Episode Transcript
Hi, everybody, and welcome to The Arm Coach podcast, episode
#8.
Hello everyone, welcome back.
I wanted to start off today by asking you a question: “When was
the last time that you felt deprived? When was that last time you
had the feeling of deprivation in your body because you had the
sense of really wanting something and telling yourself that you
couldn’t have it?”
This is such an important question because for most people, when
they try to change something in their life, like sculpting their
arms, deprivation seems to go hand in hand with getting results.
So, if I want to cut back on drinking, I’m going to feel deprived
when it comes to alcohol. If I want to save money, I’m going to
feel deprived when it comes to spending.
If I want to sculpt my arms and lose weight, guess what, I’m going
to feel deprived when it comes to food.
Now, here is the thing. You can actually change and even get rid of
this feeling of deprivation, and most people don’t believe that it’s
possible but this is what today’s topic is all about. It is about
deprivation, what it is, what creates it and why it doesn’t have to
be something that you tell yourself you’re just going to have to live
with for the rest of your life.
This is so incredibly important because feeling deprived,
especially when it comes to sculpting our arms and overcoming
overeating, is why most people throw in the towel. It is why most
people give up after trying, because they just don’t want to deal
with the feeling of deprivation anymore. It doesn’t feel bearable.
The people that I work with when they decide that they want to
sculpt their arms and end overeating, they’ll tell me that often
things are going really well at first, they’re feeling emotionally
better and physically better, they’re enjoying seeing muscle and
definition, they’re enjoying having better sleep and waking up
with more energy in the morning, and lots of the time just not
having shame about what you did or ate.
But they’ll come to me and they’ll say, “I just feel so deprived. I’d
rather watch tv instead of lift weights, I really want that piece of
cake, I really want to be snacking, I feel like I’m missing out. I
have all these great physical benefits and emotional benefits, but
what do I do about this deprivation?”
So the first thing you have to understand if you want to start to
unravel this question for yourself is, “what is deprivation?”
Deprivation literally means the state of being kept from
possessing, enjoying or using something.
Here’s the thing. Deprivation is an emotion in your body, but it is
also a physical sensation. There is both emotional deprivation and
physical deprivation, and most people never make any distinction
between the two.
Now, I talk about this a lot in my work, the need to distinguish
between emotions and physical sensations. This is a big piece of
the work that I do. It is so important.
Emotions are one word, feeling states. Things like happy, sad,
angry. Those are emotions. They are feeling states that you
experience in your body.
Now, physical sensations are also things that you experience in
your body. They are things like hungry, thirsty, tired, pleasure,
pain. But there is a big difference between the two.
The difference between emotions and physical sensations is pretty
simple, but it can be difficult because you’re experiencing them
both in your body. Here’s how you can tell the difference between
the two. An emotion starts in your mind and travels to your body,
and the physical sensation does the opposite. It starts in your
body and travels to your mind.
Now, let me explain that. When you have an emotion, it’s because
you had a thought in your mind that creates a feeling in your
body. Now, this is very different when you’re experiencing
something like hunger, thirst, pleasure, pain. That sensation is
starting first in your body – not with a thought – it’s starting first
in your body, that then your mind is registering. Then your mind
is all of a sudden aware, oh, I’m hungry, oh, I’m thirsty. That feels
good, that hurts. It starts in your body and is registered by your
mind, and you really have to understand this distinction if you
want to understand the difference between emotional deprivation
and physical deprivation.
When it comes to your emotions and the reason why you
experience your emotions in your body, your body is essentially
queuing you to what you’re thinking. When you recognize what
emotion you’re feeling, you can ask yourself, why am I feeling this
way? If you understand the cycle that I use with my clients and I
talk about all the time – the think, feel, act cycle – if you
understand that your thoughts create your feelings, then you will
also be able to understand if you know what you’re feeling, you
can work backwards and figure out what you’re thinking.
But when it comes to physical sensations, your body is not telling
you what you’re thinking. Your body is telling you how it’s
responding to its environment. So I want you to think of it this
way: if you were standing in line, you’re not automatically going to
feel anything. You’re not automatically annoyed or impatient
waiting in line. You only experience either of these emotions when
you think a thought that makes you annoyed, or when you think a
thought that makes you feel impatient.
You could also think a host of other thoughts that can make you
experience a whole range of emotions, but when you stub your
toe, you are going to feel a physical sensation connected to that
experience. Your body is responding to what is happening to your
toe and sending a signal to your brain about that sensation. This is
the difference.
Emotions start in your mind and travel to your body, physical
sensations start in your body and travel to your mind. This is a
huge piece to understand and honestly, it can take some time to
really wrap your mind around this, for a lot of reasons.
One is that, who gives us this information about experiencing our
own emotions in our body and what is creating them? Most of us
are given very little instruction on this piece of information, and if
you do ever find it, it’s usually because you’re searching it out for
yourself. No one’s sitting you down and explaining all of this to
you.
