"Stepping Out Of Autopilot"

Navigating through life's unexpected twists and turns, I recently found myself in the throes of autopilot living—a humdrum existence that nearly consumed me. My tale begins with a jarring car accident that spiraled into an avalanche of stress, from untangling insurance claims to managing family drama. Yet, it's in these moments of chaos that I discovered a profound truth: life isn't just happening to us; it's unfolding for us. I'll take you through how I turned things around with affirmations and manifestation, culminating in a victorious moment of acquiring a new car against all odds. This journey is not just about resilience, but also about the transformative power of a positive mindset when all seems lost.

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Transcript

Recognizing and Overcoming Autopilot Living

Speaker 1 0:01

Hey guys , welcome back to updated AF Collective , the podcast . I am your host , megan Worth , and today's episode is going to be a little bit about something that I feel like I've been personally experiencing the last couple of weeks , and it's a topic that I spoke about in front of like women at like women's conferences and stuff like that too . So when I realized that I was doing what I tell women not to do , which is living your life on autopilot , slipping into you know the just the routine , almost like a little bit of feeling like numb depression , I saw myself like going down that path and I caught myself quick . And then in this episode we're going to talk about recognizing if you feel like you're living your life on autopilot , that you are just going through the motions , like you're so stressed out that you can't see the bigger picture . You have tunnel vision . So the last couple of weeks I've been experiencing that and we'll unpack that and talk about what I did in this episode . Okay , guys , welcome back to updated AF .

Speaker 1 1:26

Welcome to the updated AF Collective podcast , where we celebrate the power and resilience of women . Join me as we dive into inspiring stories , engage in meaningful conversations and explore topics that empower women from all walks of life . I believe that every woman has a unique strength within her waiting to be unleashed . Whether you're an entrepreneur , a leader , a creative , a caregiver or simply on your own personal journey , this podcast is for you . Together , we'll share stories of triumph , discuss strategies for success and provide a supportive space for women to connect and grow . Get ready for real , authentic conversations that ignite your inner strength and inspire you to chase after your dreams fearlessly . Welcome to the updated AF Collective . Okay , welcome back .

Speaker 1 2:17

So just a little backstory on how the hell I found myself going into a depression and how I caught myself , and luckily I have friends that can kind of bring me back , snap me out of it . So long and short , back in December , right before Christmas , like right before all the holidays , some driver smashed into my SUV when I was stopped at a red light . That's how this whole thing started . Luckily my daughter wasn't in the car . That I am very thankful for . But I mean obviously , like that was my beautiful , beautiful car . I love my SUV , I love my car . It was gorgeous , it was very appreciative of it , like all the things , and so it got completely totaled . That's when I feel like the spiral hit and so I was like , okay , fine , I can handle this . You know , god , the universe or whatever is not going to give me something that I can't handle . And I still do believe that everything happens for a reason . Life is not happening to me , it's happening for me . There's a reason why this is happening and I have to keep reminding myself that .

Speaker 1 3:40

And that's what got me through the insurance claims , having to find a lawyer , like all of this stuff , because the backstory is the guy was unlicensed and uninsured , so my insurance company was being difficult . I had to get a lawyer . I had to get I had , you know , rental car , all this stuff . And then I traveled back to Northern California to be with my family during the holidays and that was really stressful because we have a lot of family stuff going on , and so just having the car accident and then driving , driving we drove 27 hours from Texas to Northern California and then having to deal with that just stacked more onto my plate . So I was so stressed out and so overwhelmed being there . And then the drive back was even more stressful because and I'll be like super open and honest with you guys I have great insurance and full coverage and all this stuff and my insurance company was covering up to what I guess they appraised the car to be , which wasn't enough to cover my loan on the car . So I still owed a lot of money and I didn't know .

