Tiny Buddha

Tag: Happiness

  • Why You Need to Embrace “Beginner’s Mind” to Live a Life of Adventure

    Why You Need to Embrace “Beginner’s Mind” to Live a Life of Adventure

    “The don’t-know mind… doesn’t fear, has no wish to control or foresee, steps off the cliff of the moment with absolute trust that the next step will land somewhere, and the next step somewhere else, and the feet will take us wherever we need to go.” ~Byron Katie

    I am fifty-five years old. I’ve raised a family, been through two divorces, bought and sold four houses, and had a successful professional career. And right now I’m doing one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, which is learning to host in a busy restaurant.

    My coworkers range from mid-twenties to early thirties. They are smart and hardworking. I feel like my brain is about to explode.

    Why am I doing this? Well, money, for one thing. For better or worse, I can’t go back to my original profession after taking two decades off to be a mom. But another large motivator is that I want to do something totally new and out of my comfort zone, to experience what Buddhists call the “not-know mind” or beginner’s mind.

    In my experience, adults older than about twenty-five are exceptionally good at stacking the odds in their own favor. We like to do what’s familiar, what’s comfortably in our wheelhouse.

    Let’s face it: It feels good to know what you’re doing—especially when you’re the oldest one in the room!

    Throughout childhood and young adulthood, avoiding new experiences is not optional (however much we might resist them). Every year in school we get a new teacher, perhaps new classmates, and continually new material to learn.

    Starting a new career, moving into new social roles and responsibilities, all require us to be a beginner, to not know for that uncomfortable initial period.

    Our goal in life is usually to reduce this sense of uncertainty and vulnerability as quickly as possible. Resisting new experiences, even the ones we actively desire, makes them still more uncomfortable. If we could crack this nut and truly embrace the vulnerability (and excitement!) of being a beginner, our lives would be more interesting—and a lot less stressful.

    The discomfort we feel is pure ego. Ego is the part of us that needs to look large and in charge at all times. It is not a fan of beginner’s mind. Ego tells us we’re in danger when we’re not in familiar territory. Its job is to keep us “safe,” and if that means living a small and boring life, so be it.

    I have to actively calm and soothe my ego each night when I report to work, filled with unfamiliar butterflies. I use self-talk that sounds exactly like what I say to my daughter when she embarks on a new experience:

    “Just do your best. No one expects you to know everything right off the bat. New things are always scary, but you learn more every night.”

    One of the keys to beginner’s mind is humility—a characteristic not highly regarded in this society. We are mostly about pumping ourselves up (there’s ego again). Humility requires us to acknowledge and honor what others know that we do not. For instance, I never knew how challenging restaurant work was before this, but I will never take a server for granted again!

    Humility and humiliation are not the same thing. Recognition isn’t a zero-sum game: Genuine admiration of someone else’s ability or expertise does not automatically make me “less than” as a person. In fact, it makes me stronger! To be humble in this sense is a mark of maturity and real self-esteem.

    Humility isn’t about falsely running ourselves down, but about seeing ourselves—our strengths and weaknesses—clearly. In this job, it doesn’t matter that I have a master’s degree (there are lots of servers with master’s degrees, I find) and no one cares what my previous profession was. What matters is that I’m willing to learn from anyone with the time to teach me.

    Beginner’s mind is all about being willing to learn, which can (and should) happen at any age. But you can’t learn something new if you only do what you’re already good at. You can’t learn if you insist on being the expert. You can’t learn if you’re not willing to get it wrong for a while, to make mistakes—even in public.

    The pay-offs are many, although it might be hard to convince yourself of that when you’re full of butterflies and dread. Life is an adventure, and adventures require us to step out of our comfort zones.

    Ask yourself: Am I really ready to settle for more of the same for the rest of my life? Isn’t it worth a little discomfort (even a lot) to learn a new skill, meet a new person, or discover a new aspect of myself?

    We can ask the ego to take a back seat for a while, and no one will be the worse for it. We can take our courage in our hands, and step out into the unknown, over the cliff, trusting that the next step will land somewhere.

    Usually, the worst that can happen is that we will feel uncomfortable, maybe even embarrassed. Maybe we’ll actually fail! I’ve considered that outcome and decided that I’ll survive if it happens. I’d rather try and fail than wonder if I might have succeeded.

    I hope that I’m providing a positive role model for my younger coworkers; maybe when they’re fifty-something they won’t hesitate to step out on a limb either. I know that I’m providing a good role model for my daughter. She texts me good luck almost every night on my way to work, and says things like, “I’m proud of us, Mom.”

    We lose touch with what our children are going through when we get too comfortable with our lives. They don’t put much credence in our advice to “just try it” when they never see us taking a risk. We can’t model courage, or how to handle mistakes and survive failure, if we always stay safely ensconced in our comfort zones.

    And the fact is, change will come even when we do our best to guard against it. The safety of a comfort zone is temporary, at best. In embracing humility and beginner’s mind, we really have nothing to lose and everything to gain. We’ll either succeed, or we’ll learn something—or, most likely, both. It’s a win/win (although you might never convince your ego of that)!

  • How Surfing Helped Me Turn Fear and Anxiety into Confidence

    How Surfing Helped Me Turn Fear and Anxiety into Confidence

    “If you want to conquer fear, don’t sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.” ~Dale Carnegie

    Not too long ago I went through an extremely chaotic and emotional two-week period. Anything that could go wrong or be difficult did and was. I thought it would never end.

    When it began, the little hiccups were easy to let roll off my shoulders. After about a week, I was feeling pretty worn down and was in tears daily. At the end, I felt numb, and when things kept going wrong I would say to myself “Sure… Okay …what’s next?”

    These two weeks were filled with miscommunications, the realities of parenting a teenager, negative art critiques, the end of a three-year business relationship, technical difficulties with my social media accounts, a shoulder injury, and an art block, and none of my efforts seemed to put any of the proverbial fires out.

    Not to mention that we were surrounded by literal fires here in Southern Oregon, which brought oppressive smoke and stress.

    I was tired, scared, tired, hurt, tired, irritable, and physically taxed. And did I say tired? Usually getting into the art studio and painting is the best way to bring me back around, but that wasn’t working either. I would stare at my painting and just not know what to do, so I would do nothing.

    About a week in, I drove myself to the coast to surf for the day, thinking that getting out of the smoke and into the ocean would wash away the negativity. But the conditions were not in my favor, and the day was frustrating as I paddled my way from one side of the beach to the other searching for waves. I drove back into the smoke feeling defeated, complacency of the crapolicious period of time setting in.

    The next week, I decided that there was nothing left to do but treat myself with some kindness and compassion. I rested, ate a carton of ice cream, and watched schlocky movies. I thought that maybe by just not fighting it anymore, the procession of poop would lift. But no, the hits just kept coming.

    I felt the depression creeping in as it has a tendency to do after anxiety has beat me into submission.

    For me, anxiety and depression have a way of cultivating more anxiety and depression. As the challenges arose in continuum, seeing the positive became harder and harder. The negativity took the lead and thus started a downward spiral of adversity and uncertainly. It is a horribly stagnant and uncomfortable place to live.

    So, I decided to participate in a surfing competition. Wait… wha?

    I had actually planned to compete months before. It was not something that I had ever done prior, and it is generally an activity that I would consider completely out of my comfort zone.

    I’ve never been interested in competitive sports; I’m nervous when put on the spot and I am not comfortable being the center of attention. A friend who competes annually told me it would be casual fun, but it didn’t necessarily sound like a good time to me. It sounded nerve racking.

    Nevertheless, I had registered to compete. The timing couldn’t have been worse. I already felt like I had been hit by an emotional mac truck, and the physical ailments were tagging along like uninvited hitchhikers.

    I decided that I would go, but if I wasn’t feeling it, I would back out and just be there to enjoy the beach and support my husband and our friends. And so, we prepared for a long weekend at the coast.

    The day before our departure my husband got a cold and I could feel one coming on. The morning we left I woke with a migraine.

    “Oh, this is starting out fantastic,” I thought to myself, but I kept my snarky remarks to myself, climbed into the van, and off we went. Hubbie sniffing and sneezing and me unable to keep my eyes open for very long.

    I have to admit that I was glad to get out of my art studio. Staring at my painting that I was stuck on had been a source of irritation that I was relieved to take a vacation from.

    We arrived at the beach to find almost non-existent waves, which would make a surf competition pretty difficult. Then, I received a not such fantastic report from a friend whose father is in poor health and I realized that my parents had missed my daughter’s volleyball game because I had told them the wrong time. And my shoulder was killing me. Would it ever end?

    The more it came, the more indifferent I felt. The apathy was only interrupted by sporadic bursts of tears followed by the need to collapse and sleep.

    I swear the sole reason that I didn’t back out of the competition was simply because I just couldn’t walk back up the beach one more time to get to the registration table again. Plus, I started to question if I would be disappointed in myself and regret it if I surrendered.

    So, I went on. My heat was at 11:40 the next morning. I would have twenty minutes to catch as many waves as I could, only two of which would count toward my score. The waves were ankle height. How on earth was this going to work? I ate some chocolate and went to bed.

    The morning of the competition, I woke with small butterfly flutters in my stomach that in the hours leading up to 11:40am turned into a swarm. I was nauseous, shaky, and terrified. At least I had seemed to have beaten the sickness and my migraine was gone. Focus on the positive, right?

    I paddled out in to the water with my six competitors and sat for what seemed to be an eternity. Then the horn blew and my twenty minutes began. I caught as many waves as I could and it was actually going okay.

    The horn blew again ending my heat and I came out the water with the biggest smile on my face. I had done it. I was happy with how I had surfed but mostly, I was just psyched that I had gotten out there. All of the crap from the previous two weeks melted away and all of a sudden, my problems didn’t seem like such a big deal.

    “Look what I just did!” I exclaimed. I felt proud and accomplished, the sky seemed bluer, and the world brighter. I felt ready to tackle anything. I found out that I came in dead last in my heat but it didn’t matter. I had gone through with it.

    I brought that feeling home and immediately was able to resolve the painting I had been stuck on. The technical problems I was having got fixed, and harmony seemed to be on its way to restoration. I, once again, felt I could take on the world.

    I am a highly sensitive person who struggles with anxiety. When things are going well, it feels like the good will never end. When life is not working in my favor, I feel as though I’ve been sucker punched and then repeatedly kicked when down. Like all of the warranties have just expired. Like I’m making all the wrong choices and doing all the wrong things.

    It can be hard to stand back up again when I’m questioning every option. The fear is overwhelming and paralyzing. But I now realize one way to effectively shake off these negative cycles, which are inevitable: I can turn fear on itself by doing something that intimidates me.

    I can fight fear with action.

    During this particularly bad negative cycle, I became scared of everything and it was hard for me to move forward, as I was petrified by all of the possible outcomes. It destroyed my confidence.

    My everyday coping methods of dealing with anxiety were not working. But by doing something that scared the crap out of me, something completely out of my comfort zone, I showed myself that I am strong.

    Also, I am aware that surfing, skiing, hiking, and mountain biking are all activities that force me to engage with the present. I can’t think about what’s happening in other areas of my life when I’m dropping into a wave or flying down the side of a mountain. It’s like jet-fueled mindfulness. I am reminded that there are things that I cannot control, and I become aware of the smallness of my problems.

    In this particular instance, I was so lost in doubt and confusion that merely going to the coast for a surf didn’t boost me. However, by surfing in a competition, something that was completely foreign to me, I was able to not only get outside myself for a minute through the physical act of surfing, but I was also able to prove to myself that I can accomplish things that I interpret as out of my reach.

    Sure, I may not have ended up on the winners’ podium, but in non-existent surf and with every eye on the beach watching, I competed. And when I walked out the water, I was cheered.

    Want proof of how doing something terrifying changed my outlook? Take a look at the photo to the right. That’s me coming out of the water after my heat. That smile is genuine. I felt like a winner.

    For me, there is nothing more debilitating than being fear-driven. It is a barrier to progress and I, for one, feel I have come too far to let anxiety sit at my table for long.

    Don’t get me wrong. There is such a thing as healthy fear. If I would have shown up to the competition and the waves were fourteen feet high, I don’t think I would have surfed. But if I would have backed out because things had been going poorly and so, “this will probably be a disaster too,” well, I just plain refuse to adhere to that mind set, even if that’s where my brain wants to go.

    We all go through periods of time when the world just seems to be working against us. Cycles when we feel we are swimming against the current. Sometimes the best way to break the cycle is to show ourselves that worry and doubt have not taken total control.

    We can take the power away from fear and stock it back into our arsenal by taking action.

    We set ourselves free by proving that we can do the very things that scare the bejesus out of us and that life will still go on, possibly with a renewed confidence, even greater than it was before. So, go out and do something that scares you. I double dog dare ya’!

    Photo credit for Marigny’s surfing picture: Chris Goodyear

  • How to Enjoy the Holidays When Grieving the Loss of a Loved One

    How to Enjoy the Holidays When Grieving the Loss of a Loved One

    This post contains an excerpt from GETTING GRIEF RIGHT: Finding Your Story of Love in the Sorrow of Loss, by Patrick O’Malley, PhD with Tim Madigan.

    It was spring 1980 when my wife, Nancy, and I received some of the best news of our lives—she was pregnant with our first child.

    On a Tuesday morning that September, we found ourselves sitting in her obstetrician’s office. Nancy, not due to deliver for three months, had been awakened the night before by a strange physical sensation.

    She had wanted to get checked out, just to be safe. But after the examination that morning, her doctor said we needed t0 get to the hospital. Labor had begun. I remember how Nancy’s voice trembled.

    “Can a baby this premature live?” she asked.

    “I don’t know,” the doctor said. “We will try to buy time. He will be a pipsqueak of a kid.”

    Thirty-six hours later, on September 3, 1980, Ryan Palmer O’Malley was born, weighing a little over two pounds. You couldn’t have imagined a more fragile looking creature. He had been far from ready to leave his mother’s womb, yet there he was.

    In the first few moments of his life, I was aware of the great risk of loving my son, but I was powerless to resist. From the first glimpse of Ryan, I knew he would have a place in my heart forever.

    His early life was a succession of seemingly endless days and nights. We hovered over the side of his crib in the hospital, looking down at our boy who was hooked up to all this noisy equipment. His life was measured in minutes and hours. On several terrifying occasions, Ryan stopped breathing, and his medical team would rush in to resuscitate.

    All this time, Nancy and I yearned to hold him, but his frailty and the equipment made that impossible. The most we could do was touch a tiny finger, rub a tiny arm.

    Instead of cooing, the sounds around my son were the mechanical beeping of intensive care machines. Instead of that wonderful new baby smell, there was the pungent scent of antiseptic soap we had to use to scrub up before seeing him. Despite not being able to hold him, despite all the machines between him and us, we loved him deeply.

    Early fall turned to Thanksgiving and then to Christmas. Our son gradually grew stronger. One day in January his doctor weaned him from the respirator. We could now hold him without the tangle of tubes and wires.

    On March 9, 1981, our seventh wedding anniversary, we were finally able to bring our baby home to hold him, bathe him, kiss him, dance with him, feed him, and rock him. He smiled for the first time in those days. Though he was still fragile and underweight, we allowed ourselves to start imagining Ryan’s future. No parents loved a son more.

    And then he was gone.

    On Saturday night, May 16, 1981, we were treating him for a cold but not particularly concerned. We had been through much worse. But early Sunday morning our precious son suddenly stopped breathing.

    I started CPR. Ryan’s doctor and an ambulance were at our house within minutes. His doctor administered a shot of adrenalin to his heart as the medical technicians continued CPR. Nancy and I silently prayed as we followed the speeding ambulance to the hospital.

    The next several hours are a series of snapshots forever imprinted in my mind.

