Unleash Your Inner Power with Dr. Janny Chang: Recent Episodes
Janny
Welcome to Unleash Your Inner Power with Dr. Janny Chang! I am so glad to be on this journey with you. Together, we will tap into and unleash our inner power and collectively as women. In this podcast, I introduce myself and talk about my story and how I came to coaching. Managing my mind and using thoughtwork has always been a part of my life, but using practicing it on a daily basis has transformed the way I approach every aspect of my life. I talk about the methods I use - a combination of thought work, research, and storytelling - to give clients the tools to unleash the inner power. I talk a bit about anthropology here and how thought work complements this background. I want to offer the best and customized tools for you. Learn to manage your mind and the rest will follow. If you want to tap into your inner power, then join me on this journey. Let's dig in!
This is the last episode of this podcast for 2021. It's a love letter to my friends and clients and all my listeners and includes some of my favorite poems and writings from bell hooks and Mary Oliver.
In this episode, I talk about:
1) what anxiety is and how it feels in our body
2) why anxiety and worry are maladaptive, but fear is not,
and
3) how we can conquer anxiety and worry by paying attention to our thoughts and emotions.
I offer 3 brain hacks that can help with anxiety and worrying, especially with regards to the pandemic and the holiday season. One of the most creative ways is to reframe anxiety as excitement and I offer some tips for that.
"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?' Actually, who are you not to be? " - Marianne Williamson
In this episode, I talk about self sabotage and in particular, how it's tied to our fear of success and failure. How do we stop the spiral of thoughts and beliefs about our unworthiness and develop an awareness of our self-sabotaging beliefs and behavior? I talk about three major assumptions that's tied to self-sabotaging beliefs. I recommend some mental and writing exercises we can do help rewire our brains so that we stop these beliefs in their tracks and focus on a revolutionary and loving relationship with ourselves. Imagine a world where women and folks from marginalized/resilient communities shower ourselves with affirmations and unconditional love and encouragement. What a wonderful world that would be.
As the holiday season approaches and people use the buzzwords "codependency" and "enmeshment" to talk about their relationships with others, I talk all about relationships in this episode. Where does the term "codependency" come from? How do we take into consideration cultural and historical context when we talk about "codependent" relationships? In some cultures and in the historical context, being a "fixer" was valued and was the means to survival. This is similar for cultures and groups with generational trauma. I explore this discussion and provide a step-by-step plan on how you can transform triggers and any of these relationships that you have into a deeper, intimate, and more loving relationship with yourself. This will plan will help you in your journey towards healing and it will save you mental drama during the holiday season.
This week's episode is all about our nervous systems and trauma and how channeling our predator energy can move us towards healing and unleashing our inner power.
I draw from the book Call Of the Wild: How We Heal Trauma, Awaken Our Own Power and Use it for Good by Kimberly Ann Johnson.
In this episode, I talk about:
- The difference between Trauma (with a capital 't") and trauma.
- Why humans and domesticated animals have traumas, but wild animals don't
- What it means to feel unsafe in our nervous systems
- How our responses to situations can be habitual trauma responses, like over-identifying with the prey versus the predator
- How to channel the predator energy
- The difference between healthy aggression/power and force/domination
- Why it's so important to get to know our nervous systems
If you're in the nonprofit, international development, and education sectors where you experience compassion fatigue, then you understand well the topic of burnout. In this episode, I talk about what burnout look like and how it's different than just feeling tired. Using the book Burnout: The Secret to Completing the Stress Cycle" and drawing from polyvagal theory, I talk about the four trauma responses (fight or flight, freeze, and fawning), why stressors are different from stress itself, and useful and evidence-based strategies to help complete the stress cycle in order to prevent burnout.
In this episode, I talk about the different kinds of anger and when it's productive and when it holds us back.
This episode covers the following:
1) Unproductive anger - what that looks like.
2) What productive anger looks like and how anger in general affects the nervous system
3) What questions to ask when we are angry and how to process it
4) What the thoughts around anger do to our neural pathways in our brain
5) How to mindful with intention and without judgment
In this episode, we talk about the science behind neuroplasticity - how scientists have found that the brain is mutable and that our thoughts have the power to rewire our brain.
What does this look like for us as women and/or members of marginalized groups who have told ourselves thoughts and stories that are limiting and negative?
