Navigating Frustration

Summary

In this episode, Mike and Lindsay discuss their personal experiences with endurance sports, the challenges they face, and the emotional complexities of frustration. They explore the differences between internal and external frustration, coping strategies, and the impact of aging and the pandemic on athletic performance. The conversation emphasizes the importance of setting training goals and the value of community support in overcoming obstacles. In this conversation, Lindsay and Mike explore the shifts in eating habits during COVID, the importance of resetting post-pandemic, and the tools available for overcoming frustration. They discuss mindfulness, cognitive reframing, and the balance of empathy in navigating emotional challenges. The dialogue emphasizes the significance of self-awareness and emotional regulation in personal growth and well-being.

Takeaways

• Frustration arises when we are blocked from achieving our goals.
• Internal frustration can be managed better than external frustration.
• Training towards a specific event can enhance motivation.
• Coping with frustration is a learned skill, often developed through experience.
• Comparing ourselves to others can lead to feelings of inadequacy.
• Aging can impact athletic performance and lead to frustration.
• The pandemic has affected many athletes' mental and physical states.
• Community support in sports can help alleviate feelings of frustration.
• Setting realistic goals is crucial for maintaining motivation.
• Recognizing personal growth is important in the face of challenges. It's easy to fall into lazy eating habits when life gets busy.
• COVID has prompted many to reset their routines and priorities.
• Engaging in physical activity can provide focus and motivation.
• Mindfulness and meditation help in recognizing and addressing emotions.
• Breathing exercises can effectively manage stress and frustration.
• Cognitive reframing allows for a different perspective on frustrating situations.
• Negativity bias can skew our perception of experiences.
• Having an open heart is both a gift and a challenge.
• Reframing trauma can lead to personal growth and understanding.
• It's important to validate emotions while seeking ways to move forward.

Keywords

frustration, endurance sports, training goals, internal frustration, external frustration, coping strategies, aging, pandemic effects, personal growth, athletic performance, eating habits, COVID reset, overcoming frustration, mindfulness, cognitive reframing, emotional balance, empathy, mental health, training, self-care

Thanks for listening to the Ginger and Chocolate Podcast. Check out our website at gingerandchocolate.com to get in touch with us. Follow us on YouTube, Facebook and Instagram @ginger_and_chocolate_podcast; and please subscribe to the show and select automatic downloads on your podcast app.

Transcript

Mike (00:01.036)
What is up everybody? Welcome back to Ginger and Chocolate. I'm Mike and I'm here with my co-host Lindsay and we're excited to see you. Lindsay, how you been?

Lindsay Hiken (00:09.678)
Um, actually pretty good. I, uh, I am doing my team challenge, team sheepers swim challenge in the month of February. We have it every year, 50,000 yards in swimming, 50,000 yards in the month of February, which is about 28 and a half miles or so. It is, uh, as we speak, it is the end of February. Um, I've got, well, four more days that I can swim, but I'm going to swim for two more days and I've got.

Mike (00:23.128)
Thanks.

Lindsay Hiken (00:39.5)
like 5,000 yards left. mm-hmm, mm-hmm, I'm gonna make it unless, yeah, yeah, it's totally doable for two workouts, so I'm pretty excited. I'm a little waterlogged. And I'm looking forward to not being in the pool five days a week.

Mike (00:41.676)
Nice. Okay. Yeah. That's doable for two workouts. Yeah. 2,500 piece.

Mike (00:59.424)
Yeah. Yeah, it's a lot. It's a lot. I've I remember never doing like a month long challenge like that. But when I was doing masters, a years back doing like a New Year's Day or Thanksgiving Day challenge and those were those could be pretty grueling. But I mean, something I would never do on my own, like just never, never ever. But around other people were like, All right, we're kind of in this together. Let's do it.

Lindsay Hiken (01:18.624)
Mm-hmm. No. Mm-mm.

Mm hmm. Mm hmm. Yeah, we have a team. The Masters team has a four part challenge in the fall. like Halloween, you just swim for an hour straight. So however far you get to go, it doesn't matter. But you're not stopping at the wall. You're just swimming. So you just do your hour. And then I'll tell you a quick funny story about that. My friend, Ali.

Mike (01:39.447)
Yeah.

Mike (01:45.251)
wow, okay.

Lindsay Hiken (01:53.646)
I was swimming masters with us. was she was brand new swimming there and or any mass. She was new at swimming like this. And when we said you'd swimming, you know, without stopping at the wall, she thought. We met without touching the wall, so she did the whole hour doing like a U-turn with no push off. She's like, oh, my God, I'm exhausted. And when I finally realized what she was doing, I was like, holy cow. No, you can touch the wall. You just can't.

Mike (02:13.547)
wow.

Lindsay Hiken (02:23.554)
hang at wall. that's, that's like an exercise. That's like a drill you can do to, you know, form some strength is to not push off the wall, but to do it for an hours. So then on Thanksgiving, we do 7,500 yards. Nope, 5,000 yards on Thanksgiving, 75 on Christmas, and then 10,000 yards on New Year's. And,

Mike (02:25.706)
a tough one right because it just kills all your momentum and you gotta start just it just breaks up your rhythm yeah

Mike (02:46.424)
Mm.