    • His physician coming into the waiting room with tears in his eyes, saying, “I could not save him.”
    • Holding Ryan’s body
    • Returning home without him
    • The heartbreak of our family and friends as we broke the news of his death
    • The dream-like, adrenalin-fueled rituals of visitation and funeral
    • The faces of all those who filled the church
    • The sight of his tiny casket by the altar
    • Seeing construction workers removing their hard hats as the funeral procession drove by
    • Leaving the cemetery on that sunny spring day

    I have taken off work on the anniversary of Ryan’s death every year since that first year. I go to the cemetery to think about him and the years now behind me. Powerful feelings rise each time I see my son’s name on the grave marker: RYAN PALMER O’MALLEY. It grounds me in the hard reality—this really happened.

    In my experience as both a grief therapist and bereaved father, the holiday season can be one of the most difficult times of the year for those grieving.

    Many who have experienced the death of a loved one wish they could lie down for a nap on October 30 and awake again on January 2. This season can be challenging when the shadow of loss is present.

    The collision between the cultural expectations of happiness and the personal reality of grief can create stress, confusion, and an increase in emotional pain for those who mourn. The gatherings of family and friends during this season may shine a brighter light on the absence of the one who has died.

    If this is the first holiday season after the death of a loved one, there can often be a buildup of anxiety, anticipating how it will feel to be without the one who is gone. And, even if the loss occurred many years ago like mine, the holidays are always a reminder of what was and what might have been.

    Confusion, yearning, exhaustion, sorrow, and all the other feelings that come with grief are absolutely normal during this time. Difficult but normal. Painful but normal. Grief is not a psychological abnormality or an illness to cure. Grief is about love. We grieve because we loved. Holidays may be a strong emotional connection to special times of remembering that love.

    Here are eight ideas to help you enjoy the holidays while also honoring your loss.

    Both And 

    Enter into this season in a state of mind of “both and” rather than “either or.” Sorrow does not exclude all joy, and celebration does not eliminate all sorrow. Yet, it can be confusing to experience opposing emotions at the same time or feel your mood vacillate between light and dark.

    Joy may transition into sadness in the blink of an eye. Contentment may suddenly shift into yearning. Both experiences have value because both are part of your grief story.

    Be present to the moments of enjoyment, and at the same time, respect your feelings of loss.

    Sights, Sounds, and Scents

    Most who grieve prepare themselves emotionally for those significant moments during the holidays, such as sitting down for a holiday meal and attending parties; yet, some triggering experiences can occur when you least expect it.

    A sight, sound, or smell may zip right past your defenses and cause an intense surge of sorrow. And sometimes, that surge may happen in public. To this day, certain Christmas carols I hear while shopping elicits a sudden sense of melancholy because of the strong identification they have for me with the first and only holiday season my son was alive.

    We knew our loved one in a shared environment that is full of these sensory experiences that can provoke feelings of loss in an instant because of this connection created from past holiday seasons. This is perfectly normal and doesn’t mean that you’re going backward in your grief. Value these moments as important connections to the one who has died.

    Social Splitting

    The transition back into your work setting and your social groups after a loss can create a strain because you may have to act better than you feel in order to appear socially appropriate. This social splitting can be exhausting. Add to that the cultural expectation of being “up” for the holidays, and the exhaustion may be compounded.

    This type of fatigue is normal. Monitor your energy, and be willing to moderate your social engagements, if needed. To recharge yourself from the drain of social splitting, spend ample time with those with whom you can fully be yourself and who will support you without judgment.

    Approach and Avoid

    Our most basic nature is to approach pleasure and avoid pain. Our more evolved nature can approach pain if we know there is an ultimate benefit in doing so. Our natural resistance to the pain of grief can create more pain.

    Be intentional about scheduling time during this hectic season to approach your pain. Create rituals that represent the unique relationship you had to the one who died, such as listening to his or her favorite music or reading a favorite poem.

    Light a candle or ring a bell to mark this special time of remembering and reflecting. Visit the cemetery or mausoleum if that provides a connection for you.

    I’m grateful to our Japanese daughter-in-law who requests each holiday season that we participate in the Japanese custom of taking food to the gravesites where our son and other family members are buried. Her ritual has now become ours.

    Seek Heathy Distractions

    In a season fraught with overindulgences, be aware of the risk of numbing the feelings of loss through unhealthy escape behaviors. Also, know that it’s not possible to stay in the emotional intensity of grief without some relief, so give yourself permission to engage in healthy distractions.

    The key to a healthy distraction is a behavior that allows you to pause your feelings for a moment so that you may come back, and be truly present to them later. My ritual of watching comedy holiday movies has served me well through the years.

    Reach out to a trusted friend if you’re concerned about harmful escape behaviors during the holidays. Ask if you can be accountable to them for these behaviors and if they will participate with you in heathier activities that provide you with some respite from your grief.

    Tell Your Story 

    My professional training taught me that grief is a series of steps and stages to work through, which will lead to a conclusion called closure. My experience as a grieving dad did not at all match up with this psychological model.

    Through my own grief and by working with so many who mourn, I came to understand that grief is an ongoing narrative of love, not an emotional finish line to be crossed.

    Stories help us stay connected to those who have died and help us create meaning about what we have experienced. Finding a place for that story to be received is an important part of the grief journey.

    Tell the story of your loved one as it relates to the holiday season to someone who listens well. Or spend some time writing specific memories related to your loved one and the holidays.

    Acknowledge Someone Else’s Loss

    Those who grieve want their loss and their loved one remembered, so consider making contact with someone who is grieving, as well. It doesn’t matter how long ago that loss may have been. Offer the compassion to others you desire for yourself.

    Compassion literally means to suffer with and calls us to enter into the pain of another. Listen with gentle curiosity and an open heart. Consider making a donation to a cause that is relevant to the person who is grieving.

    Be Forgiving 

    Let self-compassion replace any self-criticism as you do your best to balance holiday enjoyment with your grief. Be forgiving of well-meaning others who may try to help you with your grief by “cheering you up.”

    How you measure what’s significant and what’s trivial may have changed as you grieve. Patience may be needed when you’re in the midst of others during the holidays who experience the trivial as significant.

    As you reflect on your loss, you may also benefit from reviewing your history with the loved one who has died, and offering and accepting forgiveness for the human flaws you each had that affected your relationship.

    Remember always, you grieve because you loved. May you have peace and light as you embrace your story of love and loss this holiday season.

    Adapted excerpt from GETTING GRIEF RIGHT: Finding Your Story of Love in the Sorrow of Loss, by Patrick O’Malley, PhD with Tim Madigan. Sounds True, July 2017. Reprinted with permission.

  • Train Your Mind: Overcoming Negative Thoughts Is Half the Battle

    Train Your Mind: Overcoming Negative Thoughts Is Half the Battle

    “Believe you can and you’re halfway there.” ~Theodore Roosevelt

    I could not find the bottom of the pool.

    The task seemed simple enough: Wearing no more than twenty pounds worth of gear, swim to the bottom of an eight-foot pool, remove your gear, and swim back up.

    My feet combed for something—anything—solid beneath me, to no avail. A shock of fear struck through my veins, clouding my head. Panic. I reached a point of sheer, utter, uncontrollable panic.

    Panic is an interesting beast. It is designed to trigger the flight-or-fight mechanism in the human body; it is for survival at all costs. Yet, it tends to override any form of rationality. So, with twenty pounds dragging me down into the depths, I attempted desperately to swim back up to the surface.

    In swimming, there are three places you can be, and only one of which is dangerous. The first is above water, where you can breathe. The second is on the bottom, where you can use momentum to push yourself up. The dangerous one is in between. In purgatory. This is where I found myself.

    I had not struggled with any aspect of training while at the U.S. Military Academy. I was not the smartest of the bunch, but I was a hard worker, and I was willing to sacrifice sleep; this earned me decent grades. I was not the strongest, but I was willing to put in work every day at the gym; this earned me good physical stamina.

    I had always heard about how everyone experiences a crucible event at the academy, during which they were stopped dead in their tracks and given two choices: give in, or do everything you can to claw and scratch your way to success. I, however, was complacent.

    Time slowed down as I fought tooth and nail to reach the surface. When people are drowning and in a state of panic, they do what is called “shelfing.” It is a fruitless attempt to push the water below them with their arms to get their head to air.

    I felt a moment of cold as my hand punched above the surface one last time, clawing for air, before my lungs began burning so badly that my body went limp. I watched the world around me begin to close to black. Pictures of my family and my life flipped across my thoughts like a film reel.

    Just as I began to lose consciousness, a shepherd’s hook was thrust in my direction, pulling me to the surface, where I quickly clutched the side of the pool, panting, my heart pounding in my throat. I looked up at my combat survival swimming instructor, my eyes swirling with fear.

    “Go in and do it again,” he said.

    From that point on, this course became the bane of my existence. I writhed with anxiety before each session. I continued not to pass the swim tests. The dark cloud of failure lingered over my head. This was a mandatory class. If I failed, it put my graduation in jeopardy.

    Here I stood, in the second semester of my junior year at West Point, with an enormous, unexpected mountain in front of me. This was my crucible. This was where I would rise or fall, and it would change the course of my existence.

    It is important to mention that at this point, I had failed every single “survival gate.” I started going to every extra help session I could, continuously attempting to retest. It all seemed futile because the moment I began to sink in any capacity, my mind went into overdrive, and the panic would set in. Once the panic set in, I was finished.

    Buddha once said, “Rule your mind or it will rule you.” I was in good physical shape. I knew how to swim. This was not a question of capability; it was a question of mindset. And I had to fix it.

    Up until this time in my life, I always used a brute force approach to challenges or adversities. I did not consider the mind as a muscle requiring growth and exercise, like the body. My mind had never acted against what my body and heart wanted to do. For the first time, I experienced uncontrolled thoughts that were influencing my actions.

    Every time I attempted to swim, as soon as my hips would begin to drop under or my head plunged beneath unexpectedly, my inner voice wailed, “It’s over. You are drowning.” Like clockwork, I would let my body become vertical, and I would sink beneath the surface, splashing desperately for the center ropes or the edge.

    Something had to change. The water absorbed brute force like it was nothing, and it was more than willing to swallow me into its depths, no matter how much I flailed. I had to find a different way to stop myself from panicking.

    I started small. I looked in the mirror before class and told myself, “You can do this. You are strong.” I played motivational songs before class. I made a deliberate attempt to get myself excited, while inside, my stomach was squirming with dread.

    Then one morning, while I was wearing my full kit and attempting to breaststroke across a twenty-five-meter lane, I felt my hips begin to sink. The flush of fear stung my cheeks, and my breathing became staggered.

    “You are drowning! You cannot do it!” the voice of panic screamed in my head. I felt my shoulders go under. Then I could no longer breathe.

    My eyes squeezed shut as my arms began to wave wildly. But, at that moment, my mind training seemed to kick in. “You are alright.” The small, timid words of reason attempted to push away the panic. “You can save yourself.”

    I stopped flailing. I brought my arms to my sides and allowed myself to sink all the way to the bottom of the pool.

    “You are okay.” I felt the bottom of the pool with my boots and pushed as hard as I could against it, sending myself shooting upwards. With a gasp of relief, my head burst out of the water, and I swam to the end. I met the lifeguard’s eye; he had been waiting by the edge of the pool, ready to act.

    “Hey, good job!” he told me with a smile. “You saved yourself!”

    This was the beginning of a change. I could learn to challenge the negative thoughts.

    From then on, when I swam with my gear, I repeated the mantra, “You are okay. You are okay.” When I jumped off the 6-meter diving board and plunged into the depths of the pool, I told myself, “You will make it.” When I slid down into the wave pool, headfirst, in my gear, clutching my rubber rifle to my chest, I said, “You will finish.”

    The swell of panic that consistently grew in me could be quelled by this quiet, steady focus that simply refused to give up. In the end, I retested every single survival gate multiple times and finally scored the minimum requirements to pass the class—on the very last day.

    This experience changed my outlook on life and myself. The mind is an incredible tool that you can train to accomplish amazing feats. It can be your worst enemy, or, with practice and understanding, your best weapon.

    It is vital to realize that everyone—you included—will go through a crucible in life. It will be a defining moment during which you teeter on the bridge between triumph and defeat, and you will have the choice. That choice and the choices you make every time you are faced with a hurdle will build the habits that ultimately will come to define how you will live your entire life.

    You cannot fully prepare for a crucible in life, no matter how much you try. It will sneak up on you, and it will grab you by the neck and pull you under if you let it.

    The key lies in your way of thinking. Every single time I got in the water, I was filled with a sensation of impending doom. My internal monologue told me of certain failure. However, you can change your inner voice. Make a deliberate effort to tell yourself a different story than the one that has been drowning you. Change the way you speak to yourself. When your mind is right, your actions can follow.

    This is not a story of becoming the most successful swimmer ever. I scraped by with a single mark above failing.

    This is a story of training your mind, and making the deliberate decision to fight the negative monologue that has overpowered you. Whether it be a crucible of health, school, physical activity, sports, or money, the first step toward overcoming is to convince yourself it is not only possible, but you will.

    The negative thoughts are next to impossible to fully stop. Instead, you must train your mind to answer them with stronger, more positive thoughts. Learn to trust yourself through positive self-talk. This is not a skill to learn in a single day, but you can train yourself before your crucible strikes.

    The best step you can possibly take for yourself at this very moment is to practice the subtle art of training your mind and thoughts. Meditate on it. When you hear yourself complaining, counter your negative thought with an empowering one. Smile more often, even when you do not feel like it. Feel your fears and doubts, but go for it anyways. Compliment yourself daily. Practice gratitude and mindfulness.

    Ask yourself the question, “Who do you want to be?” and use the answer to thwart any thoughts that keep you from becoming that person.

    You do not have to let yourself drown to find your mental strength.

  • Why I Was Addicted to Attention, Lies, and Drama

    Why I Was Addicted to Attention, Lies, and Drama

    I’ve done a lot of things for attention that I’m not proud of. I’ve created drama. I’ve bragged. I’ve exaggerated. I’ve hurt people. I’ve hurt myself. I’ve lied and lied and lied.

    No one wants to be labeled as an “attention seeker.” When people say, “She’s just doing it for attention,” they don’t mean it as a compliment. I knew this. And I knew that people said these things about me.

    And still, I couldn’t stop.

    I spend a lot of time around animals, especially cats. It’s easy to see which ones have experienced starvation. They have constant anxiety about food. They meow and meow when it’s feeding time. They scarf their portions down without breathing. If the bowl is left full, they’ll eat whatever’s there—even if it’s a week’s worth of food!

    I was that cat with attention. I could never get enough.

    But compulsive behaviors aren’t about what we’re consuming. Attention seeking isn’t about attention. Food addiction isn’t about food. Really, it’s about control.

    When you’ve been starved of something, you develop a fear of losing it. You begin to cling to every morsel of what you’re desperately afraid to live without. Survival mode.

    That’s what it was like for me: constant survival mode. I felt like, at any moment, I was going to be abandoned, left alone, forgotten. I fought to be noticed. Fought to be heard. Fought to be “loved.”

    But despite my constant attention-seeking efforts, I never got what I truly wanted. I never felt loved for exactly who I was because I never showed her to anyone! I showed the world the person I thought it wanted to see, and I used other people as characters in my personal drama.

    So that is the biggest irony: because I was so desperately hungry for love, I couldn’t have it. Because I so deeply craved attention, I repelled people away from me. Then, these experiences reaffirmed my biggest fear: there wasn’t enough. I wasn’t enough. So I’d grasp more, cling more, lie more.

    Too often, people talk about attention seeking like it’s a character flaw. I see it as an addiction.

    When we’re trying to fill a love-sized hole, it doesn’t matter what we’re trying to stuff into it: drugs, money, alcohol, approval, sex. If it’s not love, it won’t truly satisfy us. We’ll keep wanting more and more.