Speaker 1 5:06

Because of that , like because I still owed a lot of money on my SUV , I was like great , like am I gonna get approved for another car loan , like two car loans ? How is this gonna work ? I was so stressed out and I got the news of all of that , about all that money that I was gonna owe , on my drive back from California to Texas and I pulled over to the side of the road and I just started sobbing because all of a sudden , I was just seeing money flying out of my freaking bank account Like I could just visualize it , which is stupid Cause again . Like I kept telling myself , like okay , there's this , this will get fixed . So I calm myself down and I kept telling myself like this is gonna get fixed , like there's a reason why this is happening . I don't know what that reason is , but I need to just calm down and I need to push forward .

Speaker 1 6:06

So I get back on the road , we make it all the way back home and that's when , like , of course , like the lawsuit , I did end up getting another car . I got another brand new , smaller , midsize SUV . It's not at all like my last SUV , but you know what , like it's a brand new car , it's beautiful , it's great and I'm grateful . At the end of the day , you know , that's just what I could afford , and so I did get that car . I don't know how I got it , I don't know how I got approved for a second car loan , but I did . And I feel like I kind of manifested that because it wasn't even hard . It was like a seamless thing .

Speaker 1 6:56

Like I walked into Ford and told them what happened . I picked out a car and then they were like , yeah , you're fine , here it is , here's the keys . I was like , oh my gosh , I was so stressed out , so freaking stressed out , and I just remember writing in my journal like this is gonna be an easy transaction , this is gonna be an easy . They're just gonna give me a car . And I'm telling you , like everything that I wrote , I wrote that straight . I wrote that for two weeks , because I had my rental car for two weeks and I waited until like the last minute to go to Ford to buy a new car , because I was that stressed out , I was so afraid of what was gonna happen , even though I shouldn't have been Cause in my journal I kept trying to write like over and over again , like this is gonna be so easy , they're just gonna give me the car , no problem , no loan issues . And that's exactly what happened and , like I said , like that was just a freaking miracle .

Speaker 1 7:55

So again , like things are good to get , on figuring it out , I'm figuring out the money situation . Obviously , now I have two car loans cause I owe on the other car and I keep thinking like , okay , I need to manifest , like I would be happy if I could manifest $15,000 . Just random , I don't care where it comes from , I don't care who it comes from , but I need 15 grand and that would kind of like fix my car situation . And so writing that down in my journal again like doing my manifestation practice and just like trying to call in more money . It's slowly started happening . I got four clients in like less than like maybe like three days , I like right off the bat , like four people wanting to buy a house , bam , bam , bam . Like everybody's under contract , like , okay , great , okay . So let's keep that going . Let's keep that momentum going .

Speaker 1 8:58

So , but what you know , during those times where I was like touring with clients and stuff like that too , it was just so , so stressful and I didn't take a day off . I wasn't practicing self-care , I was constantly with my clients , like touring excessive amounts of houses and stuff like that , which , again , that's part of the process , but when I already had other stressors outside of work stacking on top , like it was just a lot to handle and a lot to deal with . So I saw myself like living on autopilot . I wasn't working out , I wasn't taking care of myself . I would literally wake up in the morning , get my baby dressed out the door at school and then I would rush back home , change over and then get out the door and tour all day with clients like different houses and stuff like that .

Speaker 1 9:47

So this went on for like two or three weeks and I just my mental health like declined . I was not taking care of myself and I was living with like numbness , like I just felt like I couldn't feel anything . I knew like the stress was like bottling up , cause I could feel it and I knew I was living on autopilot . So I was like I ended up calling one of my best friends on the phone , coming back from one of the house tours and just crying and I told her I was like I think I am depressed , like I think this is depression and you know , of course , like God I love her Like she's trying to calm me down by like saying , oh , like okay , let's meet up , let's do this , let's do that , but I just like I just felt so dead inside , so freaking dead , and I realized like I stopped doing everything that was like keeping me saying like when , as soon as the whole car accident happened , I felt like that's when my habits , of my self care habits , stopped .

Speaker 1 10:55

And that was the effect . Like I have to remember , excuse me , I have to do those little things for myself every single freaking day . It's , it's just a micro habit to keep me on my path for healthy mental health . Just like you wouldn't just stop brushing your teeth because after a while your teeth are going to , like , get full of cavities or get gross , you have to do that every single day . Your self care has to be done every single day .

