The Energy In Which We Do Things

How and why we do things matters as much, if not more than the things we actually do! In this episode, Glenn gives examples and advice on how to make sure you are bringing the right energy you want to be to a given situation.

Transcript

Welcome to life lessons and laughter with your host Glenn Ambrose.

Hey everybody,

Welcome to the show.

So today we are discussing the energy in which you do things.

I really like this topic.

Ah,

Yeah.

It's something that you talk about a lot actually,

Like in general.

Yeah,

I think it is.

And it's really been coming to the surface.

I saw it get kind of tricky with the book,

Which I think was why it was on the forefront of my mind.

Because,

You know,

Since I've never written a book before,

There's a gigantic learning curve.

And,

You know,

At one point I made a deadline and the entire universe laughed.

And said,

Oh Glenn,

Surely,

Surely you should have learned this by now.

So,

Of course,

I made a deadline on something that I didn't know.

You know,

It was a hypothetical deadline.

It wasn't a real deadline.

But it was on something that I didn't really fully understand what it entailed,

Which was my first mistake.

And then it was kind of a culmination of a lot of things being plopped on my plate that I hadn't foreseen on top of it.

So it was just,

And my instinct is as a doer,

My instinct was to by any means necessary get this done.

You just work harder.

It's not a big deal.

That's just what you do.

And,

You know,

There was several times throughout the last couple months where I had to hit the brakes and pull myself back.

I had to let go of the deadline and say,

Okay,

This deadline really isn't important.

Whether I make it,

Whether I don't make it,

Doesn't really matter.

Let go of it intellectually.

And I did that at one point intellectually,

But I didn't do it energetically.

So there was still issues were still coming up to try to show me that I had more interior work to do around this.

So until I hit a couple more delays and it really captured my attention and I went,

Okay,

Wait a minute.

Like things aren't really going smoothly.

Why?

And I realized that like,

You know,

Energetically,

I still had an attachment to this deadline.

I was telling myself intellectually like,

Oh,

No,

A deadline is no big deal.

You know,

It's fine.

So you don't hit it.

So you'll come out a week later,

Two weeks later,

A month later.

It doesn't matter when it comes out.

It's fine.

And I did the intellectual exercise,

But I didn't do the energetic exercise deep down because it still looked like I was going to hit the deadline.

So I was kind of,

You know,

Just kind of going,

Oh,

Yeah,

Deadlines don't really matter.

But it's really cool that you're going to hit it anyway,

You know,

Subconsciously.

So then,

You know,

When things still weren't going well,

I needed to really hit the brakes and look at and go,

OK,

Glenn,

Like,

Are you deep down?

Do you really are you still attached to this outcome of hitting this deadline?

And I was like,

Yeah,

I think I am.

It's like,

Oh,

So once I release that,

Then,

You know,

Everything started going more smoothly because I was blocking my energy.

And,

You know,

It was it was causing problems because of that.

What are some of the like?

Obviously,

That was a great example with your book.

What are some other examples of times when people are doing something?

It's almost it almost seems like you're saying with the wrong intentions,

But it's not necessarily about intention,

Right?

It's about just sort of the overall.

Yeah,

It's the overall energy of it.

And it's it's what's kind of ironic is like a good example is just about everything all the time that we ever do.

OK,

Thank you for narrowing that down.

Yeah,

Yeah,

It's I mean,

It's funny because that's how I see it in my life.

And I,

You know,

Perhaps it's it's more heightened because of my personality,

Because I am a doer and I was raised to work hard and push and all that stuff.

Like I have trouble leaning back and giving space for things to come in.

Some people are naturally more oriented to that.

So perhaps this isn't as much of an issue for them.

I think it's a it's somewhat of an issue for everyone.

But yeah,

Most things that we do where it's we're so attached to the outcome.

We're so attached and unconsciously,

We don't even realize we're doing it.

We're so attached to the completion that we think that unconsciously we're thinking,

Even though,

You know,

Somebody were to ask us,

We'd probably deny it on the surface level.

Unconsciously,

We're thinking that we're going to be happy when it's done.