    My journey of healing my attention-seeking patterns has been long and painful. One of the most painful things has been realizing that most people weren’t reacting to me the way I thought they were.

    I used to brag loudly in public, imagining people around me admiring and envying me. Now, I realize that most of them were either ignoring me or annoyed by my antics.

    I used to stretch every accomplishment, imagining people respecting me. If it was two, I’d say five. If it was 100, I’d say 300. If it was one minute, I’d say an hour. Now, I realize that most people either didn’t believe me or used my lies to reinforce their own insecurities.

    I used to make a tragedy out of every pain and a drama out of every inconvenience, imagining people pitying me. Now, I know that most people either felt stuck in the cloud of toxicity that surrounded me (because of their own unhealed traumas), or they avoided that cloud like the plague.

    The world, I’ve discovered, isn’t quite the place I thought it was.

    I was so busy talking and talking, lying and lying, that I never sat down just to listen. And that is what helped me heal: looking within myself, looking around me, and embracing reality.

    Attention seeking, for me, was a kind of self-protection. On my journey of healing myself, I’ve found that self-love and self-protection aren’t the same thing. I had to remove my armor and my mask. I had to face the truth.

    Beneath my defense mechanisms, I found a fragile, wounded part of me that was traumatized by childhood experiences—by emotional starvation. But this part of me wasn’t fragile because of the wounds I incurred as a kid. It was fragile because I tried to protect it.

    After I got hurt, I tried to hide myself away. I tried to create an elaborate fantasy world to protect myself from rejection and abandonment. I piled layers and layers of bandages on top of my wounds, but wounds need air to heal. I tried to keep myself safe, but I ended up suffocating myself instead.

    I wasn’t lying and creating drama “just for attention.” I was doing it to survive. I was grasping for scraps of approval to replace my desperate hunger for real love, for authenticity, for happiness.

    On the outside, it seemed like I wanted other people’s attention. That’s what I thought I needed too. But what I really needed was to pay attention—to be able to just exist in each moment without struggling. To be able to look at myself without running away. To look at people without being afraid of them. To have peace of mind.

    Maybe you know someone who’s stuck in these patterns. Maybe that someone is you. However this applies to you, I hope to communicate one important thing: attention seeking is a symptom of a bigger cause.

    It’s not something to be dismissed. It’s also not something to be judged and criticized. It’s something to be accepted, understood, unraveled, and forgiven.

    Healing these patterns takes time. Every step along the way, it’s been difficult for me to invite reality to replace my delusions. It’s been hard to allow myself to be raw and open instead of trying to protect myself from pain.

    But this healing journey has also allowed me to enjoy real affection: from myself and from others. And that has been worth all the hard work.

  • How Creativity Heals Us and Why It’s a Gift to the World

    How Creativity Heals Us and Why It’s a Gift to the World

    “Creativity is the way I share my soul with the world.” ~Brené Brown

    I wrote a poem today for the woman I love(d).

    Just a few weeks ago, I fully believed she was the one I’d be with forever. Love forever. My heart was open so deep and wide to her. We talked about marriage and living together in the woods, making art, and being a family.

    Then things got tough. We talked, we tried, we read books, jetted our intention out into the universe. But we just couldn’t keep it together.

    There was so much pain. But also so much love. There were no lies; there was no betrayal. There was lots of kindness and understanding, attempts at consciousness and empathy. It was really hard, and my heart broke. But it’ll be okay. Just a very different road than I had anticipated.

    After a few weeks we’ve come together again as friends. Really good friends. As she said, “I want to be the best ex-girlfriend you’ve ever had.” And so far, she is. Truly.

    She challenged us to love each other as much as we can while not being together. It’s a big ask. A deeply spiritual question that pushes boundaries of everything we think we know about who we love, why we love, and what we expect in return.

    Tomorrow is the anniversary of the day we met.

    As you might imagine, my poet heart is full of love, hurt, conjecture, compassion, and the mystery of it all. And that brings me to my point…

    Creativity is not a luxury item.

    Writing her some verses about what we had, what we dreamed, and what we’ve become, helped me to clarify my thoughts and feelings. It helped me see into my own truth.

    For anyone who feels compelled in any way to activate and engage with their creativity, it really is so much bigger than it appears. Here’s why…

    Creativity helps us to be seen.

    There are something like seven billion people running around on this planet. Whether you’re driving down the freeway, walking the streets of your city, or tapping around online, it’s easy to feel lost. To feel invisible, inconsequential. It’s a big world.

    When we create something—whether it’s a one-woman show, a video animation, a poem, a song, whatever—we’re taking what’s inside of us and stepping it out. Now it can be shown or heard. Now it can be experienced, transmitted. Now it can be shared.

    When it’s shared, parts of us that were once invisible, hidden, obscured, become known.

    Perhaps you’ll get your fifteen minutes and become popular with the masses. More likely, it’ll be with your extended gang or just a few close people. And sometimes your creation will only be for yourself. Even if no one else checks out your work, it’ll still help you to see yourself. Become better known to yourself. Understand more deeply who you are.

    This is big.

    Creativity helps us express ourselves.

    To be expressed simply means moving from the potential to the actual. A dancer that sits in the corner is not expressed as a dancer in that moment. A chef that heats up a can of soup is not expressed as a chef. You get the idea.

    As my poetry teacher in college said, a poet is not someone with a book of poems on her desk. It’s not someone with a teaching gig or a fat resume. A poet is someone who writes poems.

    This may seem pretty obvious, but it goes deep. As humans, our true potential is nearly limitless. Based on the choices we make, the chances we take, and the efforts we put in, our lives move forward in whatever trajectory we choose. We will essentially be expressed in various ways as the result of our choices.

    Creativity, in whatever form we desire, helps us become who we are. Dancer, poet, entrepreneur, singer, artist, dad, friend, teacher, lover, whatever. It’s your choice. Your effort. Your path. However you choose to express becomes your life.

    This is big.

    Creativity helps us to heal.

    There are plenty of ways to heal. You can see a therapist, dig into some meditation, go on a solo voyage around the world, talk to your pals, hit up a sweat lodge, or go on a fantastic inner journey. It’s all good. Whatever’s right for you is right for you. But there’s at least one key difference in using creativity to heal.

    When we create something, it moves from the internal (an idea) to the external (the expression). Unlike a meditation or a visit with the therapist, our struggles and our catharsis can now be shared.

    I wrote a screenplay called PANACEA’S DREAM about a shaman and scientist who develop a pill that cures any illness. It works, but nobody really knows why.

    Thematically, it’s about the duality between faith and science. This is something I’ve grappled with my whole life. But now, these questions play out through my characters. I’m healed in ways by writing this narrative because I can now integrate the separate parts of myself. I can now see and have empathy for the skeptic within as well as the spiritualist who relies on faith alone.

    Anyone who reads my screenplay or sees the movie will get some kind of benefit from it. Perhaps stir up some questions. My expression can be shared. Unlike that trip to the therapist or the sweat in the lodge.

    So creativity helps us to be seen, expressed, and healed. This is fantastic! But I just recently had a bit of an epiphany and tapped into a deeper truth while talking with my old love.

    Being expressed, healed, and seen is actually a service to humanity. A gift to the world.

    When we are expressed, we become who we truly are.

    When we are healed, we become better versions of ourselves.

    When we are seen, our truth and goodness shine in the world.

    And when we express, heal, and shine, we help others to do the same. This is big. Really big.

    Tomorrow I’m going to take my own advice. I’m going to give my old love her poem. And love her with everything I’ve got in my heart (even though we’re not together). I’m going to express, heal, and be seen in ways I cannot speak.

    Creativity is not a luxury item.

  • Making the Hurt Visible: How I Stopped Hating the Man and Learned to Listen to Myself

    Making the Hurt Visible: How I Stopped Hating the Man and Learned to Listen to Myself

    “Ignoring isn’t the same as ignorance, you have to work at it.” ~Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale

    We’ve just passed the year anniversary of an event that has greatly changed our country. The shock of the election results last year sent waves of powerful emotions rippling through our nation.

    Personally, I felt the effects as intense and immediate grief. It was as though I had just lost my dearest companion.

    I had days of shock, despair, feelings of intense cold with physical shaking and episodes of vomiting and nausea, followed by weeks of sleepless nights, spontaneous sweating, nightmares and feelings of imminent danger. Everything felt like a threat. Everything felt like an unbearable reminder. It was all so devastating… and so embarrassing.

    I was ashamed of how deeply I registered the experience and found it difficult to talk about even with those I loved. I was confused as to why it felt so intense, why I felt choked when I tried to speak of how I was feeling, and assumed it was something wrong with me. I was the living example of the liberal snowflake.

    As I began talking to others I realized that I was not alone in this experience, and I began to be curious as to why it registered so deeply with myself and some others, and yet did not in some of my friends who had similar political ideologies. They were still disappointed and disgusted with what had happened, but it did not register in such a visceral way.

    Personal and systematic abuse shaped us all in invisible ways. The answers I found to why I related so physically to the event go back very far into my personal history, and if you believe in such things, my ancestral history also.

    As a small child family gatherings held a sense of dread for my sister and me. While we enjoyed the food and presents usually involved, there was also the regular ritual of uncle Joe.

    Uncle Joe would call us floozies and comment that our legs were too skinny, our knees looked like washerwoman knees, and no one would find us attractive.

    There were also the sneak attacks of him grabbing us and holding us down and tickling us while we screamed for him to stop. It was always in the middle of the room with everyone watching, and him narrating the scene, saying how much we really loved it, how silly we sounded screaming stop because we were laughing, and everyone could see we enjoyed it.

    At the beginning and end of gatherings he would demand a hug and kiss; didn’t we love our uncle?

    I remember feeling helpless, humiliated, and ashamed for my tears. It was expected for us to swallow our feelings and put on a happy face. We needed to be polite.

    If any adult came to our aid or defense I do not recall it, and I’m sure if anyone did they would have also been told that they were being too sensitive. He was showing his love for us, and why didn’t they appreciate it? We should feel lucky to have an uncle who loved us so much.

    This kind of story is so commonplace, so ubiquitous, that many may read it and still question what was wrong with that situation. But this is how the very damaging abuse called gas lighting works.

    The perpetrator takes advantage of someone weak or vulnerable. They deny the victim from having a voice in the story, then re-center the story to be about themselves, about how great and wonderful they are or, conversely, how they themselves are being abused in the situation. And they mostly are not even aware that they are doing it.

    Even in writing this down I feel the tension in my body rise. I feel the tremors involuntarily start in my limbs, my breath gets shallow, and I have trouble even wrapping my head around the words to adequately explain the experience.

    In Psychological Harm is Physical Harm Nora Samaran writes of how this kind of abuse shapes the brain and how someone can react to this behavior for the rest of their life. The systematic silencing of one’s voice and denial of one’s reality can cause someone to become incapable of talking about it.

    Uncle Joe was not the only person in my life who behaved in this way. It was everywhere, from the doctor who told me that it didn’t hurt when he burned off my warts with dry ice, to my father who told me to quit crying or he would give me something to cry about, to the teachers who seemed to always ignore my correct answers, but hear the boy behind me who repeated what I just said as if it was his own idea. It was on television, in movies, in the music I heard on the radio.

    I internalized the patterns and found myself over and over in the same frustrations, the same endless arguments, the same feelings of invisibility.

    I sought out the dynamic in my relationships, sometimes in more obviously abusive partnerships, but often in the subtle and almost invisible forms of minimization. I felt like I was talking, but the people I was talking to didn’t seem to register what I was saying.

    It was like being caught in a nightmare, where you are trying to speak but what comes out of your mouth is unintelligible. You know what you are trying to say, but what my partners heard was something altogether different. It was crazy making.

    Because of the systemic normalization of minimizing and denying the feminine perspective, I came to deeply distrust my own mind.

    I did not have to even be told my perceptions were not important; it was done in the subtle shrugging off of my suggestions, the deep sigh that made me feel my words were ridiculous, the automatic response of the males in my life to say “yes, but…,” “ I don’t think you get what’s going on,” “you are misunderstanding,” even when I was describing my own feelings or experience.

    And the many years of work I did getting a handle on my own anger issues and automatic reactions made me super sensitive to the claims that I was the one being too aggressive, making too big a deal out of something, or just being mean.

    I automatically took on the blame and responsibility of any argument. I was being irrational, I was not being clear enough, the words I used were hurtful; therefore, they were invalid.

    Mathew Remski discusses this quite eloquently from the male perspective. He talks of the behavior of minimizing being so embedded in his make up that it takes continuous concentrated effort to even notice when it is happening. And that it also takes the help of his partner continuously pointing out when it happens.

    It is a lot of work to be constantly vigilant monitoring our behavior, and it can feel almost impossible to overcome. I know because I, and most other people who have had the experience of personal or systematic marginalization do this every day with our own behavior. The constant rewriting of our own experiences to fit within a system that cannot accept our true feelings, which center the collective narrative on a cis, white male perspective.

    When the campaign happened, the behaviors I had deep visceral reactions to became public. Instead of being hidden away in the most intimate relationships or invisible private conversations, they were being played out on a very public stage.

    I felt myself reacting to them all as if they had happened to me personally (because they had, just not by this particular person).

    When one of the most powerful positions in the world was given to a person who was so blatantly abusive and disrespectful, who openly mocked his victims, who rewrote every story so the blame was scattershot anywhere but his direction, who played out the usually hidden abuses so many of us feel intimately on a scale so huge it permeated the globe, it felt to me that the years of hard work I had done to reclaim my identity had been wiped out in a single night.

    It validated the claim of every person who had told me I didn’t know what I was talking about; if I was uncomfortable it was because my expectations were not reasonable; if I felt abused, hurt, ignored it was hurtful and unfair to the person I was accusing; that pointing out my pain or the pain of others was downright impolite and my behavior. The mere fact that I had a perspective of my own, was intolerable.

    I found relief through somatic therapy. Somatic therapy works directly with sensations of the body and translating them into the emotions that we may be storing there. It requires one to become present in the now, opening to the deeply buried layers that bubble up from the subconscious when we have knee-jerk reactions and strong emotions.

    Translating the subconscious reactions we have into conscious and conscientious actions creates the space to make our hurt, and the hurt of others visible. To do this I had to dive into the depth of the grief to see where it stemmed from, not just place it was most recently triggered. This was a place that made every fiber of my being long to run away, numb out, cease to exist.

    But the leaning into the pain instead of running away allowed me to recognize and accept my own feelings and reactions as tools of learning. I had to relearn to trust my instincts and see myself as a reliable source of information. I learned that I am valid, my feelings are important, and I have a right to be heard and to take up space.

    I saw the ways I was complicit in my own harm. I had given up the right to my own perspective, internalized the doubt that my experiences are real, automatically responded to my strong emotions as unreasonable, and I had agreed that the feelings and needs of others were more important than my own.

    When I saw that I had agreed to these things subconsciously, I was finally able to decide for myself that I did not want to do these things and could make the choice to stop.

    It was and continues to be hard work. But now I listen when strong reactions come up, and instead of automatically silencing them I ask, what they are here to tell me? My anger, fear, guilt, depression, despair, all have a message they are desperately trying to get me to hear.

    With deep listening my reactions can be transformed into conscious actions. Actions that let my voice be heard, centering my own story and needs, and allowing others to express what they need to express as well. It also gives me a very low BS tolerance threshold.

    In claiming my own story I suddenly found it intolerable having it minimized in any way and could no longer be silent when it was.

    This is a deeply inconvenient perspective to have. Going against the grain of society and allowing myself to be impolite while remaining as compassionate as I can muster leads to many awkward and uncomfortable conversations. It leads to conversations where I have to put my personal safety on the line in order to stand up for my personal integrity.

