In this episode, we're gonna be exploring Byron Katie's work and how you can use it to soften the amount of judgment that you're experiencing in your life. Judgment of self, judgment of others, judgment of circumstances, because when you do, you're gonna have so much more mental space and you're gonna feel a lot more connection, compassion, and love for yourself and everyone else around you. You ready? Let's do it. 

Hello, you are listening to the Love Your Life as a Performer Podcast. I'm Kelli Youngman and I am The Life Coach for Performers. I help actors, singers, and dancers love themselves and their lives way more. So keep listening to learn how you can love your life, both on and off the stage.

Hello and welcome back to episode 45 of The Love Your Life as a Performer Podcast. Okay, so. If you're on my email list, you know that recently I shared very openly that I have been navigating a breakup with my long-term partner. And it's just been so interesting, even when I just look back on the last year of my life, honestly, since I launched this podcast, because I feel like I've been in my Jesus year. If you don't know what that is, that's when you are 33. It's the year, or the age that Jesus was when he died. And it's supposed to be like a very epic year. And when I look back at the growth that has happened over this last year, it's been freaking exponential. Exponential. And I've mentioned, I think I'm gonna do that specific, very personal look at all of my growth sort of podcast for the one year anniversary of the podcast as we get closer. I thought that would be super fun. 

And what it's just been showing me so deeply is that there are ways that life is always happening for us, even when we can't see it. Now, I'm also just gonna be really, really freaking honest because the truth is, you know, some people have been asking me like, oh, is this an end of an era? Is this a break? To be honest, like when it comes to my partner and I like, I really don't know. I really don't. I think there's many possible outcomes and. I think it's just been so fun to watch myself move through this season, because I am really truly okay with the not knowing. Right. I also think that something that's been really remarkable about this sort of season of breaking up and, you know, being on my own and literally having my own space and watching myself step up to own the responsibility of paying the entire rent and things like that, logistical things, right.

I feel like it truly has just shattered my whole identity in terms of what I thought I was capable of doing on my own right. This has been my biggest breakthrough and has really impacted the way that I'm coaching my clients. Because there are always these micro stories that we are believing, these core beliefs that we have about ourselves and for each belief. I was listening to an audiobook. And they were talking about how each belief is held up by another 25 beliefs. And so for every belief that we have, there's just all these other subconscious beliefs that are fueling that identity, that part of us that maybe has doubts or fears or OMG, I could never pay for my own one bedroom apartment on my own. Like who do I think I am? Right? 

And so it's just been really fun to again, watch myself completely shatter myself, concept and invite my clients to keep doing the same. Because as I am literally shattering everything, I see my clients having the biggest freaking breakthroughs and really shifting on a deep identity level and expanding what they thought was possible for them and exposing all of the ways they are still maybe holding on to a past identity. I have to mention this while it's super fresh, that one of my clients, when we were having a renewal conversation, they were just having a lot of thoughts about money and a lot of thoughts about my rate and you know, that it was too expensive.

And really just feeling like all of this, just like, well, that's just like out of my budget, out of the scope of what's possible for me. Right. And I really coached them so freaking hard that there was like almost like this rage that came out of them and in their words. And it was just so fun to like let that part out. And then they went on to move through the $5K and 10 Day Challenge and they ended up making $6K in 17 days. From completely shattering the idea that it was out of the scope of their possibility. 

And so that challenge specifically is something we do inside of The Paradigm to like speed up the rate in which we think we can make money, but also to expose all of the different thoughts and limitations and beliefs again, that are holding up this separation of us accomplishing whatever it is that we want to accomplish. And so, I don't know, maybe I'll do a whole other podcast episode about that, but it's just been again, really powerful to watch my own breakthrough impact my client's breakthrough, and there's just never been a better time to work with me. My coaching is freaking going to the next level right now. Okay.

So what I wanted to jump into this episode about sort of pertains to the breakup, but I don't think that it necessarily has to apply to your romantic relationship. It's something that can be applied to literally any human interaction that you're having. Okay. And so one of the things that has, again, been remarkable about this chapter is that I'm really okay with the circumstance, but mostly because I'm finding a lot of compassion equally for myself and my partner, right? I have been very minimally in the space of pointing at this person and saying, you are wrong. You did this wrong. Everything about you, it's your fault. I've really not been occupying that space. 

