Transcript
A (0:00)
And, I mean, there's so much research now on gratitude and how powerful it is in changing our state. It's one of the most powerful emotions to anchor you into the present moment. The most powerful is gratitude because you can't be anywhere else when you're saying what you're grateful for. You have to be here. My name is Melanie Whitney, and you are listening to the future.
B (0:29)
Melanie, what do you want to talk about?
A (0:32)
I would actually really like to talk about. This notion of that I've been seeing a lot this year in my coaching is that I don't think people understand how important and vital it is to be able to emotionally regulate yourself, to really get to the places you want to go or to have the experiences you want to have. So emotional regulation is something I've noticed. Just people are not like, oh, sign me up. It's like. It's something a lot of people learn in therapy, and I think a lot of people are more open now to therapy. But what I just realized this year while I was doing the coaching is that people come to me for the communication piece. They're like, yeah, I wanna learn how to be a better communicator. But then what they don't realize is really what needs to, quote, unquote, be fixed is the story that they have about X, Y and Z in their mind. So it's all about your thought creates that emotion. So the story you have in your head, the thought you're, creates the emotion. And that is the very emotion that's going to dictate your behavior. And guess what? Your behaviors that are repeated are going to create your life. And so it's been such a small, tiny little formula that I've just been honing in on with my coaching clients and, you know, different workshops and what have you. And it's so simple, but it's. It's finally simple enough for I think people to understand. Because I think before, the way I was doing it was too many steps for people. It was too much. So I just realized that a lot of us struggle with emotional regulation and we project that job onto the other person. Like, Chris, I want you to make me feel better. I want you to believe in me. I want you to, whatever, fill in the blank. We just pass that on. So it's just something I've been seeing a lot of. And with all the uncertainty in the world right now, I think people are.
B (2:21)
Struggling now for people who don't know who you are. Melanie, can you please introduce yourself and tell us a little bit of Your backstory?
A (2:27)
Yes. So my name is Melanie Whitney. So what I do for work, I essentially teach people how to mindfully communicate and regulate their emotions. But my background, I never in a million years thought I'd be doing this for work. This is like so opposite of what I thought I would be doing. I grew up in Southern California, My parents are first gen here, so grew up very Mexican American. And the big thing that drove most of my life and my adolescence was go to school, go to school, get an education, get a safe job. And so that was deeply grounded in me. So from, I mean kindergarten, I was like an overachiever, the poster child, kid, good at school, made friends, great at sports, and that was it, that was the track. And it was that all the way until college and then my master's program. So I just in my mind if I finished my education and I did all the things and I checked all the boxes, I was going to be solid in life. And then that proved to not be true. I graduated, couldn't get a job, couldn't pay my student loans, and I actually ended up finding I was unemployed for like six to eight months, which seem is like forever when you have bills to pay and things like that. And so there I was like, you know, in my early 20s. Now I look back, I'm like, I was a baby. But at that time I was like, I have my master's degree, I should be doing this by now. I should be doing this, this, this and this. So anyway, life had different things in store. I went into marketing and event planning, which I thought that's what I wanted to do. And that was my mission. I was very detail oriented, type A perfectionist. And when I went into that path, it was good for about almost a year. And then I got laid off right after I bought a brand new car and I almost signed a lease in an apartment in la and thank God I didn't. I think I got let go. They were downsizing like two days before I signed the lease. So that was a blessing. But I ended up living back with my parents in my childhood bedroom in my twin size bed. And that was like the first rock bottom that I had. I was like, what am I doing with my life? And so that was the first time I was introduced to mindfulness because I needed to pick myself up out of the floor. And I picked up a book called the Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. And that was my first introduction to mindfulness. But I still was not ready for that deep dive. And so I ended up becoming a professor and being super academic still and doing all the things. And again, more bunch of different life events happened. And ultimately I just realized how limited I was living in the education space because it's very bureaucratic. You have to follow these rules and do these things. And then one time I saw flyer for a TEDx talk and it had always been like a little secret dream of mine to do that I never told anybody. And I was like, you know, I'm just gonna apply. I probably won't even get it. And then I got it and I was like, oh shit, now I need to come up with a talk for this. And then I just did the TED talk on my experience. And that one TED talk ended up leading to another workshop and another workshop. And that's kind of the short version of how I got here, was really healing myself through that whole process.