Marisa Peer: The 3 Words That Will Change Your Life! The Perfection Trap We Don't Talk About. Your Life Today Isn't Forever.

0:00When you think it's all gonna go wrong, I know I'm gonna get ghosted, I know I'm gonna mess that up. Your mind is rehearsing that now, so when it comes to it, that's exactly what you do. How long do you think it takes for somebody to change? So the first step is... You've got more chance of being abducted by a Martian than finding love at 55. Who told you that? Probably a magazine. Is it true? No, it's not true. I think we feel sometimes when we get to the middle stages of our lives that these are just so entrenched we can't change. Always go back to, what am I thinking? And then question it. Every day the mind is sending messages to the body.

0:36So if you can change those messages, you can change. Wow, that's so true. So how do we say those words? I am enough. It's never too late to say it to yourself. It will nourish you so much. If you change your thought, it changes your behavior. And then the next step is. I love that you said that. So I'm going to break from the norm here and I'm going to say we are going to put this little bit which is normally at the end of the pod at the beginning because I'm going to give you a piece of advice you need to go and get a pen and a piece of paper if you can and if it's safe don't do it if you're driving um right now because this is one of those pods where literally every single minute there is a golden nugget of information that you're going to want to write down.

1:30There are lots of kind of alliteration things like there's an AAA, there's a PPP, there's an RTT, like you need to write this stuff down. If you're going to take one thing away from this podcast, it's this. Go and write, I am enough everywhere on a post-it, stick it everywhere on your bathroom mirror, get some pillows, start a business and just print I am enough on a load of things because I just don't think many of us feel that we are and Marissa is going to show you how you can genuinely and honestly and truly change your life by believing that you are enough that's a promise Marissa Peer so excited to have you here with me I mean I've been a long time admirer and obviously we've worked together a little bit as well what I love is that you you are a great believer in that you can you can heal yourself yeah and how did you come to that because it started with hypnosis that's obviously going into someone's mind yeah well it started with hypnosis but you know I've been a therapist my entire adult life now and and I've always been very inquisitive and very quickly I realized although we're told you know the mind is very complicated and complex That's not actually true.

2:53It's very simple. First of all, your mind does what it thinks you want it to do based on what you tell it. So if you go, oh, my God, this chocolate is amazing, or this is better than sex, or I'm going to do all that work and then have some chocolate, or, oh, let's have chocolate with being good, or let's have chocolate with being bad, your brain, you know, your brain is like a feedback. It's a robot, really. You feed it stuff, and it feeds it back. So the first thing is whatever you're doing, your mind thinks you want to do that because somewhere you told it that. Secondly, the way you feel about everything is really just down to the pictures you make in your head.

3:27Like if someone said, I've got, you know, dog's milk chocolate or cats. Oh, no, I don't really fancy that because the picture is now completely different. If someone spat on your chocolate, wouldn't it? Or if we said, hey, I've got chocolate from Ghana, it doesn't sound the same as Swiss chocolate. So it's the pictures you make in your head and the words you form. And thirdly, which is the thing that people find the most vexing, is their mind will go back to what's familiar. So, you know, the more your parents give you chocolate for your birthday and Christmas and celebrations and the more you say, oh, you've been so good you can have dessert or you pass that because I'm going to go out for ice cream.

4:08Now you've made rewarding yourself with sugar so familiar and the brain is hardwired to go back to what's familiar while going away from what is unfamiliar. But then you think, well, I can make it unfamiliar. I can just say, I don't really want that anymore. That's not my friend. People say, you know, it's my friend. You know, those cookies are my friend. They're not your friend. They're just fat and sugar. So if you can change the pictures in your head, change what it means to you and start to link pain towards it, not pleasure. You know, for instance, when I had an oncologist, he said to me, oncologists don't eat sugar.

4:44And that's not true, a lot of them do, but in his ins. And he said, you know, don't eat sugar, sugar feeds cancer. So that changed the pictures in my head very quickly. And that's a good thing. I think we feel sometimes when we get to maybe 40, like the middle stages of our lives, that these are just so entrenched, we can't change. You know, and that's played so many times, And even when you try and think of something positive, it still comes back, this is ridiculous, you're not enough, you can't do this. And that starts in school. We know that expression, comparison is a thief of joy, but that's where it begins.