Mike (02:50.775)
Oof.

Lindsay Hiken (02:52.946)
That 10,000 yard one is a long one.

Mike (02:56.024)
That's a long one, that's a couple hours, two and a half?

Lindsay Hiken (03:00.096)
longer than that, think it's more like three and a half, 345, something like that. Yeah. Yeah. Cause I think 75 is around approaching three. Yeah. Yeah. So it's, cause you're, you know, you're, you're at least for me, I should speak for myself. Other people do it way faster, but I start slowing down. You know I mean? So that first 2,500 I'd knock out and I'm like, I'm to be done. And you know,

Mike (03:01.196)
Yeah.

Mike (03:13.463)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (03:29.55)
right around the corner and then it's like the next one's a little slower and then I'm getting to 7,000. I'm like, well now I'm just crawling. I'm barely making, so anyway. But it's a good challenge. I'm happy to be doing it. What are you doing? Are you doing anything particular? I know you're doing strength training. Are you still working on that?

Mike (03:30.274)
Hey.

Mike (03:37.122)
Yeah, yeah.

Mike (03:48.564)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You can getting in the gym. I haven't caught the momentum. want to with it yet Yeah, it's It's been a lot a lot of sleep ins and missed workouts, but we are in the gym We're making it happen little by little The other thing I got a friend of mine I was in the Marine Corps with who's trying to convince me to run the Marine Corps Marathon with him That's in October

Lindsay Hiken (04:18.304)
Perfect, because you're going to do the half in September for the, Ooh, are you thinking about it?

Mike (04:19.444)
Yeah. September. Yeah. Yep. So I am. I'm thinking about it. I think I just keep coming back to I need something to train towards. I need like that's just how I motivated like event based to do a race. So it's just how I am. I've

Lindsay Hiken (04:33.602)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (04:40.866)
Yep, same.

Mike (04:45.676)
I've worked on things otherwise and it just, it doesn't have the same momentum as, as training for an event does.

Lindsay Hiken (04:54.274)
Right, no, I totally agree. I signed up for, so I've got the bike portion of the race that we're gonna do relay, but then I signed up for Wildflower, because Wildflower is back, and I'm doing the off-road sprint, so it's gonna be a sprint race, which we talked about with, well, I guess at this point we haven't dropped that episode yet, but we have talked about sprints. And...

Mike (05:05.188)
yeah.

Mike (05:11.49)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (05:19.672)
But I get to ride my gravel bike. So it's dirt. The bike part is on dirt. Yeah. So I'm super excited about that. And so I'm doing that wildflower and I'm going to go to this gravel riding camp, which that's just like, it's just a camp. It's not an event, but I did it last year and it, it's, it requires training. It's not, it's not a just show up. If you just show up and you're not trained, you're going to be in the van a lot because it's a ton of climbing. It's in Montana.

Mike (05:23.061)
cool.

Mike (05:39.754)
Yeah, yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (05:46.51)
The camp is at like 7,000 feet and then you're climbing up from there. So I have that and then I'm doing the Lake Tahoe try, also a sprint, and then I'm gonna ride with you guys. So I put my stuff on my calendar, which is definitely helping me motivate, because I'm like, like on Saturday, I did the swim and I was like, I'm done. And then I decided to get on my gravel bike, because I was like, actually, I need to ride my gravel bike. I need to start doing this. So, no.

Mike (05:48.566)
Ooh.

Mike (05:54.809)
cool.

Mike (06:01.688)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (06:12.972)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (06:14.69)
Yeah, well good, I'm excited for you to, and where is the, where does the marathon?

Mike (06:19.786)
It's in Washington, DC. So it goes through like the mall and yeah, the monuments and yeah. Yeah. So, I'm, I'm trying to wrap my head around it. mean, what's it's interesting. I mean, I've done four marathons, but they never been standalone. So

Lindsay Hiken (06:22.152)
it is!

Lindsay Hiken (06:28.167)
that's cool.

Lindsay Hiken (06:41.988)
you've never done a standalone. it is a different thing.

Mike (06:43.486)
No, just, yeah, I just done the Iron Man thing. And at that point it's like, well, I guess I'll finish this, you know? So it's interesting. I don't think I'm completely intimidated by a marathon, but it does feel like a new thing.

Lindsay Hiken (06:52.494)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (07:02.21)
The running is, at least for me and my limited experience, because I've only done one Iron Man, but the running is a different deal because you are fresh. so, of course, can do the, you can just do it the way you do an Iron Man. You can just kind of like shuffle along, but you definitely don't have that happening around you. People are just running, you know? And so,

Mike (07:16.087)
Yeah.

Mike (07:21.506)
Yeah. Yeah.

Mike (07:30.049)
Right, right, right.

Lindsay Hiken (07:31.438)
I found it to be, I found it in a lot of ways to be more difficult because by the time I got on the run course at the Ironman, I was doing what you were saying. like, okay, well, I'm gonna finish and just get through this. So I was doing like a run walk pattern and I was like, I don't really care. When I did Marathon,

Mike (07:49.143)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (07:53.366)
I really wanted to run the marathon and so, which I did. I've done a couple, I've done a couple trail ones too, which is more like an Ironman because you're not, yeah, you're not gonna run that whole thing. There's hill steep pitches where you're like power walking, but the last marathon I did was Big Sur, which is very rolling. But I ran the whole thing, it's just.

