Tiny Buddha

Tag: despair

  • Where My Depression Really Came From and What Helped Me Heal

    Where My Depression Really Came From and What Helped Me Heal

    “How you do one thing is how you do everything.” ~Unknown

    One afternoon, during a particularly low slump, I was getting out of the shower. Quickly reaching for something on the sink, I knocked an old glass off the counter, shattering it onto the floor.

    In most cases, one might experience stress, frustration, or sadness upon accidentally breaking an object that belongs to them. They might feel agitation on top of their already poor mood. But in the moment the glass shattered, I felt instant relief.

    It was an old item I’d gotten at a thrift store, and the image on the glass was all but worn off. In the back of my mind, I’d wanted to get rid of the whole glass set, and the shattering of one of its pieces served as a firm confirmation it was time to let go.

    In that unexpected moment of relief, I realized I was holding on to the glasses out of some strange obligation and a fear that I wouldn’t have the money to replace things if I gave them away.

    I marveled at this interesting aspect of my consciousness I had not noticed before, wondering, “What else am I doing this with? How many things in my life are subtle burdens that I tolerate out of some vague sense of obligation? Does it really make me a “good person” to tolerate so much, to hold on to so much unwanted baggage from the past?

    Suddenly, I remembered something I had recently learned from one of my mentors about depression: We must stop clinging to people, places, and things that no longer deliver the joy they once did. Even more importantly, release things that never delivered joy, even when we thought they would.

    This sacred practice is all too underrated. We must cut the dead weight in our lives, even if it is unnerving. Whether it is a negative relationship, a job in which you are disrespected, a habit that is draining your health, or even some unwanted items in your home that are taking up too much space.

    It is our stubborn unwillingness, our fear of letting go, that keeps us in low spirits, day after day. In these instances, we are waiting for the impossible. We are waiting for things to miraculously improve without us having to do anything different.

    Even though I was in a bad mood, I thanked the glass and the sudden shattering for its lesson. The humbling realization was that I was a clinger—someone who stuck with people, places, and things long after they’d proven they were not right for me.

    As the saying goes, “How you do one thing is how you do everything.” The glasses that I didn’t really want any more were a small symbol of how I was an energetic hoarder. I kept things until life forcefully yanked them out of my hands.

    Often, I clung to subpar situations out of fear. I was afraid of being left alone, with nothing, so I’d gotten myself into the habit of anxiously settling. And as we all know, settling is no way to live a satisfying, dignified life.

    When we settle, the parts of us that aspire to grow are denied respect. We subconsciously tell ourselves it is not worth it—we are not worth it.

    My habit of settling had gotten me into more binds than I could count—low-paying jobs, incompatible relationships, boring days, and restless nights wondering what I was supposed to be doing. Why weren’t things better?

    The simple answer was, I didn’t choose anything better. I didn’t know how.

    When we don’t know ourselves, we don’t know what we want and need. And when we doubt our worth or our ability to make things happen, we hold ourselves back from what would make us happy. This is where depression breeds, along with burnout, stress, and apathy.

    So how can this painful spiral be prevented? And if you already find yourself in this predicament, how can you climb out of the hole?

    1. Assess everything in your life.

    What just isn’t working, no matter how hard you try, in work, your relationships, your habits? These are the areas where you need to make a decision. Either let something go or make a change that is significant enough to transform how you feel about the situation.

    2. Find the hope.

    Hopelessness is a huge aspect of lingering depression. The problem is, people often try to talk themselves into being hopeful about something that actually isn’t going to work (e.g.: a relationship that was meant to end). Instead of clinging, let go and seek out new things that feel truly hopeful instead.

    It’s not always easy to let go, especially when it pertains to relationships, and particularly when you’re not hopeful there’s anything better out there for you. Start by asking yourself, “Why do I believe this is the best I can do, or what I deserve?” And then, “What would I need to believe in order to let go of this thing that isn’t good for me and open myself up to something better?”

    3. Change anything.

    When we are stuck in a rut, it usually means things have been the same way for too long. Routine and consistency can be a poison or a cure, depending on the situation. If you’re feeling stuck, look for how doing the same thing every day isn’t working. Sometimes, making any random change is enough to shake you out of that rut.

    This could mean taking a new route to work or doing something creative when you usually binge watch Netflix. Sometimes little changes can give us a surprising level of new insight and self-understanding.