5:17You know, baby's born going, I'm not enough. I was looking at my little grandson, I said he's got like triple thighs, and he's just the cutest. And nobody goes, oh my God, look at me, I've got three knees here, I've got triple thighs, I've got no hair, I've got milk spots, I've got a little fat tummy, I've got baggy, crinkly butt, therefore I'm not enough. Babies are certain they're enough. And so we have to ask ourselves, well, where does it go? And it goes from when we begin this, you know, your sister could read when she was five. Your brother, he never got food on the floor. Your cousin is so good.

5:49And then we go to school and they stream you, which is a terrible, terrible thing for the kids who are not in the top. And they have, yeah, they stream kids. They have the high group. And then they have the kids who never get picked. You know, I remember when I was at school, people pick you to be in their team. There's always one who's never picked. And, you know, what does that do to children's self-esteem? Creative people are suggestible people. You know, they can look at a room and change it. She's so like that. But you see, this is the problem. That can be the greatest gift and the worst thing ever because what are you suggesting to yourself?

6:22Oh, it's not really that good. I don't know how I pulled that off. So creative people are very fragile. People think, you know, musicians and artists are fragile. creative people are all fragile. Look at Kate Spade. You know, they, no matter how good they are, they doubt themselves. And the other thing is when you're that talented and you can write a song in five minutes or write a book in a week or you think, oh yeah, but I didn't work for it. Therefore it doesn't have any value. But what I call the self-destructive talent, I didn't earn it. So I'll get rid of it. We know that 70 % of lottery winners are completely broke in three years.

7:01The same thing. I didn't earn it. so I'm going to get rid of all of it and if I didn't earn love and I didn't earn respect then there's a huge part of us that wants to get rid of it because we can't value it because we didn't earn it so how do we find a way of chipping away being able to read or say those words well first of all stop comparing yourself you know you're unique there's no one in the world like you you have to stop this comparison the social media of course breeds comparing there's always someone younger, taller, thinner, and better than you. Always. But you have to go, but that's okay, because I'm me, and I've got my own skillset, my own talents.

7:43So you've got to, you know, I was working with a little boy recently who said, I'm not good at history. I said, darling, you're good at computers. That's it. You know, imagine if the whole world was good at everything. We'd never go out for dinner. We'd make all our own clothes. We wouldn't employ a gardener. We'd do our own house. There'd be no plumbers or electricians. You're supposed to be good at one thing and you're here on the planet to find the one thing you're good at and be better at it. It doesn't matter if you can't do sport. It doesn't matter if you can't do history. Just do IT. That's your gift.

8:14And so that's the thing is go back to what are you good at? What do you love? And just focus on just that one thing because you're here to find out what you're good at and then perfect it. And of course with all these YouTube tutorials you can perfect anything. But when you try to be good at everything, I've got to be a great mum and a fantastic wife and a Nymphomaniac in the bedroom and then I've got to be an amazing chef and I've got to be it's too much, you know Just be good at something be good at being yourself You don't have to be good at everything nobody really cares You know the people who like you don't care that you're not good at everything And if you were good at everything you'd be the loneliest person in the world because that would intimidate everybody you know.

8:56True. Every day the mind is sending messages to the body and then interpreting the ones coming from the body back again. So if you can change those messages, you can change your entire life. You know, your mind's job is to make your thoughts real. And if you doubt that, think of this, every time you feel sad, do your eyes fill up with tears? Even if you're watching a Kleenex advert. When you think of something embarrassing, you can go bright red. Think of sex, you can get very turn on when you're on your own. And when you think of food, your stomach rumbles. So we know that when we think, our body is making our thoughts real.

9:32When we think of the placebo, what you think of a drug will affect you more than what's in it, because we know that the body is constantly making our thoughts real. So when you think it's all gonna go wrong, I know I'm gonna get ghosted, I know I'm gonna mess that up, sadly, your mind is rehearsing that now. So when it comes to it, that's exactly what you do. But if you think this is going to be amazing, this is going to be great, this is going to be fantastic That tends to come true as well So the thing is we don't, you know, I always think if you imagine your mind Is like a Ferrari And you're going to drive it, but you've had no Ferrari driving lessons You wouldn't be able to handle a Ferrari, but your brain is a Ferrari And if you could learn to handle it, you could make it go wherever you wanted it to go So, and it's very simple it's really coming back to the way you feel, is the pictures you make and the words.

10:24So if you say, oh, you know, I hate speaking in public. I'm no good with confrontation. I really can't bear to be the focus of attention. Then that's a thought that becomes a fixed thought. It's not fleeting. You've said it, you've now made it fixed. And once you have a fixed thought, you act in a way that matches that thinking. If you woke up and thought, I'm not enough. I'm just not interesting enough. You're going to feel anxious, blocked, sad. I mean, there's no good thought you can have, I'm not enough. And then you act in a way, often you don't act, you stay home, you don't take risks because the loop is because I'm not enough.