Mike (07:56.279)
Yeah.

Mike (08:02.614)
Oof. That's brutal. Yeah.

Mike (08:08.936)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (08:21.942)
It's just figuring out how to pace yourself so that you're not burned out by the end of the marathon. And I found it easier to pace myself on the Iron Man because I didn't have that much to give to begin with, you know what I mean? So that's, you'll be fine. Just figure your pace out. Like what can you do for four hours? Mm-hmm.

Mike (08:35.67)
Yeah. Yeah.

Mike (08:43.18)
That makes sense. That makes a lot of sense. I mean, pace is like kind of, mean, you're like Ironman, you're going by whatever metrics, you know, you've you've trained to whether it's heart rate or, or watts on the bike or, you know, mile time, but you kind of in that mode, it's it's it's partly by feel too. So

Lindsay Hiken (09:02.572)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (09:09.218)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (09:10.55)
Yeah, by the time you get to the run, you're just you're you're already in that mentality of going forward. So.

Lindsay Hiken (09:17.566)
Mm hmm. Right, right. It's just forward motion. I think you'll like it. I think you'll like the vibe. The what I've noticed is and I don't mean Marine Corps might be a little different, but it's got that sort of welcoming community vibe like triathlon has. It definitely has that people are rooting for each other, even if you know, and then

Well, I don't know about the Marine Corps, but normally you'll see like pros running. And so if it's an out and back or if there's anything like that, you see them coming. You're like, well, they're what, three hours ahead of me. It's kind of cool to see them. But everyone else is just kind of jock doing their pace. And I always ran with a pacer because they've got those pacers in there. So I'm like, OK, I'm going to run a nine minute mile. And that's what I'm going to do. And I just stayed with.

Mike (09:49.581)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (09:59.992)
Yeah.

Mike (10:08.48)
Hmm. Yeah, yeah, that makes sense.

Lindsay Hiken (10:13.806)
And I'm big, sir. These guys, these younger guys came from behind us and they were running really fast and they passed us. And the pacer was like, we will be seeing them again when we reach the highlands, because a mile like 22 of that marathon is the steepest part. So you're already and sure enough, we were jogging across this bridge and those guys were like stretching and sitting on the bridge and kind of just had fallen apart. We were like scooting by at our little nine minute pace. It was perfect. So. Yeah.

Mike (10:23.562)
Yeah.

Mike (10:40.02)
Yeah, yeah, that's funny.

Lindsay Hiken (10:43.884)
Well, I'm happy for you and I hope that you figure that out, that race or another race, just something to kind of motivate. But today we're gonna talk about a topic that is, we've never talked about before, it's frustration. We're talking about frustration today. Because I think now's a good time. I feel like a lot of people are frustrated for various reasons in life. I mean.

Mike (10:51.639)
Yeah.

Mike (11:08.728)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (11:11.52)
I was frustrated because it was raining and I couldn't get on my bike and I was on my trainer. mean, there's there's that and then there's stuff that's happening on the world stage that can be frustrating. So.

Mike (11:19.02)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (11:23.598)
So first of all, guess what I'll do is I, as I usually do, asked AI what frustration is. And it's interesting because it said it's a complex emotional response that arises when we're blocked from achieving a desired goal or when things don't go as expected. Here's a breakdown of key aspects, emotional state. It involves feelings of annoyance, irritation, dissatisfaction, and sometimes anger.

Mike (11:43.832)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (11:52.268)
It can lead to feelings of helplessness or discouragement. That's what I find a lot of the time. Causes frustration stems from obstacles that prevent us from reaching our objectives. Okay. These obstacles can be external like a traffic jam.

or a bureaucratic delay or internal lack of skills, self-doubt, that kind of thing. It can also be caused by unfulfilled needs. And then the last thing it says is manifestations. Frustration can manifest in various ways, including emotional outbursts, withdrawal, or persistent attempts to overcome the obstacle. In essence, frustration is a feeling we experience when we encounter barriers that hinder our progress or expectations.

Mike (12:36.696)
Yeah, yeah, the big thing I'm taking out of that is that there's a picture in your mind of where you want to be. And then there's the realization that you're not there or feeling maybe not close to it. And just that difficulty being where you are.

Lindsay Hiken (13:02.016)
Yeah, the

For me, the internal frustration is something that I'm better at coping with. The external frustration is very difficult for me because I can be controlling and I can't control the external stuff. I feel like I can control my emotional response better to things that are happening to me inside. I'm frustrated with my work or something like that.

Mike (13:09.494)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (13:18.091)
Yeah.

Mike (13:35.159)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (13:35.232)
It's like, okay, well, I can maybe change how I'm working or change jobs, which I did, or, you whatever. But if it's something that I can't do anything about that's impeding my progress, very difficult for me to deal with.

Mike (13:42.103)
Yeah.