So we're pushing our happiness off.

We're going,

Oh,

It's going to feel so good when this is completed.

And so so what we're doing becomes a means to an end.

And that's not how to live a happy life.

We have to find happiness and joy in what we're doing while we're doing it.

And then the completion of it is just icing on the cake.

It's you know,

You feel wonderful that you completed it,

But you feel wonderful while you're doing it,

Too.

And that's important energy.

And with this book,

With what I just mentioned,

As well as just the enormity of the project,

Especially me not knowing of the enormity of the project and finding out as I went,

It felt like I kept falling back into the do,

Do,

Do,

Get it done,

Get it done,

Push,

You know.

And I had to constantly hit the brakes,

Pull myself back out and go,

Wait a minute.

Like one of the things I tell myself,

Especially with this book,

Is I'm like,

I don't want this book to be birthed in that energy.

So could I complete it?

Maybe.

I don't know.

I don't really care because I don't want to bring this book into the world through the energy of by all means necessary,

Just get it done.

And that's all that matters.

I wanted it to have love in it.

You know,

I wanted to kind of be infused in love,

Be birthed into this world through love.

So,

You know,

So I had to be conscious of the energy that I was doing.

So when I would catch myself and go,

Whoa,

Wait a minute,

Pull myself back,

Really center on what I was doing.

It's like,

Well,

What am I,

You know,

I'm trying to put something out that's going to help people.

I'm sharing what's been shared with me.

I'm doing,

You know,

Like and when I really re centered around all that stuff,

I would I would,

You know,

Sometimes I'd be working 14 hour days and my eyes would start crossing,

You know.

But I was I look back on my day and half the time I'm joking with my dog throughout the day because I'm in such a good mood that like and if a mistake happens,

You know,

I'd look at faith and be like,

I'm such an idiot.

Look at this.

You know,

Like because I'm in a good mood and I'm enjoying what I'm doing and that's the energy I want to do it.

You know,

And it's amazing how productive I could be and how much better my work came out and how many hours I could work in that energy without feeling drained.

You know,

I mean,

Yeah,

I felt tired at the end of the day,

But I didn't feel beat up.

I didn't have an emotional hangover.

I didn't feel like it was torturous and kind of like a victim and poor me.

And oh,

My God,

You know,

That's how I felt when I was in the wrong energy.

It was draining and it was difficult.

When I was in the right energy.

Yeah,

I'd be tired at the end of the day,

But it felt good.

It felt good to be,

You know,

Doing a 14 hour day.

I enjoyed it.

Something that I think that we approach with the wrong energy is pretty topical for this time of year.

Christmas.

Oh,

My God.

I just literally did a take on that.

As soon as you started saying,

Yeah,

I got what you were saying.

Yeah.

The holidays were coming.

Yeah.

Like,

Oh,

My God.

Yes.

So this episode is coming out.

If you are listening to this episode,

When it comes out,

Like we're right in the middle of the holiday season.

And people are,

You know,

Stressed about the holidays,

Stressed about presents for family members and friends and stuff like that.

And stressed about going to different parties or decorations or cookies.

Like there's nothing that you can't find to be stressed about during the holiday season.

And gift giving,

Though,

In particular,

Like the energy in which we give people gifts around the holidays or their birthdays is probably not the correct energy to be giving something to somebody.

Probably not.

You know,

It's the.

You know,

This is I think this is such a good example of being the change you wish to see,

Which is such a cornerstone to a found to a spiritual life.

Because you can apply it in all different ways.

And it can kind of take on all different meanings.

And it's,

You know,

I think.

I think the the stress around the holidays is only equaled by the complaining of the stress around the holiday.

Yeah,

Like it's like those.

The only thing that's as large as the actual stress is the complaining about the stretch stress.

So and it's really simple to change that.

I mean,

You know,

It might take a little effort.

It might even take several seasonal holiday seasons to complete it or something.

But really,

If you don't want,

You know,

Instead of being like,

Oh,

My God,

Society has has turned Christmas into just a material thing.

Like,

Just don't make your Christmas about material things.