11:03And if you just flip that, well, I am enough, then you think completely different. You think, well, I'm confident, I can take action because I'm enough and you behave differently. And I was teaching this to children from all over the world about two years ago and I made a big triangle on the floor with masking tape. And we had like a flip chart at each point and the first flip chart was write a thought that's not good And one kid wrote I'm stupid one kid wrote I'm ugly and one kid wrote I don't have any friends And then they ran to the next point and they had to write a feeling that came from them.

11:36The feeling was Well, I'm sad. I'm angry I'm blocked and then they ran to behavior and the behavior was I cry or one I act out and then they ran back to the thought. And after a while, they realized it's the thought that was running the feelings and the action. So they changed it. They just took out. And one said, I'm smart. One said, I'm beautiful. One said, I've got lots of friends. Now they run to a feeling. And they said, I feel brave. I feel confident. When they ran to behavior, the kid who said he was stupid, I asked the teacher to explain stuff because I'm smart. And the one who said she didn't have any friends said, I invite people to my house.

12:12Everybody likes me. So at nine, they got it that people think feelings come first but they don't you can't have a feeling of being scared of a dog unless you think you're scared of dogs and it's much easier to change thoughts and it's a change feelings or even behavior so always go back to what am I thinking and then question it I'm thinking I'm never going to find love at my age you can't make it if you didn't go to college and then question that thought is that really true? Even if it is, is it true for me? Where did that thought come from? Who told me that? You got more chance of being abducted by a Martian than finding love at 55.

12:54Who told you that? Probably a magazine. Is it true? No, it's not true. And even if it is, it's not true for you. It's not true for you. So you go back, when you question a belief, you don't believe it. So question it. Where did it come from? Why do I believe it? Who told me that? Is it true? Can I make it untrue and then your beliefs are yours to change so change it just like those nine-year-old kids did i really hope you're enjoying this episode and if you can give us a follow parenting today is a place of great anxiety i mean you know i just i feel like parents before social media we weren't being told what to do or we weren't seeing how all loads of teenagers can go wrong or I mean there's just so much to get at but again just before we started recording you and I were talking about like how long do people watch their kids for I mean I know people who have tracked their kids or gone through their bags when they're 17 18 yeah how wrong is this for kids and what can parents do about it because it is hard just simple things like for instance you know when I don't I always talk to my daughter that's a vagina it's not a flower it's not a foo It's not a woo woo.

14:06Yes. I don't want to say, can I have a look at your flower? So it's a vagina and no one touches it. Not even mommy, you wash yourself because you can't stop your kids being molested. You can give them power to go, no. And then you teach them stranger danger to shout out. I don't know this. I mean, I've seen kids, I'm sure dragged out of the store crying, but if they could shout out, this is a stranger. So you can't wrap them up, but you can teach them some stuff. You know, my daughter says to me, I was, I mean, how do you make a boy like it? Because they disagree with everything they say. Have an opinion.

14:37Be a bit difficult. Don't go, I like that, you like it. You know, be your own person. I had a thing where I thought, my God, this didn't happen when I was young, which was teaching your girls to, how do you turn down the request for a nude? Yeah. And this is something I had to teach my girls. They got those requests quite early via text. Yeah. And I thought they're probably, you know, sending 50 texts out to 50 different girls thinking one will say yes. Yeah. And I always said do it with humour. Like, well, you're going to have to work a lot harder than that if you want to see a photo. And they'd go away because they'd think, oh, she's really confident.

15:17So the job of a parent and the job of a school is to raise children with very high self-esteem. But no parent's given a booklet saying, how do you do that? and how you raise kids with high self-esteem is you say, you know, your gift is art or you're so good with your brother. I see how kind you are with the grandparents. And you point out what they're good at. And when they do something bad, you don't go, you're bad. You say, you're a good kid, but you did a bad thing. You're a smart kid and you did a silly thing. And you ask them questions. And I said to my daughter, I will never punish you for telling the truth ever.

15:54And then you've got to stick with it. You've got to stick with it when they go spilt nail varnish on the floor. And so my daughter would tell me things that made my eyes pop out on stalks. But she knew she would never be punished for telling me. She told me stuff that was really about her friends and things they got up to. But she always knew, and I would always say you can bring anyone home. You know, when you're out, you can bring anybody home. And so you have to be a safe place for your children. I think they have to come up and say, Mum, you know, I've sent someone a nude. You know, we've heard of a few boys who killed themselves because they sent out these nude pictures and they were so scared of letting the parents down or upsetting them.

