40. Other People’s Baggage

0:00 Hey, what’s up everyone, it’s Jenny, the LDS mission coach and you are listening to the LDS mission Podcast, episode number 40 other people’s baggage. I’m Jenny, the LDS mission coach. And whether you’re preparing to serve a mission, currently serving a returned missionary or a missionary mama like me, I created this podcast just for you. Are you searching for epic confidence? Ready to love yourself and to learn the how of doing hard things? Then let’s go. I will help you step powerfully into your potential and never question your purpose. Again. It’s time to embrace yourself. Embrace your mission. Embrace your life, and embrace what’s next. Hey, everyone, and welcome to the podcast. Thank you so much for hanging out with me today. I love getting on here and being able to talk about all the things to do with getting our missionaries prepared to go out serve, to have their own backs create epic confidence is just so needed right now. Am I right? I also have been thinking a lot about our return missionaries, who I have seen some missionaries come home and really struggle. It just shouldn’t have to be that hard. And I hope that the tools that I’m teaching you here will help you navigate that post mission. Part of your experience more easily as well. Um, so we are into spring break. The second weekend of spring break, we are headed to Utah to visit my family there. We all grew up in Seattle, actually in a town called P wallop. I went to Rogers High School, actually, Rogers rams. And so we used to drive up there for spring break, to visit my parents who lived up there, my dad was a dentist up there. And when my dad retired from dentistry, they actually ended up moving to Draper, Utah. And it actually ends up that both my sisters live there too. So not gonna lie, I have a little bit of FOMO. But we try to get to Utah and visit as often as possible. I also, you know, periodically, we’ll be there for an event and stuff like that. So that’s always fun. Plus, now we’ve got our older kids there are married son and our her other son, that’s BYU. So as often as possible, we like to go visit and say hello. So we’re gonna do that the second weekend of spring break. I wanted to say that I hope you guys are loving this podcast, I hope that you are getting something out of it. I hope that you’re sharing it. I did find out just recently that my podcasts will get more views and more people will see it, the more people that rate the podcast and give me a little review. So if this podcast is helping you, I would so appreciate it. If you went to Apple podcasts and gave me a review. I really do just want to get this podcast out to more missionaries more missionaries before they leave more missionaries when they come home. And actually you can listen to this podcast right on Facebook. I don’t know if I’ve ever talked about that on here. But you can listen to this podcast right on Facebook. So many missionaries are listening to it, you can listen to it on my Facebook page. So that’s really cool, too. So if you could just leave me a little review, that would be amazing. I would love it so much so we can help more missionaries. Today we’re gonna be talking about other people’s baggage. And I’m sure this sounds kind of funny, because we’re like, oh, that person has so much baggage. And I don’t want us to think of it in a negative connotation. What I actually want us to do is I want to go back to an analogy that I described in episode nine I think it was so you should totally go back and listen to episode nine three parts to a relationship. That episode will change your relationship with your companion with your parents, with your boyfriend or girlfriend. Super important concepts about relationships but in there I talk about an analogy that often people have opinions or often opinions about us that aren’t necessarily useful opinions.