    There is also the need for great delicacy and diplomacy. You cannot hope for others behavior to change when you make them the enemy.

    We all have the capacity to hurt; we all have the capacity to heal. I am the victim of abuse in cases related to my gender, and at times, my age, but have also been the perpetrator in cases where my privilege, be it from my white skin, my middle class upbringing, my citizenship etc. have blinded me to the ways I have contributed to the minimization and abuse of others.

    Learning to have compassion for myself and my own tender emotions also requires me to have compassion for those who have harmed me. In the cases of my intimate circle, these are people I love and respect, and I want to be able to still love myself and need to allow for others to love themselves. I see the great hurt many of the people who have treated me this way carry around, you do not abuse without having first been abused yourself.

    Unfortunately the abuse of toxic masculinity (the culture of oppression, patriarchal values, or the many names this behavior is known by) has become so embedded in our culture that we do not even recognize it as abuse. It is the norm; it’s just the way it is.

    It is invisible to the unconscious eye, until we make it visible. We are all damaged by it, but some are made to pay a dearer price, and some are allowed to gain privilege.

    Those that gain privilege may have less of a motivation to change the patterns and a harder time seeing the ways they do harm and the ways it benefits them. It takes a lot of self-awareness and the ability to make yourself vulnerable. Accepting the responsibility of having harmed others and making amends is a very painful truth to accept, and so many will avoid this at all costs.

    And this responsibility is passed down through the generations. If one generation cannot make amends for the harm they caused, the pain, guilt, and responsibility are handed down to the next; only the further it goes from its origins, the more subconscious it becomes, and the more difficult it is to bring the surface and recognize it.

    But this is also the way it is healed, once and for all. It is not appealing work to dig deep into the ugliest depth of our suffering, to name the ways we have suffered, the ways we have caused suffering, the ways we have allowed both things to happen. But not doing it makes those parts of ourselves most in need of tender care the least visible.

    So in this year when all I really wanted was for this guy, who made all my alarm bells go off, to shut the hell up, I was moved to look at all the ways I had let this weak and damaged person, and so many others like him, convince me I had to shut the hell up. I lovingly listened to my own story and convinced myself to speak up instead.

  • Leave the Past in the Past: What Matters Most Is Who You Are Now

    Leave the Past in the Past: What Matters Most Is Who You Are Now

    “Focus on what matters and let go of what doesn’t.” ~Unknown

    When I was in rehab for alcohol addiction, one of the most difficult things for any of us to overcome was the fact that we thought we were beyond redemption.

    Why? Because during the depths of our addiction, we had done some things we weren’t too proud of. Unhealthy behaviors that included drinking while driving, calling in sick when we weren’t because we were too hung over to go to work, or neglecting our children for the lure of spending the evening with a bottle of wine instead. None of this sounds like anything you could feel good about it, does it?

    The biggest thing I had to learn through this was that who I am now is what matters most.

    My unhealthy past behaviors don’t make me the person I am now. And the first step in becoming the person you are now—the one where your kindness can shine, your love for your children takes center stage, your choices with others are healthy, your self-abuse is nonexistent (or, at least dormant)—is to leave the past where it is.

    Instead, focus on the future and building the person you want to become. If you are struggling with being stuck in a place where you don’t feel like you’re being your best person, where you might be berating yourself for your behaviors you aren’t proud of, where you might not know how to turn your life into something that more positively reflects the better parts of you, then read on!

    “It doesn’t matter where you are coming from. All that matters is where you are going.” ~Brian Tracy

    First, we need to understand a very fundamental thing: the past does not define us. Often, we believe that the past does define us and, therefore, there is no escaping it. This is simply not true.

    We are the ones that decide whether or not the past holds us hostage. Your past may have shaped you, but it does not define who you are now. What defines you is what you do now, your actions now, and what you have become since the past you left behind.

    The second thing in becoming the person you are now is to stop doing the behaviors you don’t like, those ones that make you feel like shit about yourself. You know the ones. But, changing bad habits or unhealthy behaviors doesn’t happen overnight.

    I couldn’t change everything I disliked about myself all in one night. It was a process. You need to learn that things take time and this is just part of the journey. And, most importantly, that this is okay.

    “Every positive change in your life begins with a clear, unequivocal decision that you are either going to do something or stop doing something.” ~Unknown

    It starts with first changing your behaviors one at a time. If you could slow down just a little and ask a simple question “Will this make me feel lousy about myself if I do it?” and the voice said yes, you might be able to pause long enough to say to I don’t want to do things anymore that make me feel lousy about myself.

    You could then decide I am going to choose to not commit this behavior this time. And, that is precisely what it is—a conscious decision to thwart one unhealthy behavior at a time from coming to fruition and sending you down that ugly road of self-loathing and condemnation.

    “We cannot become what we want to be by remaining what we are.” ~Max de Pree

    If you ask yourself the opposite question “Will I feel good about myself if I do this?” sometimes it is even easier to follow through on the action.

    It was a long road for me to turn my life around from where I was, but I did it. I started by building better and more positive behaviors one at a time, until I started to have more of those than the unhealthy ones. And slowly, but steadily, I built myself into a different person—one I could be proud of and one I liked being.

    For example, if I asked myself, “Will I feel good if I go into work despite being hung over and at least show up?” And the answer was yes, then I did it.

    “Will I feel good if I don’t drink tonight and instead hang out with my children?” And the answer was yes and I did it, I actually did feel better about myself!

    The more actions you can collect that make you feel good about yourself, the further along you get to leaving actions behind that you don’t feel good about. It’s a process of collecting more “I feel good about myself” actions than “I feel bad about myself” actions. This is what you need to do.

    Even more importantly, each time you do an “I good about myself” action, you need to give yourself some credit for it. This is important, even if you slip up and commit an “I feel bad about myself” action the very next minute.

    If you don’t give yourself encouragement for the small victories, then you’re doomed to not have the courage to keep going. So self-reward, recognition, and credit are all very important things to give yourself.

    Every small act in the right direction needs to be recognized as something good and valuable, so give yourself a pat on the back, a verbal good job, a kudos, or a gold star sticker. It doesn’t matter what, as long as it is some kind of recognition that works for you.

    Make sure to give yourself recognition in whatever way makes you feel good about it. These will add up over time until you begin to start feeling good about yourself in general, at least a little bit, then more, then finally much more.

    “No matter how hard the past, you can always begin again.” ~Buddha

    What about the moments when you fail, or commit the “I feel lousy about myself action?”

    You must forgive yourself these, practice some self-compassion, and let it go. Just say to yourself, “I messed up, I forgive myself, I will try again.” Otherwise, you will stay stuck in the “I feel lousy about myself” behavior by beating yourself up for it, making yourself feel bad, and then dangerously looking for a way out of that bad feeling by committing some other unhealthy behavior.

    For example, here’s what usually happened to me. I’d feel bad about drinking, so I’d drink so I could forget about this horrible feeling I couldn’t stand being in.

    Guess what always happened in that scenario? It became a vicious cycle and a whirlpool that just kept sucking me down further and further. And that is exactly, what it is like—a whirlpool.

    Your job is to stay out of the whirlpool, by focusing on doing actions that you feel good about, building your self-confidence that you are a good person, acknowledging your accomplishments, and creating a sense of strength for yourself that you can continue to build on this foundation.

    “Each morning we are born again. What we do today is what matters most.” ~Buddha

    So, when you commit an unhealthy behavior, forgive your wounded self. This does not mean you accept it as okay or that you shouldn’t take accountability for your actions. It simply means you don’t demean yourself over it, or punish yourself for it, or otherwise stay stuck in it. You forgive, move on, and try to focus more on doing actions that make you feel good about yourself.

    By focusing on actions that make you feel good about yourself, you begin to build up a new sense of self. Because, this is exactly what you are doing. You are building a new you. You are creating a new version of you—a stronger version, a version you are proud of, a version that reflects your true values and true self.

  • Seeing Rejection As Redirection: What We Gain When We Lose

    Seeing Rejection As Redirection: What We Gain When We Lose

    “Every time I thought I was being rejected from something good, I was actually being re-directed to something better.” ~Steve Maraboli

    Rejection hurts. Whether it is from family, friends, co-workers, or a new company, when we experience rejection it hits us right in the heart—the control center to our emotions.

    We may wonder, what is wrong with me? We might begin pulling ourselves apart with self-criticism. However, rejection also has a way of teaching us, redirecting us, and ultimately making our lives better.

    I have learned to look at rejection differently these past couple of years. Actually, many of my greatest blessings have come out of what I perceived as rejection. Yes, there have been many painful experiences, but then again, I always have been one to learn more through pain than through pleasure.

    When I was younger, I faced rejection daily. I was an overweight teenager with crushes on any boy who looked at me. Other kids would constantly make fun of me, and no boys dared to show me any bit of interest. I was bullied and rejected simply for being me.

    I experienced rejection around relationships several more times as I grew older. There was a period when I was so afraid of rejection, I clung onto friendships and relationships that I intuitively knew were not healthy for me.

    Unsurprisingly, these relationships eventually died out. This, of course, validated my beliefs that I was unworthy and that I would always be rejected. More so, it led to significant feelings of loneliness, even surrounded by bodies of people.

    As I got into my career, there were several times I did not get the job I had hoped for.

    I did not receive my professional counseling license in the time I wanted and planned for. I did not get that promotion I had worked so hard for. The rejections just kept piling on.

    Finally, it was like a light bulb went on. These things were all happening for a reason, and they were all perfectly timed.

    I began to spin the way I viewed rejection. I started to see it as an ability to reassess and become more acquainted with different parts of myself. In some situations, I was able to see that maybe I was not on the right path. Or, if it still felt I needed to be there, I was able to look within and see where I needed to improve in order to make it happen.

    My perspective became clearer. Every job I was denied for, opened the door to new (and better) opportunities. Every relationship that hurt me, led me to my true love (and husband-to-be). Every mistake I made, guided me to look within.

    I was able to learn, grow, and ultimately make changes. I forgave myself for not knowing what I did not know until I learned it. I found myself thanking all of the people, places, and things that rejected me. They led me on a process to being the person I am today, a woman of integrity, grace, resilience, and strength.

    But, let me warn you, this epiphany did not happen overnight. Slowly, I began to see my perception and my beliefs were no longer serving me. I started to look at situations differently, and began searching for the blessing in disguise. I know, it sounds easier said than done, but there are some tools we could use to help quiet the inner critic that shows up during these times of distress.

    1. Treat yourself with compassion.

    If there’s anyone that knows the dialogue “You deserve bad things because…” it’s me. But, research shows negative self-talk is destructive and ineffective.

    If I believe I deserve bad things, I will start to attract people or things that validate that belief. What we feel on the inside, manifests itself on the outside.

    We need to work on responding to our inner critic with kindness and compassion. A helpful way of doing this is communicating with yourself like a dear friend.

    When a girlfriend went through a job denial, I encouraged her to trust that new opportunities would evolve. I also acknowledged her courage for just showing up and interviewing. I would never have said she’s hopeless and she ought to give up.

    When friends have gone through terrible breakups, I have always done my best to remind them they are worthy of love, and to help them find the lesson in the situation. I wouldn’t have told them it was their fault because there was something wrong with them.

    2. View rejection as getting outside your comfort zone (where all the magic happens).

    If we never experience rejection, we are probably not taking many chances, and therefore, not making many changes.

    When we get rejected, we can at least be comforted in knowing that we are taking risks. These risks help us better understand who we are and where we are going. More so, they help us build strength and develop skills to deal with inevitable adversity life brings, which helps us build up resilience.

    I worked hard to obtain a professional license, which was denied to me when I first applied due to a history of being dishonest. At the time, this broke me. I felt so ashamed and scared. However, this allowed an opportunity to really challenge and get honest with myself.

    My use of alcohol was starting to have consequences that I attempted to hide. It was beginning to slip into other areas of my life. Ultimately, this rejection directed me to a life in recovery, which constantly gets me out of my comfort zone.

    Not only am I living present and sober, it has taught me to get out of myself and be of service to others. Fast forward a year, I got my license. Boy, did it mean way more to me then than it would have the year before, as I put in a lot of hard work to making changes and re-aligning my life.

    3. Don’t let rejection define you.

    Many times when we face rejection, we personalize it. We make the event of rejection far more than the event. We begin to identify with it. This is a failure, therefore I am the failure. It is important to separate what happened to us from who we are.

    Rejection isn’t always personal. Oftentimes when someone rejects us, it has nothing to do with faults on our part; it just means we weren’t a good fit for that person, job, or opportunity.

    If we take rejection to mean we’re unworthy or unlovable, it’s likely because the rejection is triggering an existing belief formed earlier in life—which is a good thing, since this points toward something we may want to address and release.

    I had a tendency to put my worth into external things, and in a sense, abandon myself. After patterns of rejection, it became apparent I wasn’t meeting myself with compassion. I was meeting myself with shame and attempting to shame myself into making changes.

    I worked on consciously being mindful of my thoughts and shifting them to be more supportive. I learned that failure was an event, but not me as a person. Furthermore, I practiced trusting that things will work out at the right time. If it was not working out right now, I still had something to learn even if that was just to be patient.

    4. Find the lesson in rejection.

    We could easily focus on what we have lost when we experience rejection, but it’s more useful to ask ourselves, “What have I gained?” This way we can learn from the experience. Rather than beating ourselves even more over the head, we can turn our adversity into self-growth and self-exploration. With each experience, we can grow stronger.

    Personally, I have learned to look inside and identify what I need to work on. I have begun to see I am more capable to handling loss than I have credited myself. I have also found the ability to use rejection as an opportunity to humble myself, and move forward with wisdom to do things differently.

    At twenty-five years old, I was divorced from my first marriage. I was in a space of regret and shame. I felt I’d deeply let down my family and friends. I found myself isolating from others and alone. I lost a relationship, a home, friendships, and predictability. But in hindsight, I gained much more.

    I began to see I was codependent in the relationship. I was stagnant and not evolving as a person. Slowly, but surely, I began to learn to truly depend on myself.

    I gained wisdom about healthy boundaries in a relationship.

    I then learned to cherish true friendships. Friends who saw me at my lowest and still loved me without conditions.

    Most importantly, I gained a relationship with myself. I learned to love the woman I am unconditionally. In doing so, I finally attracted real love. I learned to value, respect, and love my now fiancé unconditionally.

    Our thoughts have a strong impact on our emotions. Our emotions, in turn, have a strong impact on our decisions and our behaviors. If you find yourself experiencing failure or rejection, ask yourself what is your interpretation of the situation. What meaning are you giving it?

    If you have a tendency toward negative self-talk, you will find your energy draining quickly. This will eventually take you away from what is important. When we are in a battle with ourselves, we cannot possibly be present for others.

    It could be helpful to create a new belief about the situation. On the surface, I may have a loss of relationship, but deeper down I am gaining a better understanding of myself. Train your brain to look for the blessing, not the curse. I, personally, believe I am always being protected. If you don’t believe in a higher power, you could still choose to understand rejection as redirection to something better.

    I choose to trust the universe and that things are happening as they should for my highest good. It is crucial for me to have that faith in order to be with the sense of peace, I feel, we all yearn for in life. And, to be completely honest, I am extremely grateful for things not working out the way I once hoped they would.

  • We All Make Mistakes, So Let’s Try to Remember the Good

    We All Make Mistakes, So Let’s Try to Remember the Good

    Julius Caesar has long been my favorite work of William Shakespeare. I am drawn to the political intrigue, the betrayal, the powerful words of Marc Antony.

    One line from the play has always remained lodged in my mind:

    “The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones.”

    The line often pops into my head when I feel unjustly persecuted or blamed. Shakespeare understood hundreds of years ago that human nature causes us to feel self-centered and unjustly targeted.