    4. Lastly, admit to what you really want.

    If you won’t risk being hopeful and taking action toward what you really want, you will default to a life of tragic safety. You will shy away from the truth, clinging to all the things that don’t really resonate with you. Ironically, you have to be willing to risk loss to in order to acquire valuable things in life.

    So start by being brave enough to admit what you really want in all aspects of your life, and perhaps more importantly, what you need. What would make you feel fulfilled and excited about life again?

    —

    We often think of depression as a vengeful disease that robs us of our joy and vitality. But when we begin to look at our lives with more honesty, we can see depression for what it really is: a messenger.

    I like to think of depression as the first phase of enlightenment—a reckoning we must endure to come out the other side with clarity. When we stop pushing negative feelings away, we can discover why they exist and what steps will resolve them.

    For me, this meant letting go of how I thought my life should be and embracing how it was. Rather than lamenting about the past or obsessing about the future, I started taking practical steps to improve the present. This included cleaning up my diet, giving up a job that no longer worked for me, and digging into attachment styles to learn how to improve my relationships. The more action I took, the more hopeful and empowered I felt.

    The road to happiness isn’t nearly as direct as we would like it to be, but this gives us the opportunity to access what we truly wanted all along: self-understanding, self-acceptance, and self-empowerment. Depression isn’t a problem, but a road-sign. The question is, will we ignore it, or let ourselves be guided?

  • On Those Hard Days When You Feel Like Nothing You Do Matters

    On Those Hard Days When You Feel Like Nothing You Do Matters

    “Just a reminder in case your mind is playing tricks on you today: You matter. You’re important. You’re loved. Your presence on this earth makes a difference whether you see it or not.” ~Unknown

    Today I woke up feeling like nothing I do matters. I didn’t want to wake up feeling like this, but I did.

    I got myself out of bed, brushed my teeth, and went through the motions until things inside my mind started to feel unbearable.

    The first thing I did was try to reason with myself, tell myself that, of course I matter. I tell everyone else in my life that they matter and they’re enough just as they are. But there is a tiny voice in my mind that feels loud. Just chanting, “You know you’re trash, people are lying to you. You know you do terrible things and have hurt other people. Just give up.”

    It reminds me of every mistake I’ve ever made. It attacks me with memories of my hurting someone with how I worded something or reminds me of someone who blocked me on social media, or just said, “I don’t like her because of xyz.”

    This feels immobilizing. By the time I am done with this thought process I cannot leave the living room chair I am sitting in. I pull a blanket up to my chin, curl up into a small ball, and start crying. “You’re right,” I say to myself. “You win. I should just give up.”

    My mind is spiraling with everything I have ever done that went unnoticed, that no one cared about. The essays I wrote that only a few people read. The points I made that were later recycled and went on to be successful once someone else made those same points that didn’t seem to matter when they came from me. And I have the overwhelming feeling that I deserved the bad reception, because I, too, am bad.

    Never mind that there are dozens of things that I’ve done that were greatly appreciated. That made a difference. That moved someone else enough to say, “This helped me.”

    Never mind that sometimes we can’t control algorithms, SEO, and the like.

    Never mind that sometimes you make a stupid spelling mistake even though you re-read your piece fourteen times. You just didn’t notice it, but people were turned off from the piece because of it.

    That’s the thing, being a mental health advocate, I feel like my whole purpose on some days as I struggle to get by is to hear someone say, “This helped me.” And if I helped no one, then why did I do it?

    But while I was busy worrying about who I have helped and if my helping got noticed, I may have forgotten to help myself.

    All the clichés, the putting on my own oxygen mask first, filling my own cup to fill others, they are reminders that I need on a daily basis, or I risk becoming my own victim.

    And honestly, to me, there is nothing worse than someone who is helping other people just to be a martyr. They continue toiling to help others but neglect themselves so that they can say, “I almost died doing things for other people.”

    Who are you useful to once dead, or even just burned out? The fight for mental health awareness and to end the stigma is long arduous. And if my goal really is to help others, to be there for the long haul, then I must find a reason to also do it for myself.

    That mean voice feels so loud, but suddenly an argument erupts in my mind.

    The other side finally feels empowered to speak because I kept pushing, although mentally exhausted, against the part of me that was convinced I deserve nothing. I told the quieter voice that it was okay if I messed up. That this doesn’t negate everything I have done that has helped someone, and yes, even if that was just one person. Even if it just helped me to get it out there into the universe.

    And really, the main thing is this: Everything we do doesn’t have to matter on a grand scale. It doesn’t have to leave others speechless. It doesn’t have to change the world. Just doing it is something to be proud of.