And recently it came up on a Performers Plan Coaching call where there was an interaction on set where there was just a person that was not so much the vibe of my client, like it was really... I'm trying to think of the words they used, but it was just a lot like chaotic, right? This person that was on set was like very much trying to prove and you know, like say things and get people to follow them on Instagram and all of these actions that didn't necessarily jive with my client's beliefs about how you should act on set, et cetera, et cetera.

Right. But the interesting thing, and the reason why I thought this would be a fun episode is because I just noticed that in that moment what was really happening is that my client was upset or angry or judgmental about how this other person was behaving, right? And so I was just like really intrigued by this because again, even in this breakup of like eight and a half, nine year relationship, I have really held the skill of exercising non-judgment.

And this is not a judgment on my client, but more of an awareness of like, oh, this is still a skill that many people don't necessarily have in their bones, in their bodies, which is why I wanted to bring it to the podcast. One of the ways that I have really, really been able to find so much compassion for myself and others is from the teachings of Byron Katie, and I think I've mentioned her before on the podcast. If not, I highly recommend her work. But she has a process, a tool that she calls the four Questions, and it really helps to just open your brain to a new perspective, right? 

Because the thing is, Whenever you are judging someone else, you are equally judging yourself. Whenever you are judging what is, you are equally judging the circumstance, yourself. There's just judgment. The lens of judgment exists for everything, right? And. Believe me, I get it. I feel like with one of my coaches, this was like one of my biggest teachings and they really just kept saying, Kelli, like this judgment that you're having is really going to inhibit you. And I remember in that moment, all I could think was like, bitch, you are judging me right now. 

And so I have just done so much work to minimize this in my life and I totally get it. I feel like, just for frame of reference, I also used to be the person that would like call my friend up when something happened and immediately get them on my side about what happened. I'd be like, oh my gosh, I'm not crazy. Right? It was like this person was crazy. And of course my friends are always gonna validate what I'm thinking and feeling and it's just been very interesting and I think that's why like it's so fun to have a coach because a coach doesn't necessarily validate what you're feeling. A coach is going to stand for the truth and invite you to open up your brain. They might give you the space and the tools to process what you're feeling without making you wrong, but then they're not just gonna like blindly agree with the things that you're saying, right? They're gonna invite you to the truth.

And so going back to the work of Byron Katie, she has a process called The Work that is for Simple Questions. Is it true? Can you absolutely know that it is true? How do you react, what happens when you believe that thought? And who would you be without that thought? 

I remember. You can literally rewind this, listen to it as many times as you want, write 'em down. But I remember being on The First National tour of The King and I and reading the book, Loving What Is, and it was written by Byron Katie and it sort of shows the work in action and it really changed my life. It changed how I was, I. Or at least open the door to start releasing the judgments that I was making about other people, the hold of right, wrong, good and bad that I was trying to like filter my life and everyone else through.

Right? And it was exhausting doing that, right? So the work really opens up your brain to find neutrality in any circumstance. Because there's always so much that can equally be true about us as the judgment that we're casting on others. And I think when I think about how I've applied this to my life, I'm just so willing to be wrong, to have been a bitch, to have, I don't know, been my not best self, that I'm not afraid of others thinking that about me, because I also am willing to see that in some ways. Of course, that's true. Right? 

And so within these four questions, is it true? Can you absolutely know that it's true? How do you react when you believe that thought? Who would you be without the thought? There's also this concept of turnaround, right? And so when I want to look at my partner, I. And say, you're being so selfish. Right. I am willing to turn that statement around and explore how the opposite could be true too. I'm willing, and I do this consciously, like very regularly when I realize I'm having a judgment about someone else, I ask myself, could the opposite be equally as true? And the answer is always yes. 

Right? Like if I am sitting here saying, you're being so selfish. It could equally be true that I am being selfish in my request. And the thing about that is like when you're not having a judgment that it's good, bad, right or wrong to be selfish, then it's like, okay, yeah, maybe that that request was selfish. And if I'm using the idea that being selfish is bad, I could also question that. How could the opposite be true? Maybe being selfish is good in some ways, when I'm advocating for myself and when I'm taking care of my needs first. Right? 

It's just such, I mean, in a way a mindfuck, but like the practice of doing this really shakes up your brain and the neural pathways and the filters that you are putting everything through, right? And so it's just so powerful to release the judgment, the judgment of self and others, and all of the ways that we are creating this very rigid structure of good, bad, right, or wrong. 

