220: Are You Living in a Tragedy or a Hero's Journey? One Quick Exercise to Change Your Story Today

The Stories You Tell Yourself: How Your Thoughts Shape Your Reality

What if the biggest thing keeping you stuck isn't what's happening in your life—but the story your brain keeps telling you about it?

Our minds are incredible storytellers. A comment from a neighbor,  a missed invitation, or a simple misunderstanding can quickly become a dramatic narrative about rejection, failure, or not being enough. The problem isn't the circumstance itself—it's the meaning we assign to it.

In this episode of Inner Work with MaryAnn Walker, you'll discover a surprisingly fun mindset exercise that helps you interrupt negative thinking, challenge unhelpful assumptions, and intentionally rewrite the stories shaping your emotions, relationships, and future.

Using the idea of writing your own movie trailer, you'll learn how to shift from seeing yourself as the victim of your circumstances to becoming the hero of your own story.

If you're someone who tends to overthink every interaction, this episode will give you practical tools to create more peace, confidence, and emotional resilience.

In This Episode You'll Learn:

• Why your brain naturally creates negative stories (and why it isn't your fault)
• How your thoughts—not your circumstances—shape your emotional experience
• The psychology behind negativity bias and overthinking
• Why people often assume the worst 
• How to recognize when you're writing a tragedy instead of a growth story
• The "Movie Trailer Exercise" that helps you create empowering new narratives
• How changing your internal story changes the way you show up in your life
• Why you're only living one chapter—not your entire story

Challenge for the Week

Throughout the week, notice the stories your brain automatically creates after everyday situations.

Instead of accepting the first storyline your mind offers, ask yourself:

• What else could this mean?
• Is this story helping me become the person I want to be?
• If my life were a movie, what would the trailer say about this chapter?

Then write your own movie trailer.

Imagine your life being narrated as the beginning of an incredible transformation instead of the end of the story.

Because this isn't your whole story.

It's just one chapter.

Resources Mentioned

• Free 7-Day Get Your Needs Met Challenge https://maryannwalker-life.kit.com/cdf81f07e6
• One-on-One Coaching with MaryAnn Walker Email: maryann@maryannwalker.life

Work With Me

If you're tired of overthinking every conversation, assuming the worst, or feeling stuck in the same painful patterns, coaching can help you rewrite the beliefs that have been running your life for years.

Together, we'll uncover the stories your brain has been repeating, challenge the beliefs keeping you small, and help you create new thought patterns that lead to healthier relationships, stronger boundaries, and greater emotional peace.

To learn more about working together, email maryann@maryannwalker.life.