The other reason why it can take some time to really understand
this is because most people are actually really good at not
experiencing or feeling their emotions, especially the negative
ones.
Listen, if you have gotten into the habit of using tv or food as a
quick and easy fix to feel differently, which many, many, many
people do, if you have gotten into that habit, you may be so quick
to cover up a negative emotion, you may be so quick to reach for
the remote or a snack so that you don’t feel that kind of anxiety or
awkwardness or boredom or loneliness or insecurity, whatever it
is. You may be so quick to changing how you’re feeling that you
don’t actually even give yourself a lot of time to experience what
these negative emotions are like in your body.
So what does this mean for deprivation? Not all deprivation is the
same. This is so key. This will really change everything for you.
Some deprivation is created by your body, and some deprivation
is created by your mind. If you can figure out the difference
between these two, if you can understand how these are different
in your body, I will tell you this is really going to be amazing for
you because so many of us quit, so many of us give up around
trying to change bodies and our eating because the deprivation
piece feels too difficult and impossible to overcome. So if you can
figure this out, you’re really going to be golden.
Like I said, most people have it backwards. I asked you earlier
about the last time that you were feeling deprived, and I want you
to try and go back and remember that situation. Think about that
feeling of deprivation in your body. Whatever it was, maybe it was
a cupcake, maybe it was something else. Think about what that
was like, what was going on? You wanted to have something and
you told yourself you shouldn’t have it and you were feeling
deprived. Really put yourself back in that moment and ask
yourself why was I feeling deprived? What was causing this
feeling?
Now, here’s what almost everyone will say. Everyone will say, well
of course, the thing that I wanted but wasn’t giving myself was the
thing causing me to feel deprived. So it was the cupcake or the
chocolate ice cream or the outfit I wanted to purchase. Whatever
it was that you told yourself you couldn’t have, that was the thing
causing your deprivation. But, of course it doesn’t work like that.
Things external to us do not create our emotions. They do not
create how you feel in your body when it comes to an emotional
response. What caused your feeling of deprivation in that moment
was your mind. It was not the thing external to you. It was not
caused by the cupcake, it was not caused by the ice cream.
Whatever it was, it was caused by your thoughts.
If you’re really going to understand this, you have to start to
understand the difference between a need and a want. And the
difference between a need and a want will really help you
understand this at a deeper level.
There are things that your body needs in order to function. It
needs oxygen, it needs water, it needs food, it needs sleep, it needs
warmth. There are things that your body is driven to seek out as
part of its impulse to survive. Your body needs these things. They
are basic requirements. Your body needs basic levels of each so
that it can function and maintain homeostasis.
Think about it. You cannot hold your breath indefinitely. You
cannot decide that you no longer need sleep. When it comes to the
things that your body truly, truly needs, they’re non-negotiable.
What happens when you try to deprive yourself of one of these
things, as we sometimes do?
It will feel terrible. Now, think about holding your breath. Even if
you tell yourself, I’m going to hold it for as long as I possibly can,
at some point, it is going to feel so uncomfortable in your body
and you’re going to be forced to take a breath.
Now, the reason why this happens is because your body needs
oxygen. So when you’re not breathing, when you’re holding your
breath, there are rising levels of CO2 in your body and those rising
levels of CO2 are actually irritating your lungs, and so your
diaphragm and the muscles in between your ribs, they’ll begin to
spasm totally outside of your control and it will feel like your
lungs are going to burst. It will feel uncomfortable, and you will
finally gasp for air, and it’s really outside of your control.
The same thing is true of sleep deprivation. Think about how
awful it feels when you are forcing yourself to stay awake when
your body wants to sleep. When you are depriving yourself of
sleep, it feels terrible. And it’s true, you can keep yourself awake
for some period of time. You can pull an all-nighter, but sleep is a
basic biological necessity for all humans. You need it to perform
basic cognitive functions. You need it for your immune system.
You cannot keep yourself awake indefinitely and it feels terrible
when you’re trying to do that.
There are moments when deprivation for things that we really
need, it does indeed feel very uncomfortable. It is not pleasant
when we are depriving ourselves of things that our body truly
needs. But again, this is physical deprivation. The impulse to
breathe, to sleep, to eat, they are created by your body, and when
your body doesn’t get the basic things it needs to function, it not
only feels terrible but it actually forces you to try to seek them out.
Now, your needs are totally different from your wants and again,
most people do not make this distinction. We get our needs and
our wants all mixed up together. It seems like food, oxygen and
sleep and wine and chocolate and money – right? Our needs and
wants become totally entangled.
Your body does not need the things that you want. You just thinks
that it does. It’s so important to be able to understand those two
differences because when your body truly needs something to
function, there will be physical deprivation when you don’t give it
to yourself. But when your body doesn’t really need something to
function, when you just want it, you are much more likely
experiencing emotional deprivation.
So what this means is that the deprivation you feel when you try
to cut back on screen time, the deprivation you feel when you try
to overcome overeating, is deprivation that is not being created by
your body, it is deprivation that is being created with your mind.
