Bloom By Naza

Ruth Naza Agbasimalo

If the brain is an accumulation of survival systems, learned predictions, and constructed narratives all running simultaneously below conscious awareness, what does it actually mean to live and create deliberately from that?

Episodes

  1. 23 MAR

    The Most Disciplined People Are the Laziest

    What this episode is about You've been blaming yourself for running out of energy before you get to important work. This episode explains why that was always going to happen and why willpower and discipline were never going to fix it. The three things covered: Why you're productive all day and have nothing left by eveningWhy holding your entire business in your head at once makes it impossible to startWhy other people's systems keep failing when you try to use themThe explanation connects all three: your prefrontal cortex has a daily budget. Every decision you make: what to eat, what to wear, what to respond to first spends from that budget. By the time you sit down to do your own work, the budget is gone. Key concepts from this episode Decision fatigue: the depletion of cognitive resources that comes from making repeated decisions throughout the day, regardless of how significant those decisions are. The prefrontal cortex budget: the prefrontal cortex handles all complex thinking, planning, and decision-making. It does not have unlimited capacity. When it's depleted, cognitive work suffers or stops entirely. Basal ganglia habit transfer: when a behaviour is repeated consistently over time, the brain transfers it from the prefrontal cortex (conscious, effortful) to the basal ganglia (automatic, low-cost). This is what discipline actually looks like from the inside: the decision has already been made, so the brain doesn't have to activate to start. Pre-making decisions vs. planning: planning gives the brain a reward (dopamine from mapping the future). Pre-making decisions removes a choice before the day begins. No reward. No dopamine hit. Just one fewer decision your prefrontal cortex has to make. They are not the same thing.

    22 min
  2. 23 FEB

    You've Been Bullying Yourself Into Productivity (It's Not Working)

    If you've ever wondered why being hard on yourself isn't actually making you more productive, this episode is the explanation you've been missing. In this episode, I break down exactly what happens inside your brain when you criticise yourself, why it's the thing keeping you stuck instead of pushing you forward, and what to actually do instead in your life and business. In this episode: Why self-criticism triggers your brain's threat response (the amygdala hijack explained)What happens to your prefrontal cortex — your thinking, decision-making brain — when you're in self-attack modeWhy the cruelty feels like it's working even when it isn'tThe Bloom Work: three specific moves — The Catch, The Redirect, The ShrinkNext episode: Why you'll move mountains for a client but can't do the same for yourself. (It has nothing to do with discipline.) 🎙️ Bloom by Naza is a podcast for intelligent, capable women who know exactly what to do but can’t seem to be able to execute on it. Every episode starts with your brain, not your to-do list. New episodes every Monday at 6am. Chapters:00:00 — What you believe about self-criticism01:48 — Why I started here 05:15 — What happens in your brain when you attack yourself08:35 — The seven-step spiral you don't even notice you're in10:00 — The three flavors of self-criticism (and why each one freezes you differently)13:00 — Six businesses. Why I kept quitting.15:51 — The safety system — what your brain actually needs to build17:00 — Bloom Work22:20 — How I used all three before filming this episode26:35 — What's coming next week

    27 min

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If the brain is an accumulation of survival systems, learned predictions, and constructed narratives all running simultaneously below conscious awareness, what does it actually mean to live and create deliberately from that?