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Have you ever noticed that overwhelm shows up like an invitation?
It’s not random. It’s not circumstantial. It’s an energetic pattern — and one many professionals unknowingly accept every single day. We don’t just “end up” overwhelmed. We say yes to it. We RSVP to chaos. And then we wonder why peace feels so hard to find. But here’s the question that changes everything: 👉 Why would we even accept an invitation to feel that powerless? The Familiarity Factor Overwhelm can feel safer than peace because it’s what we’ve practiced. Calm feels foreign, but chaos? That feels like home. For many of us in business, the pace, pressure, and adrenaline have become our comfort zone. Stillness feels suspicious. We crave movement — even if it’s draining. The Validation Trap In the corporate world, I remember being everything for everyone. The go-to person. The one who could “handle anything.” And the truth? It felt good. When people said, “She’s amazing, she can do it all,” that validation felt like worthiness. But here’s the cost: we confuse being needed with being valued. And when external validation becomes our fuel, burnout becomes our lifestyle. Avoidance Disguised as Busyness Sometimes it’s easier to drown in too much than to face what truly matters. Overwhelm gives us an excuse to stay busy instead of being clear — because clarity demands choices, and choices demand courage. The Illusion of Control Ironically, overwhelm can make us feel powerful. “I’ve got this,” we tell ourselves, managing endless lists and spinning plates. But control is a clever illusion. When everything feels like too much, we’re not actually in control — we’re just too afraid to let go. The Shift: Awareness and Choice The first step to breaking free from overwhelm is to see it for what it is — an emotional invitation. You don’t have to accept it. As the infinite being that you are, you can pause, breathe, and choose differently. You can say: “No, thank you. I choose peace.” Because peace isn’t passive. It’s powerful. It’s not the absence of effort — it’s the presence of awareness. 🎥 Watch the Full Dojo Talk If this resonates with you, I invite you to watch my latest video: “Why We Accept Emotional Invitations for Overwhelm.” It’s a deep, practical conversation for professionals, leaders, and awakened women who are ready to step out of the habit of chaos and return to their natural state of calm clarity. 👉 Watch The YouTube Video Because the moment you stop accepting invitations to overwhelm… you start living as the leader your soul came here to be. Nancy Mueller ~ Life Sensei at MasteringYourBeliefs.com
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Fear has a way of creeping into our decisions, our careers, and even our dreams. Not the kind of fear that keeps you safe from walking into traffic - but the other kind. The fear that keeps you from speaking up in a meeting, launching that business, or sharing your true ideas with the world.
I call this mental fear - and it’s often stronger than the fear of actual danger. There Are Two Types of Fear: 1. Physical Fear - This is survival-based. It’s hardwired into your nervous system to keep you alive. Example: A car speeds by as you step off the curb, and your body instantly reacts. That’s your biology doing its job. Once the danger passes, the fear passes. 2. Mental Fear - This is the sneaky one. It lives in your mind and imagination. It sounds like:
Why Mental Fear Feels So Strong
This is why so many talented, powerful people feel stuck - not because of real-world danger, but because of mental fear that runs unchecked. The Path to Mastery Supreme mastery doesn’t mean eliminating fear. It means:
A Question for You... What’s one fear—mental, not physical—that has been running your life lately? And what would happen if, instead of bowing to it, you let it bow to you? 💜 This week in my dojo, we discussed a 5-Step practice to dissolve mental fear and anchor into supreme mastery. I invite you to watch the replay here Nancy Mueller ~ Life Sensei at MasteringYourBeliefs.com We’ve all been told to “leave the past in the past.”