4:55 Sometimes, our trainers or our Our leaders or our friends, or our roommates, they think they know better. And so they go ahead, and they offer us a thought. Now, maybe before you started listening to this podcast, you might have thought that you just had to believe your brain. But hopefully, you know better you know that you are not your thoughts, your brain offers you thoughts, and then you get to decide if you want to believe those thoughts or not. So the analogy I like to use is the idea of a baggage claim. So, I was actually just, we were just recently watching some family videos, and my son, who’s a junior in high school, he’s always since he was young, been really obsessed with flying, he actually wants to get his pilot’s license and go to flight school after he graduates from high school. Anyway, we were just watching a home video of him. And he, when he was younger, especially loved to be the one to get the bags off the baggage claim. And so we would just let him all five kids and my husband and I just let him get the bags because he loved it so much. But the way that I like to use this analogy is that other people’s thoughts are sort of like the suitcases or the baggage on a baggage claim. And when someone offers you a thought, you have the ability to observe the thought to kind of either make it your own thought, believe that thought, or to just let that thought go on by. This is also actually true about our own thoughts as well. Like, if we thought about our brains kind of as a that baggage claim, some of the thoughts we’re gonna like, and we’re gonna keep and some of the thoughts that we don’t, and we can just let those go on by. But you definitely don’t have to believe everything your brain tells you. You don’t have to grab everything that comes off of that baggage claim. And certainly, you do not have to grab other people’s baggage. And it is funny, we can talk about it kind of negatively, like they have baggage. But what’s true is inside of their suitcases on that baggage claim is all of their thoughts, all of their experiences, all of their feelings. And whatever thoughts they’re offering you when they’re like, Hey, do you want this suitcase? We wouldn’t want it. Unless there was something really cool in there that worked for us and that we wanted. If it was just a bunch of junk and stuff that didn’t help us or make us feel good, we’d be like, no, no, thanks. Let it go on by. And one of the examples I have for you and I might have shared this on this podcast before, but I had a mom email me. And she told me that her daughter’s companion on the mission was telling her that her efforts were not acceptable before God. Now, regardless of how that missionary daughter was showing up, her companions comment her thought was her companions thought. But what was happening is that baggage was coming around the Companions baggage was coming around. And the missionary daughter was like, okay, yeah, that sounds good. I think I’ll pick that one up. Now you guys remember what causes our feelings? Our thoughts? How do you think this missionary sister missionary felt when she thought oh, she must be right. My efforts are not pleasing before God. Of course, she felt terrible. When she what she didn’t realize is she had the ability to let her companion even think that that was about her. That’s her baggage going around and she didn’t have to pick it up at all. You don’t have to believe any of the thoughts your brain gives you. But please certainly don’t believe any of the thoughts that someone else gives you if they don’t serve you. So how do we know if they serve us or not? One of the things I want to offer to you is this idea of creating a filter. We could sort of like picture at like a maybe an x ray machine of that baggage or something like that, like it’s going through security. And before you pick it up, we want to ask ourselves a couple questions.

9:54 Is this true? Is this a true thought? My suggestion Friends is any thought that doesn’t make you feel good doesn’t have to be true. Really, really, if someone offers you a thought, like, you’re not good at math, or you can’t sing, or your efforts are acceptable before God, we can just decide that’s not true. If they’re offering you thoughts like, oh my gosh, you’re an amazing human. I love how you serve people. Let’s decide those thoughts are true. Let’s make those thoughts, our own thoughts. Let’s pick up those bags and take them home with us and make them our own. This sentence actually friends that their brains offered, the thought that their brains offered them is not actually the truth about what is actually happening. people’s thoughts come from their experience from their baggage. They see their mission, they see their life through a certain lens that Dave created. And so actually, people can be wrong. You don’t have to believe your brain. And you don’t have to believe their brain, either. The second question I want you to ask yourself is does this thought serve me? How do we know if a thought serves us or not? This is how I figure it out. Right? Thoughts create feelings. And if I think that thought like, I really sit with that thought, and it creates an emotion that I like to create thought, it serves me, it keeps me going in the direction I want to go. But if it doesn’t, if it creates emotions that I don’t like, I don’t pick it up. It’s not a thought that serves me and gets me going in the direction that I want to go. Here’s what’s true friends, even people who seem like they should know, like your sister training leader, right? Or your zone leader. They don’t always know. Again, their thoughts are skewed or changed or viewed through a certain lens, and it’s entirely okay. If someone says Your efforts are not acceptable before God for you to say, You’re wrong. That’s not true. And this brings me to a couple of thoughts that you can use to combat other people’s thoughts, other people’s baggage. Tell yourself right off the bat, like oh, so interesting. They think that way. They’re just wrong. The other thing I sometimes tell myself is, you know, what? You don’t understand. And that’s okay. I had one missionary I was talking to who said that the zone leader was just like so harping on goals, and really kind of bringing them down if they weren’t meeting their goals and all of this. And I was just like, Yeah, but can’t we just like final little compassion for him? Like, he doesn’t understand how to do it any different. And that’s okay. We don’t need him to understand and we don’t need other people to understand. As long as you understand you. I had this experience, my second son served a mission in Australia for seven months before COVID. Then he came home for five months, and then he ended up serving in New Hampshire. And so that was a really hard and challenging, very challenging experience heart going out to all of the missionaries who have served during COVID in any way, shape, or form. But I remember talking to someone from my stake around the time that he was coming home from his mission. And he just said something like, it’s just so sad that he’s not having the mission that he was supposed to have. And I just I didn’t say this to that person. But in my mind, I was like, You know what, he’s wrong. And it’s okay, that he doesn’t understand.