16:32So always start with, I'll never punish you for telling me the truth. I'll never judge you. You can tell me anything. I might not like it, but I'll listen. Because, you know, they need to be able to tell you stuff. And often people will say, I didn't know who to tell. There was no one I could go to. I was scared of them being ashamed or being angry. But if you're that parent that says, I may not like it, but I'm just going to listen and accept that that's who you are. You're not like me and I'm not like you. Could you tell me about RTT? Sure. And what it is and how it came about? Yeah. So RTT means rapid transformation therapy.

17:12And I came about it because, you know, clients would come to me and say, hey, I've been in therapy for 10 years. I know why I get angry, but I'm still angry or I know why I drink, but I still drink or and I thought that's interesting That they know why they do it, but they can't change it I always thought therapy should be no different to going to A &E if I go to A &E So here I broke a mile. I'm not gonna go well We've got to build trust together now and the whole relationship of fiction. I was gonna be how about how much we trust each other But that's what they say about therapy therapy is based on the relationship between the therapist and the patient and the trust which I thought was a bit odd.

17:48I mean, I kind of get it, but when people come to there, they're in pain. You know, if you went to the dentist because your tooth had fallen out or the doctor because you broke your leg or the carper because you hurt your back, their job is get you out of pain today. And I thought therapy should get you out of pain today, like every other healing modality, but it doesn't. And so I thought, well, why don't I create something different? You know, if you want to be successful in life, you have a couple of options. invent something, inherit something, or take something out there and improve it. You know, Lululemon improved leggings, Starbucks improved coffee, Dyson improved hair dryers.

18:24So I thought I could improve therapy, I could make it better. And so I did. And then I had this technique and it's, I mean, it's very simple. Find the pattern, understand the pattern, change the pattern, all in the same session. So I had someone with terrible OCD who was cleaning her teeth 20 times a day in a ritual. It was all to do with living in the craziest family, multiple partners, multiple kids, in and out of foster care, given to different relatives. And she had a belief, I have no control. If I control the cushions and the cutlery, then I'm in control. and so RTT is like well let's go back and look at this little girl in this crazy life and say any kid would have felt the way you felt this is a normal reaction to something abnormal when children can't control what's going on they think I'll never step on the cracks they try to control in here because they can't control out there and sometimes they create another character they split their personality this happens to Janie but Susan doesn't happen to her they even can create a multiple personality by trying to control something.

19:32So the first step is let's look at it with fascination. You see the word cure comes from the word curious. Let's be curious. Why did that happen? What was going on? What did you believe? It's never judging. It's like, oh, that happened. And it actually is kind of normal for you to act like that. So now we've understood the pattern. And then the next step is to change the pattern. So find the pattern is the first step. Understand but then change it. Say, look, that's not you. You're not a little girl of six living with this mother who was an alcoholic. You're a grown-up woman, and you're in a different world.

20:06And only last week I was working with a woman whose mother had completely abandoned her for all kinds of reasons, and she couldn't let anybody really love her, and she was scared of having her own child. And I was doing this session live. I had about 500 people watching it. And I said, look, darling, you don't need a mother. You think you need a mother, but you're a grown-up woman. and you might want a mother. I want you to say, I want a mother, but I don't need her. Say that again, over and over again. I want it, but I don't need it. I don't need it. I don't need a mother. No woman of 40 needs a mother.

20:37Because what we're doing is we're doing some neuroplasticity, making her state something over until the brain, you see, it's the familiar and unfamiliar. Now we're making it familiar. I'd like a lovely mother. I don't need one. I said, your mom's going to die one day. You'll have to get used then to not having her around. You don't need her. Imagine she's come back into your life tomorrow and she's living in your house Making you coffee making it running your bath because oh I couldn't stand that because you know why? You don't want it and you don't need it What was so interesting is a week later the mother sent her a message going hey How are you could you send me some pictures?

21:13I haven't heard from you for a while She said it was so weird because I looked at that message nor anything. Oh my god, and I thought she's just a friend She's just a friend not a great friend But, oh, and she sent her the photos because I'd said to her, your mother can only now be a friend. She can't be a mother. You're 40. She's 70 something. And so what's so interesting is because we have this universal brain. When you change how you think, someone who's connected will also change how they think about you. I really like this idea of you talking about neuroplasticity. Because that word plasticity feels like it changes possible.