It's all like you don't you don't have to.

You don't have to go spend three hundred dollars on every person because society has blown this thing out of the water.

You know,

Like you wear society.

We're so used to blaming society like it's something other than us.

Oh,

My God.

Society's messed up.

It's like,

Yeah,

That's us.

So don't do like if you don't like that,

Don't do that.

You know,

Just take responsibility for your own life and your own holiday.

It's you know,

It's it's really that simple.

Like,

Just let everybody know,

Hey,

Guys,

I'm not doing Christmas this way this year.

You know,

I'm going to put a twenty five dollar limit on gifts and I'm going to try to make them from the heart.

Or I'm doing everything handmade or would give up gifts altogether.

It doesn't matter.

You know,

It's your life.

It's your holiday.

Live it the way you want to live it.

And if it's causing you stress,

Then you either need to change the way you're looking at it,

Change the way you're doing it or both.

But stress isn't mandatory.

Stress is not induced from the outside.

It's how we're looking at it.

You know,

So if you really want to feel joy in in the holidays,

Be conscious of your the energy in which you're doing it.

You know,

If you're like,

Oh,

I have to I have you know,

So the energy for my book is I have to get it done.

Well,

The energy in the holidays is,

Oh,

I have to I have to go buy these presents.

I have to spend a certain amount of money.

I have to impress people with the present that I got them.

I have to it's all external,

You know,

And if we bring it back to internal and focus,

Like what am I trying to do here?

Am I trying to give in the energy of love?

And that doesn't cost a lot of money.

And if somebody looks at looks at your gift and says this didn't cost enough or they don't like it because it didn't cost enough,

That's OK.

That's not your job.

Like,

You know,

If you're in a gift giving situation,

Then your responsibility will say in that scenario is to give a gift.

And if you'd like it to come from love,

Then have it come from love.

And that's good enough.

You don't have to control what the other person how the other person receives it.

You can't control that anyway.

So if somebody gets disappointed because you gave a gift from love and not from your wallet,

It's OK.

Let them be disappointed.

Maybe it's what they need to snap them out of it and go,

You know what?

I was kind of being a jerk.

I didn't this person really put a lot of thought and care into this and obviously cared enough to to do this for me.

And it was a lot of love.

And I kind of disregarded it.

You know,

And then then all of a sudden they start doing it.

You know,

Also,

They pick up and next year they do it.

And then and then also next thing you know,

We have this society that has shifted their way around behaving around Christmas just because each person is taking responsibility for their own lives in the energy in which they're doing things.

And that's how we can be the change we wish to see in the world.

Just starting with us.

I think speaking of not even like the holidays are obviously a very stressful situation.

So I thought it was a great example and something that's timely right now.

But even like if you're not present in a moment that you that like you should be present in,

You know,

You're like I find this a lot.

I see it a lot in other people.

And I do it myself,

Which is if say I need to do something for somebody right like I'm watching the child or my mom or something and I am wanting to be doing something else.

The energy of the actual situation that I'm in,

You know,

If I have to like make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich or like,

You know,

Get somebody's medicine for them or something like the the energy that I'm doing that with can be horrible.

If I'm not if I'm you know what I mean and it affects the quality of what I'm doing no matter what it is and it affects the interpersonal relationship.

And you know,

Like if you're not being conscious about what you're doing and why you're doing it because you want to be doing something else.

I feel like it's a way to to breed resentment yourself for other people when it's your issue.

Right.

Absolutely.

I mean,

We have to do things through acceptance.

You know,

We don't nobody's making us do things we play the martyr,

You know,

Oh,

I'm doing for them.

Oh,

Well,

You know,

I'm such a good person.

This is what I do.

And and oh,

Hi,

You know,

It's messing up the rest of my life because I have 14 other things I'm supposed to be doing.

But I have to be the martyr and play the good person.

So poor me.

And you don't understand how difficult that's just living irresponsibly.

You know,

We have to take responsibility for our own lives and responsibility for our own energy.

If you don't want to do something for somebody who shouldn't be doing it,

You know,

And it doesn't make you a good person playing the martyr.

