How to stop emotions & RSD from ruining your day in under 3 minutes

Jim Ebbelaar

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Apr 8 • 💡 Tips

tagging you all because you brought up emotions, RSD, overwhelm, or self-sabotage. We literally covered this in yesterday's Q&A and I want to make sure everyone gets the core insight, whether you were there live or not.

The big reframe: RSD and emotional overwhelm almost always trace back to self-worth and self-image.

When someone triggers you, the real issue isn't what they did. It's that in that moment, you don't feel worthy or good enough.

@Darci Wert

shared a powerful example on the call: her boss leaned over her at the computer, corrected her way of doing something, and she spiraled into "I'm stupid, he only gave me this job out of charity." But the actual trigger wasn't him. It was her belief that her way of doing things wasn't valid, rooted in old patterns from childhood. The fish-and-tree dynamic of growing up neurodivergent in a neurotypical world.

This is where the 3-Minute Comeback Protocol comes in. Here's the short version (also see the attached image below_:

Step 1: Name it. What emotion is actually coming up right now? Sometimes the monkey mind takes over and we don't even know what we feel. Just naming it is already powerful.

Step 2: Source it. Take a deep breath, close your eyes, and locate where you feel it in your body (throat, shoulders, chest). Then ask: is this connected to something older? A childhood pattern, a school experience, a parent dynamic? A lot of triggers tie back to not feeling worthy, people-pleasing, or only receiving love when being productive.

Step 3: Smallest next step. Once you've named and sourced it, 80-90% of the heaviness already lifts. Then ask: what's the tiniest thing I can do to improve this situation? If it's a recurring trigger, maybe that step is a conversation. If it's a one-time thing, maybe it's just acknowledging it and moving on.

The key takeaway: the gap between what you feel in the moment and what's actually happening is usually enormous. After a good night's sleep and some reflection, the thing that felt catastrophic is often not that big at all. Training yourself to pause, leave the room, put on music, use the protocol. That's the starting point. Over time, your brain learns to catch triggers faster, and eventually you don't even need to leave the room anymore.

@Varun Sharma

also shared something that hit hard: RSD kills self-expression. He deleted guitar tutorials from YouTube because a friend made fun of them, and hasn't posted since. That creative kid is still inside you. The situation is different now. Start doing it again.

For those of you dealing with self-sabotage (

@Nic F

f especially), this connects directly to identity. When your default state is "not good enough," success feels unfamiliar, and your nervous system will pull you back to what's familiar, even if familiar is misery. That's a protection mechanism running outdated software.

This is just scratching the surface. In the 5-Day Challenge we go deeper into where these patterns come from and how to start rewriting them. In the 6-Week Program, Week 3 (Emotional Mastery) and Week 4 (Identity Transformation) are entirely dedicated to this. We cover the full Comeback Protocol, the Circle of Control, mental rehearsal to train your nervous system BEFORE triggers happen, and the inner child work that gets to the root of these patterns.

If this resonates, you're in the right place. 🙏🔥

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