Speaker 1 11:26

And so , realizing that today I broke that , I guess , like that um , autopilot behavior , and I got up this morning and I was like you know what ? Like I'm going to work from home , of course , like I have my phone and I have my laptop and stuff like that , but the morning is going to be mine from 8am to 12 . I was going to focus on me and I had to do something that was going to cheer me up Because , again , like feeling , if you are one of those people that get up and do the same thing every single day , don't take care of yourself , you're just doing everything for everybody else , you go to bed , wake up the next day and then repeat that leads to depression . It really does . So what I needed to do is , um , break it , break out of that routine , and I was like , when's the last time I actually like have fun or laughed ? It had been a long time and I could not remember the last time I just like had fun and I was like , okay , I downloaded this app called class pass and it had like a free month trial . It's an app . Another podcaster that I listened to actually talked about it because she utilizes it , and so that gave me the idea is like you get to try dance classes , um , fitness classes , and like , do all like you can try a ton of stuff and it's all in this app . You could just sign up for it and go .

Speaker 1 13:01

Well , I ended up going to my gym , I did yoga in the morning , which I have not done yoga in years , and I sucked at it Like sucked , but I just didn't care . There was a girl like she was like to my right of me and she was so good , but I was like I could , I could like sense a little bit of like oh , I suck at this , like she's so good . Everybody's probably staring at me . And then I was like wait , no , nobody cares , nobody cares that I suck in here . And it's again like I was . Like I tell women all the time like , don't compare your chapter one to somebody's chapter 20 . Clearly , that girl over there who's like bending and like doing all the things is on her chapter 20 . And so I stopped , I stopped it and I cleared my mind and I went back to meditating and like focusing on my breath and stopped focusing on everybody else around me . Literally , I just don't . I don't know why . I don't know why I started thinking like that . So , anyway , I got done with that .

Speaker 1 14:02

I went to Zumba . I have never taken a Zumba class in my life . But you know what , like I , and I was so bad at it , like so bad , it was so intense . If you've never taken a Zumba class , you have to try , just try it . It's crazy and the girls that do this religiously are so freaking good . But the thing is like everybody's having so much fun , Everybody's laughing , nobody's judging , nobody's like pointing you out because you suck at Zumba , nothing like that it's . It was actually so much fun and I laughed so hard . There was a couple of girls at the front of the class that were so freaking good and they were so cute . Oh my gosh . Like one girl had like pigtails and she was like she was like my age and you could tell she's a mom , but like she just goes to laugh and to move her body .

Speaker 1 14:59

And that's what I was thinking in Zumba when I was like doing this , I was like I just need to move my freaking body . I've been a robot since the car accident . I just feel like I've been on like like a robotic mode or something like that . Like I said , like when you're doing the same freaking thing every single day , like you are brushing your teeth the same way , making your breakfast , the same way , driving to where you need to be , the same way , like every single thing , you're not moving your body . You need to move and I just needed to just shake out all that stagnant energy , that stress , because stress stays stuck in your body , physically in your body , and that's what causes , like all those health issues and there's I mean this sounds a little like woo , woo , but it's there's science behind it and there's so many studies that show body aches and I mean some diseases and stuff like that too . They say like if you don't heal your trauma , like your past trauma , stuff like that , it can manifest itself into certain cancers , health problems , sore muscles , inflammation , all that stuff . Like you have to shake it out , you have to , you have to move your body . Our bodies were made to move . If you're not moving your body , you're you can sink into a deeper depression .

Money Manifestation and Unexpected Delays

Speaker 1 16:22

So I did that . Sorry , my freaking neighbor's dogs , if you can hear that . They have been barking Nonstop for like two hours and I don't know what to do , I don't know . So if you can hear that , I'm sorry . I should probably go check on my neighbors . Anyway .