    While I recognize I am not now nor was I ever a perfect mother, I do know I was not a terrible mother. I never missed a school event. I made the dioramas. I read with my kids every night. I helped them prepare for no fewer than three competitive spelling bees.

    I ran school carnival booths. I made the calls to the principals and superintendents when unjust policies were implemented.

    My house was the spot where my son’s friends always came to hang out.

    I gave an epic Jackass themed birthday party when my son turned thirteen that remains legendary among his friends.

    While my ex-husbandwouldn’t often get up early on Saturdays, I never missed one of my daughter’s soccer games. I made sure I stayed involved in tennis, soccer, and swimming.

    I sharpened two pencils for my son every morning and set them out before he left for school. I put a sticky note of encouragement in my daughter’s lunch each day.

    I fought for them against abstinence-only education, ministers eating lunch in school without parental permission, and any other unjust issue my kids needed me to fight against.

    I worked on every college scholarship application with my daughter. I attended every college visit with her.

    She and I have been to dozens of Broadway shows together.

    I do not recount those events to receive accolades or praise. Millions of mothers do the same activities daily.

    Those memories are just some of my strongest as a mother. That is the reason for my recounting those memories. I remember the good about motherhood. The carnivals, the laughter, the vacations.

    No doubt my kids remember the bad more strongly. Because of my problems with alcohol, I remember a humiliating event where I chased my son trying to get him to try a drink in front of his cousin and friends. I know I got drunk the first day of my daughter’s freshman year and passed out that afternoon.

    I am sure they have multiple other negative stories about me. I began drinking in a dysfunctional manner off and on at age twenty-eight. I take responsibility for it. I’ve stupidly driven drunk. I’ve experienced the ire of both of my children in response to my drinking. I’ve spent years sober and spent months in relapses.

    Addiction appears in the DSM-V as a disease. I will fight it for the rest of my life, but I live in fear that the evil overtakes the good in the memories of those I love.

    The evil I’ve done lives on; the good remains buried. I recognize that is probably my own shame and self-pity surfacing, but I continue to feel the good remains buried.

    I experienced a similar childhood and understand now that I react to my mother in an equally unfair manner.

    My mom was the “cool mom.” She was the first one who would stand up for me or any other underdog. She was funny, edgy… My friends all loved her.

    Monetarily, I never wanted for anything. I grew up in suburban America. We went on vacations—nothing fancy: Tennessee, Arkansas, New Mexico. I had new school clothes and shoes every year. My mother never missed any event in which I participated.

    I remember the silly songs my mother would sing to me. I sentimentally keep a list of them on my phone. I remember my mother’s laugh. I am remembering the good. I want the good to live on.

    Like my own children, I will admit that it’s the “evil” I tend to remember more easily. I continue to fight that urge.

    My mother too battled with alcohol. She would get off work at 5:00 p.m. and disappear. I memorized the phone number of every regular bar she visited, every jail, and every hospital in the area. I called so frequently looking for my mother that I knew every phone number by heart.

    She drove drunk, picking up a friend and me from the movie theater, drunkenly yelling out the window. Meanwhile the grease she’d put on the stove to cook chicken at home had caught on fire.

    She passed out half-naked in my room when I was thirteen and a friend was spending the night. We had to try to drag her to bed. This event occurred after a special night of her hurling pornographic obscenities at a Craig T. Nelson character and a Jim McMahon commercial while watching television with us.

    She ran into a dumpster while driving home one night. She called us, but was so drunk she could not explain where she was.

    I am now conscious of the fact that I am guilty of that same Julius Caesar line regarding my mother. The good that she has done remains interred. The evil tends to run unfairly on repeat in my mind.

    My mother was a good mother. She was flawed, as I am, as we all are, but she was my biggest ally when I was a child.

    I am going to make a commitment to remember the good. I do not want it interred with her bones. I owe her the same that I hope for myself. Let my kids remember the good. Let that be my legacy. I owe it to my mother for the good that she has done to be her legacy.

    I cannot ever take back the hurt I’ve caused for my children, but I also know that I can strive to be better. That’s all any of us can do. We’re all only human. We all make mistakes. And we all have the choice to honor each other by remembering the best moments instead of focusing on the worst.

  • Don’t Lose Sight of the Big Picture: Spend Time with People You Truly Enjoy

    Don’t Lose Sight of the Big Picture: Spend Time with People You Truly Enjoy

    friends in the fall

    “Even if you are on the right track you’ll get run over if you just sit there.” ~Will Rogers

     How is this happening again?

    Lying in bed watching The Mentalist at 8 P.M. on a Saturday night, my mind begins to wander.

    A year ago I was so happy. I spent almost every night hanging out with amazing friends and now I’m here, alone watching TV.

    As my heart sank into my stomach, I shook my head, suppressed my feelings, and pushed play to start the next episode.

    A few years earlier I moved to Santa Fe, NM, a state I had never even visited before. Excited to start a new journey, I set out to meet new people and create a life full of amazing friends.

    Although that’s exactly what happened, the first few months were extremely difficult. I spent a lot of time trying to make new friends while having zero success. After a couple months, this went from frustrating to depressing.

    Luckily, I was able to solve the problem and learned how to make new friends from scratch. It was amazing. I was having some of the best times of my life.

    Every week I had friends inviting me to birthday parties, barbecues, camping trips, river rafting excursions, and typical nights out on the town. And when I invited people to places, like my New Year’s Eve party, people showed up.

    It was a high I’ll never forget.

    After an exhilarating two years in Santa Fe, I moved back to Huntington Beach, CA, the city I was born and raised in.

    I was excited for yet another new page in my life. Huntington is a beautiful city with great weather (and waves!). My family, best friend, and other great friends live here.

    Kim, my girlfriend at the time (now my wife), and I decided to have a long-distance relationship and I chose to save some money by living with my parents.

    The next year was a disaster.

    It might not have looked terrible from the outside, but I was eating myself alive on the inside.

    Even though I had friends in the area, I was only hanging out with them about once every two months. And about just as often, Kim and I would travel to see each other.

    But that was it. The only other people I hung out with were family members. And as much as I love them, this was not healthy for me.

    I may have seemed happy, but I was faking it. I was hurting. Instead of fixing it, I kept going with the status-quo.

    This feeling was very similar to the one I had when I moved to Santa Fe. A feeling of sadness, hurt, and longing that comes from a lack of spending time with people who make you feel alive.

    But this time was different. I knew I could make friends if I wanted to and I already had friends living here. I just didn’t make the relationships a priority like I should have.

    My laziness was striking me down and I got stuck in a comfort zone of my own making.

    It was easy to say yes and go out with friends when I was living by myself in Santa Fe. But living with my parents made it a little less appealing, which was enough to prevent me from doing it. I’d think to myself:

    I’ve already showered and I’m in my comfy clothes. I can hang out here with my parents, have a couple drinks, and watch this movie, or I can get ready again and meet up with my friends. Ah, I think I’ll just stay here tonight.

    That’s literally how many of my nights played out. And it was similar for the day time too. I’d decline an invite to go surfing because I already showered or because I was about to go to breakfast with my parents, something I easily could have skipped.

    When we finally moved Kim out here to Huntington, I thought my problem would be fixed. Instead, it was more of the same. Mexican food with my parents, cooking chicken piccata with Kim, staying home watching Prison Break, and trail running by myself in the wetlands.

    As much as I love hanging out with Kim and my family, I need that outside energy with friends who share some of my deepest interests and passions. So finally, after way too long, I made this realization:

    I need to spend more time with people who make me feel truly alive.

    My parents and Kim do fill a big part of that need. But I need other friends to fill the rest.

    I started making changes to my life that helped me meet new people and spend more time with existing and past friends.

    I joined a music production class. Kim and I played on a beach volleyball team with her coworkers and a separate flag football team with strangers. I also joined a soccer team.

    I started hanging out with my friends more. I’d text my buddy during the week and say, “Hey, wanna grab sushi Friday night?” I’d send another text to my surfing friends and say, “Surf’s supposed to be good Saturday. Who’s down?”

    On top of that, I’ve been reaching out to people I lost touch with. I recently hit up a friend who I hadn’t talked to in years and said, “Long time no see. Miss you dude. Hope all is awesome. You still running?”

    That text conversation ended with my wife and I scheduling a San Diego day trip and a twelve-mile running adventure for my buddy and me.

    I’ve even been getting together with friends I haven’t hung out with since high school!

    Ever since I put more focus and effort into spending time with my good friends, while still maintaining healthy relationships within my family, my life has improved drastically. I’m happier and more enjoyable to be around. Even better, I’m back to being my old, goofy self again.

    What steps can you take to make sure you don’t fall into the same trap I did?

    If you’re not careful, the same thing can happen to you. In the moment, it’s easy to stay home and watch Netflix because that’s easier and more comfortable. However, in the long-term that can be detrimental.

    Here are three steps you can take to get you on the right track:

    First, determine whether you have the right people in your life to keep you happy. Do you feel like you can be yourself around them? Do you feel free and alive when you hang out with them?

    Second, figure out if they are willing and able to spend enough time with you. Invite them to hang out and see if you can fill the free time you set aside for hanging out with friends.

    If you haven’t spoken to the person for a while, try pinging them first. Shoot them a text, a Facebook message, or even just comment on one of their posts. The main things you want to get across are that you miss them, you hope all is well, you’re curious how they’re doing, and you were thinking about them and wanted to say, “Hi.”

    If you’ve been in touch with them lately, just shoot them a message and say, “Hey, let’s get together soon. I was thinking of hiking El Morro this weekend. Interested?”

    It’s good to invite them to do something specific that you know they would enjoy. If you just ask to hang out, it might be hard for them to imagine what you would do together, which can make them less likely to accept. And if they do want to hang out but can’t or don’t want to do the original activity you proposed, they’ll likely respond with a different idea, still giving you a chance to hang out.

    Third, if your friends don’t have the time or you’d rather hang out with different people, it’s time to consider meeting new people. Join a photography class, sign up for a kickball team, find a book club, or attend a young professional’s social mixer.

    Go out into the world and meet new people. If you can find people while doing activities you already enjoy, even better.

    Once you understand how important your friendships are, you’ve cleared the first hurdle.

    From there, it’s on you to stay proactive to create and nourish the relationships that are so vital to your well-being.

    It might take a little more effort to pick up the phone, text your friend and schedule a hangout, or get outside and join that soccer team, but when you look back on your life you’ll be thankful you did.

  • Self-Love Means Never Saying “You Complete Me”

    Self-Love Means Never Saying “You Complete Me”

    “You can search throughout the entire universe for someone who is more deserving of your love and affection than you are yourself, and that person is not to be found anywhere. You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe deserve your love and affection.” ~Buddha

    A popular topic in the glossy magazines, learning to “love yourself” always seemed to me to be a self-indulgent first-world pastime.

    It seemed obvious that the commonly-repeated mantra “love yourself first” was just a sign of the times in a world where something like half of all marriages end in divorce. When I dug a little deeper I often found either a list of new spa treatments or a litany of new age catchphrases.

    All meaningless—that is until a series of failed relationships taught me the hard way why you have to love yourself first.

    I had always walked into relationships from the standpoint of something I needed or wanted. I wanted to feel valued and loved. I needed to feel that my struggles had meaning, and I found this in external validation. I craved for someone to stand by me and tell me that I was worth it.

    In my extremely busy and fast-paced life, I was surrounded by people so very lonely, starved of meaningful connections in a world of transactional relationships. Always the alpha-male, I craved a safe space where I could lower my defenses and be affectionate. A relationship became my way of getting what I thought I needed.

    For a decade of my life, this didn’t go well, and it certainly didn’t end well. It ended with me on the floor of my living room surrounded by pills and full of suicidal thoughts. But, after I picked myself up, this and many other truths revealed themselves to me.

    A need arises from something we find missing in ourselves.

    We need someone to tell us we’re important because we don’t feel worthy to begin with.

    We feel lonely because our lives aren’t full, and we’re waiting for someone to fill them up.

    We so crave those affectionate and reassuring words from someone we care about because we don’t feel pretty, smart, promoted—or whatever—enough. If he or she is a good mate, our need is satiated. This is why “you complete me” became such a widely expressed notion of the power of love. Unfortunately, that sort of thinking leads to dangerous places.

    We aren’t “complete” to begin with because of the very thing(s) we feel we’re lacking, or the inadequacy of our being.

    We make ourselves as attractive, accommodating, or desirable as we can to cover up these faults and fool an eligible partner into looking past our shortcomings. Eventually, we win, and then the prize is ours. And they both lived happily ever after. Except that rarely happens because that void always needs to be filled.

    We’ve told ourselves the story of our lives and convinced ourselves of the short (or long) list of things our partner can give us that will make us happy at last. But somehow it’s never enough, and when we get it, we want more of it, or something else entirely. Our demands to be listened to or supported or valued somehow seem to increase over time.

    And maybe we even become resentful. After all, we need to keep our partner fooled into continuing to see past our inadequacies, so we “hustle” for love.

    We have put so much effort into making ourselves attractive to begin with, and it’s very difficult to ever let the mask slip, lest he or she find the truth and see us for who we are. It all takes so much effort, and maybe we begin to think “It’s his fault I feel this way.”

    This is where coming into love from a place of inadequacy leads. But, when we accept ourselves for who we are, when we recognize our flaws but do not doubt our worth, we don’t seek wholeness in another person. Perhaps we even work on our perceived flaws, but we recognize these as suboptimal behaviors, not something wrong with us.  We do bad, but we are not bad.

    It’s still totally natural and healthy to have a set of desirable characteristics when we seek out that someone and boundaries for acceptable behavior, but this is a matter of choice, not need.

    When we enter a relationship from a place of worthiness and self-acceptance, we don’t hold our partner accountable for our shortcomings or expect her to fix us. We can focus on joy—which is happiness from within—rather than expecting or demanding that the other person supply it from without.

    After all, when we expect our partner to supply stuff to us in order to make us happy, crudely put, he or she becomes our dealer. Though of course it’s a bit more emotionally complicated than that, we are in a sense using the other person to fulfill our own ends, and guess what? He or she is probably doing the same to us. It somehow works!

    And what does it mean to accept yourself wholly, warts and all? What is it to say: “Maybe I let my jealousy get the better of me sometimes, but my heart is in the right place, and I don’t need anyone to prove that to me”?

    How is it that someone can say, “I’m responsible for my own happiness, and I want so very much to share that with another person”? That is loving yourself first, and that love has to stem from a deep place of worthiness.

    Love is many things, but one of them is total acceptance with no barriers. If we can’t feel that way toward ourselves, then how can we feel that way with someone else? What we do not accept about ourselves, we do not reveal to someone else.

    Love is also the most highly evolved, pristine form of connection, and connection is what gives meaning to people’s lives. This then leads to the false assumption that we need to be given love by other people in order to feel whole.

    In fact, the reverse is true. When we feel whole, we are able to love other people, and that is how we connect.

    This took so many years and so much heartache for me to figure out. When I looked back on all those failed relationships, though I typically still felt justified in some of the grievances I had, I took responsibility for the fact that it never would have worked out as long as I was seeking validation from another person.

    It would be nice and neat for me to say that now, possessed of this understanding, I found the one and am in the midst of my happily-ever-after. That’s actually far from the case! But, what I can say is that I’ve been in a couple of relationships since, and although their endings hurt, they in no way destroyed me or shook me to my core the way they had previously.

    Never again did I doubt if I was worthy of that kind of happiness or having those kinds of boundaries of self-respect. The grieving process happened, but it ended, and I remained who I was.

    To love myself first is to never have to say “you complete me” again, because I am complete just the way I am. It is to stop hustling for love and allowing myself to be loved. Far from being self-indulgent, it is such a humbling feeling, and it will set you free.

