If you are an overthinker, someone who finds themselves sweating the small stuff or just someone who feels like they need to control every aspect of their life then this episode is for you!
Jason will share with you today some stories from his own life, along with a little bit of a musical treat with you.
So let’s keep calm and tune in to today’s episode!
Get a VIP backstage pass and behind the scenes information when you sign up for The Jamming with Jason newsletter: https://bit.ly/3k53OjS
Listen in at: http://www.jasonmefford.com/jammingwithjason218/
Transcript
1
00:00:01.829 –> 00:00:11.219
Jason Mefford: Today we’re going to talk about the concept of keep calm and carry on and i’ll share with you exactly where that comes but.
2
00:00:11.730 –> 00:00:21.090
Jason Mefford: You know if you’re like most people you might be somebody who is an over thinker or someone who gets anxious about things and wants to try to control.
3
00:00:21.480 –> 00:00:41.400
Jason Mefford: Everything in their life so if that’s you, and even if it’s not you’re going to want to listen today because we’re going to talk about some important ways to help you reduce stress in your life and keep calm and carry on so with that let’s roll that episode.
4
00:00:44.310 –> 00:00:50.280
Jason Mefford: Alright well today, I wanted to come on this is kind of a little impromptu podcast recording and.
5
00:00:51.660 –> 00:01:04.710
Jason Mefford: The reason for it is just a couple of things that have actually happened in my life, this week, so I thought i’d share because it’s just one of those things that kind of hit me that I need to talk about so here I am my friends.
6
00:01:05.940 –> 00:01:12.180
Jason Mefford: Now, again, as you as you listen to this you’re going to get a lot of value from what you hear today.
7
00:01:12.900 –> 00:01:19.320
Jason Mefford: And you’re going to be able to figure out ways in which you can actually reduce some of the stress in your life.
8
00:01:19.980 –> 00:01:30.780
Jason Mefford: And when you do that right when you finish listening to this episode, make sure to leave a comment and review on the podcast and then make sure and share it.
9
00:01:31.170 –> 00:01:38.940
Jason Mefford: with other friends and family that you know who might also need to hear the same message right because sharing is caring.
10
00:01:39.660 –> 00:01:47.970
Jason Mefford: Now, a lot of the people that I work with are very stressed out there type A personalities that tend to.
11
00:01:48.540 –> 00:01:56.640
Jason Mefford: overthink a lot they end up getting in their head and what I call kind of wrapped around the axle if you know what that term means.
12
00:01:57.150 –> 00:02:07.950
Jason Mefford: And because they go about their day trying to control everything and what they think is responding is technically usually reacting.
13
00:02:08.550 –> 00:02:26.520
Jason Mefford: Now anytime that we jump into that or we we tend to react more often, we end up making things worse and so i’m going to share with you some some some techniques today and some like I said some things that have been have just kind of surfaced up in my life.
14
00:02:27.750 –> 00:02:37.920
Jason Mefford: With some conversations that i’ve had with people this week that I want to share now, you may have heard of that term before keep calm and carry on okay.
15
00:02:38.430 –> 00:02:46.830
Jason Mefford: That comes from a World War Two era marketing campaign that was done in the United Kingdom in England during the war.
16
00:02:47.400 –> 00:02:58.500
Jason Mefford: Because at that time you know there, there was bombing going on in England, and so you know the air sirens would go off people would have to go down into the into the bomb shelters.
17
00:02:59.040 –> 00:03:16.050
Jason Mefford: And throughout the night there would be bombs dropping, and so the the the British Government, you know wanted to kind of rally the troops, if you will, right and in remind people that look just be calm and carry on we’re going to get through this.
18
00:03:17.220 –> 00:03:25.560
Jason Mefford: So they ended up coming up with this marketing campaign printed off a whole bunch of flyers that they had intended to put up all over London.
19
00:03:26.220 –> 00:03:35.310
Jason Mefford: That didn’t really happen, but what ended up happening was those documents got stored and somebody found them 50 or 60 or 70 years later.
20
00:03:35.940 –> 00:03:44.940
Jason Mefford: And that’s why you’ve seen now that that whole slogan keep calm and carry on you’ve probably seen the little image different places that’s really where that comes from.
21
00:03:46.080 –> 00:03:52.800
Jason Mefford: And you know when there are things like that going on in our life when it feels like there’s bombs dropping all around us.