It's you know,

It makes you a good person when when you feel like a good person.

Being a martyr doesn't make you feel like a good person makes you feel like a victim.

And like you said,

It breeds resentment towards the other person.

It's like,

Hey,

Can you help me?

Yes.

Oh,

My God.

I can't believe they asked me to help them.

Don't they understand what this does to my life?

Oh,

My God.

You know,

It's like,

No,

Can you help me?

No,

I'm sorry.

I can't.

That's the appropriate answer.

Instead of instead of yes,

I can.

Oh,

What was me?

So because and I think that that's a good example where it starts tying in these different situations like working on the book,

The holidays,

Gift giving,

Being present in what you're doing.

You can start seeing how those situations all tie into being present and just being conscious of your energy.

How else are you supposed to be conscious of your energy unless you're present,

You know,

And just focused on doing what you're doing because you're doing it as opposed to it being a means to an end or wanting to be somewhere else or wanting to do something else or wanting to do it in a different way.

I just do what you want consciously.

You know,

Through acceptance or with enthusiasm and have your focus on that.

It's the childhood book that I read to my son when he was growing up.

I think I've mentioned this before,

But it's all these animals going and this animal,

You know,

It's always animals in the kids books.

A lot of times it is because they can relate.

So it's you know,

They go,

What's the most important thing?

What's the most important thing to right now?

And the they say,

Well,

You got to go to the top of the mountain and talk to the owl,

The wise owl,

The wise owl knows the answer to these difficult questions.

So this animal starts to walk to go see the owl and he stops and ends up helping this this old,

You know,

I don't remember what it was,

Turtle,

You know,

Do some gardening.

And then the winds pick up and it saves this little bunny from getting blown away and brings it back to his family and then ends up spending the night there.

And then and then when he finally gets to the owl,

He says,

You know,

What's the most important thing?

And the owl says,

Talking to me right now.

It's like,

That's the most important thing talking to you.

It was yes,

Because it's what you're doing right now.

And when you were saving the baby bunny from the wind,

That was the most important thing,

Because that's what was happening right then.

And when you were helping that that old tortoise,

You know,

With the gardening,

That was the most important thing,

Because that's what you were doing.

We need to put our attention on what we're doing while we're doing it.

And it sounds simple,

But very rarely do people do it.

I mean,

It's,

You know,

Most of the time,

Just if you're getting a drink,

You're focused unconsciously,

We're focused on having the water inside of us and going to get the glass is just a means to an end and kind of a pain in the ass.

Are you are you familiar with I'm sure you are.

This is a dumb question.

Are you familiar with the term senioritis?

Oh,

Yeah.

Yeah,

Like in high school.

Yeah.

So,

So,

So to me,

Like,

Senioritis,

Obviously,

Is the idea that like your senior year of high school,

Especially like spring of your senior year of high school,

You're already gone.

Like in your mind,

You're gone,

You're done.

You don't care about anything like grades suffer.

And,

You know,

This is a big problem for a lot of people because they get into a college in the first semester.

The second semester,

They have senioritis and they like let their grades fall and then bad stuff can happen.

Right.

Well,

I feel like we're all of us are in or the majority of us are in a perpetual state of that,

Which is we're looking towards the next thing when we're at work,

We're thinking about the weekend being at home,

You know,

Had the fun thing we're going to do that night.

And then sometimes like the real the real bad thing is when you're at work and you're thinking about the fun thing you're going to do when you get home and then you get home and you should be doing that fun thing.

But all you're thinking about is that you have to wake up at 6am to get to work the next morning.

Yeah.

And,

And so on and so forth.

Right.

We're always putting it off.

So you're never you're never bringing the energy to the moment of the moment that you're in.

Right.

Yeah,

You're always just,

Yeah,

Just a means to an end and our lives are so busy that it's just constantly like that.

It's always,

You know,

Putting something off.

And I mean,

I think retirement is a wonderful thing.

I mean,

Everybody's just,

You know,

Oh,

I can't wait till I retire.

I can't wait till I retire.