Speaker 1 16:41

So I did Zumba for an hour right after yoga and it was just so fun and I actually laughed , not just like that little like haha , now I freaking laughed my ass off . It was just so good . So I walked out of there , definitely embarrassed but feeling lighter , like I just took all that stagnant , stuck energy inside of me and just like started . It just started leaving my body . It was , it was . It was an awesome , it was great , it was a good experience .

Speaker 1 17:18

Will I do it again ? Hell , yeah , I'll do it again , but again it's one of those things like your small habits , the things that you do for yourself , add up , take care of your mental health the same way you take care of your hair , your skin , your nails , your teeth . You don't I mean , I don't know about you , but like I can't let myself go . But what's the first thing that we all let go of or we just ignore when everybody else needs stuff from us , is our freaking mental health . And that can't happen anymore , because I was on a really slippery downward slope and if you know anything about manifestation , you cannot manifest from a very stressed out state of mind , trying to figure out next steps for stuff , like going through the motions , being in fear of everything , being overwhelmed , you can't , you're not going to manifest anything good , you're actually going to manifest what you don't want , and I'll tell you a story on that , because that just made my life a hell of a lot worse .

Speaker 1 18:29

Being in that state of mind and long story short , I , when I got my car , I put down $1,000 . And it pretty much bought my interest rate down , so I was saving money on my payments . So I wrote them a check , which was fine , and I get a call five days later that the check didn't go through . Mind you , I didn't want to give the $1,000 . I really didn't . And in the back of my mind I was like I could just again , like with the lawsuit , with the amount of money I have been paying people to do things for me because of this whole car accident , I really didn't want to give another $1,000 . So , but I did , I wrote the check and I was like , just freaking , take it .

Speaker 1 19:20

But in the back of my mind I was dreading it , and so the check bounced , which it shouldn't have , but it did , and I don't know why it did , because there's money in my account , I just think because the checks are old , or maybe it was attached to an older checking account that I no longer had , which I was . I'm thinking like that's what happened . And so I was like , oh my gosh , like I apologize profusely , like I felt so bad . I was like let me write you know . He's like well , technically we can't accept a second handwritten check , but you can do like a cashier's check or a money order . And I was like perfect , I'm going to the , I'm going to the bank right now and I'm going to get a cashier's check . He's like perfect , so I get to the bank and it's not my bank , so my personal bank I use like a military bank , so we don't have an actual freaking bank .

Speaker 1 20:16

I had to go to like like another bank that wasn't even mine and they wouldn't give me a cashier's check because I don't belong to that bank , which I found weird . So , anyway , I went to our grocery store , went to HB and I went to the service counter . I was like okay , can I get a money order for $1,000 ? And it wouldn't go through , like my card wouldn't go through my due , there's money in my account , and the card wasn't going through . It turns out the chip on my card was broken and I was like what the hell ? Why is all of these just money things happening to me ? Why ? And I was so frustrated and so we tried to swipe it and it still it wouldn't work . And so I called my bank and I was like what's going on ? I need a thousand dollar money order so I can pay the down payment on my freaking car . And I'm like borderline tears and she's like I don't know , like try swiping it again and nothing , it wasn't working . And then she was like , oh , I'm sorry , it's because your chip isn't working . Your chip needs to work in order for you to get a money order . Yeah , doesn't make sense , but anyway . So , long story short , I couldn't get the money order . I had to call my bank again and order a new card with a working chip . That , oh my God , that was crazy . And it's in . Then it gets so funnier . And this is how I figured out I was manifesting this Because again , I didn't want to release the money .

Speaker 1 21:56

I wanted to hold on to it so tight , but I know it had to . I had to go to Ford , but again because I was like dreading that thousand dollars being taken out of my account and so funny thing is they FedExed it , which it was only going to take 48 hours for the card to get to my house and the FedEx driver . Something happened to the truck . There was a delay I don't know if it was like a weather delay , but there was a delay and it took what was supposed to only take two days took seven days to get a new card . I felt so bad . I mean I was personally texting the loan officer at the Ford dealership , like the finance guy , like on his personal phone , giving him screenshots of like the FedEx issue , and then at one point they didn't like it went from like your card will be here on Wednesday to Thursday in front of two like we don't know . It literally was just like it'll be there when it's there . It was like pending and I was like I'm doing this .