  • What Helped Me Move On After Being Cheated On

    What Helped Me Move On After Being Cheated On

    “Sometimes walking away is the only option because you finally respect yourself enough to know that you deserve better.” ~Unknown

    When I was cheated on, I was hit by an ongoing blizzard of conflicting emotions.

    There were the initial tears that I failed to hide from anyone. There was a cold ruthlessness as I told her that I couldn’t be with her after what she did. There was a wave of misery, there was a wave of anger, and all of it was dotted with periodic moments of calm and even gratitude that she was finally out of my life.

    There were also random spikes in my productivity as I sought to get on with my life, followed by horrifying loneliness, feelings of betrayal, doubting my own self-worth, and the inevitable relapse back into misery at the discovery that she had hooked up with the guy she had cheated on me with less than twenty-four hours after I had ended our relationship.

    Grief, I learned, is non-linear. It will go, and it will come back. Sometimes I’ll be perfectly happy doing the food shopping, and get depressed over a memory of us doing it together. There’s no predicting when this will happen.

    It was an ongoing spiral, as we had a number of mutual friends, and on top of that, two of our mutual friends lived right below me, and she would visit them often. So she was sticking to my life like gum in hair. There was no escape.

    It wasn’t the first time that she had cheated on me. On the first occasion, the man in question told me that my girlfriend had justified her actions by saying that I had hit her.

    This allegation swept me off my feet. In fact, I was speechless. I mean, it’s one thing to be cheated on, but to have the person I am in love with say a lie like that, something potentially so damaging, it actually broke my heart more than the act of cheating.

    I broke up with her then, and she burst into tears. Her tears were so genuine, the pain of losing me was so obvious, but at the same time contradicted by what she had done.

    The following day she begged me to take her back, and with tears streaming down her face she told me that she had been manipulated, and that the other man had made up all that stuff about me hitting her just to split us up. And she seemed so genuine. I took her back.

    Things proceeded as they had before, both of us determined to put this into the past and move on together, into a bright future. We got a place together, and poured all of our efforts into making it our dream home.

    At some point she lost her job, but I told her to leave the rent to me, since we were partners and money shouldn’t come between us. And during the months that I was supporting us both financially, she cheated on me again, this time with a guy who she insisted was just a friend.

    In the past I had noticed a lot of flirting between them, but she had always told me that I was being paranoid, and hanging on to what had happened in the past. It was like my memory of the first guy had been weaponized to use against me if I dared mention that she was making me uncomfortable with her flirtatious behaviour toward her new guy.

    When it came to light that there was more between them than she was letting on, I ended things, and instantly fell down this well of despair.

    Several of our friends had given me plenty of emotional validation in the sense that I had treated her perfectly, and that anyone in their right mind would be appreciative. But at the initial time of heartbreak, such words do little to stand against the relationship grieving process.

    Our mutual friends informed me that she was officially dating this guy less than twenty-four hours after I ended the relationship. That was expected but painful. What wasn’t expected was the revelation that there was a third occasion where she cheated, in the months in between the two that I knew about.

    This was with a friend who she had mysteriously fallen out with, and urged me not to speak to. We had mutual friends who knew about this third occurrence, but had kept silent in the hopes that my girlfriend would tell me.

    When this all came out, I did speak to this mysterious third person, and found out the horrifying realization that my girlfriend had also told this person that I had hit her. What a coincidence.

    This statement not only hurt, but it unravelled all of the trust she’d rebuilt with me when she convinced me that the first guy was lying and had manipulated her. Now it not only hurt to have my partner lie about me, but I learned that she was lying to me, too.

    Her mysterious fall out with her friend was caused by her refusal to leave me, her friend feeling led on, and when confronted by why she wouldn’t leave me, giving the explanation that as long as she stayed with me she could live somewhere rent-free.

    Cue emotional tidal wave. I mean, this is a lot to process. It was as if the person I had spent every day with was suddenly a completely different person. I had been lying in bed next to a stranger. Behind every “I love you” had been a hidden smirk. I felt like the punchline to a colossal joke that everyone knew about except me.

    I coped badly at first, ending the relationship but being unable to embrace the sudden void of free time, which would otherwise have been spent on her. And in the free time, my mind wandered back to the good times, unable to match the person I had fallen for with the person who I had just broken up with. I couldn’t quite believe that they were the same person.

    I sought out moments where she could have changed, and wondered what had changed her. Had she been manipulated by the people she cheated on me with? I grasped at a lot of straws in a vain attempt at thinking that maybe this relationship was fixable.

    The apartment we had moved into together was our creation, having decorated and furnished it together. It was our dream home. Now it was just mine alone, but haunted by my memory of her presence. And at the core of all of this was my own self-doubt. Had I done enough? Why was I so easy to just casually hurt? Is she evil? Am I just undeserving of love?

    But all of my time wallowing in our apartment alone did give me time to think, and I came to the conclusion that all I had to do was think differently.

    A lot of my trains of thought had elements of truth, but were completely lacking in logic. Here are the things that I told myself in order to move forward.

    Firstly, what was my ideal scenario?

    I was mourning the relationship, but what did I hope to happen as an alternative to what was actually happening? In my head I said, “I would love to have her back, having decided that this guy she’s with isn’t actually that great.” Or better yet, “I would love it if she’d never met him.”

    But you see, even if she had never met him, she’d still be capable of doing what she did. In fact, her repeat offences were proof enough that this was a very real side of her, and I needed to acknowledge that.

    If she’d never met this guy, she would have met another guy. So really what I’m ultimately saying to myself is “I would love it if she was the person I thought she was, and not who she actually is.”

    This can be simplified and translated to “I’m wishing for a different person. A better, more suitable partner, that isn’t her.” This thought came as a shock because at the time I didn’t want to accept it, but it’s the truth—she isn’t suitable for me.

    So secondly, what did I actually lose?

    On the surface, it’s easy to say that I lost my girlfriend to another man. This isn’t the case. All I lost is time out of my life that I had spent committed to the wrong person. I didn’t lose the relationship because it was a lie. And I was losing more time out of my life by fixating on it. Again, it’s a harsh truth but one I had to accept.

    So thirdly, it was time to address my own thoughts of self-doubt.

    Was there self-esteem to be recovered?

    I told myself repeatedly that I’d failed her, and that I wasn’t enough, while those who had seen our relationship grow and collapse had reassured me that I had done all that I could. How does one get out of this rut of self-doubt?

    A friend pointed out that the questions I was asking myself, such as “Did I do enough?” in spite of its negative tone, revealed a strong commitment to my relationship. When we were together I was doing my best out of fear of not doing enough. My doubts about this now were the exact same caring, positive characteristics that I was proud of when we were together. I had nothing to be ashamed of.

    So my fourth train of thought: Is she evil?

    It’s a perfectly rational conclusion to come to. Logic would say that if the blame isn’t on me then it must be on her. At first it feels great to say that she’s evil. Misery transformed into anger works, for a little while. But it isn’t productive, nor is it healthy. And I had to come to the hard conclusion that no, she wasn’t evil. In fact, when I last met her, she was downright miserable.

    I asked her, “Why aren’t you happy? You got everything you wanted. You got the guy you wanted, you got rid of the guy you didn’t want. You still have your family and your friends. I just get to live alone in the home we decorated together, with all of our memories.”

    Okay, so I was slightly bitter when I said those things, but one look at my former partner revealed that in spite of everything, she wasn’t happy. Nor was she prepared or willing to make amends. She just shook her head sadly and said that she still felt empty. And that’s when I realised that she was very lost too.

    Her cheating on me was not a reflection on me as a person not good enough for her. It was a reflection on her insecurities.

    She was trying to fill a void in her life, and she was making the classic mistake of looking for the answers in other people, but being unsatisfied because the problem was in her. I was just unfortunate to fall into her destructive path, a path that was just as destructive to herself long term as it would be for her short-term partners.

    Maybe she’ll continue this cycle. Maybe her current boyfriend is the one that will snap her out of it. But in that moment I just felt sorry for her.

    I told her goodbye when she confessed that even though I dumped her, she was planning on leaving me for this guy anyway. I may feel sympathy, but I don’t think a sympathetic side should mean that I’ll let her insult me.

    I still know my worth. Many would say that letting her back after the first time was me being a doormat, but I wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt. I never lost sight of my own worth.

    I think it’s worth pointing out that even though I’m lessening the pain with these lessons, it’s also important to still let myself feel things. Sometimes I’ll be so sure of myself, and then walk past the place where we first met, or something will remind me of her, often something odd and obscure, and tears will form in my eyes. And that’s okay. It’s not the end of the world. The trick is to let myself feel it without letting it hinder my own productivity.

    An important lesson is that it’s okay to be sad.

    It’s hard to display emotions when people throw out phrases like “Man up” and “Get over it.” Phrases like that invalidate emotions that are perfectly valid. Why should I hide my emotions? Something bad happened to me, I sometimes feel sad as a result, and that is 100% okay.

    A friend told me recently, don’t bury it alive. Deconstruct your relationship, through communication and letting your emotions breathe. Give the relationship a metaphorical autopsy. Do not bury it alive, or it will come back to bite.

    The things I tell myself have aided the healing process. They won’t erase the sadness completely, but nor should they. Our emotions are good for us.

    On a final note, one of my areas of concern is my trust issues. I have yet to encounter them because I haven’t yet attempted to get close to someone else, but I know that they’re waiting to pounce on me.

    After what I endured, it would be crazy to assume otherwise. But does this mean I’ll be avoiding relationships altogether? No, it doesn’t. I’m re-writing my train of thought, and as far as I’m concerned, my trust issues are just another part of the screening process. I know what to look out for. I know my worth. I will not be hurt like this again.

  • 20 Reminders That May Comfort You When You Feel Anxious

    20 Reminders That May Comfort You When You Feel Anxious

    Your heart races. Your body temperature rises. Your hands may shake. Your stomach may churn.

    Your thoughts start spiraling to the worst could that happen, and suddenly you feel so unequipped—like everything’s going to fall apart, and you won’t be able to handle it.

    It can feel so powerless when anxiety takes over, almost like your brain and body are being hijacked, and there’s little you can do to feel safe or in control.

    Except that’s not actually true. Though anxiety can have both physical and mental symptoms, and we can’t just will it away, there are things we can do to calm ourselves.

    I know because, like most of us, I’ve been there many times before, and I’ve coped both poorly and well.

    I’ve panicked about panicking, believed every anxious thought, judged myself as weak, and tried to numb my feelings with alcohol—these are things I’ve done more often than I care to admit.

    I’ve also breathed deeply, observed my thoughts, treated myself with compassion, and chosen to embrace my feelings—more and more often as I’ve gotten older.

    Since I know we have a lot more power than we think when it comes to managing anxiety, I recently asked this question on the Tiny Buddha Facebook page:

    What’s one thing you try to remember when you feel anxious?

    More than 1,000 people responded, which I appreciated both because their thoughts were comforting and also because this reminded me just how common anxiety is. It’s natural. It’s human. But we don’t have to let it control us.

    Next time you’re feeling anxious, remember what these Tiny Buddha community members shared:

    1. This will pass, and more quickly if you don’t resist it.

    It’s a wave I must let hit me and ride until it passes. Fighting it prolongs it and turns it into a riptide. ~Lori Craven

    If you just let the current carry you to where it will for a little while, the river will eventually spit you out. Just go with it and it’s going to be okay. ~Renee Breuer

    2. You can and will get through this—and this can make you stronger.

    I verbally acknowledge and remind my inner child that it’s okay, and “Adult Doug” will take care of it. That’s where the anxiety arises from. I know as an adult that my success rate of surviving any crises I’ve faced is 100%. My little inner “Doug” gets scared and feels anxious, afraid, and insecure, so I just tell him that I have it in control. ~Doug Marcum

    I can handle whatever happens. I always have, one way or another. If things don’t work out the way I expect then that’s okay too. The anxiety will pass and I will be stronger afterward. ~Suzy Wedley

    3. You are safe.

    I breathe and repeat to myself: “I’m safe. I’m okay. I can take care of myself. I am powerful. I am significant.” Repeating it helps me refocus. ~Ida Zakin

    The situation isn’t life or death. I’ll live to see another day despite the outcome. ~Claire Denney

    My mantra: “It’s just adrenaline. It can’t hurt you. It will pass.” ~Chuck Striler

    4. Your body is trying to protect you.

    I’m not a dying zebra! I watched something that said stress is a natural part of our fight or flight response, which is helpful if you’re on the savanna running from a hungry lion. ~Jenn Miles

    Anxiety is my body’s way of trying to protect me. My body has good intentions. It’s just a little misguided. I’m grateful for my body’s protection. ~Jenny Britt

    5. The past and future cannot hurt you in the present.

    I try to think about what is causing me anxiety, and it is typically a thought or thoughts about the past or future. I remind myself that I am okay in this moment, and all we ever have is this moment. It helps me. ~Angela Regan-Storvick

    6. Thoughts can only hurt you if you give them power.

    Since mine stems from thoughts that then spiral, I remind myself that thoughts are just that. They do not have to have meaning attached to them if I do not let them. Let them come in and out and give them no power, no meaning. Do not fuel them but let them come and go. They do not have to be reality, and most times they are not a reflection of reality or my true self, just plain old thoughts, and I do not have to react to every single one. ~April Rutledge

    7. Worrying will not change the outcome.

    I remind myself that my worrying will not change the outcome—never has and never will. Then I focus on what I’m grateful for, things that are beautiful and wonderful in my life right now. And lastly I repeat this: “I let go and I trust that I am being taken care of.” ~Joie Kreze

    8. What’s worrying you is temporary.

    I try to remind myself that whatever is causing my anxiety is temporary and if I’m patient, it will be resolved. ~Jess Swanson

    I try very hard to remember that for most situations, they will pass whether I get all stressed out or not. ~Karen Jane Lehman

    9. You have everything you need.

    I try to remind myself that I have what I need: air, water, food, clothing, shelter. Then I remind myself to keep things in perspective and that I can choose how I am. ~Lorna Lewis

    10. You’re stronger than you think.

    I get anxiety over little things and I have to remind myself of how much I have overcome. If I can get through two brain surgeries, four different types of radiation treatment, Thyroidectomy for Thyroid Cancer, and a left neck dissection, I can get through the little stuff. Sometimes you just have to push through the discomfort of the situation and see it will be fine. ~Sara Ruggiero

    11. There’s a lot going right.

    I concentrate on what positive is going on right now this minute. I am safe, I am not hungry, I have a good job, a husband that loves me, my family is safe and healthy. I keep going until I feel the tension fading. Then slowly but surely I can clear my head enough to take on what lies ahead of me. ~Birgit Gerwig

    Things could be worse. I have my health. I try to count my blessings. ~Colleen Tayler

    12. You are loved and supported.

    I think of all the people who love me. I picture their faces and I imagine myself surrounded by a bubble of love, and as I’m breathing deeply I’m breathing that love in and out. ~Conni Wrightsman

    13. Things often aren’t as bad as they seem.

    Four by four, how will I feel about this? Will it still seem huge and overwhelming looking back in four days, four weeks, four months, four years? It helps me to put things in perspective . ~Jacqui Learmonth

    I ask myself, “Am I, or is someone I love in danger right now, in this moment?” 99.9% of the time, the answer is no, so I do some breathing and relaxation exercises to calm my mind and deal with the situation from a healthier perspective. ~Celeste Rothstein

    I ask myself: What are the most important things in my life, and then focus on that. What I am stressing about usually isn’t one of the important things. ~Nicole Neubauer

    14. You can calm yourself by focusing on your breath.

    Give your brain a simple task. Sit and breathe. Stare at a wall. Put yourself in time out and inhale slowly. You are not wasting your time. Thoughts will float into your mind. Let them keep floating. Re-align your spine as you sit. And breathe. Take ten minutes if you can. If you can’t, even a minute is better than nothing. ~Dabe Charon

    Inhale for four counts, hold for seven counts, exhale for eight counts. ~Lisa Martinez 

    Breathe. If that doesn’t work I run. It forces me to regulate my breathing. This will calm my body down forcing my mind to calm down as well. ~Carolyn Stennard

    15. Trust can sometimes be the antidote to anxiety.

    Trust and anxiety are mutually exclusive so focus on trust, whatever you can trust at the moment, and anxiety moves out. ~Alexia Bogdis

    16. It helps to focus on what you can control.

    “One step at a time.” I tend to become anxious because I worry and overthink things that I can’t control and may or may not happen in the future. So I started to think this in my head whenever I notice the feeling creeping up. To take action one step at a time on something that I can control and let the rest run its course. ~Adelia Benalius

    17. You don’t need to have everything figured out right now.

    Sometimes it’s not enough to take it day by day. Sometimes, it’s hour by hour, or even minute by minute. And if I breathe and stay calm, I can make better decisions to effect positive change with the situation with which I’m dealing. ~Susan Stephenitch

    18. Getting it out can help you let it go.

    Write it down, get it off your chest, relax, make a plan of attack. Do something instead of worrying. Don’t let it take away today’s peace. Nothing stays the same! ~Lisa Marie Wilson

    19. You deserve your own love and compassion.

    Anxiety can often come from a place of judgment of the self. Stop, breathe, and surrender to self-compassion. ~‪Christine Strauss‪

    20. You are not alone.

    Know you’re not alone. Others are struggling with something as well. We’re all in this together! ~‪Melanie Rn‪

    —

    What helps you when you feel anxious?