    Suddenly I feel a small sense of ease. I am tired from arguing with myself. I am tense from sitting in a tight ball with my jaw clenched this whole time. I unravel myself. I release my jaw. I inhale deeply and release more tension as I exhale. I choose to open up my laptop and write about what went on in my mind just now.

    If you’ve ever felt this way, like nothing you do matters and it’s never good enough—like you have to do more or be more so people will notice that you matter and you’re good enough—here’s what I’d like you to know:

    You are allowed to simply live. You are allowed to just be you. You are allowed to just exist and for that to be enough. You are allowed to be content with just breathing on some days. And you are allowed to be proud of yourself for wanting to help others, even if on some days it seems you’ve helped no one but yourself. It’s enough. You’re enough.

  • One Question for Anyone Who’s Stuck in a Rut: What Do You Believe?

    One Question for Anyone Who’s Stuck in a Rut: What Do You Believe?

    “You become what you believe, not what you think or what you want.” ~Oprah Winfrey

    What do you believe? During the forced stillness of the pandemic environment we’re all living in, this is a question I’ve been faced with more intensely than ever. In particular, I’ve come to question what I believe about myself, and how that impacts every element of my life.

    Coming out of years of self-help for social and general anxiety, a long-standing eating disorder, and several dissatisfying personal relationships, I had to come to question what these external realities reflected back to me. For what you believe about not only your life, but more importantly, yourself, will show up again and again, and yes, again, until you’ve finally addressed the root of the problem.

    In my case, my lack of self-value resulted in many dysfunctions and setbacks in my personal and professional world.

    My deteriorating self-image led to my eating obsessions, a lack of confidence exacerbated anxieties, and the low value I placed on myself was most likely written all over me, judging by the way others showed disrespect toward me in personal relationships.

    Not only was I devaluing who I was, but I also operated from a place of being closed off to others, afraid that if I showed my true self I wouldn’t measure up to their expectations.

    This all came to a head when COVID-19 emerged and led to a global lockdown. Going off of numerous negative relationship experiences, I visited a doctor to discover I had a pelvic floor condition called vaginismus, which results in involuntary vaginal muscle tightening that makes sex and physical exams like pap smears either impossible or extremely painful.

    I spent the next four months going through physical therapy to heal my body from this condition, breaking off a new relationship to focus completely on my own journey. It amazed me how the mind and body go hand-in-hand; my muscle tightening felt like a total embodiment of years of being closed off to others and remaining safely isolated from sharing my true self.

    As I mentioned previously, prior to being diagnosed with vaginismus I’d spent years healing my mental health problems and gaining strength in my career experience.

    After high school, I was lost in my career path for a solid period of time, making lukewarm attempts at artistic endeavors such as acting and modeling, never fully prepared to take a leap and fully immerse myself in any one field.

    Again, this would require a bearing of my true self that would frighten me just to think about. Not only that, it would mean that I had the nerve to believe I was worthy of attempting a profession that’s reserved for an elite group of “special” people, a group I never considered myself to be a part of.

    I did muster up enough courage to move to Los Angeles, however, where I felt I could start a new identity. My Northern California roots felt outdated, and along with some family I sought to better myself with a fresh start.

    One of my first steps toward positive changes was a hostessing gig at a bowling alley, which forced me to get out of my shell and be more social for a change. I still felt very self-conscious, but the more I worked on interacting with customers and coworkers, the more I learned how much I loved people.

    This further developed when, following a chance Intro to Journalism course I took at Pasadena City College in Southern California, I found a new joy that I wasn’t expecting.

    I began to love writing, and not only that, my favorite element of this new career path was interviewing—something I never thought I’d be able to conquer with the severity of my social anxiety, which prevented me from going into grocery stores at its peak

    Deep down, I started to believe that something different could be possible for me. Maybe I could break out of my old mindset and turn into the person I’d always felt I was inside: someone who loved people, longed for and accomplished successful interpersonal relationships, and stood in her power, unapologetically.

    By January of 2020, I had gained a local job news writing in my home base of Burbank and felt optimistic about the future. After the pandemic hit, however, I went through a time of feeling down during isolation. This paired with the vaginismus diagnosis made me become initially quite frustrated.

    “Why is this happening to me?” I wondered. I had done a lot to overcome other personal issues, but now having to do months of diligent, and sometimes extremely painful, physical therapy felt like a punishment that I didn’t deserve.