But what most people don’t realize is that secrets don’t just sit quietly in the background — they live in the body, the mind, and the nervous system. They show up in how we walk through our day, how we make decisions, how safe we feel receiving love, money, or peace. Secrets have weight. They might be buried, but they are not gone. The Mental Toll When you carry a secret — even one you’ve never spoken out loud — you’re constantly splitting your energy. A part of you is living… and another part of you is monitoring, guarding, hiding. That mental strain leads to overthinking, anxiety, brain fog, and a constant sense of “tension” even when nothing is wrong. You may find yourself distracted, irritated, unable to stay present. It’s exhausting, and most people don’t even realize it’s connected to the very thing they’ve buried. The Physical Symptoms Secrets are not emotional only — they are physical. The nervous system stays in a low-key survival state. You might feel:
The Emotional Isolation One of the most painful effects of holding secrets is the isolation. Even when surrounded by people, you still feel alone. Because you’re still hiding. Still protecting. Still filtering your words and emotions. This creates a distance between you and the people who actually want to support you — and blocks you from receiving the love or abundance that tries to come in. What Happens When You Finally Let It Out When you finally release the secret — acknowledge it, speak it, do the inner work around it...
It's Time to Let the Attic Door Swing Open I’ve seen this happen over and over again: one session, one honest moment, and suddenly years of heaviness begin to lift. That’s why I created my Power Hour session — because sometimes you don’t need a whole program… you just need one safe space to tell the truth, make the connection, and finally drop the weight. If you’ve been carrying something that feels too heavy to hold alone — it’s time. Book a Power Hour with me In 60 minutes we will pinpoint the real source of your exhaustion or emotional pattern, connect it back to what’s been hidden, and release it. You will walk away lighter, clearer, and no longer stuck in the old story. 🔗 CLICK HERE to book your Power Hour session ($179 USD) Only 10 spots open each week. Nancy Mueller ~ Life Sensei  We talk about “doing the inner work” like it’s a checklist. Meditate. Journal. Go to therapy. Heal the inner child. Forgive. Move on.
But here’s the truth most people avoid: You can do all the inner work and still be hiding. Still playing small. Still carrying the weight of what was never yours. But most people never talk about the secrets: Secrets don’t just live in your past — they echo through your mental, physical and emotional body. Ask yourself:
Secrets Create Stuck Energy... You might think you’ve let go — But secrets shape your choices in ways you don’t even see. They show up as:
Clearing the Secrets = Reclaiming Your Power Real inner work is less about fixing and more about facing. When you clear what’s been hidden:
So I’ll Ask You Again: What does inner work really mean to you — right now, in this season of your life?
The inner work isn’t always about healing your childhood or processing trauma — sometimes it’s about telling the truth. To yourself first. Here’s a bold question: What secret are you afraid would change everything if someone knew? Secrets have power — not because they're hidden — but because they hold emotional contracts. Here are a few truth-inviting questions I’ve been asking my clients:
When you stop holding the weight of everyone else’s story... When you tell the truth to yourself without fear of what it means about you... When you let go of the “role” you were cast in… You begin to feel free. You begin to feel powerful. You begin to choose again. Have You Ever Asked Yourself: What does inner work mean to me — right now, in this season of my life?
We’re not meant to carry it all alone. We’re meant to clear the attic (that space in your mind where memories are stored and rarely looked at just like the attic in a house) and create space for something new. Until next time, remember: You are not broken. You are just buried. And the truth will always set you free. With love & awareness, Nancy Mueller ~ Life Sensei  Does the squeaky wheel REALLY get the grease or does it get replaced?
