Stop Saying "My Anxiety." Your Body Is Listening.

Summary: In this solo episode, Katie shares what she calls her biggest pet peeve and it is not aimed at the people doing it. It is aimed at the system that taught them.

The habit? Making anxiety, depression, trauma and pain yours by saying "my anxiety," "my trauma," "my depression." Katie explains why this small language shift has a profound neurological and energetic impact, how your cells are literally listening to the words you use, and why your brain will find proof for whatever you claim as your identity.

She shares the story of Liz Larson noticing her sweatshirt at her first CognoConscious event, a client who stopped using the word anxiety entirely and transformed their life, and practical ways to start shifting your language today so your nervous system can actually start to heal.

Key Takeaways

→ Stop saying "my anxiety," "my trauma," "my depression." When you make it yours, it gets deeper into who you are. Anxiety is not who you are. It is something you are experiencing.

→ Your cells are listening. Science has shown that even subatomic particles change their behaviour when observed or thought about. Your body is responding to every word you say about yourself.

→ Your brain wants to be right. Whatever you claim as yours, your brain will find proof for. Stop giving it the wrong target.

→ This is not your fault. Doctors, therapists and the medical system have taught you to speak this way. Awareness is the first step to changing it.

→ Try renaming it. One of Katie's clients stopped using the word anxiety and called it "the ick feeling" instead. That single shift was part of a complete transformation of their life.

→ Post-traumatic stress is not diagnosed until three to six months after an event. That window is an opportunity to neutralize the impact before it becomes part of your identity.

→ Add humour where you can. It is very hard to hold onto anxiety while you are laughing. Make a sound effect. Call it "the ugh." Take the power out of the word.

→ You are a human being who has had bad things happen to you. That is very different from being the anxiety, the depression, the trauma, or the pain.

Resources

• Website
• Free Mini Cogno Mondays
• Learn more about Cognomovement
• Try Cognomovement for yourself!
• Book a call with Katie

Credit: Tom Giovingo, Intro & Outro, Random Voice Guy, Professional ‘Cat‘ Herder

Mixed & Managed: JohnRavenscraft.com

Disclaimer: Katie is not a medical professional and she is not qualified to diagnose any conditions. The advice and information she gives is based on her own experience and research. It does not take the place of medical advice. Always consult a medical professional first before you try anything new.

Transcript

Katie Wrigley (00:28)
Welcome back to the Catapult Effect podcast. I am your host, Katie Wrigley. Today, I want to talk about the importance of words and share my biggest pet peeve with you. Well, biggest pet peeve, second to people going the speed limit in the left lane. That one really gets me too. I should probably do a cognitive movement session around that so it doesn't irritate me as much or...

happen as much. That is kind of the way things work. But for the pet peeve that applies to you, my dear listener, it is and I want to be clear, the annoyance that I have, the pet peeve is not with the people who are saying it. It is the fact that you have been taught to talk this way. That is what drives me crazy because words are so important. They are so important and I'm going to share story with you.

that my mentors Liz Larsen and Bill McKenna actually share in the forward of my upcoming book, From Crutches to Half Marathon, about the lesson that they saw me getting from this exact thing. So, my pet peeve is when we make anxiety, trauma, depression ours. And we do this by saying the following, my anxiety, my depression.

Even my pain, my trauma. Please stop making it yours. Please stop doing this to yourself. And here's why. Your body is listening. Your brain is listening. So when you make it yours, it's actually getting deeper and deeper into who you are. Anxiety is not who you are. Trauma is not who you are. Depression is not who you are. Pain.

is not who you are. You are a perfectly unique, wonderful human being who has had a lot of bad shit happen to you. That is very different than you being the anxiety, you being the trauma, the depression, the pain. Very, very different. I want you to really hear that distinction in here.

So when I first joined Cognomovement and I did my first Cognoconscious, which is Liz and Bill's huge one year event, it's absolutely amazing. It's actually gonna be at Mount Shasta, California this year. It's gonna be, I don't even have words. I'm so excited to go this year. Already bought my ticket, already all set, cannot wait.

But was wearing a sweatshirt that said, my body is a temple, ancient and crumbling, cursed and harboring some unspeakable horror. That may not be the exact thing, and I don't want to stop and go look up the exact terms, but that's pretty close to it. And I actually have that quote correct in my upcoming book, From Crutches to Half Marathon. Really encourage you to grab a copy of that when it is out. And I'm going to have a link for you to join the wait list.

you want to make sure that you don't miss it when it comes out, I will make sure that you know and you can come join us for a launch party. But at any rate, Liz actually really noticed that sweatshirt. She honed in on it and she was like, you know, I know you're wearing that as a joke, but your cells are actually listening. And I know that sounds crazy. I'm going to go into this again. And she's like, would you consider potentially taking it off because

it seems as though your body is taking that message very literally from what you're explaining. And in case you don't know too much about my story, when I first joined that first CognoConscious, I was awaiting a neurosurgery consult for my back and my pain levels were excruciating. And I walked away from that event three days later, was three day virtual in 2020 and this is when I went. Now it's five days in person, so good. But I walked out of the event,

and put together a piece of furniture in my kitchen that was meant for two people to assemble together. And I did it on my own without my back bothering me. So that was how much changed. And as far as the cells listening, there is truth to this. I'm forgetting who the scientist is, but scientists have actually done split or not split studies. They did a study on this.

that as soon as it was either an atom or a proton but something was observed it would change its behavior. And then we could they even took it to a point where they realized that even if they thought about it these little tiny particles were reacting to the thought.

Our bodies are always listening. And so this is why it's so important. This is why you hear a lot of stuff about self-talk, affirmations, and all of that is really important. People can go overboard on it, totally get it, I've been there myself. But the reason it is, is that you're training your brain and you're telling your brain what to look for. And as a human being, you actually want to be right.