I can't wait till like,

Why?

So you think you got to be happy just sitting there doing nothing.

It's,

You know,

That's and it's such an accepted statement.

But like,

You know,

My father told me many years ago,

He was at a I think it was a financial planning seminar or something.

And somebody asked,

What's the number one thing people fail to plan for in retirement?

And the guy giving the seminar said,

No,

No question hands down easiest question to answer is it has nothing to do with money.

It's what to do with their time.

Nobody plans.

Everybody thinks that when they retire,

Then they're going to be happy.

And this thing they're not doing anything and people fall into deep depressions because of that,

You know,

Non movement equals depression.

So like if you're not moving,

You're not doing something you don't have a purpose.

You don't have a reason to get up and move and do something.

It's you know,

It's depressing.

I mean,

I know people have committed suicide because of that personally.

It's you know,

It can it can be really difficult.

So it's you know,

It's not putting off.

It's happiness is right here.

You know,

It's in the enjoyment.

This is also the reason this is such a big subject.

This is also the reason that people get burned out when they do good.

You know,

Like in in Eckhart Tolle uses an example of I think I think it was him.

I heard this years ago going over to like Africa to try to work on the AIDS epidemic.

And and you can take this large example and then bring it into lots of little areas in everyday life.

You know,

The large example is just for contrast so we can see it better.

So like Tolle is saying,

You know,

Most people like go out into a situation to help others get burned out in a fairly short period of time.

And subconsciously the reason is subconsciously even though they might not even say it consciously or believe it consciously subconsciously the idea is that they're going to go over there and they're really going to help this issue.

But the issue is so large that they you know from from a whole gigantic issue one person to see the dent that you make is very difficult to see.

You know,

I mean every person doing something obviously matters something.

But when you compare it to the whole the scope of the problem,

It's very hard to see your contribution really adding up.

So so because of that people get burned out when but you have certain people who don't get burned out and the ones who don't get burned out are the ones that take joy in the moment of doing what they're doing.

So they're very conscious while they're doing it.

And if you're conscious while you're doing it,

Then you're bringing in good energy to it.

So if you're you know if you're going to give you know there's always that person that's like you know giving 20 shots and they just and is that one person that's just sits down and like holds the hand of somebody and just looks them in the eye and makes a connection.

And just says a few words and then they give them the shot and then they move to the next one.

And it just that their energy is so kind and loving and connectedness and they're actually enjoying each moment of what they're doing.

You know that is being present.

That's that's deriving and there's no reason to get burned out from that.

You know so so we'll take that example bring it back into my book because it's the same thing.

If I was working all day trying to get the book done at the end of the day I was exhausted and burned out.

If I worked all day being in the present moment anchored into that moment and really enjoying the process of writing and editing and putting out something to the world.

If I was in that energy.

I wasn't.

You know I wasn't burned out at the end of the day.

I was joyful tired but joyful throughout the whole process which culminated at the end with feeling good.

You know and that's and then we take I'm going to take it one step further and this is walking through life.

If we walk through life consciously being present in everything that we're doing to the best of our ability.

And of course we won't do it perfectly but instead of trying to get somewhere if we enjoy the journey when we get there it's it's a really enjoyable time.

And but it was an enjoyable time for the five years it took us to get there.

If we think we're only going to be happy once we arrive somewhere then we're miserable for the five years because we just keep putting our happiness off until we reach this thing.

Then we finally reach it and we might be happy for a few days maybe a few weeks but then it wears off.

We have to go do something else.

So we have to get derived the joy in the journey.

Okay.

You may speak now.

I mean I don't really know what else to say about that.

I was going to say I was going to say how do you do it but you just you just nailed you.

You just put the nail that so it's the same in them.

You know it's like everything spiritual it's the same in the macrocosm as it is in the microcosm.

So we can take these big you know things and concepts and just bring them into our daily lives.

And you know what does it look like it looks like paying attention to what you're doing while you're doing it and you can start that by brushing your teeth or being in it you know like sometimes I get I hop in a shower and a question that comes into my head is where are you right now.