Speaker 1 23:04

I realized I was like I'm freaking doing this , like I'm manifesting all of these money problems because I wanted to hold on to that money . Well , guess what ? The universe was finding ways for me to hold on to this money and it was so embarrassing . Luckily the guy was so nice . He's like don't worry about it , you know , we're just glad that you're communicating with us . You're like not disappearing and I was like look , I have the money and I'm trying to give it to you . I just don't know why all of these things are happening and , of course , like I realized it , it was my subconscious listening to what I actually wanted to do , which was to hold on to the money . So my new card came today and I was able to drop off the money at the dealership . Like the money order , everything is fine , and I put two houses under contract . Today , as of literally two hours ago , I have two clients that are now under contract with home . So it's like as soon as I released the money , money was already finding its way back to me .

Importance of Relaxation and Mental Health

Speaker 1 24:15

So I need to learn to relax and remind myself that , like again , like things are happening for me , they're not happening to me . There's a reason why my life is just feeling chaotic , because usually , when my life just like feels like it's falling apart , it's actually falling into place . There's always something big waiting on the other side of like the chaos , cause I go through these maybe like once or twice a year of just like redirection and once I think that I have everything in control and we are smooth sailing and everything is like going really well , things start to fall apart , but they're not falling apart . I feel like they're just like redirecting me somewhere or I'm supposed to be , you know , maybe being a little too comfortable and live it on autopilot or whatever , whatever the heck I was doing . Like , again , like I get tunnel vision and I stopped seeing the bigger picture . And when you get tunnel vision , that's when you can lose the actual direction you're supposed to be going , if that makes sense . So , again , like , be careful with stress and worry and stuff like that and just try to just surrender and let go , because you don't know what's waiting on the other side . I don't know what's waiting on the other side of this chaos , but I have a feeling that it's gonna be something that's going to work out for me and it's going to benefit me . I don't know what it is , but I , you know , I will share the story of whatever the hell happens , I will share it and I'll let you guys know . And another podcast that I listened to . I'm gonna share it on here because it helps me a lot . And , of course , like I'm going to share a good podcast , even if it's like my competition , it doesn't matter , it's not really my competition , but like Paul's , the resilient mind podcast .

Speaker 1 26:37

And if you are a big fan of like Jim Rown , les Brown , I think there's Bob Proctor , I think they had like Tony Robbins , like it's just a collection of these like of like the top world speakers , speeches and stuff like that and like keynote stuff , and what this person did is they took all of these different speakers and just put their stuff in one place and so , obviously , like I'm a huge Les Brown fan , like I love him , I love his talks . I think he does such a good job of storytelling and then having like there's , you know , you learn something from it , from all of his stories , and then he has that comedic tone . So he makes things very , very interesting and that's how he captioned , or captioned captures audiences . I feel like , because he's so entertaining , he could just command a room and one of my favorite sayings and I don't know if he came up with this saying , cause I've heard Rachel Hollis say it , I've heard Tony Robbins say it , maybe Joe Dispenza , like I've heard people say this before but Les Brown has been speaking a lot longer than these speakers and the talk that he said on this morning's episode at the Resilient Mind podcast was a speech that he gave back in the 80s , so maybe he was like the creator of this , but I love this saying is like too many people die at 30 and are buried at 80 . And I love that saying and that's where I like that's like kind of the topic that I talk about .

Speaker 1 28:29

Like the living on autopilot thing is like living just in like this routine and stuff like that , cause you're just like , you're just so dead inside . You don't have any motivation or spark or any . You're like no goals or anything like that . You're just , you're not . You're living a life that you don't like A lot of people are . You hate your job , you feel stuck , you're fearful that if you actually do what you want to do , like start that business , write that book or whatever you might be afraid of failing . And we all know what fear is . It's an acronym and it's on one of my slides for like my when , when I do my speaking engagements and stuff like that for women conferences , false evidence appearing real , and I I talk a lot about . That is like living in fear . You're only fearful of things that you don't know anything about .