    **Most responses were edited for spelling and grammar, and some are part of larger comments not included in full.

    UPDATE: Tiny Buddha’s Worry Journal is now available for purchase! You can grab your copy here. 

  • 4 Simple Techniques to Erase Subconscious Negativity

    4 Simple Techniques to Erase Subconscious Negativity

    “As you sow in your subconscious mind, so shall you reap in your body and environment.” ~Joseph Murphy

    The subconscious mind is like a computer’s hard drive.

    It saves whatever information you feed it, without any bias. It does not discriminate between useful information and trash information. It just saves everything!

    The subconscious mind learns through repetition. So if it’s fed the same information multiple times, it keeps overwriting it until the information gets etched in.

    As you would have guessed, such information is harder to erase.

    For example, let’s say you write “I am not good enough” on a piece of paper. Now keep overwriting on top of this. The more you overwrite, the bolder the text becomes and the harder it gets to erase it later.

    Let’s look at another example. When you first learned to ride a bicycle, you found it hard to balance. But you kept trying and could maintain balance for five seconds and then ten seconds and so on. Finally you could maintain balance for longer periods of time. Because of the repetitions, your subconscious mind picked up what it takes to maintain balance.

    Once the subconscious mind learns, it falls back on this information whenever it is required.

    So the next time you sit on a bicycle, the subconscious mind automatically switches on the default bicycle-riding program and without any effort, you start to ride your bike.

    What is interesting is that if you learned to ride the bike in a faulty manner, you will keep riding the bike in a faulty manner.

    For example, there are people who find it difficult to drive a car while wearing shoes. They can only drive the car barefoot! This is because when they were learning to drive, they did so barefoot. How do I know? Well, I am one of them!

    For me, learning to drive a car while wearing shoes was like learning to drive the car all over again.

    So what does this tell you?

    Once the information is fed to the subconscious mind, and is repeated enough times, it simply gets etched in the mind and is hard to erase later.

    Yes, it is erasable, but erasing it would require extra effort. This is exactly the reason why bad habits are so difficult to break. And this holds true for both physical habits and mental habits.

    Physical habits equate to stuff that you do. Like your daily routines.

    Mental habits are thought cycles like your self belief, your insecurities, your view of the world etc.

    In a way, your mental habits fuel your physical habits and vise versa. It’s cyclic in nature.

    Rewriting Negative Subconscious Programs

    As mentioned earlier, your subconscious mind is like a computer’s hard drive. And just like we can erase and put new software into a hard drive, we very well can reprogram data into the subconscious mind.

    Hypnotists have been doing this for ages.

    But the technique we are going to look at is far stronger than hypnosis. Plus it is very simple to do. In fact, the technique is so simple, you might be forced to think, is that it?

    So let’s see what this simple technique is.

    The best and most effective technique to alter your negative subconscious mind patterns is awareness.

    That’s right, you simply become aware of the subconscious patterns.

    Once you become aware, the additional actions required to make the change follows automatically.

    Becoming Aware of Subconscious Mind Patterns

    Subconscious mind patterns are called subconscious for a reason. They are below (sub) your level of consciousness. In other words, you are not consciously aware of them.

    For example, I used to have the habit of shaking my leg non-stop when sitting down, also known as restless leg syndrome. It would be many minutes, sometimes even hours before I would become aware that my leg was shaking and I would stop doing it. But moments later when my attention shifted to something else, my leg would start shaking again.

    What helped me eliminate this issue was to develop body awareness. I started to become more and more aware of what my body was doing at any given point. So whenever my leg would start shaking, I would become aware of it within a few seconds as opposed to many minutes like before.

    Over a period of time, the shaking stopped. I still do it occasionally but it is very rare. And each time I can catch myself quickly and stop doing it.

    Body awareness not only helped me tackle this issue, it also helped me become aware of tense body parts so I could relax them more often.

    For instance, I noticed that whenever I worked on my computer, the muscles around the base of my skull (known as the suboccipital muscles) would tense up badly. This would cause fatigue, headaches, and back pains. Body awareness helped me sense this and consciously relax my muscles whenever that happened.

    This is just one very small example of how you can overcome a subconscious habit by becoming aware of it.

    This habit is easy to catch as it is happening on a physical level. But there are many mental habits that happen on a mind level. You cannot see them; they just happen.

    For example, just like me, you might have the habit of judging others. The strange thing is that the judging happens automatically. The problem with this habit is that you not only judge others, you judge yourself too. It always works both ways. Also, what you perceive of the other can be massively different from reality because you perceive from your own belief system.

    The way to become free from this habit is, again, to become aware of your thinking patterns.

    As you become more and more aware of your thinking patterns you will be able to catch your mind judging others. As you catch yourself judging, you do not blame yourself or force yourself to stop; you simply become aware of it—“Ah, here I go, I am judging again!”

    As you continue to do this, slowly but surely, your judgments of other people will start to reduce.

    Developing a Deeper Awareness

    Awareness is a habit and the more you practice it, the more it becomes second nature. I find the following four techniques to be extremely useful in developing awareness of your physical and mental processes:

    1. Consciously watching your thoughts

    In our day-to-day life, we are lost in our thoughts for the most part. The goal is to detach from your thoughts for a few moments and watch them as a neutral observer.

    This practice can help you become aware of negative thought patterns. You will find yourself questioning your beliefs and thereby weakening negative beliefs and consciously replacing them with positive ones.

    Here’s what you can do:

    Sit comfortably, take a few deep breaths, and calm yourself down. Start to become aware of your mind producing thoughts without engaging with them. If you find yourself getting engaged with the thought, take a moment to acknowledge that and return back to watching.

    If certain thoughts produce strong emotions in you, feel the emotions instead of trying to suppress the thoughts. Divert your attention within your body and feel the energy behind these thoughts.

    As you watch your thoughts, you will become aware of many negative thought patterns running in you. Simply becoming aware of these patterns is enough for them to start disintegrating.

    2. Consciously feeling your emotions

    Becoming aware of your emotions helps you understand the thought-emotion connection—in other words, what kind of thoughts produce what kind of emotional responses in your body.

    This can help you weaken and release the hold of strong negative emotions.

    What I find works best is to consciously recreate emotional responses when you are by yourself.

    Let’s say certain situations cause strong anxiety in you.

    For example, there were times when simple things like walking into a crowded restaurant made me feel anxious. There was this feeling that everyone is looking at me and judging me negatively, and that thought gave rise to a set of emotions that clouded my thinking and made me feel extremely anxious and unwelcomed.

    When you are in such a situation, it is hard for the untrained mind to do anything. But there is a workaround. You can use this situation to train your mind when you get back home.

    When you are back home, you can sit down in a calm place and recreate that exact scenario by running it in your mind. Doing so will evoke pretty much similar emotions. This time though, instead of being lost in your thoughts and overcome by the emotions, you have a choice to consciously feel your emotions. Feel them fully as they arise without becoming afraid of them. As you feel your emotions this way, they start to lose their power over you.

    What you are doing here is becoming aware of thought patterns and the reactions they create in your body. This awareness slowly starts to dissolve existing thought patterns and their corresponding emotional responses.

    Next time you visit the same restaurant, you will be aware when certain thoughts start getting generated and your body’s emotional response. But because you have already felt your emotions consciously and because you are aware of your thought patterns, you will find that they have significantly weaker reactions. Continue this and soon the reactions would die down completely.

    3. Consciously feeling your body

    Becoming aware of your body can help you learn how to relax your body and thereby aid healing.

    For example, you might have body parts that tense up when you are engaged in work or some activity. For me, as I mentioned before, it was the back of my head and the suboccipital muscles (muscles near the base of the skull) that tensed up when I was engaged in work.

    This would lead to extreme headaches and back pain and would cloud my thinking, leading to frustration. It was only after I started becoming aware of my body that I could feel these muscles all tensed up and relax them consciously. I had to relax them consciously many times over while working and after a few months they automatically started to stay relaxed.

    A simple technique you can use to become aware of your body is to feel your body from within during a meditation practice. Simply feel the inside of your body starting from the soles of your feet to the tip of your skull. As you scan your body this way, find and relax various tension points along the way. If you find certain parts aching, spend some more time there and relax these parts.

    Relaxing your body is key to healing. The more relaxed your body feels the more rejuvenated you will feel. This exercise is best done before going to sleep, so you feel fresh and rejuvenated when waking up. In-fact, you can do this lying down in bed.

    Getting in touch with your body can also help you better feel and release your emotions.

    4. Consciously focusing your attention

    In any given point of time, our attention is divided between a myriad of things. Most of us don’t have any control over our attention. It just wanders like a wild beast anywhere it wants to go.

    This method will help you gain control over your attention. The more control you have, the better you will be able to practice the above-mentioned methods.

    For instance, you can feel your emotions for longer periods of time without getting pulled into thinking. Similarly, you can watch your thoughts longer without getting lost in the thoughts often. You can also stay mindful for longer periods of time.

    There was a time I found it extremely difficult even to read a few paragraphs of an article. Within just the first few lines, my attention would drift away into my thoughts. I would be reading, but not understanding anything. I would then have to re-read the lines again. This is what happens when you don’t have mastery over your attention.

    And the most effective way I found to gain mastery is focused meditation. All it involves is to divert your attention to your breath and keep it there for as long as possible. If your attention wanders, bring it back again. As you keep doing this practice, you will start to gain control over your attention and your ability to focus.

    —

    These four methods are the gateway to deeper awareness. They can be practiced together or separately, depending on what you find beneficial at the moment. I believe these techniques can help anyone become free from low self-worth, limiting beliefs, anxiety, depression, and all other types of issues related to the mind.

  • 7 Things You Need to Know to Live Your Best Life and Make a Better World

    7 Things You Need to Know to Live Your Best Life and Make a Better World

    You know those “moments of truths”?

    When what you hear, or come to realize, turns your world around. When one or several things turn out to be exactly what you needed to hear at the exact right time. Ba-boom.

    For the past couple of years, I’ve had several ah-ha moments that have made my life better. Here are seven of those realizations. Some were harsh to come to terms with (like #1), while others brought me the greatest relief and hallelujah moment (like #7).

    Read them, ponder them, and let them move in with you. See if they can alter your life and perhaps amp up your awesomeness even more.

    1. You’re 100% responsible for your life.

    First time I heard this I got a tiny bit uncomfortable, to say the least. Did that mean I had to take responsibility for everything? Even areas in my life where I had felt mistreated, misunderstood, and clearly had my reasons as to why things weren’t ideal? Like my financial situation and why I wasn’t working with something I love.

    At first, I didn’t like the idea of taking full responsibility for everything. But, then it hit me: If I want to own the solution, I have to first own the problem. This doesn’t mean that what someone else did to us was okay; it just means that we accept what happened (because, let’s face it, it did happen) and then take responsibility for how we let it affect our life onward.

    We can’t change a situation in our life that we don’t take full responsibility for, because that means that the power sits with someone or something else. Excuses, blames, and reasons might cushy-comfort us for a while, but it won’t change the game.

    Try this: Look at one area of your life that you’re not fully satisfied with. Then, choose to take 100% responsibility for it, no matter what has happened or how things are now. (If you find it difficult to start, just imagine that you do it for two minutes).

    Taking responsibility means taking your power back to where it belongs: to you.

    2. The thing that annoys you about others is a reflection of you.

    What really pisses you off about others? What frustrates you and makes you go through the roof? Yeah, that’s all a mirror of you.

    Realizing this for me gave me so many ah-ha moments (after I passed my denial phase). For example, I was frustrated with one person who always interrupted me and others. Why wasn’t she capable of listening? Why did she always have to interrupt people half way through?

    As you might have guessed, this was also something I did. (Now I’m aware, so hopefully I don’t do it as much anymore.) Realizing this was powerful. Not only could I reveal sides of myself I wanted to work on, it also allowed me to practice compassion instead of judgment with others’ behavior. Win-win!

    Look at things that annoy you about others and then turn the focus toward yourself. What’s the message here? How can you grow and develop from it?

    3. What you admire about others is a quality you long to express.

    Here’s a simple exercise that can reveal some pretty cool things about yourself. Who do you admire? What qualities in them do you look up to?

    What you admire in others—or perhaps secretly envy—is also a mirror. It shows what qualities or desires that longs to be expressed in you.

    If you admire Oprah’s way of connecting with people, know that you also have that ability. If you admire Richard Branson’s bravery and positive outlook on life, know that these also exist within you.

    I always get really inspired when I see someone talking in front of other people, while looking really relaxed. So, I figured that this was a side of myself that wanted to play out more.

    Since then, a friend and I started organizing workshops in Stockholm so we could practice speaking in front of others. Now, those events are a place to meet and connect with others who also wants to grow, learn, and create their ideal life.

    Think about someone you look up to and become specific in terms of what you love about them. Then see if you’re currently expressing this quality. If not, what can you do to start expressing it more? Take small steps forward to play with those qualities.

    4. You can’t drive out darkness with darkness.

    In today’s world we’re constantly exposed to attacks, shootings, and other tragedies. It’s everywhere—in the newspaper, on TV, and social media. We can’t ignore it, but what we can do it decide how to deal with it.

    Either we can react to these situations with the first impulse that comes up, or choose to consciously respond to them. Those are our two options. But, here’s the thing: We cannot react to frustrating, fearful, or stressful situations with frustration, fear, and stress and expect a positive outcome.

    If we’ve learned one thing throughout history, it’s this: War feeds more war. Anger triggers more anger. Fear leads to more fear. We cannot drive out darkness with darkness—only light can do that.

    This applies to all situations, big and small. So, next time someone cuts you in traffic or arrives late, try to step into their shoes. Maybe they were in a hurry. Maybe their partner had just broken up with them. Maybe they’re having a really crappy day.

    Or next time you hear about a terrorist attack, send love to those affected, and love in action by helping in whatever small way you can. After you’ve processed what happened, try to even send healing energy to the person who did it. Who knows what this person has gone through, or what their mental state is like? Who knows his pain, threats, and beliefs about this world?

    Hate, anger, and resentment only create separation between us and others. They don’t lead to a better world; they lead to more pain, for all of us.

    What we all need right now isn’t greater separation; it’s greater connection. So focus on giving light where there’s darkness. Put love where you can’t find it.