Mike (13:52.534)
Yeah, that, I'm trying to think as he, as you talk about the internal and external experiences there, I got pretty well versed in the external frustration. starting with like bootcamp and the Marine Corps. cause we, like every, just about every situation we had, we were expected to do things and the, and it was either.

Lindsay Hiken (14:09.74)
Hmm.

Mike (14:21.096)
very unlikely we would actually accomplish them or set to be impossible. And so that was drilled into us of like, Okay, well, here you are, you failed, or this, this is this is the obstacle, and it's not happening, is it? And seeing people adapt to that level of realization that the stated goal would not be achieved. So

Lindsay Hiken (14:45.122)
Mm.

Mike (14:48.586)
I'm not immune to that, but I feel like I was a little bit better maybe than average and coping with that.

Lindsay Hiken (14:57.42)
Right, right, that makes sense. It's almost like they trained you guys to address frustration instead of freaking out about it.

Mike (15:04.618)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, so I mean the natural response is to freak out because you know, you're gonna you can't achieve this and you know, there's like a Punishment if you fail and you're like moving You know the the racks or the beds from one side of the other side of the squad bay and you know 30 seconds and having everything arranged perfectly It's like it's not happening it's not happening and I think

Lindsay Hiken (15:29.326)
Right.

Mike (15:33.684)
It made us, you know.

Realized that we were in this situation with other people and if we lost your cool and we panicked then things would go much worse, so Yeah, but it's it's it's still harder to cope with when one of the internal frustration is hard I think for me because you know if I've looked at past successes that I've had and Mainly it's been like, you know out on the course, you know, like

like things I've done with Ironman racing or triathlon in general and the, you know, the, the body type I had, or it just the times I had. Um, and then realizing I'm not there now. That's it. That's the tough one for me. There a lot of comparisons of like, I know what it's like to be there and I'm not there now.

Lindsay Hiken (16:21.047)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (16:28.15)
Yeah, yeah, I can relate to that one for sure. Aging has been aging has been something I found frustrating and internally have have definitely struggled with, especially there are women on my team that are my same age that don't have my physiology. They don't get injured and they're very talented athletes.

Mike (16:40.354)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (16:52.589)
huh. Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (16:56.014)
and they're crushing it and they're going to Kona and they're like, oh, I did my Ironman in like sub 11 hours and I'm 55 years old. Like, okay. So and I'm like, oh, I'm going to sign up for two sprints this year and hopefully I'll make it, you know. Yeah.

Mike (17:06.348)
Yeah. Yeah.

Mike (17:14.936)
Yeah. Yeah. That I know that feeling to the comparison between myself and another, you know, I have a really good friend that I, uh, I didn't serve with, but, um, I've known him from the Marine Corps and he, um, he actually set the Guinness book of world records for most 70.3 triathlons in a year. think he did 26 insane. Um,

Lindsay Hiken (17:39.299)
Wow.

That's a lot.

Mike (17:43.416)
It's a lot. And, uh, and he'd do them fast too. It wasn't like the typical, just like slog through it. Like he was just destroying me. And I asked him, I was like, like, I'm putting in a lot of training time and you're putting in a lot of training time, but you know, like what's, what do you, what's, what's your secret, man? What's the deal? He's like, I think it partly is genetics, man. Like, I, like, I, I know you train just as hard, but like for whatever reason I'm able to do this.

Lindsay Hiken (17:50.414)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (18:05.834)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (18:12.044)
Yeah, yeah, that's that's right. I think it is genetics to us but

It doesn't necessarily stop me that knowledge doesn't necessarily stop me from kind of comparing or just being a little like, I mean, I wish I could run that fast or I wish I could do now. I'm we've discussed this before how you and I are not as on top of maybe the metrics as other people in terms of like the data and analyzing all of it. And I will say.

Mike (18:28.058)
yeah, yeah.

Mike (18:43.228)
Yeah, that's so true.

Lindsay Hiken (18:47.65)
The women I'm thinking of are very much like they're type A, they're very much on their data. They're making all these tweaks. They don't skip workouts in their training peaks. know, one of them has the same coach as myself and you know, I heard her say like, I feel bad if I miss like she needs to make every single workout in her training peaks green by doing it.

Mike (18:51.394)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (18:57.324)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (19:07.778)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (19:09.098)
And I would like to, but I'm like, I'll just go in there if I didn't do one and write like comment, like why I didn't do it and just leave it read, right? Like, I didn't do this today. So we aren't, I'm not training as well as them, but also I get injured pretty easily. So that's a physiological thing that they don't appear to have.

Mike (19:22.378)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Mike (19:32.31)
Yeah, yeah, exactly. It's interesting because it's easy to compare to people who have maybe a greater ability or faster times or are able to push through and really grind out a workout. And I think with frustration, it can help to realize that, there's also, on the other end, people who can't do what we're doing.

To any level right either they're injured or they just their body doesn't tolerate what we're doing You know, so it's that's one of the things that's helped me cope with with frustration is realize that you know, there's I'm I feel lucky to even be where I am to be able to to do what I'm doing and Yeah, I don't like you said, I don't have the type a like in fact, I feel

Lindsay Hiken (20:02.894)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (20:09.144)
Right.

