I am a new grandma.   If you were here with me, I’d show you tons of pictures of my adorable granddaughter.  I’ve become one of THOSE grandmas.

Before I even became a grandma, I knew that I wanted to rearrange the rooms in my house so that I could create a “bunk house” for my future grandkids. 

I wanted my house to be a fun “Grandma” house, although I’m sure I’ve got stiff competition for that. 

The Grandpa in this situation is way more fun than me so he’ll probably make it Grandpa’s house…but whatever.  We’re both excited to be Poppa and Grandma’ma. 

I became a grandma less than a year ago and I’m ready to start the process of rearranging the house to create the bunkhouse. 

I’ve thought about it a lot!

 Like, if brainpower would move things around, I would’ve been done a long time ago…but it doesn’t.

 Let me explain. 

When we moved into our house over 17 years ago, we made the bonus room above the garage into our offices. It also quickly became my hobby room too. 

Back then, we owned an online scrapbook store, so it totally made sense. 

I had my sewing machine as well as all my scrapbooking supplies in that bonus room. 

All four of our kids were living with us and they we’re lucky enough to have their own rooms.  We were a full house! 

Fast-forward a few years and two of our kids had left the house to go to college etc.  Our two younger kids moved to the basement rooms and that left two rooms vacant on the main floor.  Our scrapbook store had gone out of business, and I had started making & selling Travelers Notebooks, so it made sense to make one of the rooms into my sewing room and the other room became the guest room.

The 2020 pandemic also happened shortly after this, and my husband and I were not able to both do our work in our upstairs office.  It was impossible for both of us to be on zoom calls at the same time in the same room, so he created an office in the basement where we were waiting to build a little kitchenette. 

I am really good at filling in the space that I have so the upstairs office was taken over by me and that puts us where we are today.  All of the “stuff” I’ve collected has really filled in the space that I now want for Grandma’ma’s bunk house.

Our youngest kids have now moved out too, and not settled down yet, so we want to keep rooms for them to come home to. 

This gets us back to my dilemma right now…moving all of my hobbies into the one bedroom left open.  

This feels very overwhelming to me, so I’ve been putting it off, feeling like the task is just too big! 

If I’m really, really honest, I have a hard time getting rid of things that I just might use again one day.  My mind spins and spins on that. 

Do you do that too? 

Here’s the good news…

Your brain is always on your side!

Your brain has its very own safety team. 

That safety team scan’s your environment looking for things that are familiar.

When it finds something that is NOT familiar, it triggers it into getting you back into a safe place.

Anything can trigger the safety team to fire off and If you don’t know that your brain is doing this, you won’t understand what is going on.  

It’s mostly done unconsciously. 

It may not be rational or logical and it could get you stuck in fight, flight, or freeze at any sign of something your safety team thinks isn’t safe for you. 

This is stuff to be aware of so you know how to work with it instead of against it.

Did you know that the human brain isn’t wired for success?  The brain is wired to survive.

So, all change, even healthy change can feel unsafe to your brain, and your safety team, because it’s not familiar.

Back to my problem of creating the bunk house.

I was feeling stuck in being able to start moving the rooms around. 

And feeling stuck can actually feel like a safe place where I can compress all of my feelings that are uncomfortable. 

Even making easy decisions can set off your safety team.  Part of getting unstuck is learning to feel the uncomfortable feelings and recognize them for what they are.

One of the best places to begin that won’t set off your safety team is to start making Micro-decisions.

Micro-decisions are very small steps that are so small they almost seem ridiculous.

It might seem to you like you’re not making any progress at all when doing these tiny steps.  But be real with yourself. 

You’re not making progress when you’re stuck either!

You’re going to get where you want to go faster by doing these micro steps than if you keep doing what you’re doing, which is nothing. 

In your brain what you want to do is too big!

This makes your brain feel overwhelmed because it feels unfamiliar.

So, you shut down and then shame yourself for not doing anything and then repeat.

So, you start with these tiny micro steps instead.

Try to Remember…

This is where you are starting.  Not where you are going to end up.

These small steps create small wins that help you to begin to feel motivated. 

Then you begin to move forward at a faster pace.

These small steps are so small that when your brain sees you doing them, it’s like, that’s new but it’s no big deal, no threat here.

It keeps your fight, flight, freeze reactions in the off position so they stay out of your way.

