You Don't Have to Do This Alone Anymore—But Your Body Disagrees

When was the last time you asked for help? Not delegated something at work. Not outsourced a task.

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Actually asked someone, "I need help. I'm not okay.

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I cannot do this alone." If you can't remember, or if the thought of doing that makes your chest tighten, this episode is for you.

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Asking for help sounds simple. Three syllables, three words. I need help.

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And yet, so many high achieving women, those three words feel almost impossible to say.

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Because asking for help requires something terrifying.

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It requires you to be seen as someone who doesn't have it all together.

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It requires you to trust that the person you're asking actually cares.

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It requires you to believe, really believe that your needs matter enough.

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And if life has taught you otherwise, your nervous system learns something very specific.

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Don't ask. Handle it yourself. Needing people is dangerous.

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That is not weakness. That is wisdom based on evidence.

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The problem is that wisdom is keeping you isolated.

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And isolated and isolation is keeping you stuck.

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Excuse me. The inability to ask for help is not a personality flaw. It is a protection strategy.

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At some point in your life, you asked.

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You reached out. You showed someone your need, and what came back wasn't what you needed. Maybe it was judgment. Maybe it was dismissal.

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Maybe it was someone who made your need about them.

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Maybe it was silence. And your nervous system filed that away.

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No longer you the no the longer you go without asking the more impos impossible

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it feels now it's not just scary it's unfamiliar and now it feels like a

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foreign language your body forgot how to speak when was the first time you asked for

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help and it wasn't safe you don't have to share it out loud just

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let yourself. Remember it because that moment, that specific

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moment is probably still running the show.

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Excuse me. I want to talk about a time in my life when

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it wasn't the first, but it was one that really set a tone for me. And I had gone

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and done a sweat lodge years ago and I never had an interest in doing a sweat lodge and I was invited and I

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thought okay well I'll give it a try. So we went up into the mountains and we did this sweat lodge and everything

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wasn't okay. I ended up being in from what I gathered the hottest pot. It was like here's the door and I'm like right

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here on the back end so all the heat is coming to me. And I didn't know that cuz I kind of came in and sat by the front door of the teepee.

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But as people came in, we had to move down. I didn't like that idea. So I did.

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Well, there was a point somewhere in that session that I it was so blazingly hot

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for me and I freaked out and I had to leave.

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I mean, I I couldn't tell you the panic that I was starting to feel in that moment. There were so many things going on inside my body that I had to get out.

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I had to get air. I was suffocating. I was terrified, but not in a life-threatening kind of

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thing. It was just something was panicking on the inside.

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So, I got out and I dealt with it. I mean, I sat in through it through most of it, but there was some somewhere

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along the line. I don't know how long I was in that teepee, but it wasn't too much longer after everybody started coming out. So, then we go back to the

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house and we are going to be eating. So, I'm nibbling cuz I'm getting a migraine.

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And I know that this migraine is because of what happened inside that teepee at that point because

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I I my electrolytes were down. I was dehydrated. I needed to eat. I knew what I needed to do for my body to get me

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back to where I needed to be. And the woman who posted this thing came up to me and told me I wasn't allowed to eat.

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And I just went, "Okay." I said, "But I'm getting a migraine." And she says, "I don't care.

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We wait for everyone else and it's not time to eat." Yeah.

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Her little rule mattered more than a human being. And talk about anger. I can't even begin to tell you how angry I was.

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And to me, what I got was you don't ask and you don't help yourself and nobody cares about you is what I did. And on the way home from the mountains, whoever

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the women were that I was in the vehicle with at that point, I railed on him and I told him that I'm never doing this again. This woman was horrible. She was

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a fraud because she cared more about pre her presentation and what she was doing than she cared about another human being. And I was really upset about it.

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So that moved me into not wanting to do things for people. It moved me into not

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asking more, that I needed to depend on myself, and I knew that I would never do anything that had to do with the Indians

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ever again in my life. I know, isn't that terrible? But I did. I made that judgment. I still kind of hold it. But

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there's also other reasons why I have that because I understand my past lives being an Indian and so on and so forth.

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Anyways, the other part that came up was

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when I hired my mentor and we always had conversations about me going into my head and I wasn't in my

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heart and I would and I really paid attention to that and I remember one day really getting into knowing my heart and

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then you know the switch but I didn't recognize when I switched out of that and my mentor had said, "Kathy, you're

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back in your your head." And I'm like, "No, I'm not." And then I realized before I started my full-fledged argument because, you know, I was good

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for that. And I realized that I did go into

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I did shift out and it was so subtle that I really had to look more at the subtleties of when I would go out. And

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what I realized during that period of time was, you know, when I'm in my head, I'm doing what my head wants me to do.

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And as I'm in my head doing the things that I want to do,

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which is about be being protection, taking care of not taking care of myself, making sure everything is like

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in a box, you know, controlled. And when I'm in my heart, it's not quite that.