    After a short bit of contemplation, however, I had a real and sudden shift in perspective. I simply thought, “I’ve been through more than this in the past. I’ll get through it.” I believed I could, and from that moment on dedicated myself to healing not only physically, but emotionally as well.

    Within four months I made enough progress to end in-person physical therapy appointments, I started blog writing and continued with news writing in Burbank, earned a journalism scholarship over the summer, which I contributed toward my studies, and now have just started my own independent journalism writing website.

    The more I believed that I could accomplish my goals, and the more I felt I was worthy of such things, the more I saw everything in the universe work for me, and not against me.

    Today I continue to improve my self-image, and I have a long way to go. But overall, I feel healed from where I once was.

    I’m pursuing my passions, now unashamed to show and share who I truly am.

    I demonstrate a great deal of self-respect in personal relationships, no longer tolerating poor treatment from others who don’t consider my worth.

    My diet and exercise habits are healthier, my vaginismus treatment is complete, and, although I still have to maintain physical therapy exercises, I feel grateful for where I’m at in that regard and in every aspect of my life.

    If you had asked me five years ago, prior to all of this self-improvement, what I believed about myself and my life, I probably would have said I had a promising future ahead, although my actions and interactions continuously showed otherwise.

    This is why I feel I’m at a much more positive place in life at this moment.

    Not only do I propose that I believe positive things about myself, but I now show it through my actions.

    I no longer want respect, I demand it.

    I no longer want to pursue my goals wholeheartedly, I now do it as much as I can every day.

    And not only do I dream of expressing the truth of who I am, I embody it.

    So, if you too feel like you’re stuck in a rut in your life, if you feel that the world isn’t treating you fairly, and if you don’t like what the universe is showing you, then I urge you to ask yourself:

    What do you believe? About yourself? Your worth? Your life? Your potential?

    What do you believe about what you deserve, in relationships and in your career, and what you can accomplish if you try?

    How do those beliefs affect how you show up in the world—the decisions you make, the chances you take, the things you tolerate, and the habits you follow each day?

    What would you do differently if you challenged your beliefs and recognized they’re not facts?

    And what can you do differently today to create a different outcome for tomorrow?

    These are the questions that shape our lives because our beliefs drive our choices, which ultimately determine who we become.

  • How to Get Through Your Darkest Days: Lessons from Addiction and Loss

    How to Get Through Your Darkest Days: Lessons from Addiction and Loss

    “You are never stronger…than when you land on the other side of despair.” ~Zadie Smith

    In the last years of my twenties, my life completely fell apart.

    I’d moved to Hollywood to become an actor, but after a few years in Tinsel Town things weren’t panning out the way I hoped. My crippling anxiety kept me from going on auditions, extreme insecurity led to binge eating nearly every night, and an inability to truly be myself translated to a flock of fair-weather friends.

    As the decade wound to a close, I stumbled upon the final deadly ingredient in my toxic lifestyle: opiates. A few small pills prescribed for pain unlocked a part of my brain I didn’t know existed: a calm, confident, and numb version of myself that seemed way more manageable than the over-thinking mind-chatter I was used to.

    At first the pills were like a casual indulgence—I’d pop a few before a nerve-wracking audition or first date, the same way other people might have a few drinks before going out on the town. But my casual relationship to opiates was short-lived: soon the pills were no longer reserved for awkward dates or nerve-wracking auditions, and instead necessary for any type of outing or interaction.

    I knew I’d crossed an invisible line when I began to feel sick without a “dose” of medication. The physical pain they’d been prescribed for had long subsided, but they’d created a need that only grew with more use. Soon I became sick if I didn’t take any pills, which is when I began going to any lengths to get more.

    I wanted so much to stop but felt trapped on a terrible ride: I’d wake hating myself for what I’d done the day before, and with deep shame I’d vow earnestly to quit—then afternoon would come and with it, withdrawal symptoms. As my stomach would turn and my head would spin, I’d lose the resolve to stop and begin searching for my next fix. With that fix would come a few hours of relief, followed by another cycle of self-loathing, a vow to quit, and more failure.

    It was a spin cycle that likely would have killed me had life not intervened in ways that at the time felt devastating; in a span of two weeks my “normal” façade collapsed and, with it, most pillars in my life. Like a house of cards toppling, I lost my job, car, relationship, and was evicted from my home.

    It felt like a cliché country song where the singer loses everything, except in those songs that person is usually likeable and innocent—but in my story, I felt like the villain.