All of us want to be right. And so what this means is your brain is going to look for proof to make you right. Your anxiety, your trauma, your depression, your pain. Yep, it's there. It's there. I feel it. It feels like shit. We don't want to make it part of us. Your cells really are listening to you and your body is constantly trying to talk to you.

That is a huge premise behind Cognitive Movement is that your body is expressing for you the emotions that your mind cannot. And this is really important because we want the body and the brain to be in alignment and pointed towards what you actually want for yourself, not more of what you don't want. And so when you're using terminology to make things yours,

you are actually reinforcing more of what you don't want. And it is really important here to mention that this is not your fault. You were taught to talk this way. Your doctor will come in and ask you about your anxiety, your pain, your depression. If you're dealing with a therapist, your traumas. We hear it referred to as ours.

In part, probably because it's just the easiest way they can start to connect and dive into it. I don't know.

Again, if you've me any point in time, you know I have mixed feelings about the medical system. It is absolutely fantastic when we're talking about a severe trauma. But as Americans as a whole, we totally, fully over utilize this. We are way too dependent on the system that is created for profit and therefore want you to keep coming back for their profits. That is a piece that a lot of people miss. There's so much.

that you can start to do and take control of and heal for yourself when you start to shift out of this model that you've been taught. And part of that shifting is the words that you're using when you are describing experiences that are either happening to you now, such as the feeling of anxiety, or have happened to you in the past, such as a trauma.

We really want to be careful with that. And as another piece of that, another thing that I hear people say is, I'm going to get PTSD from this thing. Maybe, maybe not. You can have an event so severe, like, and I have worked with clients who have had incredibly, incredibly traumatic events, like witnessing someone's death. Pretty bad.

Not an easy non-violent passing away either. I'm talking about a violent abrupt end to someone's life.

that is going to change you. No doubt you are not going to see the same person that you were before that but the diagnosis of post-traumatic stress and I'm not going to use the d either the diagnosis of post-traumatic stress doesn't come for three to six months.

So what does this mean? It means that you actually have time that you can neutralize that event in the nervous system, in the mind, in the body. Does it mean that you definitely won't get post-traumatic stress? Maybe yes, maybe no. It really depends on the severity of the event and how dedicated you are and how dedicated the practitioners are, how skilled they are at being able to help remove the impact of that.

Now with some of the people I know who have witnessed deaths, there is a post-traumatic stress component to it. Even though some of them dove in and started doing the work immediately, which I give mad props to anybody who does that. And I've worked with people all over the country, all over the world. And it's very important as I'm talking about these things that I'm not giving any location or anything that people cannot stay completely anonymous. When we're talking about that level of impact,

anonymity is incredibly important. But again, the thing I'm also noticing about these people who dove in right away, they aren't making any part of it theirs. The mindset is already of a place where they know they want to heal and part of that is not making it part of their identity, not allowing it to be laced in there and also being willing to neutralize the impact of these events.

so that they don't become theirs, so that it isn't any more difficult than it already is to work through whatever that event was.

Again, I'm not annoyed at the people who are making it yours. If that's you, I'm not annoyed with you. I'm annoyed at the people who taught you this. But what I do want to encourage you to do, I want to encourage you to notice when you're making it yours and start to shift it.

If you notice if you start to say my wait no time on delete delete delete I'm feeling a little anxious right now or the anxiety is starting to really bother me. I even had one client who stopped using the word anxiety completely and this person completely transformed their life. We had done a longer bunch of sessions together we worked together once a month for a year and they changed

so much that was going on in their life in that time. And it was absolutely incredible to witness. And one of the biggest complaints they had when they came to me was that they got an anticipatory anxiety going to work. They are a first responder. They got anticipatory anxiety going to work. And we worked through it from several angles and that anticipatory anxiety kept coming up. One of the biggest changes

This person actually wound up taking leave for a little bit to help the nervous system get into a more resourceful state and they dove headlong into more healing, which I have mad respect for all of those decisions to give yourself a break to take some leave from the thing that is stressing you out and give your nervous system time to breathe. Chance to unload some of its baggage.

But one of the big shifts that this person made is they stopped calling it anxiety. It was the ick feeling. It wasn't even labeled as anxiety more, just the ick feeling. And they would notice when it started to come up. And this person actually ultimately decided that they wanted to shift to another part of first responding to not necessarily be feet on the street.

going into the scary situations, they wanted to take more of a backseat, they realized that was a better fit for their nervous system. And that 100 % is a fantastic outcome and solution. They have the life they want. They got incredible results. This person has actually referred multiple other clients to me and I so appreciate them and if they're listening, they know who they are. Since I'm using their exact words, ick feeling.

And that is a really important decision. But if we're judging ourselves, like, there's something wrong with me if I don't want to keep doing this job. No, there's not. You tried it. You were great at it. And it's not you.

The words that we're using, want to reinforce this again, are very important. So notice when you start to make something yours and shift it. Potentially even change the words you use. Get away from anxiety, getting away from depression. Maybe instead of anxiety, you do what my client did and it's the ick feeling. Or it's the ugh. I don't like how I feel right now. It's the ugh, ugh. Make a sound effect.

because it add a little bit of humor it's gonna be hard to hold on to anxiety if you're trying to laugh at the same time too. So make it fun for yourself and notice how you feel as you're starting to shift out of that because it this is right your cells are listening your body is listening give it the input that matches with what you really want and shift out of that if depression is something that you deal with I got the blase

Film blah today. All right, film blah today. Do whatever you can to take the power out of that word and diffuse it.

All right, I trust that this is exactly what you needed to hear today. Thank you so much for joining me. And as always, until next time, please be well.