Creative Self Care With Crystal McLain

Why You Ghost Your Own Growth- And How to Finally Stop

• Crystal McLain • Season 6 • Episode 1

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We explore why motivation surges and crashes, why consistency feels impossible, and how shame turns growth into a threat. We share a practical reframe: create safety around noticing, show up without promising follow-through, and build momentum through truth-telling and regulation.

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SPEAKER_00:

Hey, Happy New Year. So I thought we'd kick off 2026 by talking about something that might make you feel extremely seen and possibly a little bit attacked. But in the best possible way, I promise. So here's my question. Have you ever had this experience? You're exhausted, you're burnt out, you recognize you're at the end of your fucking rope. And you know that you need something different. So you download the meditation app because you need to feel more calm. And you buy the journal because you need to process what's actually happening in your life. And you research all the new habits because you desperately need to level up your stress management game. And so you get all of the things and you know what you need, but then nothing. The energy required to organize and follow through comes and goes. It's unpredictable and it comes without any patterns that you can recognize. Or maybe you've had that moment where you feel the surge of the new beginning and fresh start energy, and you're like, yes, this is it. I am finally gonna take care of myself. I'm finally gonna journal. I'm gonna exercise. I'm gonna start that creative hobby, set boundaries, and then three days later, three hours later, or more honestly, sometimes three minutes later, it's just gone. The energy, the motivation, the focus has vanished. And it hasn't gone quietly. It actually leaves you with a side of shame and self-defeat. If you are nodding right now, this episode is for you. So I recently posted about recognizing growth edges on TikTok. You might know what I'm talking about. The moments when you're feeling bored with yourself or frustrated with your routines or intolerant of old habits. And so I made this post, and a friend of mine left a comment that was so profound and important that I feel like we need to unpack it because what she named is the very thing that keeps so many of us stuck in the same shame spiral instead of actually moving forward with our goals. So today we're gonna talk about why your nervous system might be treating consistency like it's an elusive unicorn, why that all or nothing feeling isn't a character flaw, and how to actually create momentum when your brain chemistry is working against you. So let's dive in. All right, so before we dive in too deep, I first I just need to read to you what my friend wrote. And I want you to really listen to this because I guarantee some of you are going to feel like she crawled inside your brain. And so this is what she wrote. I'm definitely familiar with the self-boredom, the go-to soothers being tapped, the intolerance. Here's my biggest stumbling block and shameful, though probably super obvious, secret. The energy, either physical or emotional, required to even organize in my mind, much less act on it, comes and goes. And it does so without a pattern I can recognize yet. Also, often with a totality that feels like, ah, a new beginning, or, well, every scrap of that is gone forever, which, although demonstrably wrong, seems to get me every time, makes me hesitate to enter these conversations about growth, to avoid the shame of not following through, or even worse, giving important people in my life the obvious impression that I must not care that much about it. It's a gross and murky place to be. This comment is one way to stop thinking of silence as safety instead of the stagnation it is. Wonder if I'll have the balls to hit send. My god. First of all, she did hit send. And that matters, and we're gonna come back to that in a minute. But let me tell you what I want you to hear. This is not a character flaw. This is actually neurobiology. When you experience energy that comes and goes without a predictable pattern, when the motivation to even, quote, think about growth feels unreliable, that's not you being wishy-washy, uncommitted, or lazy. That is your nervous system doing exactly what it was trained to do. So let's break this down so you can understand. So there are two major players here. And if you've got both of them running the show, you're basically trying to drive your car with the emergency brake on. So the first player is ADHD or some other neurospiciness. So ADHD brains have inconsistent access to neurochemicals that fuel things like motivation and task initiation. We're talking about dopamine, norepinephrine, the stuff that makes your brain say, yes, let's do the thing. And here's what non-ADHD people don't understand. That access is literally unpredictable. It's brain chemistry, not willpower. Some days you wake up and your brain is like, I could reorganize the entire garage right now. And then other days you can't even respond to a text message from someone you love. It is not you, it's inconsistent neurochemistry. The second player is trauma, burnout, or chronic overwhelm. Now, if you've lived through instability, and I'm talking about anything from, say, childhood trauma to years of work burnout or living in a body that society sees as a problem. Your nervous system learns to treat unpredictability as a baseline. Your nervous system adapted. It learned that consistency is, as I like to say, a fucking unicorn. It's a mythical creature that you've heard about, but never have actually seen in the wild. So what does your brilliant protective nervous system do? Well, for starters, it doesn't trust the energy is going to last. It's not surprised when plans fall apart and it constantly braces for things to change. And it's not just this programming that's the problem. Trauma and chronic stress actually accelerates the loss of gray matter, which is literally the brain's processing center. So this isn't pessimism. This isn't self-sabotage. This is your nervous system running an insufficient program that's been conditioned to keep you safe in times when things felt unpredictable or unsafe. Now imagine if you've got both ADHD giving you inconsistent dopamine access, plus a nervous system that isn't running on all cylinders and has learned that chaos is normal. What does that look like day to day? Well, it looks like energy showing up like new beginning and then vanishing like it's gone forever. It looks like knowing exactly