    As I watched my entire life crumble around me, I felt no choice other than to return home and seek the shelter of the only person who had always been there for me—my mom.

    The mom who had raised me with morals like honesty, accountability, and kindness, although I hadn’t been living them for a while. The mom who had struggled raising two kids alone, gotten us off food stamps by going to nursing school, and who watched helplessly as I descended into the same cycle of addiction that had taken the life of my father.

    She told me I could stay if I was sober; I vowed to try, though I’d stopped believing my own promises long before.

    In the recovery program I found soon after, there was an oft repeated saying on every wall: “it’s always darkest before the dawn.” If taken literally, it makes you think about how dark the night sky is before dawn breaks… how heavy, looming, and consuming. Before the light returns, it can feel like the darkness will never end.

    That was how my early days sober felt.

    But as I cobbled together a few weeks and then a few months, I began to feel the faintest bit of trust in myself. Through abstinence and therapy, mindfulness and a sober community, the hopelessness that had seemed so all-consuming began to crack open and let in some light.

    I moved out into my own apartment, returned to school to complete a long-sought college degree, and had a waitressing job that I loved. Then, just after I achieved one year sober, I got a phone call from my brother that would change everything.

    “Melissa, you need to come home,” he said, his voice thick with tears. “It’s mom.”

    My stomach dropped as I gripped the phone, suddenly feeling about five years old. I’d find out later it was a heart attack.

    I felt the darkness descend again.

    —

    In the days that followed her death I felt like a dependent child that was unable to care for myself. I dragged myself through brushing my teeth, dressing, and arranging her funeral; it felt like my heart had stopped along with hers.

    The same thought kept circling the drain of my head—how can I live the rest of my life without my mother?

    I couldn’t imagine not having her at my graduation, wedding, or when I became a parent. Her disappearance from my future brought up a dread much worse than that of the previous year— but as I began to settle into my grief, I realized I had a path through this moment, if I were willing to take it.

    The tools I’d forged in sobriety would prove to be useful in the dark days that followed. I share them below as an offering for anyone who travels through a dark night of the soul: simple steps to keep in mind when you can’t see a path forward.

    Take things one day at a time.

    In sobriety, you learn that imagining your whole life without another drink or drug can be so daunting that you just give up and get loaded. So instead of borrowing future worry, you learn to stay in the week, the day, and the moment.

    I didn’t have to know what having a wedding without my mother would be like—I just needed to eat breakfast. I didn’t need to imagine my graduation—I just needed to get myself through one more class. As I pieced my future together one moment at a time, I found that I could handle the emptiness in bite size pieces. I didn’t have to figure it all out—I just had to keep going.

    Allow feelings to come and trust that they will go.

    Much of what I’d been running from as an addict was the discomfort of my feelings. I didn’t want to feel rejection, so I contorted myself to be liked; I didn’t want to feel sadness, so I busied myself with the next activity. In recovery I learned that we can run from feelings all we want, but eventually they catch up to us in some form. Instead of running I’d learned to allow; instead of busying myself I’d been taught to turn toward pain and trust that it wouldn’t last forever.

    Though this was easier said than done, some part of me knew that running from the grief of my mom’s death would only snowball into a freight train later. I’d scream in my car as I seethed with the unfairness of it all; I’d rock with sobs on my couch when the sadness became too much. It wasn’t pretty and it felt terrible, but when I let the grief shake through me. I found that there would always be an end… that at the bottom of my spiral a thread of mercy would appear, and I would be able to go on.

    Tell the truth.

    From a young age, I felt much more comfortable in a mask of smiles and jokes than sharing how I was actually doing at any given moment. Though getting sober had helped me shed layers of the mask, I still found myself trying to likeable, approved-of, and “good.” But as grief zapped my energy and ability to make myself palatable, when people asked how I was doing I started to be honest.

    Sharing the pain I felt after my mom’s death was like standing naked in the middle of the street—I wasn’t used to crying in front of people and didn’t think they’d like me when they found out I wasn’t always “fun and easy going.” But it was exactly this type of vulnerability that allowed true friends to materialize, old connections to deepen, and the support I longed for to appear.

    Allow yourself to be forever changed.

    In recovery from addiction, I began to think of my sobriety date as a second birthday—the start of an actual new life. Though the way my former life had burned to the ground was painful, I welcomed the chance for a new start.

