very elite performer, somebody who, who I know somebody who is doing some incredible stuff within their field, and asking about stress, not because, you know, in, in different stages of his life, he has experienced stress. But then he started to get worried now, thinking that the kind of opportunities, the kinds of responsibilities he’s going to take on from this point, he’s worried at the stress that these indicators of stress, may completely cripple him. That’s the question. And he explains in the question, it’s a very interesting question.
He says I do a lot of things to deal with my stress, and nothing seems to work, or it’s working. And I don’t think it’s working at the level that I want it to work. I have followed many of your suggestions, I do a lot of yoga. And I also have a good eating schedule, a tight schedule. I drink a lot of green tea. And I don’t exercise a lot, but I do walk. And occasionally, I also do massages, and I’m an overall happy man. But somehow I’m feeling the pressure of stress taking over. In whatever projects he’s doing. Anyway. So that’s the gist of this email. And the question he’s asking is, Will hypnosis work? Okay, so that’s where the question ends. Okay, so first of all, I don’t want you to be hard on yourself, I think you’re doing all the right things. It’s not about winning over stress, it’s more about managing stress. So stress is a given, it’s a factor. It’s like, you have weather, you have traffic, you have taxes, you have family, children, everything you have. And this is also one of those things, this is invisible. This doesn’t stand in front of you. It’s not like a shadow that follows you everywhere. But it in a way does shine, at least you have an image of the shadow. But stress is an integral part of existence, we need to make friends with stress. So this is given, there are no second thoughts about this question becomes says, how much can we do internally, such that we don’t get overly impacted by stress? What can we do internally, to not get impacted by stress?
So you’re getting stressed out by thinking about the opportunity you have ahead of you. And even though you’re successful doing what you’re doing, you’re worried about what’s going to happen. So I think if this is this is more about worry, then this is about stress. And I think you’re over-projecting yourself into the end outcome. And getting worried about it, I wouldn’t do it. If I were in your situation, I would take if you’re a true practitioner of yoga, meditation, and everything that you’re doing, then I would let go, a part of that is letting go. So I let go, I will let go of my inhibitions. I would let go of my preconceived notions about things, situations, and projects that I’m working on. I would simply exist. And that is one of the core lessons of self-improvement is to exist. Of course, you have to have the pursuit, that’s what’s given. But you got to exist, you got to be in the moment, and you got to stay with it. When you try to pace yourself in your thoughts and think about what’s going to happen to you a month or a year or 10 years from now. Then now you’re not in pace with the moment. So now there’s going to be some level of the current the present moment demands a certain side of you and that side of you is not available to it. So there are some penalties that you have to pay because This moment is going to inflict some damage on you. So this is about managing your thoughts and ignoring the body as much. Now, will hypnosis help? That’s the question the answer is yes, you know, any mind-mending technique helps. And to think that you’re doing something, and it’s not working, and going on to something else, which is more or less identical. And expecting that to work. I don’t think it’s smart. I don’t think it’s good thinking. So I would continue to do what you’re doing, and not worry about hypnosis and other things. These are, you know, they have a, they do play a role, and they have a place, but then I think they should be somewhere else. So if I categorize everything that you said in the email, then there are three buckets into which I can put everything that you said, the first bucket is escaped, okay, and I came up with this hot meal a long time ago, by the way. So first is called Escape. So every time somebody is under stress, they want to escape. So what people do, and you’ll see people doing now, a lot since everything has come back to normal after COVID, is people going on vacations.
So people escape from the reality for some time, which is good. But the problem is the comeback of that reality. So if you’re using hypnosis, I’ll tell you where hypnosis helps in this specific case you can escape the reality in your mind. And you don’t need to come back to reality, even though you are physically there. Vacations, you go out, and you come back. And I talked about this also several weeks ago. So when people are under stress they want to escape. The second category is the reason why you are feeling stress is that you want to do good. You want to excel, you want to engage more. So the second category is engagement. So what can you do, to engage and engage in a better way into everything that you’re doing? So the idea is not to really run away?
You know, it’s just so you want to engage better? That’s the question here, and how can I engage better so that the future opportunities I’m having, I’m going to really accomplish those opportunities, kind of get a handle on them. So the engagement, improvement of an engagement or engaging in a better way, is one of you know, another. So that’s why people do, is they go to yoga, they go to meditation, and hypnosis is another area why you’re asking this question. The third category is entertainment. People listen to music, people go dancing people do these things, not not, because that’s the calling, they want to do it because they did it some time ago. But along the way, somebody told them, if they do these things, then their stress is going to go away. Or you will feel better about yourself, which is good, nothing wrong with it. So people deal with stress, by escaping by engaging in using some tools, and by entertaining themselves. So think of this problem as a triangle. And look at each side of a triangle as an escape, engage in entertainment, entertain. Now see, and if you see yourself with a dot inside the triangle, which side are you leaning more towards? So move the dot around to each side of a triangle, and see where you find the most control. This is a question of control. So So what it means is that started taking small vacations. Go on small vacations, you don’t need to wait three months or six months to go on a big vacation. And who knows the big vacations may work or may not work. And usually most of the time people say they don’t.
So makes no sense to take that kind of vacation at all. So take small ones. Start to engage more, you’re doing meditation, you’re doing yoga. That’s all great, awesome. So how about going into nature? How about taking walks or hiking, whatever to engage? And the last one is entertainment, you know, entertain yourself, is there some something in you inside of you that has that you have a natural you know, softness, for example, dance or music or poetry or whatever, whatever that is that kind of takes you away from who you are, and takes you into a different world altogether. I would do that. To see where the dot moves and where you feel. Whichever one you feel that you’re having better control over or by doing that gives you better control. Keep it That stupid that stays force for whatever amount of time and there comes a point where, where even these opportunities you’re talking, they will come your way, and you will accomplish them. And then you move on to do even bigger things. So I’ll tell you something, and I want to leave you with this, with this thought or this notion. It is, at this moment, you’re thinking the next two opportunities are big for which you don’t think that you have the time and or you don’t have the capability or you don’t have the mental state to accomplish them will tell you that, you know, five, 710 years from now, these opportunities are going to become bigger and better. And you tend to age and you tend to slow down. And you tend to not have the same energy levels, the same energy levels that you take pride in today. So the opportunities are going to become bigger. And each opportunity is going to demand that you show up in a bigger way. So your job is to not worry about the opportunity that you have right now. But strengthen yourself and go after them. Whatever you can, as much as quickly as you can, as strong as you can, as well as you can go on to these opportunities and expect the other, the later opportunities to be much bigger than what you have got going now.
Okay, so I’m going to stop here you go enjoy your Sunday, and I’ll catch up with you all whether it’s listening tomorrow, and it’s Halloween tomorrow here in Silicon Valley, or in bed in America. I think it’s all over the world. No, I’m saying that. Okay. That’s all for now, but everyone is safe. And before you know it. I’ll be with you tomorrow. Stay tuned.