Alright now, it is Thursday. But not just any Thursday. For you and for me, this is Trust Yourself Thursday here on the Sweet Spot. Yes indeed, Trust Yourself Thursday. And you know what? We've been doing a wonderful series, a beautiful series here about who you are after pressure, who you become after the pressure, what identity has pressure forged in you? They say pressure makes diamonds. Are you a diamond? Of course you're a diamond. You know, diamonds are beautiful and all that, but they're also hard, they're rugged, they're tough. And I think you're a combination of both. Welcome to The Sweet Spot. And I'm Dr. Derek Sweet. Pressure doesn't just test your outcomes, it tests your trust. And since today is Trust Yourself Thursday, and for a lot of people, we work and we travel and we talk and we communicate based on a level of trust. I mean you jump on an airplane, you trust the pilot. You go on the bus, you trust the bus driver. You sit at the restaurant, you trust the chef. You are using trust every single day, my friend. We both are. It's amazing. And the thing about it is, pressure comes to detect if we're really trusting at a level that makes sense. If we are shaky on our trust, what happens is that the pressure overrides us, we go to panic, and we end up with a lot of issues because we're not ready to handle the level of stress that pressure brings because we are not believing in a way that allows us to interact and react properly inside the moment of pressure. Does that make sense? Earlier this week, we talked about the stance. We talked about that also last week, about stabilizing where you stand so pressure doesn't rush you into panic. We talked about sequence. We said also that pressure doesn't just change you, it literally narrows how you think and behave if you allow it to create panic. Yesterday, Win It All Wednesday, we said that winning looks different now. And you know what? That's all great. I love pressure because what it does is it tells me if I'm ready for the big moment. And there have been moments where I have I've not been ready, but I'm ready now because I understand there's a difference between pressure, a difference between stress and anxiety. When I'm faced with a situation, I ask myself, is this pressure or is this stress? And if I'm feeling anxiety, am I under stress or am I under pressure? If I'm under pressure, this is because I perceive that there's something I've got to do and I've got to figure out if I can meet the demand that it's putting on me. If I'm under stress, my whole body is feeling tight and my jaws clenched. I'm beginning to feel as if I can't handle the situation in front of me. And not only that, if I'm feeling anxiety, I know that I'm not even in the present moment. I'm in the future, I'm in the past. Yeah. And you know what that all boils down to? Can I trust myself? Not the old version of me, not the version who hadn't been through all of the stuff yet. No, can I even trust the person I am now, the person that pressure has shaped, the one I'm still getting to know. You know, most people think that self-trust is confidence. I trust myself, sounds like I feel sure, I feel strong, I know how this will turn out. But confidence isn't usually what cracks after pressure. Trust is what cracks. And they're not the same thing. Confidence is about your capacity. Can I do this? That's what confidence is, right? Can I do this? Trust is about judgment. Should I? Should I do this? And how? Pressure doesn't just test whether you can perform. No, no, no. It tests whether you can read what's really going on accurately. It tests whether your read on reality was even accurate. You trusted people and they didn't show up. Was your read accurate? You trusted situations that cost you more than you expected. Did you misread that situation? You trusted your instincts once and things went wrong. They went sideways. Does that mean you read yourself wrong? So, in those situations, trust doesn't really disappear. It narrows, it slows down, it becomes more deliberate. It asks more questions before it opens the door anymore. And here's where people go wrong. They treat that narrowing as damage, like something's wrong with me. I'm not a trusting person anymore. It's not damage. That's wisdom being installed in you, my friend. Absolutely. You're just wiser now. You've made some mistakes, you had some bad experiences. And here's what the science says is actually happening beneath the surface with this trust thing and pressure. You know, when you're under sustained pressure, disappointment, betrayal, loss, all of those things, they like they cause pressure. Your nervous system kind of recalibrates in those moments. It becomes more cautious, not broken, more protective. Your brain isn't saying never trust again, usually, it's saying pay closer attention next time. Yeah, and neurobiologically, from a neurobiological perspective, what's happening is this your amygdala, your brain's threat detection center, starts flagging more inputs as worthy of scrutiny. Does that make sense? Your brain just flags these inputs as like, hmm, I've got to inspect every single thing. Meanwhile, your PFC, your prefrontal cortex, the CEO, the part that makes meaning, that weighs options and analyzes, gets more involved in every decision that used to feel automatic. You become more analytical. In other words, you're not paranoid, you're just processing more carefully because of the betrayal, because of the