It is emotional deprivation, not physical deprivation.
I will tell you that this is the very best news because once you
understand this and once you are able to make the distinction, it
means that you can start to exert some control over it. You can
start to work with your mind, you can start to work with your
thoughts to stop feeling deprived when you want to cut back on
screen time or to stop feeling deprived when you want to reduce
your sugar.
This is so essential because feeling deprived and feeling like you’re
missing out is usually the number one reason why people aren’t
successful when they want to sculpt their arms or they want to
overcome overeating. Because they feel the deprivation is too
much, it feels impossible to overcome, like it’s never going to go
away, they’re going to be missing out forever. This idea of I just
can’t go on living life like this and I’m always going to feel
deprived, this is always going to feel terrible. It feels like too
much for people, and so they quit.
But if you understand the difference between emotional
deprivation and physical deprivation, if you understand the
difference between true needs and wants, if you understand the
difference between how an emotion is in your body and how it
starts in your mind and travels to your body versus a physical
sensation, you have the pieces that you need to start to untangle
this for yourself and start to understand how you are feeling, and
also how that is being created by what you’re thinking.
Deprivation is usually just an emotion and emotions are always
caused by the thoughts that you are thinking. So if you want to
start the process of doing this work, you have to start to pinpoint
the thoughts that are creating your deprivation. Thoughts like I
really want it, it tastes so good, this isn’t fair, this sucks, I hate
missing out, everyone else is eating cupcakes, no one else has to
deal with this, I hate this, I just want to have a good time –
whatever these thoughts are, you have to start to bring awareness
to what you’re thinking. What are the thoughts that are creating
emotional deprivation for you?
I will tell you that just having this awareness is so big. It makes
such a big difference and so many people when I introduce this
idea of the difference between emotional deprivation and physical
deprivation, they want to run straight to the point when they hear,
oh, I can change this, I don’t have to feel this way? Let’s change
this immediately.
But I always tell them, you have to first start with awareness. You
have to first start to see that you are the one creating your
deprivation, not the screens, not the cupcake, not the ice cream,
whatever it is. You have to see that you are the one creating it with
your thoughts, because once you understand that – and it will
take some time, because this will be a big shift for you. It will be a
big shift to start to think, I’m creating this deprivation? It’s not
the pizza and breadsticks that’s creating the deprivation? This is
not how we think about things. This is not how we think about all
sorts of deprivation.
So it will take some time, but once you start to see how your
thoughts are creating the feeling of deprivation, all of a sudden
you have so much more authority over it. Just through awareness.
Not even through changing it. Just through recognizing what
you’re thinking, you gain so much more authority, and the reason
is because you move away from just being at the mercy of your
thoughts and having no idea of how they’re affecting you, to
suddenly being in a place where you can notice your thoughts and
you can see what they are creating.
So for now, I just want you to wrap your brain around these
concepts. These are new concepts for you. We don’t think about
deprivation in this way, we don’t talk about deprivation in this
way and just starting to understand it is going to be really
important. And then, once you feel like you have a handle on that,
start to work on awareness. Don’t try to jump to changing it. Don’t
tell yourself, okay, so if emotional deprivation is created by my
thoughts and I can control my thinking, then I shouldn’t
experience any deprivation anymore ever again. It doesn’t work
like that.
It's a process where you really have to start to have awareness
around it and really believe, really understand that you’re the one
creating it. Then you can start to change your thinking but not
until you see 100% that you are the one creating the deprivation
that you’re feeling.
But again, this really is the best news, because it means the one
thing that people are so afraid of, feeling like they’re always going
to be missing out, they’re always going to be wanting something,
they’re always going to have to tell themselves no when really they
want to say yes, that is not set in stone. Too many people struggle
with this; too many people are stuck in this because they just don’t
understand the difference between emotional and physical
deprivation and how they can start to change the emotional
deprivation that they are experiencing.
So just as a recap, deprivation is often the thing that keeps people
stuck when they want to sculpt their arms and change their
eating, because they feel like they’re unable to change it. We tell
ourselves it’s impossible, we tell ourselves that we’re just missing
out, that we’re just going to have to live with feeling this way, but
it’s not true. You can start to feel differently. You can change
emotional deprivation because it’s not the same as physical
deprivation.
Emotional deprivation is created by your mind and your thoughts,
and awareness is that first step. You have to fully understand that
your thoughts are creating these feelings before you can begin to
change it. So pay attention to what you’re thinking. Pay attention
to your thoughts in your mind, pay attention to the things that
seem kind of innocent but the thoughts like, I really want it, this
isn’t fair, it sucks, everyone else is, I hate doing this, I have to
have it – whatever it is, notice your thoughts when you’re feeling
deprived and that is going to be the very first step to change.
Alright, that’s it. I really loved sharing this episode with you guys
because I think this is really the key to change everything. I would
love to hear what you think. If you have questions, if you want to
know more about this, you can always send me a message. That’s
it for this week. Thanks everybody for listening.