Transcript

Speaker 0:42

Well, hello and welcome back. Today we're going to have some fun tapping into the creative side of our brain, the side of our brain that says, "What else is possible?" And we're going to do that through one simple exercise: writing movie trailers. Now, stick with me on this one because I think this is a very simple but a very powerful idea. And this is one that's actually pretty fun to do, so I would not be surprised if this becomes the new party game because oh my goodness, it can just give you such a huge insight into yourself and into other people when you think about your life in terms of, what would my movie trailer look like? So here's how we're gonna play. Something happens in your life, for example, it's raining on your wedding day or your dinner gets burned or you receive some negative feedback from somebody. When that happens, notice what is happening in your brain. Your brain is an amazing storyteller, but it doesn't always tell the most accurate of stories. I mean, yeah, it's gonna tell you that, "Oh no, I'm telling the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, and you should believe me." But that's not actually the truth, right? It's actually only telling you one possible storyline, and we know that there are multiple versions of the same story because everybody has a different story even when the circumstances are the same. Everybody reacts differently to the same circumstance. For example, one person might burn dinner and burst into tears, and another person might burn dinner and burst into laughter. It is the same circumstance, but one person made that circumstance a tragedy while the other one made it a comedy, right? So when something happens, notice the storyline that your brain wants to attach to that something. Okay? Those are all the neutral circumstances. They do not mean anything until we write a story about it. You are a storyteller whether you think you are or not, whether you think that you're a creative or not, And more than likely, you've practiced a certain genre of writing for quite a while now. You have practiced a certain kind of script, and thinking that this is the only way that your story can end, that might be what's keeping you stuck. So here's the game. Are you ready? When something happens, then notice your thoughts about it and then repeat it back like you're narrating a movie trailer. So for example, let's say it's now 8:00 PM, and you're brushing your teeth, and you notice that you have a poppy seed that's stuck in your teeth. And so when this happens, notice, "Okay, what is my narrator saying? I know that I have a poppy seed in my teeth. The last time I ate poppy seeds was for lunch. What's my narrator saying?" So maybe the narrator in your head is saying something like, "MaryAnn went the entire day not noticing this seed, and none of her supposed friends told her that it was there. Maybe she doesn't have friends after all." Right? That's a total downer of a story, right? But a more supportive story might be, "Nothing keeps this girl down. Even when a poppy seed has been her companion for an entire day, then she's able to laugh about it, floss it out, and move on." And it's not just poppy seeds that she doesn't let get her down, right? Okay, also as a side note for poppy seeds, I did have to look at my teeth before recording. I had some everything bagel bagel chips for lunch, and oh my goodness, they were so good, but then they've got all the seeds in them, right? Sesame seeds and poppy seeds. But then, do you wanna know what my honest to goodness thought was before recording? I mean, yes, I did check in the mirror to make sure I didn't have poppy seeds, but I thought, "You know what? Worst case scenario, I do have a poppy seed in my teeth, and then this'll be the video that takes off." It seems like the videos that have the most engagement are the ones where something's wrong and people just can't look away. So it wouldn't actually be the worst case scenario, right? So anyway, that's just one other story for that poppy seed. Or maybe, for example, your neighbor says, "Oh, you got a haircut," and your brain wants to immediately write a story. So one story might be, "Oh, MaryAnn shouldn't have changed stylists. Oh, that was a big mistake. How embarrassing. She looks terrible." Or maybe the story is, "Oh, wow, people can't help but comment about my good look. Oh, doesn't it look amazing? I'm so glad that I found that stylist that's good with curly hair." Right? You get to decide what story you want to assign to that neutral circumstance of somebody saying, "Oh, you got a haircut." Also, I'm just gonna say, it's a personal pet peeve of mine when people make a statement instead of a compliment, so pretty please to my listeners, if you've noticed that somebody's cut their hair, instead of saying, "Oh, you got a haircut," please tell them how great they look. But even if they don't tell you how great you look, you can write a good story in your head. Now, if your brain has ever taken a five-second interaction and then turned it into a two-hour-long docuseries, then you're in good company. All of us are amazing writers, and while the brain wants to convince us that, "Oh, no, my brain, nope, I'm just thinking over here. I'm just telling you the facts," it's not just telling you the facts. It's writing a story, and it's assigning meaning even when it doesn't necessarily need to. And the stories that it's writing are not always helpful. In fact, sometimes the brain, it wants to keep rereading the same sad page or the same depressing chapter over and over and over again. But really, the truth is that we are all on our own hero's journey. That means we're going to have highs, and we're going to have lows. And we get to keep moving forward instead of getting hung up on that one negative plot line So imagine for just a moment that you walked into a movie theater and you sat down, the movie's halfway through, and you don't know the characters, you don't know what's coming next, but you assume that since you sat down and watched five minutes of that movie, that you knew everything about it, right? You knew what kind of a movie this was. But the thing is, the five minutes that you sat down for, it was the part in the hero's journey where the hero is really