disappointment, because of the kind of pressure that you're under. It's not a flaw. You're actually in an upgrade situation, but sometimes we judge ourselves because we're being like that. The mistake people make is shaming themselves for this shift in their thinking. They say, Well, I used to be so open, I'm not who I was, something must be wrong with me, I'm paranoid. But what if nothing is wrong? Try that on. What if nothing is wrong? What if the goal was never to trust faster? What if the goal is to trust truer? Yeah. What about that? What about that evolution that's happening in you that's positive actually, but it feels sort of odd because you're pulling back to be more wise, to be more discerning. And the ancient wisdom understands this kind of trust very deeply. Think about Ruth in the word in the ancient wisdom. Ruth had lost her husband. She had lost so much. Her future was uncertain. Her security was gone. And Naomi, the one person she could follow, tells her, Don't, don't follow me. Go back to your people. I have nothing left. My life is bitter. Don't attach yourself to me and my emptiness. Don't go, go. Think about what Naomi was really saying to Ruth. She was saying, I'm not worth following anymore. I'm not worth hanging out with anymore. She was saying, I can't even see my future. So don't be here. Don't attach yourself to me. And Ruth looks at that. Looks at that woman who has lost sight of her own worth and refuses to leave. That's the part that gets me about that story about Ruth and Naomi. There's a movie about Ruth and I think somewhere, but I don't want to be distracted. Look, let me go back. So so yeah, so Ruth, Ruth looks at the situation and she says, look, I'm not going anywhere. Not because she's naive. No, no, no. Not because she's um in denial about how hard the road will be. No, she sees something in Naomi that Naomi can no longer see in herself. Have you ever been there in a situation where you don't see it in you, you don't think you've got it, but somebody deeply believes in you. Somebody says what Ruth said, the one of the most famous lines in the Bible, in the book of Ruth, I think it's uh chapter 116. She says, Where you go, I'll go. Where you live, I'll live. Your people are my people, your God is my God. That's in Ruth 116 in the message Bible. Don't worry, I'm definitely gonna do the KJV, okay? Tomorrow. So where you go, I'll go. Where you live, I'll live. Your people are my people, your God is my God. Let's slow that down. Slow it down. What's going on here? What is Ruth saying? A woman who has faced loss, a woman who's being told go your own way. She says, she doesn't say, I know this will work out. She didn't have any kind of like false hope. She doesn't say I won't get hurt again. She says, I belong with you. I belong with you. That's not blind optimism, my friend. That is trust as a witness. She's trusting her own perception of who Naomi really is, of where she belongs, and even when the person she's choosing has lost sight of their own value, she sticks with that. Have you ever faced or been around that kind of loyalty? Somebody who sticks with you no matter what, especially in a pressurized situation, you value those things when you feel them and experience them. So yeah, after the pressure, post-pressure trust, after the press, you know, post-pressure trust doesn't require that the other person be a whole person. It doesn't demand any guarantees. It says, you know what? I see what's real here, I know what's going on here, and I'm choosing on purpose to trust and to walk with you and to be loyal to you anyway. It's not reckless, my friend. That's sacred. That's sacred. So, okay, maybe some of you out there like, alright, Dr. Sweet, I didn't I don't really face that kind of pressure. But have you ever faced betrayal? Have has anyone ever betrayed you? Have you ever faced betrayal? Betrayal can hit can hit us a little different, right? Because betrayal doesn't break circumstances, it breaks your confidence in your own judgment. Because when somebody betrays you, the only way they can betray you is if you trusted them to begin with, and you believe they would never do something like that. You picked that person, you were the one who believed that promise. And facts, you opened the door. And now, when someone tells you, oh, just trust again, oh don't worry, just trust again. Something inside of you is like, H E, you know what? No, I'm not doing it again. You know, you tighten up. And I want to name that for what it is. That tightening is not always bitterness. I call it discernment under construction. Because trust, after betrayal isn't about reopening every door you closed. Not at all. It's about learning which doors deserve keys and which ones just get a window. You're allowed to give access in stages, you're allowed to watch before you invest. That's not being cold, that's being wise. And that's how the pressure can change you, right? So, what does this actually look like in daily life? It looks quieter than it used to. You know, post-pressure trust doesn't announce itself, it doesn't need applause, it doesn't need to be validated by everyone in the room. It shows up when you stay professional without needing recognition, because you're no longer performing for approval. It shows up when you listen to your fatigue instead of fighting through it, because you've learned that your body tells the truth before your mind does. It shows up when you start watching