Speaker 1 29:30

For example , like when you are like when you're fearful , when I was fearful when I had to pull off to the side of the road because I was told that insurance was only going to cover up to a certain amount on my totaled vehicle and I had to figure out , okay , like how am I going to pay that off ? How am I going to buy a new car ? Like how , how , like the what-ifs , everything running through my head and I'm like panicking , having a panic attack . It's only because , like , I don't know what my options are . And I and I was panicking because your brain , when you have a problem it could be any problem , right , small problem , big problem , anything your brain automatically goes into problem-solving mode and it will scare the shit out of you if your brain can't figure out what the next steps are or how to fix this . And I don't know , I didn't know how to fix that problem .

Speaker 1 30:32

And so people who Want to better their lives , or they want to quit their job , they want to move to a new state , and you country like start over or whatever . They just don't know what their options are . It's so easy to stay where you're at because it's predictable and you already know what to expect . You know what your options are . You can live your life in a job you hate , get a steady paycheck . You're gonna know what your paychecks are because it's the same every two weeks . You already know you get health coverage . It's predictable , but you hate it .

Speaker 1 31:10

So If you educate yourself and this is what I talk about too like you don't need motivation , you don't need that . That's motivation is garbage . You need to be educated . You have to educate yourself first . We don't need more motivated idiots running around this world , which I feel like we have a lot of those . I mean , you can Listen to some influencers on Instagram and stuff like that and half the time I'm like what the hell are you talking about ? You need , we need more motivated , educated influencers and To show us the way , to kind of say like , hey , if I can do it , you can do it .

Speaker 1 31:58

And that's why I wanted to get so so much into like speaking , because I have to live up to what I Preach . I guess that's the best way to say it . I have to live up to that and if I'm living on autopilot and I'm going down the road of depression , I I who the hell am I my hypocrite ? I can't go tell these other women like , change your life , change your mindset , don't live on autopilot . And then there I was .

Speaker 1 32:33

Luckily , I snapped out of it after I realized what the hell was going on and I started learning about the process of what needs to happen Right now in my life between the car accident , my finances , my career , my daughter , everything . I Needed answers , and so I just started asking questions to the right people . I got a lawyer , I talked more with my insurance company , I talked to people who have dealt with things like this . I needed answers , and the more answers I got , the more I felt better , and so the next thing I needed to do after I started feeling a little bit better , was to shake out that Negative , stagnant energy that was still stuck in me . I Found a lot of like , a lot of times , like when I was talking about the accident , if somebody wanted to To ask me what happened , like I I would cry because it's still stuck there . It's definitely a form of trauma and I still felt it stuck in there .

Speaker 1 33:40

And now , like I said , like I feel like it just like shook it all out . I got it all out Between yoga , zumba , stepping out of my freakin comfort zone . I don't care , I just needed to shake it out and have fun . Okay , if you need to break out of a routine that is leading you down the path of depression . Find something to interrupt that , that that negative Every day routine that is leading you nowhere . Find something to interrupt it .

Speaker 1 34:14

For me , it was definitely yoga and Zumba . Um , I'm gonna actually make that part of like my weekly routine , just to move my body . Move my body , just get rid of it . So , yeah , I hope that , like , you got something out of this .

Speaker 1 34:30

Hopefully it made it made a little sense and yeah , like it just it's been a crazy past few months , but I Feel like I'm back on track and I won't allow myself to Just stop and forget about my mental health . And you wouldn't forget about the other things . Girls like their hair or makeup and stuff like that . We're not gonna let ourselves go . Why are we letting go of our mental health ? Don't do it . Anyway , thank you guys so much for listening . I appreciate you . It looks like you guys really enjoyed our last episode with summer and Because that episode like blew up . So , thank you so much for listening . If you guys are getting anything out of it , please leave a review , rate me the stars , like , follow me on Instagram . Yeah , just let me know you're listening . Okay , I appreciate you guys so much . Thank you so much for listening and I will see you next Friday .