Mike (20:30.316)
When I'm around too many type A people, just like, I drop all competition. just like, sure. I don't know. Maybe I want to wear my watch for this workout and see people lose their minds. But the metrics.

Lindsay Hiken (20:37.378)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (20:44.014)
Yeah, I don't care about them. Yes, I am. I am just like you on that. hear them talking and I think. Yeah, that's it's inspirational to me how how focused you can be. But that's not me. And I'm going to just enjoy the journey over here without my I put my watch on, so I have an idea that I did the work.

Mike (21:09.176)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (21:13.527)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (21:14.254)
but I never look at it during the workout, I don't care. I do kind of have that thing of like if it's not on Strava, it didn't happen a little bit. But you brought up something too, which I think is important to talk about a little more, which is comparing yourself to yourself, like comparing yourself to your old self.

Mike (21:17.452)
Right. Yeah.

Yeah.

Mike (21:37.656)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (21:40.002)
There was one Lindsay pre pandemic and another Lindsay post pandemic. And I think a couple of things happened. I aged, had lots of hormonal changes all at the same time as the pandemic. So there's a lot of it, not just COVID, but it was like a perfect storm. And I'm, I still do that too. Like what you're saying about, my time used to be X, Y, Z. I used to be able to do this. I definitely,

Mike (21:51.352)
Mmm.

Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (22:09.218)
training wise was in a different space mentally, physically.

Mike (22:12.982)
Yeah, Yeah, that's true. That's true. It's of just the pandemic effect, right? We're still kind of unpacking what that what that did to everybody.

Lindsay Hiken (22:21.848)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (22:27.306)
Mm hmm. It's it's the training. then for me, it's also which is a weird thing, but it's lazy eating. Like I don't cook shit anymore. Like I will go to Whole Foods to the hot bar. I'll eat a sandwich. I'll get a delivery service. I'll do I. Quit cooking. I don't know when or why.

Mike (22:41.089)
Yeah.

Mike (22:53.474)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (22:56.728)
But I had this like, I was a healthy eater. I would plan meals, I would make stuff. I would go train, boop, boop, boop, boop. And then sometime during COVID when I actually had more time to cook meals and stuff, I stopped.

Mike (23:08.286)
Mm hmm. I think a lot of us kind of withdrew. You know, we decided what we keep doing and withdrew because you know, when there's danger, like my mind just always goes to like what a turtle does just goes back into the shell. Right. And there's only so many things that you can keep if you don't have that sense of safety. You know, so

Lindsay Hiken (23:26.886)
Lindsay Hiken (23:34.51)
That's true.

Mike (23:37.464)
I mean, a lot of stuff like we had, like I've had to force myself through to do to complete. So other things just got like, well, just beyond my capacity at the moment, which it's it. I think it's a, it's an interesting line because that can lead to, you know, maybe a sense of helplessness like, well, this is just how I am. And then not exploring how much more you could possibly do. So can get into

Lindsay Hiken (23:46.894)
you

Mike (24:06.508)
like that territory of like excuses or, you know, limiting ourself maybe. But there's a reset that happens. There's a reset that happened for me with COVID for sure.

Lindsay Hiken (24:13.677)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (24:19.406)
Mm hmm. Yeah, the reset and I think we talked about this on our New Year's episode, you and I working on kind of. Overcoming some of the. Some of the. Challenges that occurred or or changes that are not really benefiting us at this point in this year or so.

Mike (24:37.741)
Yeah.

Mike (24:44.045)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (24:45.838)
Getting back into racing is one of the things for me just because it does give me some focus. And when I don't want to do the workout necessarily, there's a higher probability that I'll go do it. And I'm always happy when I did. I've never done a workout and then afterwards been like, you know, I should have just laid on my couch.

Mike (25:07.126)
Yeah, yeah, exactly. Exactly. You know, the only time I think I've heard people regret workouts is during taper and then they overdo it right before a race. That's probably the only exception because other than that, man, I did this workout. My god, my endorphins going I feel better. No, no, we say that. Right? Right. It's always someone gets like a last minute injury. Like, fuck.

Lindsay Hiken (25:26.018)
Mm hmm. 100 %

Lindsay Hiken (25:33.346)
That's what happened to me for Iron Man Arizona. I did not taper, right? Or at all. And then it was my first attempt at Iron Man and definitely, okay, so I did have that one regret because I did not start that race because I injured myself so bad. couldn't do, I couldn't race. And did have regret there. Okay, so let's talk a little bit about overcoming frustration.

Mike (25:37.824)
Yeah.

Mike (26:00.34)
Overcoming frustration. Yeah. Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (26:01.71)
or how to cope, should say, not necessarily overcoming, but it may still be there. Let's see. So AI said some mental and emotional tools, and we know most of these, mindfulness meditation, just because it helps you become more aware of your actual emotions in the present moment. you're trying to do that without judgment, but just name those emotions.

Mike (26:29.098)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (26:32.162)
That makes sense. Because, you know, when they were defining frustration, it was talking about how it can manifest in like, anger and sadness and, you know, annoyance, irritation. So being able to stop and sort of name what those things are, I think will help address what those what they are. Let's see, breathing exercises. We've talked about that before.