    But when my mom died, I didn’t realize that losing her would again scatter me into a thousand unrecognizable pieces—pieces I kept trying to fit back together but weren’t ever going to be the same, because I wasn’t.

    Once I allowed my life, relationships, and priorities to be changed by my grief, I found a self that was stronger, more resilient, and somehow more tender. I never would have chosen the form of this lesson, but I came through these experiences a more authentic version of myself… an overarching goal of my life.

    *

    It’s now been seven years since my mom’s death, and I’ve been sober for eight. As my journey continues to unfold, I never lose sight of how broken I once was and how dark things seemed. I also know that the struggles of life aren’t over; they’re part of being human and living a full life.

    But something I now keep in mind is that it’s always darkest before the dawn—I know I don’t have to always see the light…

    I just have to keep going.

  • What If There’s Beauty on the Other Side of Your Pain?

    What If There’s Beauty on the Other Side of Your Pain?

    “The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.” ~Albert Einstein

    “I don’t want to live anymore. I don’t want to be here. I can’t do this. It hurts too much. It’s too hard.”

    I’m curious how many times I’ve heard these words over my lifetime. From different people, ages, genders, ethnicities, and walks of life. The words the same, the heaviness no different from one to the next. Hopelessness has a specific tone attached to it. Flat, low, and empty.

    Being the child of a parent who committed suicide, there is a familiar inner fear that washes over me when I hear these words. A hyper alertness and tuning in, knowing it’s time to roll up my sleeves.

    As a psychotherapist, there is a checklist that goes through my head to make sure I ask all of the right questions as I assess the level of pain they are experiencing.

    As a human, a warm wave of compassion takes over as I feel around for what this particular soul needs.

    After asking the typical safety questions and determining this person is not at significant risk of ending their life, I ask, “So what is the end goal here? What do you think happens after you die? Where will you go? How will you feel? What will feel different when you’re dead versus how you feel right now?”

    The answers vary from “It will be dark and nothingness, no feeling, no existence” to “I’ll be in heaven and done with this,” but more often than not they say, “I don’t know.”

    I sometimes question, “Well, if you don’t know how can you guarantee it will be better than this? What if it’s worse? What if you have to relive it all again? What if you are stuck in a dark abyss and can’t get out?”

    More times than not they have not thought this through. They are not thinking about what is next, mostly because what they are really saying is “I don’t want to feel like this anymore.”

    I get that. We all have those moments.

    Then I dig in further:

    “How do you know your miracle is not around the corner? How do you know relief will not come tomorrow if you allow the opportunity for one more day? What would it be like to be curious about what’s next instead of assuming it will all be just as miserable?

    Since you have not always felt like this, is it possible you may one day again feel joy and freedom?

    If you look at your past, you’ll see you have had many fears and low moments. Did they stay the same or did they change? Most of your fears did not come to be, and if they did, you survived them—you made it through. You may have even learned something or strengthened your ability to be brave.

    If you turn around, you can see there is a lifetime of proof that your world is always changing and shifting. You’ll see many moments when it may have felt like things were not going the direction you wanted, but you’ll likely see an equal number of moments that led you to exactly what you needed. Use those as evidence that your surprise joy may be just around the corner.

    During these conversations, my own curiosity resurfaces. I often ponder if my mother held out a little longer what her life would have looked like. I wonder if another medication would have helped her. Or if the words of an inspiring book may have offered her the hope to keep holding on. Or if the feeling of the sun on her face would have kissed her long enough for her to want a little bit more.

    What if she held on to the curiosity of what was to come instead of deciding there were no surprises or joy left? Would she have felt the bittersweet moment of watching me graduate from high school? Would she have been there to cheer me on when I earned my master’s degree hoping to help people just like her? Would she have held my daughter, her first grandchild, and wept tears of joy knowing she made it?

    Who knows what her life would have been like if she held on for one more day? I will never know, but I am curious.

    I have sat with countless children and adults while they are deep in their pain. I ache for them, cry for them, and also feel hope for them. I wonder out loud what will happen next that we cannot see.

    I’ve seen pregnancies come when hope had left, new relationships be birthed when the people involved were sure they would never feel loved again, new jobs appear out of nowhere at just the “right” time. I’ve seen illnesses dissipate once people started paying attention to themselves, and moments of joy build in the hearts of those who were certain there was no light left.

    The truth is, we don’t know what will happen next, but we know we have made it this far. How do we know tomorrow won’t be exactly what we’ve been waiting for?