As I journey through life, I find myself thinking of the desires of my younger self: feeling safe, feeling heard, having an equal voice, having the only say about my body, being a loving mother, earning my own money, parenting with love, unapologetically putting my children first, being encouraged to pursue my hidden talents and gender equality. These desires were born from my childhood experiences of mental, verbal, and physical abuse that escalated to sexual abuse by the age of 12. As an adult, I was looking for a way to speak up and stay safe instead of going along to get along! When I decided that going along to get along, no longer worked for me, I started searching for a way to find my own inner strength. My search led me to martial arts because I believed my strength could only be found in my ability to physically protect myself. As I became a student, competitor and teacher in the martial arts and I read Gavin De Becker's book, The Gift of Fear... 'At core, men are afraid women will laugh at them, while at core, women are afraid men will kill them.' ~ Gavin De Becker The weight of this quote landed heavily on me at the time because I couldn't help but dwell on, what seemed to me, the unfairness of this statement. Certainly the fear of death is much worse than the fear of being laughed at. This did not seem like a way for men and women to honor the strength that each of us possess. As I continued searching for my own method of feeling safe, I couldn't help but feel the unfair advantage men seemed to have over women. Martial Arts taught me that the strongest weapon any of us possess is our mind. Everything begins in the mind; the mind can convince us of our strength or convince us of our weakness. It's our inner strength that allows us to be heard, seen and valued. And now, many years later, with the overturning of Roe v Wade, and the overturned verdict of Harvey Weinstein, I find myself wondering if women will once again be put in a position to prove who we are as women! Energetically, we have expanded into a much higher realm of possibilities for humankind and to put any negative energy towards what we "don't" want to happen would surely be a giant step backwards! Now, more than ever, is the time for women to come together in solidarity and instead of making our future about gender equality, let's first seek to understand. We are all part of the whole, we are all one. Each of us is the source of something for another and they are the source for us. If you need anger, someone will be the source of that anger for you. But when someone else needs anger, you can only be their source if you're choosing that emotional pattern. Let each of us take responsibility for our own inner healing and together we can create a world where decisions will be based on the most qualified. We can create a world where we honor each other's strengths instead of looking for a weakness to exploit. Let each of us take responsibility for making the other feel safe; we, each of us, can be the source of peace for each other when we stop being afraid to let go of "the way it's always been done" and work together to find a way it can be. It can be possible for men to stop fearing women and women to stop fearing men when we work together to truly hear what each of us is asking for. It can be possible for anyone to speak up and feel safe no matter what they're asking for. Ladies, we have nothing to prove! It's time to make yourself heard, even if your voice shakes. But more importantly, when we're making ourselves heard, we must remember that being heard should never be at the expense of drowning out the voice of another. When we allow every relationship to be about strength yielding to strength instead of one person believing themself to be stronger than the other, we can all stand in solidarity and create a more inclusive future for generations to come!  What is the worst thing you believe about yourself and why do you believe it's true?
You believe it's true because you've told yourself the same story so many times, you've created a belief about it. A belief is simply a thought you think over and over and over. All limiting or self-sabotaging beliefs are accompanied by painful or uncomfortable feelings. Your thoughts and beliefs cause you to feel a certain way which creates specific emotions in your body. This is known as your "State of Being. Most people have a habit of dealing with unwanted feelings by stuffing them deep down inside because they believe it's a sign of strength or the solution to problems and struggles! But it isn't! you've managed to do is shift your thoughts to the "unconscious thought portion" of your mind which is exactly what makes them so easily assessable the next When you have a habit of stuffing your feelings, all you've managed to do is focus on something else instead of facing whatever was causing the feeling in the first place. Your Beliefs and Your Feelings are The Cause and Your Current Struggle is The Effect. If you want to change the effect (your current struggle or state of being) you have to start with the cause (belief). The first step to change a limiting or self-sabotaging belief is to know what it is. What is the story you've been telling yourself over and over for as long as you can remember that reinforces your belief? Reinforcement stories usually start with statements like:
Everything is energy, including you. Your feelings are nothing more than electromagnetic charges of energy that bounce around in your body like the constant clanging of a Las Vegas slot machine being set in motion by your thoughts. Now that you know this, you can't unknow this so would now be a good time for you to start mastering your beliefs so you can stop thinking the worst about yourself and open yourself up to everything that's possible for you? Nancy Mueller ~ Life Sensei at MasteringYourBeliefs.com  What can you do when you’re 12 years old and you don’t have the ability or capability to question the rules you’re forced to live by?