struggling. Things aren't going well. They feel so lost and so abandoned and so afraid. They don't know how it is that they're going to get out of this. Now, if that's the only part of the movie that you see and then you walk out, you're going to have a very different perception of that movie, right? So when you get out of that movie, you might go and talk to your friends about it and say, "Oh yeah, I saw that movie. Ooh, it is so depressing. I didn't like it at all." And your friends might respond with, "Wait, what? No, it was such an inspiring movie. I can't believe you said it was depressing. It brought me so much hope and so much encouragement. It was such a feel-good movie. I wish you would've sat through the whole thing so that you could've seen how it ended because, oh, it was so good." So they had a very different experience of that film because they were willing to sit with it and to just watch the hardship happen. They were able to wait in hope as to what was coming next. They were willing to hold onto the hope that things are gonna turn around in this film. Things are going to get better. The hero's going to be okay. They're going to come out on top. And oftentimes this is what we're doing with our own lives. We're focusing on and replaying the same sad scene. We are reliving the same role of victimhood in our own personal stories instead of allowing ourselves to sit in the hope and the possibility of, "Wow, I wonder who it is that I'm going to become through this experience. I wonder how things are going to turn around for me. I wonder how I could be my own hero in this story." The brain, it craves certainty, and the brain, it also wants to be right even more than it wants to be happy. So if you're thinking thoughts like, "Well, I guess this is just my life now. I'm just going to die sad and alone," then guess what? Your brain is going to start looking for all of the reasons why that's true, even though it's not necessarily true. But the more evidence your brain shows you that what you're thinking is true, the more likely it is that you're going to believe that story. But think about all of the movies that you've watched, all the books that you've read, where there's a plot twist and things absolutely turn around. You can do that too. So ask yourself, the story that I'm writing, what kind of a life is that gonna be creating for me? And is that the life that I want? The truth is that negative storylines, they actually come really easily to the brain because the brain has a built-in negativity bias, and this is actually a safety mechanism. The brain believes if I can just predict and prepare for the worst case scenario, then I will be okay. And yes, it is totally fine to think about and prepare for the worst case scenario. Definitely be prepared. But when you get stuck in that loop and stuck thinking that, "Okay, I am now living in the worst case scenario," it's gonna be really hard for you to just be in the present. It's gonna be hard for you to look for what else might be possible because you're reinforcing that one storyline. Your brain is attempting to protect you with this plot line. It is trying to save you from rejection. It's trying to save you from embarrassment or disappointment or failure or loss. And it does this by making up stories. Because even negative stories, they can feel really empowering because they're giving us some kind of an explanation. They're saying, "Oh yeah, I can understand why I'm the victim here. It's because everybody else is so hard on me. I'm the victim of circumstance. Everything goes wrong for me. That's my role. That's my storyline. This is true," and we tend to cling to it. And part of us feels really good practicing that because it gives us some explanation for why it is that we're feeling so miserable. But our built-in negativity bias, it's naturally going to make it easier to write stories of victimization rather than the beautiful, heartfelt Hallmark scripts, right? So it does take some effort, and it takes some practice to see what else might be true because we do have that negativity bias, but it is absolutely worth the practice. So for example, that poppy seed that's been in there since lunchtime. What story are you writing? Are you writing a story that says, "Ugh, I am such a doofus. That is so embarrassing. I am mortified. I can't believe that nobody told me. They're so mean to me, and they just let me go around all day with this poppy seed in my teeth. I'm so embarrassed"? Or maybe you're writing a story that, "Oh, I have a poppy seed in my teeth. That's so funny because I know that every single person who has ever eaten a poppy seed ever has probably got it stuck right in the front of their teeth, and it's fine. It just makes me human. People are gonna think I'm relatable because of this poppy seed, and it comes out so easily with floss. It's not a big deal. I'm not gonna be overthinking this tonight. I'm gonna sleep so great." So notice the stories that you're telling yourself, and get creative as you work to write a new story because you do not need to stay up all night recycling that same tragic chapter. When you accidentally tell the insurance guy, "Bye, I love you," before getting off the phone because you were just talking to your fiance, what story are you going to write about it? Do you wanna make it into a comedy and maybe tell yourself the story that, "Oh, my gosh, that was so funny. I bet it totally made that guy's day. He's gonna be telling all of his coworkers about it. That is just hilarious." Or are you going to write a story about self-humiliation? "Oh, that is so embarrassing. I'm so embarrassed. I'm so inadequate. I'm such a goober. My fiance should be ashamed of me." The thoughts that you are thinking, the stories that you are writing in your head, they are what create our emotional experience with life. So why not write a story that makes you feel a little bit better? When you go into a movie theater, then you know that you're going to experience the full range of human emotions. In fact, that is what makes a good storyline. You also know that more than likely the hero is going to overcome their hardship. They're going to find love. They're gonna solve the case. They're gonna land the job. They're gonna get the superpowers, right? You just aren't