21:49Because that's what plastic surgeon means. It means to mold. It doesn't mean putting plastic in your face. It means to mold, to shape. It's a Greek word, plastic. And so when you can change your thinking, you can change absolutely everything. So RTT goes back and finds some key scenes. It deals with unfinished business. And then it presents to the client, look, you know, your dad was 18 when he had you. He was more immature than you. You didn't get a great dad. That's a great shame. but what would a great dad have said to you? You know, I was working with a kid recently who was so angry. I said, darling, I'd love to give you a great dad.

22:26I can give you the next best thing. What would a great dad have said? He goes, I don't know. I said, well, you do. You do. Of course, he's 17. Of course, he goes, whatever. And I said, what would he say? And he went, he said he was proud of me. He said, I'm a great kid. He said, you're the kid any day. And then he suddenly went for it. And we began to say all these things because the brain doesn't know or care. So if I said to someone, you're amazing, that's good but if you say it the brain it's the same as someone else saying in fact it's better because I could say you're amazing to manipulate someone you're amazing can you lend me some money you're amazing can you lend me your car if I said to myself I'm amazing there's no agenda so it will sink in much better and I said to him you know darling if I put balm on my skin now because it was dry that balm would nourish me but the words of the balm they're going to nourish you wherever they come from, they'll still nourish you.

23:17So at 17, he began to say, I'm smart. I'm a great kid. Any dad would be proud of me. And because the words are so impactful, even though he was saying them, it changed his whole life completely. And so we all should think, hey, what have I never heard? One bit of RTT is called the missing bit, the missing bit of you, the words you never heard, the praise you never got. And it's like, well, it's never too late to say it to yourself. It will nourish you so much. So start saying, I matter, I'm smart, I'm interesting. I've got something to offer the world or people like me. I'm fun, I'm a good person, I'm a great friend, I'm a wonderful partner.

24:00Say it, state it, affirm it, embody it. Because of course, when you start to make that familiar, the brain will always go to what's familiar. And our job is to make bad stuff unfamiliar. and good stuff, especially self-praise. You know, there's nothing that will grow your esteem like praise. When you're saying these things to yourself, is there kind of a great place to do it? Would it be in front of your bathroom mirror in the morning or would it be lying to yourself? The shower is good because it's a very meditative, the water. What else are you going to do in the shower? I love the smell of this grapefruit conditioner.

24:38You might as well use that time in the shower to go, I matter. I'm smart, I'm enough, I'm lovable, I'm significant. Remember those needs we start off with? I'm significant, I'm connected, I'm lovable, I matter. Say it over and over again, then say it in the mirror. And what will happen is you might feel very sad and tearful. You might even feel angry. You might think, oh, this is so stupid. It just means you haven't yet made it familiar. If you keep doing it, the brain goes, oh, here you go again. You say that every day it must be true, and then it will sink in. How long do you think it takes for somebody to change that pathway?

25:14You know, we've heard the 21 days. It takes 21 days for a new belief to come in and an old belief to go. And it can, but it can take 21 seconds. If ever you've had food poisoning and brought up, you think, oh, God, I can never eat oysters again. When I was a kid, my grandma used to give me whiskey when I had a cold. And it was so disgusting that I can't even smell whiskey. And so my brain linked pain to that immediately. But sometimes you can change very quickly. My friend said, you know, I went into an abattoir and I came out unable to ever eat meat again. She was on some trip and she said, and that change took minutes.

25:50I just thought, oh no, I can't do that. So it can take 21 days. It can also take 21 seconds. And in fact, you get to change twice every day of your life. If you change a thought, it changes your behavior. So you change, we're always changing. The minute we're born, we're changing. The difference is you can influence and shape change in your life. Someone said to me recently, what's it like getting older? I said, well, it's better than the alternative, don't you think? It's a gift some people never get. My best friend in the world died nearly two years ago and she's never gonna get to get old. She would love to get old and have wrinkles and have grandchildren.

26:31So you have to think, oh gosh, I'm getting old or my kids have left home or that didn't work out. But can you reframe that? If your problem is someone else's fantasy dream come true, and for someone in the world it is, whatever your problem is, your husband leaves his pants on the floor, your 16-year-old kid hates you. Oh, my God, that's so true. That's someone's fantasy. They go, I love that problem. You've got a difficult boss. You commute to work for an hour. You've got to travel all over the world on a plane. Oh, my God, it's so true. I love that problem. and what would you have given 10 years ago to have that problem?