Mike (26:50.666)
Mm-hmm. Yes.

Mike (26:59.383)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (27:01.806)
So do you ever do box breathing where you do like inhale? So this is suggesting the four seven eight which I've never done. Inhale for four seconds, hold for seven, exhale for eight.

Mike (27:05.762)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Mike (27:11.125)
Interesting.

Mike (27:15.352)
Yeah, that's a, I've done box breathing and I've kept it simple with the same number all the way around. But from what I understand, the longer you exhale, the exhaling slows what really helps slow you down. So sometimes I will just, without counting,

Lindsay Hiken (27:23.105)
amount of time.

Mike (27:39.088)
and it just kind of letting go of any number, you know, inhale to what feels natural. And then I'll just make a game where I make the sound like the air coming out of a tire. And I do that for as long as I comfortably can and then start again.

Lindsay Hiken (27:57.442)
Yeah, I like that idea. So if you're listening and you don't know what box breathing is, it's just a technique where you breathe in for a certain amount of time. You hold your breath for a certain amount of time and then you breathe out for a certain. The most common one is for doing it for the same amount of time like Mike just mentioned. So say breathing in for a count of six, holding for a count of six, exhaling for a count of six. But the longer you exhale, the more calm.

Mike (28:07.778)
you

Mike (28:25.9)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (28:26.006)
you're supposed to receive. So cognitive reframing is another, it says it involves changing the way you think about frustration, a frustrating situation. Do you know about, I'm sure you know about cognitive reframing, given your work.

Mike (28:34.187)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (28:46.936)
Yeah, it's a huge part of what I do for people. It's just a different perspective on the situation. For example, if I had someone really upset in a race because they finished maybe third and they had their mindset on winning that race.

then the cognitive reframing would be like, look at all that effort you put into achieving this, you got on a podium on a race, or I would say, you know, look at the growth that happened between, you know, when you started this and to where you are now, you know, like, think of how many people would just die to be on that podium alongside you and how

you know, proud your family is. So I, it's just a different perspective on the same situation because situations a lot of times are neither inherently good or bad. It's the meaning we assign to them.

Lindsay Hiken (29:58.23)
Right, right. And I feel like it's very easy to assign a negative meaning to something. Easier.

Mike (30:06.09)
Mm Yeah. Yeah. Because we have a negativity bias. I don't know if we've explained that on the show before, but what I can briefly say about a negativity bias is that as humans, the theory is that as we evolved and became, you know, homo sapiens that, so many, so many years out in, you know, the natural world, living in caves or whatever our ancestors were doing.

it's more adaptive to notice something negative because, you know, for a human, because let's say if I see a tiger out there, that's, know, I'm looking for danger and I see it, then that's going to keep me alive. So, and so it's more adaptive to see a tiger in the bushes that's not there.

Lindsay Hiken (30:39.043)
Mm.

Mike (30:57.058)
than it is to think everything's good and then get jacked by that tiger and eaten. You know, the happy-go-luckies don't all, like, don't survive as much as the negative Neds and Nellies.

Lindsay Hiken (30:57.154)
Right.

You

Lindsay Hiken (31:05.835)
Right. The snapping of ranches behind you. You're like, isn't that a pretty sound?

Mike (31:12.086)
Yeah. Yeah, it's probably someone giving, you know, coming up to give me a fresh ripened fruit, you know, like, or something like that. Yeah. So that what so what that means for us today is that simply noting that it's it's more likely for things to imprint on our brain if they're negative experiences or for us to notice negative things. And so that's not a bad thing. We're just we're biased that way as humans.

However, it just means that we we it's to our benefit to notice the positive things that happen Because those don't stick as much, you know You can have a great you can have a great day or a great vacation or a great week but there might be one thing that really sticks out that just you know, it's like Bothers you and that can taint the whole experience in your mind Because it gets an

Lindsay Hiken (31:51.468)
Right, right. And we have, no, no, go ahead.

Lindsay Hiken (32:06.828)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mike (32:09.812)
it doesn't get the equal amount of weight. It's, it's weighted disproportionately.

Lindsay Hiken (32:14.796)
Yeah, that actually, I can think about a million times that that's happened in my life. And I feel like the bias is good for the reasons that you explained, but also we have less danger from tigers or lions or whatever attacking us because we're not all just out.

Mike (32:18.872)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Mike (32:38.155)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (32:42.83)
on the desert plains. mean, sometimes people are and some people live out there. you know, me sitting here in Half Moon Bay, I have a lot less exposure to actual danger. So my mind is looking for things, like you said, seeing the tiger that's not actually there is a benefit versus not seeing anything. But so my brain can see a lot of tigers that are

Mike (32:42.925)
Yeah.

Mike (32:58.058)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (33:09.812)
not there that are actually it's at this point it's like a it's not relative to my actual like exposure to danger i'm just like my god i didn't get to do xyz that now is my tiger you know what i mean

Mike (33:21.08)
Hmm?

Mike (33:26.71)
Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So it's, the awareness of that stuff really helps us overcome it because like, like when I work with people who, you know, carry trauma from a traumatic event in their life and they're feeling really overwhelmed or triggered by something relatively small, but it triggers a memory of something really bad, you know, like I'll work with them and I'll say, this is, know, if you can think of it, this is remnants. This is

Lindsay Hiken (33:38.926)
Hmm.

