The Bully Food Challenge

When it comes to explaining yourself, less is always more, especially when it comes to a bully or any of their lackeys. Here’s why: First of all, explaining is weak. It gives power over to another. Explaining isn’t all it’s cracked up to be: It’s showing you have integrity at the very last minute instead of when you could have done the right thing. Either you knew what was right and failed to do i...

To make this point simple remember this: Words can mislead, but the body never lies. This applies to everything from a person’s body language to what they choose to do or not do. What a person does says more about them and speaks more about their feelings and intentions than anything they say. A person can say they want to help, but if they don’t do anything helpful or attempt to help, then they d...

When is it best to do nothing? In response to a bully, almost always is the answer, but let’s get more specific in today’s episode. Any time you feel compelled to fix, change, or make it better with the bully, stop right there because you are handing out the bully snacks in that moment. Notice whenever you feel like you MUST do something about the bully. Get good at noticing this impulse, so you c...

It’s amusing to be strategic and do things nobody expects. Helping your enemy strengthens your personal standards by putting them to the test. If you can be kind to a bully, you can be kind to anyone. Helping your enemy also diminishes your self-importance and humbles you. For a minute your ego will kick and scream as you help the bully, but then it will relax, and the better part of you will win!...

Saying "so what" is a wonderful way to respond to an unpleasant person, who you have no energy for, and the bully surely fits that description. “So what?!” Is a slightly annoying and possibly antagonistic thing to say, so definitely don’t say it to someone you want to get along with, unless you’re joking. It’s fairly mild toward a bully, but it could push a someone who is a potential safety threat...

When it comes to putting yourself first, we’ve got two parts to consider. Coming first and going first. Coming first (in your own mind) means choosing yourself. It comes from a place inside us. We commit to meet our own needs as much as possible. It is to prioritize yourself-your own goals, preferences, feelings, opportunities, options, and interests. Coming first ensures you know your own path. I...

Speak their language. There’s a difference between bullying them back (fight) and showing them you speak their language (acceptance—you’ll mirror them, match them, be like them). The first is retaliation, which is weak and potentially dangerous. Speaking their language isn’t about becoming a bully, it’s showing the bully you know how to play their game and that you’ve got their number. The first i...

Have you ever heard the advice to just drop it or let it go? I’ve talked about Dr Claire Weekes before. She was an important pioneering doctor in the field of anxiety recovery. She said anyone could recover from disordered anxiety, excessive nervousness or panic attacks with four simple (but not always easy steps): Face, accept, float and let time pass. It’s clear to me that these are the for anti...

Not always meeting others’ standards doesn’t mean having low standards or no standards at all. No! What you must do is create and live by your own standards. We’ll look at what stops people from setting high standards, why standards raise your status and how to set them. People value what they invest in, and to value yourself you must invest in high standards you set. Setting high personal standar...

Bully food behaviors don’t always lead to bullying, but they always limit friendship. Bully food is any behavior, thought, feeling, or belief that feeds into the cycle of bullying on your end. The list is long, and it includes: worrying, fearing, trying to impress or please, be perfect, obey the bully, avoid them, it’s thinking things like I’m not good enough or I’m so pathetic I deserve this, and...

The voice is the running inner monologue  and/or stream of images you hear and see inside your mind. You might believe that voice is you, many people do. It’s actually just part of your mental processing. Your brain thinks to make sense of things, figure them out and solve problems. When thoughts become so automatic they appear to run beyond your conscious control, they turn into a thought st...

My favorite question to ask myself before I face something stressful is What would this be like if it was easy? Questions like the one above are designed to make you stop listening to the voice in your head, and focus on your inner knowing or gut feeling instead? Many experts in the world of helping others or self-help, encourage people to ask themselves questions that move focus away from the voi...

Zoom in on one behavior to reverse in the name of relaxing your stress response The key here is to take it easier than you have been. Often times when we feel anxious or overwhelmed, we start to rush. We rush as we walk from place to place, we race through assignments and tasks, we get impatient in conversations with others, rapidly tapping our toes This is part of the threat response of flight: w...