22
00:03:53.190 –> 00:04:02.580
Jason Mefford: It can be pretty unnerving it can be pretty stressful and at that time you know we really you have a choice you can decide to try to be calm and work through it.
23
00:04:03.270 –> 00:04:14.730
Jason Mefford: Or you can freak out right the really The choice is up to you now i’m guessing you don’t really like freaking out, I know I don’t like freaking out and that’s why I want to talk to you today okay.
24
00:04:15.240 –> 00:04:31.080
Jason Mefford: Now, before we get we get started into me kind of sharing some stories, I thought this would be a good time as well to play a little song to you and kind of talk about that as we’re getting into what we’re going to talk about today so.
25
00:04:32.130 –> 00:04:40.920
Jason Mefford: Let me go ahead and get ready over here and and will actually just we’ll get going we’ll we’ll play and we’ll sing a little bit as we go along here okay.
26
00:04:42.570 –> 00:04:44.820
Jason Mefford: So you probably heard this one.
27
00:04:59.940 –> 00:05:07.830
Jason Mefford: here’s a little song and Bobby mcferrin the road, I want to sing a note for note don’t worry.
28
00:05:10.710 –> 00:05:12.090
Jason Mefford: be happy.
29
00:05:15.570 –> 00:05:21.540
Jason Mefford: Every life we have some trouble when you were a kid.
30
00:05:26.940 –> 00:05:27.750
Jason Mefford: happy.
31
00:05:48.210 –> 00:05:49.950
Jason Mefford: Please do.
32
00:05:51.600 –> 00:05:55.650
Jason Mefford: Somebody came in your bed, but don’t worry.
33
00:05:59.070 –> 00:05:59.880
Jason Mefford: happy.
34
00:06:03.060 –> 00:06:06.330
Jason Mefford: And load say yo man to play.
35
00:06:07.470 –> 00:06:07.890
Jason Mefford: My.
36
00:06:09.720 –> 00:06:11.520
Jason Mefford: game, but don’t worry.
37
00:06:14.460 –> 00:06:15.720
Jason Mefford: be happy.
38
00:06:17.580 –> 00:06:18.270
Jason Mefford: i’m happy.
39
00:06:34.980 –> 00:06:37.830
Jason Mefford: got the cash in cash flow style.
40
00:06:38.880 –> 00:06:42.750
Jason Mefford: God no Gal to make me smile don’t worry.
41
00:06:45.900 –> 00:06:47.730
Jason Mefford: be happy.
42
00:06:52.020 –> 00:06:56.310
Jason Mefford: Okay, so just a little bit of the song, but again, you know you can’t listen to that song.
43
00:06:57.420 –> 00:07:05.790
Jason Mefford: But not actually put a little smile on your face, you know and and I think again, you know, sometimes we take life too seriously.
44
00:07:06.270 –> 00:07:11.820
Jason Mefford: And, and we really freak out right, and you know, in the in the song, you know things about.
45
00:07:12.300 –> 00:07:18.390
Jason Mefford: You know don’t have any money the landlord says that he’s going to litigate you know you may have been in a situation like that, before.
46
00:07:18.810 –> 00:07:27.450
Jason Mefford: You know, at the end of the day, though everything always seems to work out, and this is what you know again the older that I have gotten The more I realized.
47
00:07:27.810 –> 00:07:39.780
Jason Mefford: everything works out just fine and things don’t kill us we make it through what seemed to be tough times if we keep calm and carry on Okay, so let me.
48
00:07:40.380 –> 00:07:47.190
Jason Mefford: Let me bring you up to speed or give you a little context as to as to why I really wanted to talk about this today to you.
49
00:07:47.850 –> 00:07:54.870
Jason Mefford: Because like I said I actually got a call from one of my friends yesterday and Just to give you a little context on the story.
50
00:07:55.290 –> 00:08:01.380
Jason Mefford: So you can kind of understand you know what’s what’s going on here and why this was an issue and why i’m talking about it.
51
00:08:02.280 –> 00:08:08.730
Jason Mefford: One of my friends who actually is also an instructor they they teach courses they taught courses for many, many, many years.
52
00:08:09.330 –> 00:08:16.830
Jason Mefford: And you know a lot of times when you when you build a course when you give a speech you’re usually referring to where you’ve done a bunch of research.