Mike (33:55.082)
residue from trauma. So while the situation is uncomfortable right now, how much of it is actually because of what's going on and how much of this feeling is leftover from what happened before and just that awareness can stop the the the spiraling a lot of times doesn't make it all go away. But it's something that I've used, you know, with a I had a frustrating event I was training up for this 24 hour endurance.

Lindsay Hiken (34:06.541)
Hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (34:14.094)
Right.

Mike (34:22.808)
go-rock event where it's like based on a special forces selection kind of stuff. So you allow carrying packs and carrying telephone poles and people and marching around for a while. Yeah. It was, know I paid money to do this. Um, and I was freaking out coming up towards it. My friend, you know, who's not a veteran, a civilian, a firefighter guy, really cool.

Lindsay Hiken (34:31.63)
Telephone calls. my God.

Mike (34:46.584)
I was like, yeah, man, just you're good. Like I was like, why is this guy not freaking out? And I realized my body was like gearing up for like a mission. And it just popped and like, this is leftover war stuff. And so it didn't take away all the anxiety, but it stopped it at a lower level from from wrapping up. So, you know, I realized that's not a direct parallel to frustration. But the same concept can be applied to say like, OK, I'm frustrated about this.

Lindsay Hiken (34:53.902)
Mm.

Mike (35:15.016)
And it's natural to be frustrated, you know, but what can I do right now versus just grinding away and grinding away like this isn't happening. This isn't happening. This isn't happening. And making it worse like, okay, well, what can I make happen? What can I actually make happen? What's going right right now?

Lindsay Hiken (35:30.412)
Yeah. Right, right. mean, that's

It's such a useful tool and skill to be able to do that. think I can't always do it. A lot of times I'm completely unable or I just don't even think of doing it. But when I'm super frustrated and I can get to the place where I just call it the fuck it's where I'm like, OK, fuck it. You know what I mean? Like it is what it is. I can't I can't deal with this anymore. I don't care. As soon as I do that.

Mike (35:53.846)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever, all right?

Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (36:04.224)
Like most of the frustration just drains because I'm like, okay, I don't have control over this. can't do it. There's nothing I can do about it. I've done what I could do about it. And so fuck it.

Mike (36:11.308)
Yeah, yeah.

Mike (36:15.254)
Yeah, yeah, exactly. I think, God, I forget the name of the author of the book who wrote The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck. Good book, yeah, good book for exactly what we're talking about. What I will say about frustration too is when I'm working with people in my profession,

Lindsay Hiken (36:17.326)
you

Lindsay Hiken (36:25.422)
I don't know.

Mike (36:40.844)
or I'm dealing with people just on a one-to-one basis. I, it's the nuance of, of me giving these suggestions and guidance to people is that I'm very careful never to stray into the territory of invalidating whatever experiences that they've had, you know, so it can be a balance in with ourselves too, with our own selves. It's like, this isn't that big of a deal. Well, maybe it is a big deal, right?

Lindsay Hiken (37:07.406)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (37:10.07)
Maybe it is a really big deal and I would never say like to someone who's depressed, well, just don't be so sad, right? Or don't be so so frustrated. It's not that bad of a situation. Could be. Could be a horrible situation.

Lindsay Hiken (37:22.062)
I've had people say that, it's not helpful.

Mike (37:25.378)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, just get over it. You know, like those things aren't helpful, right? They're invalidating. So what I will say is like, while this situation that you've experienced to cause you frustration or whatever difficult emotions you're feeling is very real and perhaps unfair to you.

Lindsay Hiken (37:28.45)
Yeah. No.

Lindsay Hiken (37:45.646)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (37:47.614)
What is in your power right now to help you move forward through this to to live within your values or live and you know succeed as much as you possibly can. So yeah I just I wanted to say that because I think that gets missed a lot of times in some of the self-help world it's just like why are you sulking you know it's like I don't know maybe they just weren't this.

Lindsay Hiken (37:52.462)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (38:09.154)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (38:13.624)
Yeah.

Mike (38:16.12)
Horrific life situations. Yeah, don't be so sad. I'm like, oh.

Lindsay Hiken (38:16.52)
Yeah, exactly. It's like buck up, you know, and that doesn't. And as a woman, there's a lot of you should smile more. OK, thanks. Thanks for that. I'll take that into consideration. Let me smile more. Exactly what the middle fingers.

Mike (38:39.096)
Yeah, smile a lot more.

Lindsay Hiken (38:45.836)
I'll share really quickly in terms of reframing. This is not about frustration, but it's about what you spoke about, about trauma. You know, I go to therapy and I had, my gosh, my dog's whining. So if you can hear her, I apologize. She's not coming in here. She's obnoxious, but she's whining. There's a whole house and she's outside my door. Like, okay, well, that's good. So.

Mike (39:03.01)
You

Mike (39:09.112)
Of course. You can't hear it Can't hear it here.