quite sure how they're going to get there yet, but you're rooting for the hero. You're rooting for the underdog, and you have that hope that, yeah, they're gonna make it through. I can't wait to see what's going to happen next. Nobody's going to go into a movie or read a book where nothing goes wrong or where nothing actually happens. I mean, I guess that some people do. My mom actually enjoys a podcast where they tell stories where nothing really happens, and the intent of that podcast is to help people sleep But generally speaking, humans want to experience the full range of their emotions. But for some reason, we expect that in our own personal lives, we're only allowed to feel positive emotions. And if we're not only experiencing those positive emotions, it must mean that something is wrong with us. But even the idea that something is going wrong, that's just a story that we're telling ourselves, and it's not a very supportive one. Sometimes we tell ourselves stories that bring us pain, like something is going wrong. Like, "Well, my kid would never do that," and then they inevitably do, and then we write another story. We resist it, thinking, "No, that is not the plot line that I wrote for their life." And then we might even experience grief and mourning as we resist their storyline and their actual plot line, and that prevents us from actually seeing all of the growth that our child is actually gaining because of that experience, not in spite of it. They're just entering a new chapter. They're entering their own hero's journey, and another chapter is coming. Or maybe we tell ourselves, "Oh, I made a huge mistake. I'm never going to recover." But maybe you're just at the beginning of your own hero's journey, and you don't know yet how you're going to get to where it is that you're going to go because you're just focusing so much on this one page of what's gone wrong instead of actually continuing the story and seeing what else might be possible, what else is coming down the line. So let's play around with a few examples, okay? So the neutral circumstance is your husband said, "Oh, we're having spaghetti again." Now, one story in your head might be, "Oh, I failed. He's disappointed in me. I make spaghetti too often. I'm not very creative in the kitchen. My husband probably doesn't like me anymore." There are endless numbers of stories that you could write about this very neutral thing. The husband just said, "Oh, we're having spaghetti again," and they're not gonna make you feel very good. And there's also stories that could feel a lot better. For example, maybe you want to tell yourself the story that, "Yeah, I am so amazing at saving time by making spaghetti on my busy days." Or maybe you wanna tell yourself the story that, "Ugh, I am so good at saving money. Look at how much money I've saved our family by having spaghetti once a week, and it's even better that I love spaghetti with garlic bread. It's my favorite." Or you might be thinking, "Ugh, I'm so glad that I have a few quick and easy go-to recipes that I can have on hand when I have crazy days like today. And guess what? If hubby doesn't like spaghetti, he can have cold cereal. It's okay." Or I could even tell my husband, "Hey, Wednesdays from now on I'm going to be making spaghetti because that's all that I have time for. But if you would like to cook on Wednesdays, I really love those burgers that you make. So which one would you like, spaghetti or burgers?" But the stories that we tell ourselves are going to impact our relationships and how we feel. Okay, let's do another one. The neutral circumstance is that your kid didn't get invited to that party. Now, again, there are any number of stories that you could tell yourself here. You could tell yourself the story that, "Those kids are so mean. They intentionally left out my kid. My kid is always left out. You know what? And my kid can kind of be socially awkward. They're probably never going to have friends." Now, if those are the stories that you're telling yourself, how are they going to make you feel? How are they going to be impacting how you show up as a parent? How are they going to be impacting your relationship with your child? Now some more supportive stories might be, "You know what? If those friends are choosing to leave my kid out, it's their loss because my kid is pretty awesome. And their leaving, that's gonna open the door for more supportive friends to walk in." Or maybe you wanna choose the story, "You know what? My kid is gonna be so much more empathetic and inclusive moving forward because of this experience, because they now know what it feels like to be left out." Or maybe you wanna choose the story, "You know what? Their invitation, it probably just got lost in the mail. That happens. It's fine." But again, remember that the story that you tell yourself is going to determine how you feel. It's gonna determine how you feel about you. It's gonna determine how you feel about your kid. It's gonna determine how you feel about those other kids. It's gonna determine how you feel about life in general, so be more intentional with the story that you're telling yourself. Think about every movie you've ever loved. More than likely, it was full of highs and lows, of wondering will they or won't they? It was full of hardship and overcoming hardship, and it is a joy to see how the hero is going to overcome their challenges, and we're there for the whole journey, right? We love it. So why do we assume that our own story is over just because we're currently in the middle of a difficult chapter? And what might happen if you started to imagine yourself as the hero in your favorite story? What might happen if you started to get curious about how you're going to overcome this? What might happen if you start to get curious about how it is that you're going to work through this rather than just being resigned to what currently is? And as I said in the beginning, one of the most fun ways to play around with this is to write your own movie trailer. If you were going to write a movie trailer for your life, what would the voiceover say? Be very intentional about it, and you get bonus points if you tape this to your bathroom mirror, and you practice your voiceover every morning and every night. So what would your