14:37 It’s okay that he doesn’t understand that maybe this is the exact point of his mission. Maybe my son is learning the exact things that he needs to learn. And I took that person’s bag I saw it go by on the baggage claim. And I thought to myself the two questions like Is this even true? Is it true that he’s not having the experience? Is it true that he got gypped? Somehow? And I decided, no, it’s not true that we kind of stink if we just decided that he was gypped. Because as long as we think that we’re gypped, then we just keep finding reasons to believe that we’re gypped. What I kind of chose to believe is it was the exact experience he was supposed to have. Here’s the other thing. Does this thought serve me? Or did it serve him to think that he got the short end of the stick? No. How do you feel when you think I got the short end of the stick? Press straighted kind of puts you in a little bit of a victim mode even not useful to think of it that way. To think I got gypped or I got the short end of the stick or my mission wasn’t the way it was supposed to be. And so we just had faith, and we kept thinking this is exactly how it’s supposed to be. I just let that bag roll on by on the baggage claim. I thought of one more analogy that I want to share with you on this with other people’s baggage and not having to adopt their story. For whatever reason, I started thinking about the one time when I was walking in the parking lot, and I accidentally got into the wrong minivan. I don’t know how much I’ve talked about it on here, but I drive a white minivan. My kids are far too old to need a minivan. But I just love the minivan it has the best sound, it has the best heated seats, it has the best room for luggage for our trips to Utah, all of that. So I got into the wrong van. And immediately I knew that it was the wrong vent. It didn’t feel right. My stuff wasn’t there. My water bottle wasn’t there. My sunglasses weren’t there. And you can have this same experience to when someone offers you a thought that doesn’t feel like a true story to you. It’s like Oh, whoops, this isn’t No, that doesn’t feel right. And you get out of the van. When when you get into the wrong van. Are you ever like, Oh, hey, I think this feels really strange. It actually might be a criminal offence if I stay here, but I think I will. Of course not. It’s like this is their this is their story. This is their van I’m out. We actually one time when we were driving to Utah, also stopped in Burleigh, which is usually where we stopped to get gas. And also at the dollar store and at the Maverick, okay, to get snacks or whatever. Anyway, we all of a sudden we were kind of pulled off. Everyone had gone to the bathroom, we got the gas, we kind of pulled off to the side and waiting for a couple other people to come out of the bathroom. And a random, probably like 1817 year old girl climbed into our van. And I was like, Oh, hey, Shannon, all of a sudden, she realized she was in the wrong fan. And she felt super embarrassed and super uncomfortable. But again, she didn’t just stay in like buy into, like, Oh, I like this story better. Let’s just stay here. She knew that it wasn’t right. And it didn’t feel comfortable. So she got out. You don’t need to step into their story. Their thoughts are all about their story they have about life. And we don’t need to even expect other people to step into our story. It’s totally fine that that guy didn’t understand the way that my son and I saw his mission is totally fine. He didn’t understand. And it’s okay. Listen, even when people tell us, this is how you should think about this. I don’t care if it’s your parents, I don’t care if it’s your siblings. I don’t care if it’s your companion. Even when people tell us, this is how you should think about it. You don’t have to think about it that way. I want you to test it.

18:58 I want you to filter it. I want you to ask yourself, how does it make me feel when I think about myself or I think about this situation in this way. A missionary I was talking to was telling me that she was getting ready for a baptism and her and companion had like, done all the things and gotten all the stuff and gotten the paperwork and talked to all the people that they needed to and they showed up at the church ready and early to you know, get stuff set up and they there was a member that met them there. And the member was just kind of came at them and was kind of saying that they’d done it wrong and they should about the paperwork. Even though the paperwork it was home was at home and it wasn’t even like a person, like the mission leader or anything or even a member of the bishopric it was just some random member that thought he was his job to tell them that they’ve done it wrong. And she told me I just felt so sad. I felt attacked and I said you know what? He was just wrong. It’s okay. A and we don’t need him to understand. I said next time just test it, filter it, see how it makes you feel when you decide I did it wrong. What’s actually true is maybe he’s wrong is totally fine. Learn how to have your own back, you guys learn how to intentionally decide instead of just picking up every bag that comes off of the baggage claim, learn how to intentionally decide if this is one that you want to keep. Now, one thing I do want to point out is that one thought might work great for one person, that thought doesn’t necessarily have to work great for you.

