When Things Don’t Turn Out as You Expected | Wake Up Epic, June 21, 2026

When Things Don’t Turn Out as You Expected | Wake Up Epic, June 21, 2026 My wife said the other day as she was leaving and saw me shaking, "You're an odd man." I know. I am an odd man relative to people who don't take care of their bodies, who don't allow themselves to feel, and who don't allow themselves to take a step back, a step to the side, or a step forward as opposed to just plowing through. Today, we are looking at a sneaky one: What do you do when things don't turn out exactly as you expected? A lot of times, you aren't even aware that you are carrying an expectation. You are just driving forward because it feels like the right thing to do, or because you are running on an obligation, a should, or a heavy burden of responsibility. Then, it doesn't work out. In this session, we use a simple, fast shaking sequence and a slow-motion squat flow to drop the heavy weight of outcomes, disidentify from old results, and turn that past friction into new creative fuel. 📌 Video Chapters & Timestamps 0:00 – Introduction: The Odd Man Routine Rotating and shaking the body. Embracing the movement rather than just plowing through your day on autopilot. 0:42 – The Purpose of the Shake Bouncing out the frame to regulate your nervous system, feel what you don't want to feel, and give your mind a clean break. 1:17 – The Slow-Motion Shake Experiment Intentionally slowing down your shaking. Using an imaginative, forced tempo change to pull your awareness entirely into the present moment. 2:48 – The Leg System: Mini Squat Drops Dropping into a mini squat and coming back up. Feeling the natural strength, power, and tension working inside your lower body as a single system. 3:42 – Lateral Bias Squats: Uncovering Hidden Shoulds Continuing the squats but shifting your weight heavily toward one side, then the other, to track the expectations you place on yourself. 5:03 – Upper Body Expression: Finding Your Rhythm Adding your arms into the squat flow. Letting your hands express an athletic, soft, or dance-like pattern that purely pleases you for its own sake. 6:15 – Sustainable Delight: Moving Beyond the Outcome Finding a smooth, light, whole-body movement that you want to keep doing simply because it feels good, pulling you out of the focus on results. 6:50 – The Over-Effort Lesson: Why Projects Feel Heavy Pausing to realize that when a movement is over, you don't grieve it—you just move on. Exploring why we can't do the same with jobs or pitches. 8:00 – Merging the Past Friction with Renewable Movement Bringing to mind a specific memory of a goal or project that did not work out. Sinking back into the slow squat flow while holding that memory. 9:10 – The Disidentification Statement: "I Am Not That" Continuing the rhythmic squats while saying out loud: I am not that. Disidentifying from the project, the expectation, the outcome, and the obligation. 9:57 – Creative Fuel: Metabolizing the Experience Allowing your body to shift into less templated, creative movements. Letting your system digest the past disappointment to build new agency. 10:51 – Final Alignment: Capable Posture Coming back to center. Landing in your structure as someone who has fully metabolized the experience—maybe a little hurt, but overall far more capable. 🧠 What We're Exploring Today The Presence of Slow Motion: Shaking in slow motion feels weird and imaginative. But changing the speed of an automatic habit forces your brain to stop running on a default loop. It acts as an instant pattern interrupt, bringing your conscious awareness to the micro-details of your breath and joint alignment. Renewable Movement for Its Own Sake: When you finish a physical movement loop, you don't judge yourself or feel ashamed that it's over; you just get the immediate benefit and move on. Training your body to do things purely for the enjoyment of the action breaks the habit of focusing entirely on the final outcome, which is the exact tool you need to clear out post-project grief. Metabolizing Disappointment: When a project fails, it is easy to wrap your identity around the loss. Moving your whole body while stating I am not that signals to your nervous system that you are completely separate from the result. This disidentification turns the heavy emotional weight of a past failure into a raw, creative force you can use to make progress today. 💬 What happened to the tension in your body when you said I am not that today? Did shifting into a slow, sustainable rhythm help you let go of an old expectation? Let me know what you noticed in the comments below.