    I believe our baseline feeling as humans is peace. The loving calm that fills us when we are in the presence of those we adore. The kind of whole that we feel when we’ve done something we feel proud of and we reconnect to the love we are made of. The way we feel when we are giving love to others and the way we feel when that love is returned.

    I also believe that the human experience is filled with struggle and hardship and challenge. I don’t think we are getting out of it. I believe we are equipped with the power to lean into our pain to let it move through us. To use our experiences as our strength and our knowledge for the next wave of frustration.

    I don’t believe we are supposed to suffer, but rather learn to thrive in the face of hardship and use hope as the steering wheel to guide us through… knowing even though the light may not be right in front of us, it’s just around the corner.

    And the more we employ this faith and our practices that support us, the quicker we are able to return to the peace that lies underneath.

    In the moments of hardship, what would it be like to allow for curiosity? To not only acknowledge the feeling in front of us—and feel it—but to also allow for the possibility of what is to come.

    All of our experiences come with the free will to choose how we will respond to them. With openness and wonder or dismissal and resistance. It’s also okay to feel it all at once. The feelings will pass. They always do.

    The next time you feel stuck in a feeling, or what feels like a never-ending experience, consider thinking: I wonder what will come of this. I wonder what I will gain. I wonder what strengths I will develop and how I will support myself. I wonder what beauty lies on the other side of this pain. Don’t push through it but surrender into it.

    Then allow for curiosity. Be open. You never know what surprises the day may bring. Maybe today is the day it all changes. Or maybe tomorrow. You may not know the day, but you can be ready and open for it when it arrives.

  • 7 Steps to Overcome Daily Despair and Start Living Again

    7 Steps to Overcome Daily Despair and Start Living Again

    Man on Mountain

    “If you cannot make a change, change the way you have been thinking. You might find a new solution.” ~Maya Angelou

    Have you ever felt really stuck? Like every day was a struggle to get through and you knew in your heart the next day would feel the same?

    For the last seven years—since the crash of 2008—I’ve been redefining myself, and it’s been painful.

    In 2009 I opened an Internet retail store, knowing nothing about retail, let alone the intricacies of the Internet.

    After years of hard work and little to show for it, every day began to feel like total drudgery. Facing daily discouragement and defeat weighed heavily on me.

    I began to lose my self-confidence and doubt everything I was doing. I was frozen by the fear of failure.

    Every day was torture. Each morning I promised myself I would be productive, but day after day I failed to accomplish even the simplest tasks. Days added up to weeks, and weeks piled up into months of “stuckness,” frustration, and despair. I was literally ensuring my failure. And I knew it.

    Despair encompassed every area of my life. I felt like I was thrashing through quicksand. I stopped meditating regularly, couldn’t get enough sleep, and the stress was affecting my digestion and my health. I was in a fog of depression.

    Although these issues manifested in my business life, I placed such a focus on making my business succeed that I lost all balance. My personal life suffered greatly. Despair can’t be compartmentalized. It affects all aspects of your life.

    Why do we get stuck?

    The irony of life is that so many of our problems—the stumbling blocks that hold us back—are often there because we get in our own way. We can create a prison of continued, daily suffering for ourselves. And then all we can do is agonize because we desperately want out.

    Each day we wake up in a fog hoping the cloud will lift. We simply can’t see clearly enough to evaluate our problems and realize that each one links back to an action or thought that created it.

    If only we could see this, we could untangle the threads and clear up our lives. Knowing the cause can make the problem much easier to fix if we can just get our minds in the right place.

    How to Reset Your Mind

    Use the following seven steps to overcome daily despair and start living again:

    1. Break the pattern.

    The first thing to do with any negative pattern is stop what you’re doing. You’ve got to break a pattern to change it. This means emotionally removing yourself from the situation. You’ve got to regroup.

    Taking time away is helpful. If that’s not feasible, find a quiet place where you can retreat for alone time during all spare moments. If you have kids, do this while they’re sleeping or safely occupied.

    Tell yourself you’re leaving all your worries outside the door and you’ll pick them up later if you decide to. You deserve this time. You need it. Think of it as a gift to yourself.

    If you’re open to meditation, this is a perfect time to start a practice or deepen your existing one.

    I separated myself from despair during my time alone by admitting that I was torturing myself and not accomplishing anything. I declared that I refused to live like that any longer, and promised I would find a different way.

    2. Free your mind.

    During your free time, don’t think about problem-solving of any kind. Focus on resting, healing, and gifting yourself with positive, healthy thoughts and experiences.