20:43 So one time I was teaching at a steak mission prep course. And a person raised their hand and they said, with everything you’ve taught us here, how do you see this story of President Hinckley and his dad writing him the letter that he wrote him and just to refresh your memory, President Hinckley was called to one of the missions in England, and it was during a really challenging time around the depression. And he felt really strongly about going on a mission and knew that he wanted to be there. But when he first went to Preston, in Lancashire, he found some discouragement. You know, that’s pretty normal for missionaries to experience when they first go to a new area, new circumstances, his brain was probably kind of freaking out, like I’ve talked about in other podcasts. Anyway, President Hinckley was just really struggling and having a tough time. And the story goes like this. President Hinckley wrote home to his dad and said, I’m not doing any good here. I’m just wasting my time and your money. He said, I don’t see any point in staying here. And then his dad wrote back to him and said, Dear Gordon, I have your letter, I have only one suggestion for get yourself and go to work with love your father. So when I was teaching this mission prep class in the steak, this guy wanted to know is this thought, forget yourself and go to work, one that will work for everyone. And when I offered to him is, some people will take this thought, forget yourself and go to work, and it’ll motivate them, it’ll light a fire under them, which is exactly what President Hinckley took from that. It created a feeling of motivation, it created a feeling of excitement, it created a feeling of determination. He said that he got on his knees in that little bedroom, and made a pledge that he would try to give himself to the Lord every single day. So that sentence that thought that his dad offered him for get yourself and go to work was the exact thought that created the exact feeling he needed to take action. But what is also true and what I told that guy at the Mission prep class is that thought, forget yourself and go to work might not create the same feeling for another person. And other person when they hear that forget yourself and go to work. That might create the feeling of inadequacy, it might create the feeling of overwhelm, it might create the feeling of guilt or self loathing because they’ve had a hard time making themselves go to work. So again, we just need to always test it out and figure out if the thought creates an emotion that we like. I know that a lot of times I’ve heard that. I’ve heard missionaries tell me that. You know, they’re just preaching a lot of perfection and preaching excellence and meeting goals and all of that. And first half of the mission, that probably works great. They love thinking about it that way. They love thinking about meeting goals and being in a place of excellence. So go ahead and take that bag off of the baggage claim. If that works for you. Great if it creates motivation if it creates emotions of like, love and excitement and motivation, go for it pick up those thoughts. But I know for me, when I start telling myself I have to be perfect. And I have to read this reach this certain level of excellence. It actually shuts me down. Like I don’t want to do any of it. I get overwhelmed. And so like I said, we got to test it. Don’t just decide that everything everyone says is wrong. But try it On the thought for yourself, I kind of think of thoughts like trying on clothes. Like try it on, does that feel good to think about it that way? Keep it. If it doesn’t let the baggage roll on by. All right, you guys,

25:18 I just really want you to be empowered to not believe your brain. And for sure, don’t believe other people’s brains that their baggage just tells us about them about their own experience. And listen, once you get really good at this skill of having your own back, filtering it out, ask yourself if it’s if it’s true, and if the thought serves you, you will empower yourself so much in your life. All right, everyone have the most amazing week. It was so fun to be with you, everyone. Take care. Bye bye. Thanks so much for joining me on the podcast today. Listen, if you are learning a lot from this podcast and you like what you’re hearing, you will absolutely love hopping on a free strategy call with me. That’s where you and I meet up one on one and talk specifically about what is going on for you. I love teaching young adults the mental and emotional tools that they need to overcome worry and anxiety serve the successful missions they’ve always dreamed of and navigate their post mission experience with confidence. So go to Jennie dildine.com, and click on the work with me link. I would love to meet you. And I would love to get you some helpful tools and strategies to help you fully embrace whatever is next for you. And in the meantime, no matter which part of the mission experience you are involved in. Just know that Jenny, the LDS mission coach is thinking about you every single day