So, I began making the micro-decisions needed to make baby steps forward in the Grandma’ma Bunkhouse drama my brain has created by trying to keep me in the familiar, safe places.

Instead of focusing on moving the entire upstairs room into the smaller downstairs room that is already too full, I began breaking it down into micro-decisions.

I was procrastinating because I felt like if I got rid of anything, then I would need it and I wouldn’t be able to get it again.  That is one of my hardest things. 

This is a safety issue. 

It helped me to see that I wasn’t feeling financially safe.

When you take time to really look at what you’re doing and why, it helps SO much.

Procrastination is actually a perceived threat that keeps me stuck because I fear that I won’t have what I need (see why the safety team was called out and I froze?)

This caused me to freeze and not get started because my brain went to its comfortable (and not helpful) place that I won’t be able to get what I need again.

Now, I could dive in deep and try to figure out where those feelings of scarcity come from or just solve the problem right there to help the part of me that feels unsafe to feel more safe. 

Can you start to see where thinking about WHY I’m procrastinating can really help?

INSTEAD I CAN CHOOSE TO BELIVE THAT…

I am not the problem.

I am the person who is trying to solve the problem.

And I can do that!

The sewing room was full of things I wouldn’t be using anymore since I wasn’t making and selling Travelers Notebooks anymore. 

This points me to where I could start.

A micro-decision.

I could start by getting rid of all the small amounts of fabric that I had that I used for making Travelers Notebooks.

Don’t get me wrong!

This is NOT easy for me!! 

I love fabrics. 

I love sewing.

I love quilting. 
I could save every scrap of fabric because it could potentially be used for some kind of project.

 So, I started with the smallest amounts of fabric and worked on getting rid of those first.

As I was doing this first step, something came to my memory from my past that really helped me move forward.

I remembered a big flour sack of scraps of fabric that was in our basement when I was little.  I loved going to that flour sack and finding little pieces of fabric I could use and making them into something else. 

When I started going through my fabric scraps and it was hard to get rid of them, I started picturing a creative child who didn’t have money to go buy fabric but could get them from the donation center.  I started thinking of a little girl going through the bags of fabric scraps I was making, and seeing her face as she looked through it, being creative as she makes things with my scraps that were just sitting in bins. 

It didn’t feel like I had wasted money by getting rid of them anymore when I pictured someone else being able to use it.

My next micro-decision came when I decided what I was going to use the new space for. 

That helped me to know what to start bringing downstairs first. 

I’m going to sew and scrapbook in that room, so I started moving anything that was scrapbook related down first. 

Everything else could stay put for now.  That next micro-decision make it feel less overwhelming.

I found myself procrastinating even after making that decision.

There was a lot of stuff to move down the stairs! 

How did I get over this next “threat” my brain created for me?

I would make one micro-decision each time I was upstairs studying or working.

I’d choose one thing that could go in my new space each time I’d go back downstairs.

That make the task seem smaller. 

Instead of seeing EVERYTHING that needed to be moved, I looked for ONE thing to take with me.

Do you see what I mean?

I no longer had to move the entire room, I just needed to move this one box of paper. 

And guess what, it worked!

Once I started doing the little micro steps, my momentum kept going, and it felt less and less overwhelming. 

I was able to give away a lot of what I had.

I threw a lot of junk away too and I am now safely in my new craft room, with half a bunk house ready to fill with beds and grandkids!

Where are you feeling stuck?

Is there a project you’ve put off because it feels too big?

Is there an email you need to reply to, but it seems scary?

Do you want to start working out?

Do you want to clean a room like I did?

Try talking to your safety team.

Get curious about WHY you’re procrastinating and what your safety team is trying to keep you safe from.  What is the unfamiliar thing you’re trying to do?

This is a good journal prompt.

What is your safety team trying to protect you from?

Write about your task and get really curious about why you’re procrastinating getting started.

Once you’ve written about that, start writing out some micro-decisions you could make that breaks it down into super small steps.  Break them down until they are so ridiculously small that it feels silly to do something that easy.

Then do it.

If you need someone to help you break down the big decisions into micro-decisions, that’s actually what I do. It can really help having someone from the outside looking in, that can see things you may be missing.  I can help you get over the “stuck” and get moving again.  Let’s set up a conversation and see what you think.  Send me an email at marla@hunkeedori.com  and we’ll get a time set up soon!