What can you do when you’re in the habit of waking up every day feeling the need to escape? What can you do when your 12-year old self has lived with a succession of cruel and sadistic punishments because you’ve been led to believe “that’s what happens when you’re bad”? What can you do when your 12-year old self has lived with an abusive, angry and sadistic father so you do what you’re told instead of what makes sense? What can you do when your father forces your 12-year old self to get undressed and lie down on the bed so he can teach you something important and you’re too afraid to ignore the warning bells going off inside your mind? What can you do when your 12-year old self feels suffocated as your father’s weight is pressing down on you while you try not to choke from the smell of his cigarettes, lip balm and heated breath and you feel a whole new kind of fear because you don’t understand what you’re supposed to be learning? What can you do when your father finally climbs off of you and your 12-year old self is crying because you don’t understand this lesson and your crying only makes him angrier? What can you do when your 12-year old self is wondering what you can do to keep it from happening again? What can you do when your 12-year old self wants to talk about what happened with someone so you can understand it better, but your father has threatened you not to tell anyone? What can you do when your adult-self can’t stop thinking about the things that happened to your 12-year old self and you’re filled with anger, shame, humiliation, and confusion? What can you do? This was the question my child-self asked me for 12 years, the question my adult-self tried to ignore for 12 more years, the question it took me 12 years to stop ignoring and the question it took me another 12 years to be open to learning the answer to. One in 9 girls and 1 in 20 boys under the age of 18 experience sexual abuse or assault; more than 90% of abusers are people children know and are taught to love and trust. When your child-self doesn’t have the ability or capability to say “no”, your adult-self can be retraumatized each time you relive the memory of your experience. When that happens, our adult-self wonders, “what can you do?” When my adult-self started asking, “what can you do” my initial response was to find things my adult-self had the ability to do that my child-self did not have. This is when I got angry, wanted vengeance, wanted sympathy from others, but most of all, I wanted people to know how much I was still hurting. It hurt to think that the people who should have been there to protect me were the people I needed to be protected from and that the other adults in my life weren’t there for me, which made me even more determined for people to know how much I was still hurting. It took a while to realize that as long as I wanted people to know how much I was still hurting, I would continue to feel hurt. It took me even longer to realize that it was my inner-child, that little 12-year old girl who still lives inside me, was looking for the love she never received. I’ve learned that sometimes it takes a while for us to recognize when our inner-child is trying to get our attention. She’s crying out to us as though she’s pleading with us and saying, “please hear me, validate me, see me, know that I exist and that I am worthy of your love” which is precisely what every woman wants to experience in her life. The next time you ask yourself, “What Can I Do”, consider being open to healing your Inner Child. She’ll thank you for it in ways you never dreamed possible to bring joy, love, prosperity, abundance and happiness into everything you do! If you’re wondering how you can begin to heal your inner child, check out the free resources available at MasteringYourBeliefs.com Sensei Nancy Mueller ~ Mastering Your Beliefs  We know that all negative or limiting beliefs come from the same place that our positive beliefs come from. You never hear someone say, "I need to find a way to stop being so positive" but millions of people talk about wanting to eliminate their impostor beliefs, limiting beliefs and negative beliefs.