Because half the time I'm not in a shower.

I'm planning my day I'm figuring out what we're going to do first and next and you know so it's like no just be in the shower.

What part of what part of the equation do you think would be practicing gratitude for the moment you're in.

Um,

I think it comes naturally basically like if like if you're in a present moment and you're in good energy and you're focused on what you're doing out of joy.

Gratitude is just oozing through you.

You know like it's just naturally there.

It's just what it's the feeling that's going through you as you're doing it.

All right.

That one didn't you.

I did.

That'll do it for this episode.

So I look out for that.

That's got to be a quote,

I think.

Yeah.

I might have to put that as a quote.

Definitely.

Stamp that on a picture.

Send it out there.

We'll do that.

Okay,

So,

Um,

Glenn,

Obviously,

People want to something that,

Um,

That.

So if people want to find you,

GlennAmbrose.

Com,

You're available for life coaching all that stuff.

So a friend of mine was watching the video,

Right,

And you get full videos of all of the episodes of Life Lessons Laughter on Patreon,

Which is the best way to support the show.

All the content out there is free.

Patreon,

We give you a little bit more.

You get early access to everything,

Whatnot.

But my friend was watching the show or a clip from the show the other day and she was like,

Glenn is so animated.

Like he never sits still his eyes and I'm like,

I know you should try trying to find a screenshot from one of those clips.

Like trying to find a screenshot for the thumbnail from a clip for a video for you is so difficult.

Yeah,

Because you're so you're so animated.

You're talking with your hands.

You have a golf tee in your hand.

Your your eyes are are,

You know,

You're you're just so in the moment and enjoying what you're doing.

And it's a great thing to watch.

So so that's my plug for Patreon.

And if you if you haven't seen Glenn do an episode of Life Lessons Laughter,

It's definitely worth it.

It's I guess it's entertaining.

Yeah,

I don't know.

I don't know what I do because I am in the moment,

You know,

And it is joyful.

So and that's why we've done 150 episodes because it's fun,

You know.

It's the best reason to do anything in this world.

It's just is it fun?

Yeah.

OK,

Then do that.

Yeah,

For sure.

Also,

Check out Glenn's book,

Which is available now.

The link is on GlennAmbrose.

Com.

Yeah,

Yeah,

It's.

It's been a lot of work,

But yeah,

It's finally completed as as this recording is 11 11 2019.

I don't think it's a coincidence that it's 11 11 and I and I just finished my book.

So it's like,

You know,

Perfect timing with the numbers if you're into that.

So it's like,

Yeah,

The the book is really officially done as of today.

And so,

You know,

I have to go through the process of of getting it printed and stuff.

So so it'll be out soon,

You know,

In a few weeks and stuff.

But you can preorder it now and and it's it's awesome.

It's exciting.

I you know,

I really we put a lot of work into it and it I started getting that really good feeling towards the end.

Like,

Yeah,

This is this is OK.

This is culminating.

This is finally culminating into what it was supposed to be all along.

So it feels really good.

So,

Yeah,

Check it out.

I'm excited.

So I guess I'll do it.

Thanks for listening,

Everybody.

And we will talk with you soon.

Glenn is available for life coaching sessions to book an appointment or for more information,

Go to Glenn Ambrose dot com,

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Reviews

Great talk as usual! Thanks guys!

Thought I’d listen to this to fall back asleep this early am & instead got so interested that I was up taking notes. 😊 Could feel the great energy in this interview & the joy Glenn was talking about. You, Glenn, make such good points & inspire me! Thanks so much both of you!

Great ideas and energy as always. I must say, that I get some of my most brilliant ideas in the shower! Thank you.

Happy new year, Glenn! Thank you for talking about this subject...I knew I wad being a martyr about the Mexican banking issue

Brilliant as usual! Love you guys 💋

OMG, 11:11 is my life/spiritual number!🤗 This talk also resonated with me in regard to people that are on weight loss journeys. Most will state that getting to their destination isn't the most difficult part, it's maintaining once they get there, just an observation I thought I'd share😉 Great Pod as always. TY