Lindsay Hiken (39:16.778)
my therapist has been working on reframing things for me because I have, you know, childhood trauma from a number of things. And a lot of it, you know, lot of things that happened made me feel very alone in the world, like just very alone. And which can be scary if you're a child to feel like you're completely different and alone. And

Mike (39:25.25)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (39:34.262)
Yeah.

Mike (39:40.941)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (39:45.944)
But then I have this like, completely seemingly unrelated for me, I have this almost pathological like concern for animals, you know what I mean? so last summer, Josh and I were in Tahoe and we were on 80 and this huge truck full of pigs was being obviously driven to slaughter.

Mike (40:11.692)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (40:11.84)
and one stuck its little snout out and was just trying to get some air. You know, they were all crunched in there. And I just burst into tears. Like I could not get it together after that. I burst into tears. so I was telling my therapist about it because I was like, this pathological concern I have for animals can be a little debilitating. You know what I mean? I can, I can, don't let me see some dead deer on the side of the road or I'm going to fucking freak out.

Mike (40:15.627)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (40:34.658)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (40:42.402)
But, and so she said, so she took this and related it. She just walked me through this process of like.

What were you feeling when you saw that pig snout? Just trying to get air. You know, through the whole process I'm talking about, you know, this little guy is just being crammed in there, probably very scared, probably very, could be hungry, thirsty, not getting its needs met, just trying to get some air and going through these feelings. And it kind of related back to a situation when I was a child where I was trying to, I was feeling very crunched by

life and was trying to get just be me, you know what I mean? Just get a little air. And and so then so we kind of connected those things and then we started reframing. Reframing it like I'm not that pig, you know what I mean? I am I'm not I'm not in the truck being crunched. I could drive the truck, for example, not that I would drive a truck to Slaughterhouse, but you know what I mean? I could be in control.

Mike (41:21.9)
Yeah.

Mike (41:29.802)
Ahem.

Mike (41:48.471)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (41:49.952)
of that as an adult, could re parent myself in that moment. So then we went through this exercise of me, re parenting myself in that moment with that child that is me, you know, so that I didn't feel that that crunching of life and that I was being stifled and couldn't be me, couldn't get a breath of fresh air. And it was just such a helpful process was very

You know, she's like, you're going to need a little rest after this session. You're going to feel a little, you know, which I did. I needed rest and I felt a little emotionally raw. But it's helping explain this thing I have that makes me that makes it somewhat difficult to move through life sometimes about the animals. It's like, I see helplessness and I see unfair treatment. And I relate to that because of trauma that I experienced myself.

Mike (42:23.799)
Yeah, yeah.

Mike (42:45.784)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (42:46.326)
And that explains this sort of like over.

the overdoing of that emotion, like how it's so strong in me. So I'm working on this reframing thing and you know, yeah.

Mike (42:52.952)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (42:59.426)
Yeah, yeah. Well, and another thing I'd add to that and add to a lot of people's situations when they feel a certain way and...

especially sad at the suffering of others is it's such a gift to have an open heart. Such a gift and you know I'd venture to say that applies to most or all of our listeners too. I mean just by the content we're putting out if you're vibing with it that if you have an open heart it can be a lot harder to navigate the world because you see things that affect you.

Lindsay Hiken (43:17.644)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (43:32.022)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (43:38.338)
Yeah.

Mike (43:38.636)
you have a certain reaction to it, whereas if you were totally jaded, wouldn't phase you because you shut off your heart. It's it's trickier to navigate the world like this, but in my experience of it, I've just been reminded by people how I think lucky we are to have that gift.

Lindsay Hiken (43:42.328)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (43:58.35)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, it is a gift, definitely. I don't know that I need to be a psycho about it, but it is gift to have empathy for others and to have these feelings and have an open heart. I agree with you. It's a gift, but it's also it's a challenge. know, it's a challenge to have this gift. And sometimes I. I think.

Mike (44:06.168)
Yeah

Mike (44:20.696)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (44:26.658)
It would be nice not to drive down the street and see a dead squirrel and be like, my gosh, that poor little thing, blah, blah, blah. I squirrels are a dime a dozen, but that particular one got squashed. I don't necessarily, I'm just trying to temper my, I'm trying to have an open heart and also temper it with balanced emotions, I guess I should say.

Mike (44:38.647)
Yeah.

Mike (44:46.744)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (44:51.318)
Yeah, exactly. that's for summing things up, probably the best way to handle frustration or any difficult emotion.

Lindsay Hiken (45:00.654)
Yeah, yeah, I agree. Well, I think we did it. Do you have anything else to say about frustration or training or, you know?

Mike (45:12.49)
Not yet. More to come. More to come on this journey. So, you know, I love coming together with each week, Lindsey, and talking about this journey. And just really happy we can keep doing this. And I want to say thank you to the people who are listening. Thank you for investing your time in us. And thank you for keeping an open mind and open heart as we talk about all this stuff with you.

Lindsay Hiken (45:18.092)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (45:30.094)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (45:40.226)
Yes, thank you so much. This is labor of love for Mike and myself. It's a good creative outlet and I really appreciate it. It does so much good for us and I hope that we are giving back something and appreciate you guys listening and we will see you next week. Say bye.

Mike (46:02.616)
All right, see y'all.