what you need to do, but being unable to organize the thought, much less take action. It looks like that all or nothing feeling that my friend described so perfectly. And here's the part that breaks my heart. It looks like shame. Deep, murky, isolating shame. Because when you don't understand what's happening in your nervous system, you interpret it as a personal failing. You think, I must not care enough. I must not want it badly enough. I must be fundamentally broken. But you're not broken. Your system is working overtime just to regulate, which leaves way less juice for things like organizing and initiating and following through. So let's talk about what's really happening when shame enters the picture. My friend said something so important in her comment. She hesitates to enter conversations about growth because she's afraid of the shame of not following through or giving people the impression that she doesn't care. Here's what nobody tells you about shame and the nervous system. When shame runs the show, your brain learns that talking about change means you're setting yourself up for failure, which ultimately means danger. So it shuts you down before you even start. Your nervous system literally treats growth like a threat. And this is why you might ghost therapists or avoid accountability partners or go silent in group chats where everyone else is sharing their wins. It's not because you don't care, it's because your nervous system has learned if I name what I want and then can't follow through, that's dangerous. That's exposure, that's proof that I'm broken. So silence becomes safety and stagnation becomes the status quo. But here's the thing silence doesn't actually keep you safe. It keeps you stuck. And more importantly, shame blocks the exact thing you need most, which is nervous system regulation. Because shame activates your sympathetic nervous system. It puts you into fight or flight, and you cannot access the part of your brain that plans and organizes and initiates when you're in survival mode. This is the fucking trap. You need regulation to take action, but shame prevents regulation. So you can't take action, which creates more shame. It's a loop and it's not your fault. So how do you actually create momentum if this is the case? All right. Well, if shame is keeping you stuck and your nervous system treats consistency like a unicorn, what are you supposed to do? Well, here's the reframe that changes everything. Recognizing your truth is the work. Naming it is the work. When my friend hit send on that comment, she did something radical. She moved the experience out of the shame spiral and into reality. And here's what I want you to understand. When something stays silent, your brain treats it like a secret failure. It becomes this shameful thing you can't even look at directly. But when you say it out loud, when you name what's happening, you're telling your nervous system, this isn't dangerous. This is just my truth. And that shift interrupts the shame cycle. So here's your new permission slip. Not that you need it. You are allowed to show up without the follow-through. Post the comment, say the thing, name what you're noticing, even if you have zero idea of what comes next. Because here's what happens when you do that. Your nervous system gets new information. It learns, oh, I can notice things and still be safe. I can want change without having all the answers. I can be in process without it meaning I'm failing. And that is how real momentum builds. Not through forced follow-through, not through shame-based willpower, but through creating safety around the noticing. The more you show up without demanding immediate action from yourself, the more your nervous system learns, this isn't a setup, this is just my truth. And when your nervous system feels safe enough to tell the truth, that's when real movement or growth becomes possible. So what does this look like in real life? Well, it might look like texting a friend that you're noticing that you're frustrated with your current routines, but without having to have a plan to do anything about it. It might look like journaling that you recognize that this is a growth edge, and then just closing the journal without trying to problem solve it. It might look like commenting on a post about change, even though you're not sure you'll follow through, or saying out loud, my energy is unpredictable, and that's just fucking fine. It's totally okay. None of these really require action. They just require truth telling. And here's what's wild: truth telling without shame is one of the most regulating things that you can do for your nervous system. Because when you name something without demanding you fix it immediately, you're practicing being with discomfort, without going into crisis mode. You're teaching your nervous system that awareness does not equal emergency. That's nervous system literacy. That's the fucking work. Now, if you are listening to this and you're thinking, okay, cool, but I still need actual tools and support to move through this, I would say you are absolutely right. And this is exactly why I created the uprising, which is my Patreon community. Because these growth edges need witnesses, not just willpower. You need a place where you can show up, name what's happening, and get support without the shame. So every week I post something I call Reclamation Monday, which is content where we dig into nervous system literacy and stress regulation tools and how to reclaim your agency from systems that profit from your exhaustion. I also have a self-guided course called Turn Stress into Strength, where you can learn all about who you are, how you function, and simple practical tools to regulate your nervous system. And we've got a whole community of people doing this messy, nonlinear work together. You don't have to figure this out alone, and you do not have to be perfect at it. And if that sounds awesome, I'd like to invite you to join us. All right, my friend, here's what I really want you to take away today. If your energy feels unpredictable, if consistency feels impossible, if you're stuck in the shame spiral of wanting change, but not being able to follow through, you are not broken. Your nervous system is doing exactly what it was trained to do. And the work isn't forcing yourself into action. The work is actually creating safety around the noticing. Name it, say it out loud, show up without demanding follow through. That's how you're going to interrupt the shame cycle, and that's how you're going to build real momentum. And that's what I want for you in this coming year. I fucking love you. I hope to see you soon. Bye.