    Change your daily activities from TV and other distractions to calming interests. Take walks outdoors. Read only uplifting things. Catch up on your sleep. Get to bed early when possible.

    Clear your mind by practicing silence. Silence does wonders to slow your thoughts and help you to be mindful of the present good moments.

    I began to shift my focus to meditation and other down-time activities instead of work. I practiced silence every morning while walking to clear my mind and stay healthy. And I made time for friends and family even when I didn’t feel like I had the time.

    I was so relieved that my despair soon began to lift when I stopped focusing all my efforts on work.

    3. Collect ideas to kick-start your thinking.

    Once you’ve broken your pattern, determine the key issue you’re struggling with and find a high-quality resource to begin collecting ideas.

    Are your relationships getting you down? Do you need some spiritual rejuvenation? Is your problem depression? Do you need to learn positive thinking, stress management, or time management?

    Plenty of resources to address your problem are at your fingertips on the Internet, in a bookstore or library, at a local group meeting or Meetup, or a seminar. Find something that sparks your interest and has received top recommendations from others, and dive in.

    I took an online marketing course to rebrand my business. The instructor planted the thought that I’d be much happier shifting my business into something I was more passionate about.

    After listening to me, she suggested that I share what I’ve been doing for years on my yoga path to help others like I was helping myself.

    4. Give your situation some preliminary thought.

    Armed with fresh ideas and with the new resilience gained from your self-care, begin to gently daydream some possibilities.

    This is important. Approach this in a relaxed way—not grasping for answers but allowing them to surface naturally if they do. It’s not even a requirement. This is a creative process.

    During this time, I casually ran ideas through my mind to see if sharing my yoga experiences was a possibility. A big part of me wasn’t sure it was right because my practice was so personal. But I loved the idea of turning my passion into my work.

    5. Trust the process.

    There’s no plug and play solution for transforming despair. Your subconscious, creative, problem-solving mind takes time to process properly.

    Be patient. You don’t need all the answers right now—just some starter fluid to get your brain thinking. As with any creative process, the first answers won’t be your best.

    Know that the right answers will come in time because you’re feeding your mind and you’ve removed all pressure. If you’re stressing out at all or pushing too hard for answers at any point, back off and resume Step 2.

    6. Reset your reality through change.

    Once you’ve cleared your mind, absorbed input from a trusted resource, and eased into daydreaming, you can start making some changes in your life.

    When promising, unique answers begin to surface, start deciphering the details.

    Although the advice you found probably felt uplifting and hopeful, in order to successfully transform your life, you’ll need to put the new ideas into practice. What steps can you take to follow the recommendations?

    It took me a full year from the first time I thought about changing my focus to actually doing something about it. The more I daydreamed about what can be accomplished through the ancient yoga teachings, the more it seemed a perfect fit for me to spread the word.

    I incorporated my instructor’s advice, and made sharing my yoga journey a main part of my business. This time I consulted respected resources to learn how to do it successfully rather than winging it like I did with the retail store.

    Your answer doesn’t have to mean changing your work. My business had to change because it wasn’t working and I was allowing it to cause my despair.

    You can change whatever aspect of your life is causing your pain.

    7. Trace back to the thoughts or actions that caused your stuck feeling.

    Changing the outer aspects of your life is often the best way to uproot despair. But to make the change permanent, it’s important to carefully consider the inner aspects. Identify the thoughts or actions that resulted in your situation to begin with.

    For me, my business wasn’t taking off like I expected it to, raising serious issues of self-doubt. Not making it work meant failure. Hadn’t I already failed to hang on to my career in corporate America?

    This doubt caused me to spend more time researching what I should do to market the business than actually marketing it. I was always being attracted to the next “best idea.” Fearing it wouldn’t work, I kept searching instead of implementing.

    When I finally realized that self-doubt had caused my problem, I was able to start implementing instead of doubting, and complete my healing.

    —

    No matter how bad life seems, you can find the way out of despair.

    We all need time to rejuvenate, so break your pattern. Take time to reflect on what you truly want out of life and what you must do to get back on course.

    The answers often are not complex. They’re just hidden because you lost your focus on what’s important.

    Take some time to think about the thoughts or actions that may have led to your despair. Once you identify the problem, with a little guidance you can correct it and completely change your life.

    The best part? Your answers will often arise on their own once you devote time to yourself to heal and reflect.

    Man on mountain image via Shutterstock