Keep reading if you're open to letting me share why I believe that the 3rd commandment can support you when you want to be more positive than negative! The 3rd commandment states: "You shall not take the name of the Lord God in vain" I must admit that most of my life this puzzled me because for many years, I understood it to mean you should never use the word "God" in a negative way. Google's definition backs up what most of us were taught. Google's explanation for the 3rd commandment is:
We all know that using the word "God" in a negative way happens more often than not. We also know that all positive or negative and limiting beliefs are based on something we were taught or intuited between the ages of birth to 8 years of age. So, if you are a believer of the 3rd commandment either you've NEVER used the word "God" in a negative way or you do use the word "God" in a negative way without much thought about the 3rd commandment! But what if there is a different interpretation of the 3rd commandment. What if a further understanding of this commandment could set your mind free to see yourself in a new and more empowered way? God is a word that is used to describe "all that is". A few other words that describe "all that is" are The Universe, The Creator, Jehovah, Higher Power etc., But the NAME of God is "I Am" When you use the NAME of God to interpret the 3rd commandment, you can expand your interpretation. How many times have you thought or said, "I am frustrated, I am worthless, I am wrong, I am unlovable, I am stupid, I am too busy, I am fat, I am..." By using the NAME of God instead of the word "God," the 3rd commandment takes on a more expanded understanding of why this commandment is so important! When you use the name of God in vain, you're describing who you are and what you're capable of in a negative way. When you use the name of God in a positive and loving way, you create more joy, happiness, abundance, prosperity, and good will in everything you do: "I am loveable, I am capable, I am creative, I am financially abundant, I am mentally/physically/financially/spiritually prosperous, I am bold, I am gracious, I am accountable, I am connected, I am present, I am joyful, I am responsible, I am daring, I am positive, I am selfless, I am honest, I am kind, I am original, I am respectful, I am fearless, I am smart, I am brave, I am self-aware, I am self-confident, I am self-reliant, I am determined, I am..." When you interpret the 3rd commandment this way, "You shall not take the name "I Am" in vain" are you able to see how you have the power to be and experience who you are in a more positive and powerful way? You are always more powerful than you think you are and you deserve to keep finding ways to prove it to yourself! Nancy Mueller ~ Life Sensei at MasteringYourBeliefs.com  I started cooking and baking for our family of seven when I was 8 years old and I loved to bake. My brothers loved that I loved to bake and when the holidays came around, I would bake all the traditional Christmas cookies and our Italian favorites that were handed down from our grandmother!
When I got married and moved into my own home, my cookie baking continued and because my brothers would eat them as fast as I made them, I would make dozens and dozens of cookies! I shared them with friends, family, neighbors and took them to holiday gatherings. One year a neighbor woman asked me a question that threw me out of my holiday orbit, she said, "Your cookies are really good, better than any cookies you can buy in a store. If you will consider baking extra cookies this year, I promise you that however many you make, I will sell them for you." What????? The reason her question threw me out of my orbit was because I had never considered my love for baking cookies as a marketable skill that I could make money doing. I liked the idea of having a reason to bake MORE cookies so before Thanksgiving, I bought an upright freezer to keep in the garage and I baked and froze the cookies until she was ready to start selling theme the cookies until she was ready to start selling them. After the cost of my ingredients and my upright freezer, I was amazed to see that I had made a profit. I have so many milestones in my life but I love sharing this one because it really opened my mind to the the power of going beyond my story that I was just a wife/mother/sister who baked cookies! I still love to bake but I only bake for myself and my guests. Even though I didn't open Nancy's Cookie Shoppe, it did create an expansion for my entrepreneurial journey. When I learned to Go Beyond My Story of what I was capable of, it opened a door to how much more I am capable of and that's when people and opportunities started showing up in my life. Gift yourself with the knowledge of How To Go Beyond Your Story and who knows what kind of an expansion it will create in your life! You are always more than you think you are and you deserve to keep finding ways to prove it to yourself! Nancy Mueller Life Sensei at MasteringYourBeliefs.com  Thought From Sensei Nancy: No woman can fail if another woman sees her success! When you're too close to the situation, it's easy to become doubtful or fearful but others can clearly see your success because they are not close to the situation. You're never alone as long as you have someone to reach out to!
Why do we struggle? What causes us to have a lack of faith in who we are, what we're capable of and why we're so successful? Here is a list of 10 Effects That Can Be The Source Of Struggle (in no particular order)
Effects manifest from the cause and the cause manifests from what you're thinking and what you're feeling about what you're thinking. Consider the following:
You hold all the power, believe this and your experiences of Cause and Effect will manifest differently! Nancy Mueller ~ Life Sensei at Mastering Your Beliefs P.S. Join me virtually on Thursdays at 10:00 a.m. PST at The Dojo as we explore similar conversations about our mental, physical, financial and spiritual expansion and all of the possibilities available to us! |
AuthorNancy Mueller ~ Life Sensei Archives
October 2025
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