53
00:08:17.310 –> 00:08:29.250
Jason Mefford: And so you know typically again, we will cite who we have who we’ve you know done the research with if there’s certain quotes or other things like that then we’ll attribute those to those people.
54
00:08:30.210 –> 00:08:39.300
Jason Mefford: And what ended up happening was you know and again this person has been doing this for years has hundreds of courses that are out there and speeches and other stuff.
55
00:08:40.020 –> 00:08:51.540
Jason Mefford: But, for some reason somebody decided to be mean and and sent some emails of you know they found that there were three sentences in this one particular course that were not.
56
00:08:52.020 –> 00:09:05.340
Jason Mefford: Particularly attributed to a some source, and so the person was going off on my friend, about how unethical and and bad they were you know really trying to shame that person.
57
00:09:05.820 –> 00:09:17.880
Jason Mefford: And again, you know for somebody who’s really trying to do the right thing and feels like they’re a good person when somebody attacks you like that it can obviously trigger you right so.
58
00:09:18.270 –> 00:09:25.290
Jason Mefford: So this person was calling me and saying okay Jason here’s the facts, what do I do i’m really scared about what could happen.
59
00:09:25.830 –> 00:09:34.380
Jason Mefford: Right, because in that space, again, I mean all of a sudden, you start thinking oh my gosh people are going to sue me i’m going to lose all this money blah blah blah blah blah right.
60
00:09:34.860 –> 00:09:48.060
Jason Mefford: And all of a sudden right, it can start spinning out of control, in fact I got about five messages probably from this person within about an hour like hey I need to talk to you right away okay.
61
00:09:49.110 –> 00:09:59.550
Jason Mefford: So I call them talk to them, you know we talked about the about the the item and, as far as I could tell probably not a big deal right there was somebody who was just having a bad day.
62
00:10:00.000 –> 00:10:10.230
Jason Mefford: That decided to be mean to my friend and say some really hurtful and mean things in the email, so I didn’t see it as that big of a deal now again my friend.
63
00:10:10.560 –> 00:10:20.880
Jason Mefford: she’s you know this person is trying to do the right thing Okay, and so you know again trained and risk management trained and trying to respond to some of these things.
64
00:10:21.300 –> 00:10:31.890
Jason Mefford: And so, my friend, all of a sudden just starts going ballistic thinking wise right and just starts jumping in and overthinking about this whole thing and trying to scenario plan.
65
00:10:32.340 –> 00:10:39.540
Jason Mefford: about all of the different things that might go wrong or how how how this my friend might be impacted from it okay.
66
00:10:40.620 –> 00:10:40.920
Jason Mefford: Now.
67
00:10:42.180 –> 00:10:49.590
Jason Mefford: i’m going to fast forward a little bit because, again, I had the conversation with my friend and said look I really don’t think it’s that big a deal I wouldn’t worry too much about it.
68
00:10:50.250 –> 00:10:55.350
Jason Mefford: Now, unfortunately, my friend didn’t take my advice right a lot of people don’t take my advice that’s fine.
69
00:10:55.740 –> 00:11:05.280
Jason Mefford: Listen to the podcast you can take my advice you don’t have to take my advice it’s entirely up to you right, you have free will, you can choose to do what you want to do.
70
00:11:05.970 –> 00:11:15.240
Jason Mefford: But I talked to my friend again today, so you know 24 it was technically probably like 28 hours had had transpired, since I talked to my friend.
71
00:11:16.620 –> 00:11:23.040
Jason Mefford: and come to find out that you know, during during the day, my friend it ended up staying up very late until two or three in the morning.
72
00:11:23.430 –> 00:11:36.510
Jason Mefford: Trying to go back through all of the different courses that they had you know talking to attorneys talking to other people freaking the Fuck out okay like literally freaking the Fuck out.
73
00:11:36.990 –> 00:11:48.330
Jason Mefford: So much so that my friend forgot to eat or stay hydrated during the day and so last night, my friend passed out right.
74
00:11:48.870 –> 00:12:10.770
Jason Mefford: Because you know again my friend wasn’t taking care of themselves instead was so worried and got so wound up about what appeared right that they were really anxious about this thing that was going to be this really big deal and, at the end of the day, it’s not right, I mean again.
75
00:12:11.880 –> 00:12:20.760
Jason Mefford: The advice from a the advice from the attorneys from other people not really a big deal, but you know again.