And I said earlier, you know, it's really exhausting to put others and the circumstances through the filter. But it's honestly even more exhausting when you are putting yourself through the filter of trying to figure out, does this make me a good person? Does this make me a bad person? Is this, you know, the right thing to do, the wrong thing to do? Versus really just knowing and believing and trusting that who you are is good. And that if something happens that feels like out of alignment with who you are, it's also not bad. You don't have to shame yourself or weigh yourself down or make yourself better than others or less than others. I think the, the value of this idea of releasing the judgment is it really just creates this neutral like existence where someone else isn't determining whether you were above or below. Right. 

I think that's another thing, another slightly different way of looking at the same thing is like when we are judging others, a lot of times what our brain is doing subconsciously is making ourselves better than someone else or worse than someone else. I'm even thinking about. In this example that I gave with my client, it's like their brain was trying to say that like that behavior was inappropriate or that behavior was rude or uncalled for, and all of these things, right? And it isn't good, bad, right or wrong to have the awareness that these things are happening, that this person is being chaotic, right?

That's not like a bad thing to have that awareness, but where it becomes problematic is when we are holding onto the judgment about that person, right? And when you are in so much neutrality, it's just okay to be like, wow, that person is being chaotic. Right. And we don't have to push against any of it. We don't have to make it mean something about us.

It doesn't have to be like, oh my gosh, like I am so much better than them. And we can also use the contrast to inform how you want to behave, what you love about yourself. Right. But I think there's like a slight difference in having the awareness. Using the awareness, however you may, and not resisting or judging or pushing against, right?

It is just really neutral information, other people, the words that they say, the way that they show up and truly, what's happening in our own brains is the only thing that we can ever be responsible for. How we are showing up. What we want to be thinking and feeling. And when the judgment is just released and there's no hierarchy, you don't have to be better than other people. You don't have to be worse than other people. Again, when it's just like, this is who I'm being. This is not good, bad, right or wrong. This is how I'm showing up. This is what I'm thinking. I'm willing to see all perspectives. It just creates this freedom. It's like so much less work, right? 

Like I'm not spending my time and I mean, yes, am I like reflecting and you know, learning and gaining awareness from the circumstances that happened in my relationship and, you know, interactions like yes, fuck yes. I am learning so much about myself and about the dynamics of a relationship and how I want to exist in a relationship. Right? But I'm not replaying the scenario saying, this is how this person failed me. This was their fault. This was them, right? You just wanna be onto yourself so much when you're looking at one person or someone else, without also equally investigating and being curious with yourself, right? 

There's just so much learning and so much compassion and openness that can be accessed when it's not only about the other person. When you're really learning from how is this impacting me? What were my beliefs that were fueled by this interaction? What are my core beliefs that are still being held up if I stay attached to this one perception, this one vantage point of the circumstance, right? It just creates so many more possibilities, so much more openness than you know, just needing to be right or needing to believe something negative about someone else in order to feel good about you, right?

And so all of that to say, when you're really willing to love yourself through any of your shortcomings, there's really no need to judge yourself or others for the things that happened right. Then, just like any circumstance, there's just learning. There's just wisdom. There's just more awareness and attunement and alignment that can come from it because really we're only ever growing and life is only happening for us, and that is really how you free yourself and step into expanded consciousness. 

So that's what I got for you this week. Get curious, invite in these turnarounds. Explore Byron Katie's work and look at, you know, where in my life am I being very, very close-minded. It isn't good, bad, right or wrong if you are, but when you have the awareness, that's when you get to soften and loosen and release these harsh filters of judgment. And then you get to just see, cool, that's how they're existing. This is how I'm existing. What do I wanna like give my focus and my energy to? How do I wanna grow? How do I wanna expand and what can I learn from the perspective of really zooming out and seeing the full picture. Even when that means acknowledging my shortcomings, other people's shortcomings without it being good, bad, right or wrong. Because then truly you can just have so much gratitude, even for conflict, and you don't have to be afraid of disagreements or confrontation or any kind of, you know, hard thing in your life at all. Because you always know that it's happening for you and your greatest growth and expansion comes from it. All right, I'll meet you back here for another episode. 

Hey, I wanna invite you to get started because if this is blowing your mind, imagine the impact of when we actually work together. There are two ways to work with me privately, one-on-one or inside of the paradigm with high quality community. Either way, you're gonna go to kelliyoungmanwellness.com/launch to book your free launch call. We're gonna spend 60 minutes together with you and your unique dream and vision to co-create a plan to get you there. Let's freaking go.