I break it down for you with some amazing garden metaphors and some tips:
- What visualization can do for you
- How to be more attuned with our feelings and flirt with our negative feelings, but not let them stay
- How we can shift our attention when we have these negative thoughts about ourselves
- The key questions to ask ourselves so that we're consciously selecting and cultivating those thoughts that we want in our brain and our sanctuary gardens
In this episode, I talk about why your brain is a liar when it comes to thoughts you have about yourself. It's conditioned to find evidence for negative thoughts or beliefs because it wants you to stay stagnant and not take any risks. But as the Field of Dreams goes, if you believe it, the results will come. Take the leap to believe in yourself, and your brain will look for evidence of this new thought.
I also talk about what happens when you think the past holds you back. Maybe you think of yourself as a different person or you have friends and family who are attached to a certain thought about you - a thought that you are trying to change. The past has no bearing on your present or future. The past is over. I look at how we can trick the brain to focus on your present and future self.
Then, I talk about the importance of ritual in helping to part ways with old thoughts and strengthen new ones. I use the Lohorung people from Nepal as an example of why rituals are so powerful and effective in bringing new thoughts to the fore and helping you step into your own power.
In this episode, we explore what it means to be an emotional adult and how being in emotional childhood holds us back.
For activists and academics, we look at how managing our mind and leaning into emotional adulthood actually helps us tackle social justice issues and energizes us to go change the world around us. I look at codependent behaviors that keep us in emotional childhood and how these behaviors prevent us from having healthy and loving relationships with ourselves and others.
I give practical tips, questions, and exercises you can do to lean into emotional adulthood when you find yourself in a strained relationship with someone.
In this episode, I talk about procrastination as a thought and emotion management issue, rather than a time management issue.
I explore why people procrastinate and all the various reasons.
I also provide tips that will help the different types of procrastinators, including writing down our thoughts and feelings, understanding which thoughts are causing us to procrastinate, and using our personal mission statement and future selves to help us complete tasks.
In this episode, I talk about shame, what it feels like, how it's normal to feel shame, and why shame is especially harmful to women and folks in marginalized communities. Do you find yourself making yourself smaller because you don't want to make people around you uncomfortable for taking the spotlight? As folks of color, we've been taught our whole lives that we aren't enough and don't measure up to the mainstream. So that's why it's even more imperative for us to combat shame and to take back the spotlight. Shine and shine brightly. I offer some antidotes to shame, including getting pissed and fierce AF (in Beyonce fashion), changing our thoughts about shame and ourselves, and giving ourselves extra doses of love and compassion.
In this episode, we examine what it means to have regret and the other underlying emotions of regret. I use the story on which the movie Arrival is based ("The Story of Your Life" by Ted Chiang) to reframe our perceptions and feelings of regret. It's possible to accept regret as just a part of our journey and our story without giving weight to it. I also talk about using storytelling and writing in the third person to work through our interpretations of the past, present, and future. Memories are just thoughts and stories selected and assembled by our brain. So, we get to decide how we want to tell the story of our past and how much meaning we want to give to moments and feelings of regret.
In this episode, I talk about how perfectionism, judgment, and fear are holding you back from pursuing your dreams and becoming who you're meant to be. Perfectionism is for scared people. What would you do if you weren't scared? What would you do if you knew that you'd have your own back no matter what? I talk about some antidotes to perfectionism and why doing B minus work, which is encouraged by Master Coach Brooke Castillo, actually frees us from perfectionistic thinking and allows us to fail, learn, and grow.
In this episode, I talk about how doing thoughtwork and learning to manage your mind will improve our relationship with others and yourself. I talk about how thoughtwork always brings the power of control back to you and your own decisions. It's fundamental to unleashing and harnessing our inner power. With thoughtwork, your relationship with yourself is also improved because that love is easily accessible. Just as other people cannot control your thoughts and feelings, they also aren't the only way for you to feel love for ourself. You can love yourself and generate that feeling now. Check out how.
Welcome to the first episode of Unleash Your Inner Power Podcast!
In this episode, I tell you my story, my journey, and how I arrived at life coaching. I talk a bit about what thought work is and how it's closely aligned to Buddhism and Eastern thought. I also talk about how it complements my the field of anthropology and social science theories. Ultimately, it's a transformative tool that will help change women's lives.