76
00:12:21.270 –> 00:12:27.150
Jason Mefford: My friend is very risk averse wanting to you know, make sure that they’re always seen as doing the right thing.
77
00:12:27.660 –> 00:12:39.750
Jason Mefford: And so, still has this whole action plan now Why am I talking to you about this, because how many times in your life have you done something very similar right, in fact, we have some you know.
78
00:12:40.200 –> 00:12:49.590
Jason Mefford: family members in my family right now that are having some health issues and again it’s very easy right for people in my own family as well.
79
00:12:49.950 –> 00:13:00.630
Jason Mefford: To get very anxious about things that you don’t know if they will ever happen right and the problem is, you know, again, we think that we’re doing a good thing.
80
00:13:00.990 –> 00:13:17.010
Jason Mefford: By trying to prepare by trying to think this through, but we end up spending a tremendous amount of energy and end up finding ourselves in a Funk finding ourselves kind of depressed or feeling flat.
81
00:13:18.390 –> 00:13:29.670
Jason Mefford: Instead of just doing what Bobby mcferrin says, you know of don’t worry be happy, of the British campaign keep calm and carry on.
82
00:13:30.150 –> 00:13:38.190
Jason Mefford: Because again what I will tell you is having lived as long as I have so far Okay, and I still got a long ways to go in my life.
83
00:13:38.790 –> 00:13:51.600
Jason Mefford: But most of the things that I have freaked out about never came to pass Okay, a lot of the time and energy and anxiety and everything else that I felt.
84
00:13:52.200 –> 00:14:06.420
Jason Mefford: from some of these things never amounted to anything okay so here’s kind of the tip that I want to leave with you and kind of share today, something that i’ve been doing and something that would probably serve you well as well.
85
00:14:07.710 –> 00:14:09.000
Jason Mefford: When these things come up.
86
00:14:10.260 –> 00:14:25.080
Jason Mefford: is to first really figure out is it a really big deal, most of the time and i’m I would say, probably 99.9% of the time when we are fearful or have anxious thoughts about something.
87
00:14:25.920 –> 00:14:36.450
Jason Mefford: We don’t have to do anything we don’t have to do anything, and it will pass okay so as an example.
88
00:14:37.200 –> 00:14:46.440
Jason Mefford: Today, and this is something that i’ve been doing for a while, so if you ever email me and I don’t get back to you for a day or two well hey i’m busy.
89
00:14:46.980 –> 00:14:55.080
Jason Mefford: But there also might be another reason as well, right, so one of the things that I do in my life is, for example, if I read an email.
90
00:14:55.710 –> 00:15:04.470
Jason Mefford: And that email triggers me or it’s somebody, on the other, line that is is all my gosh you know i’m drowning and need deep water.
91
00:15:05.340 –> 00:15:14.070
Jason Mefford: What my modus operandi is I ignore it and it’s not because i’m ignoring the person.
92
00:15:14.610 –> 00:15:24.210
Jason Mefford: But because what again what i’ve taught you before told you already is most of the time these things will take care of themselves.
93
00:15:24.720 –> 00:15:31.440
Jason Mefford: In fact I don’t know how many times, you know again that i’ve done this because I don’t want to waste a bunch of my time or my energy.
94
00:15:31.920 –> 00:15:41.190
Jason Mefford: on things that really probably aren’t a big deal, and so, in fact, what will happen often is again, I will get these frantic emails from somebody.
95
00:15:41.910 –> 00:15:47.310
Jason Mefford: or frantic calls from people that I ignore for a few hours or maybe a day.
96
00:15:48.000 –> 00:16:04.620
Jason Mefford: And Sure enough, before I even respond back to them, the problem has already been fixed Okay, so I didn’t have to worry about spending that time or energy on something that probably wasn’t a big deal anyway.
97
00:16:05.040 –> 00:16:13.920
Jason Mefford: In fact, this morning, again I wake up i’m looking at my emails a little before eight o’clock I tend to not like to start work until about nine.
98
00:16:14.370 –> 00:16:21.150
Jason Mefford: And I get an email from somebody that triggers me a little bit you know and again it’s it’s because they’re kind of.
99
00:16:22.110 –> 00:16:32.250
Jason Mefford: You know, making a bigger deal out of something that really probably wasn’t a big deal now again my first gut reaction is oh my gosh I gotta respond back to that right.
100
00:16:32.880 –> 00:16:38.820
Jason Mefford: But again i’ve trained myself to realize that you know what most of the time these things will take care of themselves.