voiceover say? What if it said something like, "Eva was a struggling artist who had no idea that at her next exhibit, everything would change"? How might that shift how Eva prepares for that next exhibit? How might that change the energy that she's putting into her artwork, the energy that she's bringing into the exhibit as she presents her work? How might that shift everything for her if that's what she's choosing to believe, is that everything is going to change at this next exhibit? Or maybe your trailer sounds something like, "Sandy thought that her marriage was over. Little did she know that she was just beginning a new relationship with the same man." How is that going to shift how it is that she engages with her husband? How might it shift her resignation into optimism and hope that she can actually create the change that she's looking for? How might it help her to think about what it is that she would like to be different, and how might it help her to advocate for those changes? Or maybe your trailer sounds like, "Fred was about to learn what a huge difference this one small change could have on his life, and in doing so, his transformation would inspire many." How might that shift Fred's level of consistency with that small change over time? How might that shift his results when it comes to his fitness journey or building his business or whatever it is that he's wanted to show up for more consistently? Or maybe your trailer says, "Katie was about to learn that the more she fell in love with herself, the more the creeps would naturally fall away and Prince Charming would find her." How might that shift how it is that she thinks about her current experience with being single? How might that shift how she feels about the guys that are currently pursuing her? How might that change how she feels about herself and who it is that she does and doesn't wanna tolerate when it comes to who gets to be in her immediate circle? Or maybe your trailer says, "Mary thought that she would never recover from that divorce. Little did she know that everything was lining up to create a life more beautiful than anything that she could have imagined." How might that help Mary to step into her highest version of herself? To really get her thinking about, "Boy, what kind of a life do I want to create? How can I make my life more beautiful and more amazing? What is it that I want to start to imagine because it's gonna be even better than that?" How would that support her in her personal journey? Or maybe your trailer sounds like, "Jessica was afraid that she would lose everything if she stood up for herself, but she was about to discover that stating boundaries would create meaningful and authentic relationships where she felt loved and respected." How might that shift how it is that Jessica actually feels about standing in her own power, about actually speaking up about what she would and wouldn't tolerate, about what it was that she wanted in life? Significant change happens when you shift your story from, "Oh no, who's gonna leave and who's gonna stay?" into, "My goal is to show up as my authentic self, and I'm gonna see who that brings in. I'm going to see who stays." It is such a little thing, but it can have a significant impact on how it is that we show up in life. Your brain is going to keep writing stories, and some of those stories are going to be playing on repeat, so make sure that it is a story worth retelling. When you find yourself playing those stories on repeat, I want you to question them. I want you to ask yourself, "Is this story really serving me? Is this a storyline that is helping me to become the best version of me, or is this story keeping me small?" Because here's the thing that I really want you to remember, is that this isn't the whole story. This is just your current chapter. This is one scene. This is one chapter. This is one difficult conversation. This is one season of life, and the truth is that we don't actually know what's coming next. But the story that we choose to tell ourselves is going to impact our experience moving forward. So go and pop some popcorn, get your pen ready, and let's write your next chapter together. You get to decide who it is that you want to become through this experience, not in spite of it, but through it. You get to be the hero. You get to be the underdog that wins it all. You get to decide what is going to harden you and what is going to soften you. You get to decide if you're going to be the hero or the victim in your story. Notice the stories that you're telling yourself, and tell yourself the story that, "Who I'm becoming through this experience is pretty amazing." The more conscious you become of the stories that you're telling yourself, the better you can make your story. You get to decide, "Okay, I'm gonna add a little plot twist here. I'm gonna start to show up differently. I'm gonna try this on instead. I am going to become the hero in my own story." Now, if you're currently having writer's block as you're working to write your own story, maybe you're a little bit too well-practiced when it comes to writing tragedies, and you want to learn how to actually write a hero's journey where you can step into that hero energy, then come and work with me. Together, we can look at what it is that your brain is wanting to create and come up with a storyline that is more supportive for the life that you actually want. Space is limited for summer, but I do currently have two spots available for one-on-one coaching. You can email me at maryann@maryannwalker.life to inquire about working with me. I would love to be the Samwise Gamgee to your Frodo Baggins. So check out the show notes to come and see how to work with me. And if you're not quite ready for one-on-one coaching, I do also have some free offerings available as well. I currently have a seven-day challenge to help you to learn how to get your needs met. This is a podcast for recovering people-pleasers. I know how much you give to other people, so in this free challenge, then I'm there to coach you for seven days on how to help you to get your needs met and experience more peace in life. You are the author of your life, and I cannot wait to see what you create. All right, I hope you have a great week, and let's talk soon. Bye now