This episode is about two paths: yours and theirs. When you react, you’re going down their path. When you respond, you are walking them down yours. Stop reacting to them! It’s obvious you don’t want to go down their path anymore, but you do it out of the habit of reacting to them, and that’s only one of many problems your reactions cause: Weak Low value Bully food Your reality isn’t clear You have...

Overcompensation: Anyone’s impulse to a large painful problem is to solve it as quickly as possible. When we are convinced by our stress and anxiety we solve problems through our fear response. It makes sense we want to go to extremes and even overcompensate to resolve our problems, but it’s a mistake to do so using the threat response if the problem isn’t an actual grizzly bear. I’m not ask for y...

Bullies are masters of activating stress and anxiety in their victims. They do this by getting you to engage your own stress and fear responses FFFF. Today we’ll dig deep into that…how they get you to work yourself into a frenzy of stress and fear. FIGHT: Most people think of the fight fear response as actual physical fighting, but the vast majority of the time fighting comes out as resistance, re...

First let’s look at typical advice people give about dealing with bullies. It’s great to know how to reframe advice to make it work for you. Here’s how you’ll be advised to do by a simple internet search: Tell a trusted adult. ... Ignore the bully and walk away. ... Walk tall and hold your head high. ... Don't get physical. ... Try to talk to the bully. ... Practice confidence. ... Talk about it....

Body Scan Meditation: Many of us are on vacation and celebrating holidays, so this is a perfect time for rest and relaxation. We’re doing this meditation today, so you can learn to relax into a stronger connection with yourself. Over the past few episodes I’ve stressed the importance of self-acceptance to to point of letting go of what others say and do, and being able to laugh them off by laughin...

Popularity is how well you relate to others. Coolness is how well you relate to yourself. You can be one or the other, you can be both, or you can be neither. Coolness and popularity are not guarantees against bullying, but they add layers of protection that drive bullies away, which are available to you. Namely positive self image and an open attitude toward others. Additionally popularity and co...

Never Nice, Always Kind is a bully food principle. If you’re a people pleaser, or you’re a little too nice, listen up! Kindness and niceness can both be friendly, but they differ in depth. Kindness is friendly consideration, niceness is friendly pleasantness. Niceness can keep someone stuck in an illusion, and kindness sets them free. The other signal niceness sends is you think others can’t make...

Mocking is the best alternative to assuming they’re kidding because it’s a playful way of being judgmental and showing disapproval. If you can’t assume they’re kidding because they aren’t being funny at all, you have to use judgement instead. I told you that in the last episode. When you can’t laugh, you have to judge, and the form of judgement that requires the least amount of effort is mocking....

People don't realize how much their comments affect you because they really aren’t too concerned over you. They are far too busy thinking about themselves. People are worried about what others think of them. They have no clear idea about how you feel because they aren’t you. So when they say or do something that stings, they have little to no idea how much it actually gets to you…unless you show t...

Assume They’re Kidding: Teasing vs taunting Teasing and taunting are two very different things, and in this episode I’ll teach you how to tell the difference between them and how to handle both…luckily for you it’s the same strategy. This is a multi layered lesson. To tell the difference between teasing and taunting and turn taunting around, first I’d like you to understand the importance of emoti...

Two Kinds of Predictable: predictably weak or predictably strong. Either one will eventually send the bully packing, because bullies cannot stand being bored for long, but strength is by far the better path. It’s not only faster but you also get to keep your dignity. So, if your choice is between predictably strong or weak, the obvious choice is strong, right? Why do so many people choose weakness...

We’ve touched on the Fight Flight Freeze Fawn or Flock response before-Today we’re going to really dig in to understand it better. It’s the body’s response to a perceived threat. FFFF is our threat response. Both the sympathetic (or stress and the parasympathetic (or calm down) responses are involved. Sometimes your body and mind will go into high gear in the face of a threat. You’ll feel adrenali...