101
00:16:39.330 –> 00:16:47.100
Jason Mefford: So I didn’t respond back you know I saw that the message was there I did the couple of things that I needed to do first thing in the morning.
102
00:16:47.430 –> 00:16:52.320
Jason Mefford: About two or three hours later, was going to go back and respond to this person’s email.
103
00:16:53.010 –> 00:17:00.990
Jason Mefford: Go back into my email sure enough what happened in the meantime, the person had pretty much answered their question already okay.
104
00:17:01.410 –> 00:17:15.120
Jason Mefford: So again, most of the time these things will actually take care of themselves and, as I told you, before you know a lot of times when we when we try to jump in when we try to.
105
00:17:15.960 –> 00:17:29.250
Jason Mefford: You know, stop gap use whatever word you want right that we’re jumping in and we’re trying to fix something most of the time, are trying to fix something actually makes it.
106
00:17:29.730 –> 00:17:42.210
Jason Mefford: Worse Okay, so not only do we go through all of the stress and anxiety, but often we end up making it worse because we cause confusion and everything else that goes on, with life.
107
00:17:42.960 –> 00:17:55.500
Jason Mefford: The other thing is that we don’t serve people well if we are always there to catch them when they fall because a lot of times, people need to experience and go through things on their own.
108
00:17:56.160 –> 00:18:07.320
Jason Mefford: We don’t have to fix their problems it’s their life, they should be fixing their own problems as well right now again i’m not saying, not to be helpful to people.
109
00:18:07.680 –> 00:18:22.080
Jason Mefford: But sometimes the kind thing to do is to stand by and watch someone go through a situation they need to go through to learn what they need to learn okay.
110
00:18:22.650 –> 00:18:33.870
Jason Mefford: And it also means again we don’t need to you know jump into their ship either okay pardon my French, but I don’t pardon my French here, in fact I don’t even speak French, but whatever.
111
00:18:34.920 –> 00:18:46.320
Jason Mefford: OK so again the whole idea folks is this idea of keeping calm and carry on or as Bobby mcferrin says don’t worry be happy man.
112
00:18:47.670 –> 00:18:53.340
Jason Mefford: You know, most of the time you know again i’m sure that you don’t want any more anxiety or stress in your life.
113
00:18:54.030 –> 00:19:12.780
Jason Mefford: Well, what if you chose not to allow that anxiety or stress or fear to be in your life, did you realize you actually have a choice, you have a choice to decide whether you’re going to jump in and get wet, so this is a term that I learned from the great Jim 14.
114
00:19:13.800 –> 00:19:23.520
Jason Mefford: You know, is, we can choose to jump in the water and get wet with everyone else, or we can choose to stay dry, so you know again.
115
00:19:24.060 –> 00:19:36.600
Jason Mefford: Yesterday, when I was talking to my friend, I could have chosen right to jump in and be all worried and concerned, just like my friend was but no, I chose to stay dry.
116
00:19:37.140 –> 00:19:47.730
Jason Mefford: I didn’t see it as an issue I wasn’t going to give it an extra thought I was going to help answer my friends questions, but ultimately it’s my friends path.
117
00:19:48.120 –> 00:19:55.350
Jason Mefford: that they have to go down i’m there to support, as long as I can be supportive, but again it’s really something that they have to do.
118
00:19:55.950 –> 00:20:05.910
Jason Mefford: And so again, you know, most of the time, the things that you are feeling anxious or fearful about probably if you ignore it.
119
00:20:06.450 –> 00:20:20.640
Jason Mefford: or just move on and do something else, a lot of times it’s actually going to fix itself because it’s funny how life just tends to work out exactly the way that we need it to.
120
00:20:21.240 –> 00:20:30.960
Jason Mefford: Even though sometimes we’re trying to control we’re trying to white knuckle we’re trying to hold on and make things work out exactly the way we think.
121
00:20:31.500 –> 00:20:45.690
Jason Mefford: It needs to work out, but what again I have found is most of the time when you allow life to just unfold it usually unfolds in a much better way than we could have ever even imagined.
122
00:20:46.380 –> 00:21:07.890
Jason Mefford: So with that again my friends have a great week and, again, think about just relax you know don’t worry be happy keep calm and carry on because, again, whatever is going on in your life it’s probably not going to kill you, and if you just relax everything is going to work itself out.