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When I'm in my heart, it's a lot different because it's about connection.

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It's about the stuff that we don't want to feel like if people hurt us or if we're feeling whatever. But I also know

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that everything that I do is I operate from my heart. And if I'm operating from my heart, things flow better. I'm more

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in alignment with myself. I'm connected with spirit differently. I'm following what I'm doing. It's like I'm in

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cocreation with the spirit and I feel safe that way. Believe it or not, I learn to like be okay with that

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because I move forward in the baby steps that I can take. Everything is going fine. I don't know what to do. I stop and I rest. And that's a beautiful way

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of taking care of yourself and realizing where you are in your life. You know, you do what you can with what you know.

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And when you don't know, you stop and wait and wait for spirit to give you an answer or you ask for them to help you. And that's what I do a lot of times.

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So what I created from that was basically the head hard the head heart switch. And the first time

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that that I called my my mentor,

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my coach actually was I was crashing and I don't know what was coming up, but I was emotionally in my in my stuff and I

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was freaking out and I didn't know what it was cuz sometimes, you know, we just all of a sudden we start freaking out and we don't know why we're freaking out. And that was one of those moments.

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And so when I was doing that, I'm like, "Oh my god, I'm not going to stay here.

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I'm going to do something that's very terrifying because my coach was teaching me that I need to ask for help." And as much as I fought and resisted all

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of that, I knew he was right. And I knew that he could get me through whatever this was because I never had somebody in my court. So now I'm being tested.

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And as I'm being tested for that coaching and calling him saying, "I I need to talk to you. Are you available?"

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And he said, "I'm not now, but I will call you back in x number of time." And I'm like, "Okay, fine." Now, a lot of

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times when I get that, now I didn't do that this time, but usually when I get that, I know that the person's probably not going to call because they don't know how to deal with me when I'm crazy.

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And he did. He called back when he said he would and he simply asked, "What is going on?" I mean, he was so calm and so

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grounded in where he was that I immediately felt in my heart that this man cared about me. And this man really

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genuinely wanted to know what was happening. And I broke down in tears at that moment.

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And and I told him what was going on. He helped me navigate through what was happening. And by the time we were done, I was up there. I was kind of laughing.

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We were having a good time. Things were I was like back in my body in the good place, not the crazy place that I was

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because I just didn't know. And sometimes we don't know what we don't know. And sometimes we do need that

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help. And so I braved myself to do that, knowing he could have said no and treated me like the woman did at that sweat lodge.

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But it was also what I felt like was the first time I had exhaled because I felt that he cared.

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And when you can feel that for the first time, it changes everything.

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Because for the first time in a long time and maybe ever, I let someone in.

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And that world didn't end. It got better. And here's what my coach taught me, and I call it the head heart switch.

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Most of us live almost entirely in our heads. We're planning. We're analyzing.

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We're solving. We're controlling.

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The head asks, "What if this goes wrong?" all the time. And the heart asks, "What

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do I actually need right now?" We don't ask those questions to ourselves because we're afraid to stop and listen to what we have to say.

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The head protects and the heart connects.

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And asking for help requires the heart.

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Which means you have to make the switch first. And here's how.

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Close your eyes and take in a breath and exhale.

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Place your hand on your chest and just breathe into that space.

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Ask yourself, not your head, your heart.

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What do I need right now?

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Not what I should do, not what is the right answer. What do I need?

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Let the first thing that comes up come.

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Don't edit it. Don't talk yourself out of it. Just notice it.

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That thing you just felt, that is the thing worth asking for.

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Keep your eyes closed and we are going to go a tad deeper. Take a deep breath in slowly

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and exhale through the mouth.

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Bring to mind someone you trust, even a little, even imperfectly.

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Imagine saying to them just three words, I need help.

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Notice what happens in your body when you imagine saying that.

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Now say to yourself, "My needs are not a burden."

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Asking for help is an act of courage.

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I am worthy of being supported.

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I am allowed to let someone in.

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One more breath in and out.

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And open your eyes when you're ready.

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Asking for help is one of the bravest things a strong woman can do. Not because it's easy, because it requires

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her to trust that she matters enough to be held. You matter enough.

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I promise you, you matter enough.

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Next week, we are going to talk about when success becomes survival. And I want to invite you to check out the I am

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the light sanctuary. I am offering a 7-day free trial. There is no pressure and no obligation. Check it out and look

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around and see if this is for you. The show notes are in the link is in the show notes.

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Sorry.

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I want to thank you for joining me today. I really do appreciate you taking your time. If you'd like to be notified in the future, just hit the like and

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subscribe button and you will be notified of the next time I am I have my show. We're going to do a conversation

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training tomorrow at 8 a.m. Mountain Standard Time. And I look forward to seeing you there. I am Kathleen Flanigan and you don't have to carry this alone.