behavior instead of believing promises, because patterns are more honest than words. I'll say that again. It shows up when you start watching behavior instead of believing promises, because patterns, when you're observing them, they're more honest than words. You're not pulling back from life, sweet spotter. No, you're placing yourself more carefully inside of life. That's not guardedness, that's precision. You're not closing your heart, you're learning where it actually belongs. Does that make sense? Does that make sense? You're learning where your heart belongs. You're not closing it, and that means it can't be available for every single thing, especially if you've been through pressure and betrayal and trust um patterns that were not good. Right? So let me leave you with something you can use today, okay? You've done great. You've listened, you're you've you're in it, you're with me. Listen, when you are unsure whether you're to whether to trust yourself or someone else, I want you to ask this one question. And here it is. What pattern am I seeing? Not what hope I'm holding, not what I expect, but what pattern am I seeing? I'll say it again. What pattern am I seeing? Not what hope I'm holding or what I'm expecting. Hope is beautiful, don't get me wrong, but hope can lie. Hope can lie to you. Hope says maybe this time it'll be different. Maybe they won't do that again. Maybe they'll be okay, you know. Oh yeah, that hope says they didn't mean it. Hope says, I'm probably overreacting. But you know what? That that may be true or not true, but the pattern doesn't lie. If you look at the pattern, the pattern won't lie to you. Patterns say this is what has happened repeatedly. And when you build trust on patterns, my friend, instead of hope, instead of expectation, something shifts in your nervous system. I'm telling you, I'm a doctor. I love saying that every now and then. Yeah, when you build your trust on patterns instead of hope, something does shift in your nervous system. You stop asking, Am I being too cautious? You start asking, what has this person or this situation actually shown me? You see, because trust rebuilt, a trust that's rebuilt on patterns is much quieter. It's not as electric, but it definitely lasts. It definitely lasts, and that's an important thing to keep in mind. Okay? And here's the line I want you to carry out of this episode as we wrap up this episode. The old version of trust that you may have been using was really big time. It was loud, it did its thing, it announced itself, I made promises, it moved fast, it did its thing. But now you've been through some stuff, you've had some experience, you just you're in a post post-pressure situation. This is trust after pressure. It doesn't do that, it's real quiet, like it's super quiet. Like the older folks that I'm around, and the the elders in my family, and and my aunts and uncles and mom, dad, all the folks around me that I learn from, they watch first, they're like watchers. You know, trust after pressure doesn't uh it's not loud, it watches first, it lets silence do the work. It doesn't need to convince anyone, including you. Trust after pressure is not louder, it's cleaner. There's something about it, it's very, very clean. That's the thing about post-pressure trust that I want you to grasp. You've been through some things, you've had some pressure, now you have to trust again, it's a lot cleaner. You're looking for patterns. It doesn't trust easily. Uh and clean trust doesn't really argue, it observes a lot, it makes a choice, it chooses. Clean trust doesn't argue, it observes, it chooses, and it walks away when it needs to without an apology. Let that land. Does it look for patterns first? Does it then make a choice? And does it walk away when it needs to without an apology, without even looking back? Does it have a sequence? We've talked about sequence, how sequence is more important than speed in these things when you're dealing with pressure. You've been listening to the sweet spot, my friend, and you've been in trust yourself Thursday, and we went deep. We went in tomorrow. Tomorrow, sweet spotter is Finish Strong Friday, and we're gonna walk the talk around fatigue. Not as weakness, not as failure, but as a truth-telling kind of moment where we see how fatigue is not what's gonna create your limit. It doesn't create the invisible ceiling thing that we talked about before. It reveals the ones you've been living under all along, the ceilings that you've been living under all along. We kind of repeat certain themes here because it's very important that you cross all the T's, dot all the I's, and link the things that. Are important, okay? Alright now, sweet master. Okay, sweet one, my beautiful soul. If today gave you language for why trust feels a bit different now, now that you're a sweet pattern observer, okay, why trust feels different now. If something in you just sort of exhaled, subscribe. Subscribe to the sweet spot because the sweet spot is free. And share this with someone who's been rebuilding quietly, someone who needs to understand trust in a little bit of a different way, someone who needs to connect the dots around who they are in the pressure that they're experiencing and how they're gonna go about trust. Someone who's been calling themselves guarded when really they've just been learning. You're not damaged, you're discerning, and that's growth. And I'll see you tomorrow. This is Dr. Sweet. Out of the