    5. People are always doing the best they can.

    Now, you might not agree here, but stay with me. What if everyone, including the most greedy, hurtful, and ill-tempered people on this planet, are doing their best at all times? That is, based on their experience, mood, and beliefs.

    If this statement is true or not, we’ll never know. But, acting like it is will save you time, energy, and frustration. Maybe the slow waitress has severe sleeping problems. Maybe the guy who’s not meeting his deadline has family issues. Maybe the criminal had parents with drug problems and the only way he got attention was by breaking rules and causing pain.

    We never know what someone else is going through. We never know their thoughts, experiences, or what caused them to do something. All we can know is that if we were in their shoes, we might do the same.

    Replace judgment with curiosity. Use your empathy and try to imagine life as the other person. Just for a while, be them, act like them, and think like them. Things tend to look completely different from another perspective.

    6. You have to accept what you don’t like about your life to move forward.

    Some things are hard to accept. Maybe it’s a situation, a limiting belief, or your own or someone else’s behavior.

    For a long time I tried to ignore the fact that I didn’t like my job. I tried to numb my feelings by focusing on party weekends, alcohol, and friends. But, I was never able to create change by pushing away what I didn’t want. It just gave more power to the unwanted. Eventually, I had no other option but to accept what I felt. To realize that it was okay not to feel satisfied where I was.

    Once I had accepted what was, I was able to change it. Then I could paint out an ideal situation and take small steps forward in that direction.

    Work with what is—see things exactly as they are and then act.

    7. You matter immensely.

    You do. And knowing it to be true will make you a better person. You matter to those around you, to the society you live in, and to this world.

    Not one person has the same set of interests, skills, and experience as you. Your talents, curiosities, and qualities aren’t random—I believe they were given to you for a reason.

    Put them to use. Let the world see what you’re capable of. Let others take part of your gifts and caring. When you thrive, you give permission for others to do the same. Playing small or staying stuck in worries or fears serves no one.

    Act, speak, and believe that you matter immensely—because you do.

  • Why Failed Relationships Aren’t Actually Failures: 5 Lessons on Love That Doesn’t Last

    Why Failed Relationships Aren’t Actually Failures: 5 Lessons on Love That Doesn’t Last

    “Tis better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all.” ~Lord Alfred Tennyson

    I’ve always loved relationships—the euphoria of early romance, the comfort of built intimacy, and the experience of adventuring through life with someone else. While there are some pretty snazzy parts of being single, I was a sucker for love from a young age.

    Now, I also didn’t meet my fiancé until I was thirty—which means I’ve seen my share of the romantic downside as well. With the highs of love come the lows of romantic breakdown: heartache, loss, and the grief of things not working out. Regardless of how they happen, breakups aren’t easy, and it’s common to think of a relationship’s ending as a failure.

    But is it?

    The dictionary defines failure as “the nonperformance of success or expectation.” If the point of a relationship is to be together until death do us part (or until we ride off into the sunset and the credits roll) then yes, a breakup is not exactly a success.

    But what if that’s not the point? Maybe we can still strive for a love that lasts while reframing our ideas of the loves that didn’t.

    The following is a compilation of lessons I’ve learned from my own “failed” relationships, a mixtape of why “failed” love isn’t actually a failure at all.

    While our definition of that word may vary, I encourage you to read on with an open mind. There just might be more success in your own past than you previously thought.

    1. Relationships teach us about ourselves.

    Whenever one of my previous relationships was coming to an end, it usually began with the finding of incompatibilities—disagreements as small as where to eat or as large as whether or not to have kids.

    The inconsistencies in beliefs often showed me more about myself than they did the other person. I had to date an atheist to find out how much I really wanted to believe in God. I had to date someone who liked to stay home to realize how much I liked being social. While finding these incompatibilities was anything but fun, in retrospect I see they were a map to finding myself.

    2. Relationships show us where we can grow.

    There’s a saying that I’ve always liked: “Relationships pour miracle grow on our character defects.” When I was in a relationship that pushed my buttons, I realized which buttons were there to be pushed: things about myself I wouldn’t have noticed until another person made them glaringly apparent.

    For example, dating someone with a lot of female friends showed me that I was pretty insecure; while at first his social circle seemed to be the problem (how dare he hang out with other women, right?), over time I realized that it was my own self-esteem that needed attention. Although this “button pusher” relationship didn’t stick, it showed me where my work was.

    Through examining my buttons (rather than the button pusher), I was better equipped to do the self-work that would allow me to show up more fully for every future relationship, romantic or not.

    3. Relationships allow us to practice vulnerability.

    It’s pretty scary to open our hearts up to another person. After all, none of us really know what the future holds, right? Those of us who have experienced our fair share of heartache have even more reason to be cautious: We know what it’s like to lay our hearts out on the line and give someone the option of smashing them to smithereens. (While it’s helpful to avoid this heart-smashing type of relationship, it happens to the best of us, and the possibility is always there.)

    Yet, being vulnerable in the face of potential loss is truly the bread and butter of life. Sure, we could play our cards close to our vest and lessen the likelihood of possible harm—but in turn, we also lessen the likelihood of truly being known.

    Regardless of how a relationship has ended, when I’ve allowed myself to fully open my heart to another person, I am reminded that it was not a waste at all; it was a brick in the road of living my fullest life.

    4. No love is ever wasted.

    When in the throes of a relationship, we often have our heart set on not just our partner but on our future with that partner. This is often the hardest thing about a relationship ending: you don’t just lose what you’ve shared, but the imagined future that you’d included the other in.

    When that future vanishes, it’s common to look back on the shared past with regret. But what if expressing love, kindness, and shared intimacy is an end in and of itself?

    As humans, we love to keep our eyes on the outcome and the finish line but forget that it’s the journey to that mountaintop that shapes us. As the quote above reads, “Tis better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all.”

    Whether the act of love is in the present or the past, it existed all the same—and if we allow it to do so, it can remind us of the most beautiful side of the human condition.

    5. Our past loves played an important role in our lives.

    Each person that journeys beside us on the road of life not only shapes who we will become but also how we feel as we get there.

    My first love and I moved across the state to pursue our individual dreams. While our relationship didn’t last, we were a safe haven for the other in an unfamiliar and daunting time.

    On the flip side, those unhealthy relationships that, on the surface, appear all wrong can help us more wisely choose a partner in the future.

    While it would be great to learn lessons from other people’s experiences, most of us have to find out what we want by trial and error—from dating a few (or a bunch) of the wrong people before we can identify the right one. Even the most painful relationships in my past helped me learn who I wanted to be with (as well as who I wanted to be) in the future.

    —

    Some endings are inevitable. Being able to see the positives in our past doesn’t mean those relationships have any business in our present. It does, however, mean that instead of looking at what we lost when something ended, we can remember what we gained as well: perspective, strength, and experience.

    If failure is the nonperformance of success, then let’s demand to expect only growth from ourselves and define success as the amount of love that we gave. Because love is never lost…

    It simply changes shape.

  • How to Connect with Yourself in a World Designed to Distract You

    How to Connect with Yourself in a World Designed to Distract You

    “The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled.” ~Plutarch

    We live in an age of information overload. Our televisions and the Internet are flooding our senses with a myriad of things.

    Researchers carefully craft all the advertisements we watch and all the magazines we read to prime us to think certain thoughts and take certain actions. A particular color, a special tone in the voice, a slight gesture with the eyes—all are designed to do one thing and one thing alone: influence our minds.

    They affect us just enough that the subsequent thoughts we may have seem like our own, and the decisions we make based on those thoughts seem rational.

    On a daily basis, we are ‘primed’ to spend our time or money on something we may not need. A thought is planted in us so carefully that suppressing it feels like denying our most basic instincts. And why not? It stirs our primal desires of power, sex, and influence. The results are obvious, and all around us.

    We are always looking forward to the next gadget to purchase, the next movie to watch, or the next television series to binge on. We are consuming information and material possessions at a startling rate, and we don’t seem to mind. We feel that when it comes to entertainment and information, there is no such thing as too much.

    We also engage in the use of social media as a means of connecting with people. We want to share everything from pictures of our family to the latest meals we cooked.

    Sending out that daily status update makes us feel a certain kind of security about who we are. We know we are living a good life when someone confirms it with a “like” on the Internet. It’s a form of social validation that encourages sharing, often at the expense of true feeling.

    This constant outward search for approval is often the reason why we don’t look for an internal source of approval. We get used to asking others about who we are and become unable to see the reality for ourselves. If they tell us we are doing the right thing, then we must be; otherwise, we are not that sure.

    The result of this trend is we have no time left to reflect or ponder. If, on occasion, we do look inward, we feel a sense of emptiness and fear. Not knowing what to do with it, we try to fill that emptiness with some external source of gratification.

    That emptiness is important. It is telling us that we are disconnected from who we are. This disconnect is one of the main reasons why we end up in painful life situations.

    A few years ago, I was about to graduate from a US university. The job market was tough, and I needed all the help I could get to find decent work. At the time, a professional contact who I greatly admired became my mentor. He seemed to know it all, and I always looked forward to his advice.

    He believed that a person in my field would not find a job easily out of college, especially because I was an international student and would require a work permit.

    He thought that in order to survive, I needed to get certified as a programmer in a particular high-end software. Although it would be tough to get, the effort would be well worth it. And if I still couldn’t find a job, he would get me in touch with the right people himself. And so, it was decided.

    Over the next six months, I spent thousands of dollars on books, coaching, and commuting in order to get certified in a computer language that I struggled to develop any liking for. I was jobless for six months and couldn’t even afford to pay my rent. I lived with friends who were kind enough to let me sleep on their couch and study for twelve-plus hours every day.

    The day after the exam, I had to go to the ER for severe dehydration. It turned out that I had lost close to twenty pounds over the previous few weeks and weighed only 125 pounds. Obviously, I could not afford health insurance at that time and got hospital bills that took me two years to pay off in installments.

    When my mentor found out how terribly I had performed in the exam, he told me my chances weren’t looking good and he wouldn’t be able to do anything for me. I never heard from him again. After a month, I got the result that I did manage to barely clear the passing mark, but it was too late. I had already accepted a job that would let me pay the bills.

    Over the next few years my self-esteem continued to erode. It ended with me leaving the country and heading back to India after four years of struggle in the United States.

    Looking back at why I placed my trust in someone so blindly and continued to face self-esteem issues, I realized that I was totally disconnected from who I was as an individual.

    I knew that I did not like computer languages to begin with, but while making that fateful decision, I ignored all the self-knowledge I had until that point. I put more trust in someone else’s belief about who I was, just because I needed their approval.

    I suffered, not because someone gave me bad advice, but because I was unable to reject it. I kept ignoring my instincts because I thought they didn’t matter.

    A good sign of having lost connection with yourself is that your true instincts feel like distractions, and distractions feel like true instincts.

    When we are distracted, we feel bored, confused, and unmotivated. We become inclined to pick the easiest path from those available.

    The post-Internet world is designed to distract us, disconnect us from ourselves, and keep us that way. It gives us one novelty after another, just like giving a child one toy after another to keep her occupied. Otherwise, she might cry. But sometimes, a child needs to cry.

    We are afraid of crying, of getting hurt, of looking at ourselves as we are. So we prefer to be distracted and entertained, no matter what the cost.

    Is there a way to rediscover that connection with ourselves? To feel centered and confident about who we are; to understand our emotions, feelings, and desires clearly; to know our strengths and acknowledge our limitations?

    Can we know ourselves from moment to moment, every day, not with words or descriptions, but with an actual perception of our inner selves being intact, self-sufficient, and free from outside influence?

    I think there is a way. This three-step process has greatly helped me reconnect with myself. I hope it helps you too.

    1. See what you see.

    Take a moment to notice what you are seeing at the moment. Is it your phone or a computer on which you are reading this, and your surroundings? Or, are you also seeing, at some level, mental images?

    Most of the time, we are unconsciously seeing things, such as what happened at work today, or what our friend said to us, or some scenes from a favorite TV show. At other times, we are often seeing things that we want to happen, or fear might happen.

    The physical eye shows us one reality, which is often mundane, but the mind’s eye shows us a reality that can be quite interesting.

    We unconsciously or consciously visualize things that either give us pleasure or fear. We imagine negative outcomes and think of ways to protect ourselves in case they happen, or we imagine positive outcomes like enjoying an upcoming vacation. Yet, both outcomes exist only in the mind. The present reality contains no such thing.

    Visualization is a double-edged sword.

    As kids we are encouraged to imagine more and more in order to be creative. But creativity isn’t just visualization, is it? It is also about seeing the same reality as others, but differently. The key is being able to visualize when we need to and not when we don’t. Otherwise, our imagination becomes hyperactive and results in a constant stream of images in front of our eyes. As if we were dreaming while awake.

    If we can stop our visualization at will and only see what our physical eyes are showing us, then our mind becomes simplified. It relaxes and naturally draws our attention inwards, to our bodies. Our attention moves from things that exist in the mind to the things that exist in physical reality.

    Quick exercise: Look around the place you are currently sitting in. See all the things in your room, no matter how insignificant. Look at every shape, every color, every corner. Take time to notice it. Look at your own hands and examine them closely.

    Reality is full of physical sensations, not imagination.

    This brings us to the second step in the process.

    2. Feel what you feel.

    If someone were to ask me, “Can you describe exactly all the emotions you are having at the moment?” I would find it difficult to answer.

    We often experience multiple emotions at the same time. Sometimes we are angry but also sad because of our life situation. Sometimes we are at peace with the world but also feel a longing for something better. Sometimes we are full of gratitude, but not without a hint of pride. Our body responds to the emotions we are having through physical sensations.

    When our palms sweat, we know we are nervous, and when our heart races, we know we are excited or afraid. When we are worried, our breathing becomes shallow and our muscles and nerves tense up. When we are happy, we breathe easy, and our body relaxes. The reason is, our mind is telling the body what to feel, based on what the mind is thinking.

    We are so used to living this way that we pay no attention to what the body is feeling without this input from the mind. As a habit, our body obeys our mind, not the other way around.

    For example, what are you feeling in the little toe of your left foot?

    Can you distinguish the sensation in each one of your toes? It’s not that easy, because our mind has never paid attention to it before.

    Quick exercise: Close your eyes and try to discern the shape of your hand by feeling the electrical impulses on the skin and the gentle blood flow in the veins. If you are able to discern only the index finger or just the thumb, then become more sensitive to what you are feeling until you can feel your entire hand. Within two to five minutes you will feel your heartbeat and its rhythm pulsating through your hands. It has always been there.

    Repeating this exercise with our entire body can help us develop a full-body awareness. In my experience, this is a very powerful way of connecting with ourselves.

    The only thing you have to watch out for is what you think about those sensations. For instance, if you find a source of pain, you might hear your own voice say, “Here is that bothersome pain again. What do I do with it?”

    If you hear negative self-talk such as this, it is okay. Listen to it calmly.

    This self-talk points us to the next stage of connecting with ourselves, which is listening.

    3. Hear what you hear.

    Whose voice do we hear when we talk to ourselves? It’s our own voice, or at least how we want ourselves to sound, right? The person who speaks inside our mind is the “I,” and the person who listens is “myself.”

    Boy, do they love to talk!

    The “I” is always telling “myself” things to do, and things to avoid. Even if we go on a solitary hike on a mountain to spend some time in nature, we can still hear the “I” talking.

    But why are there two of us? Commonsense dictates that there should only be one, right?

    Of course there is only one individual, and we can all experience it this way.

    Quick exercise: Close your eyes, and pay close attention to whatever sounds there may be around you. For thirty seconds, listen to every detail you can hear. Then open your eyes.

    While you were listening, was there an “I” talking to a “myself”? Or was there only the experience of listening?

    When you were having that experience, there was no division between “I” and “myself.” They were one! That state of pure listening, feeling, or hearing is the state of connection.

    When we are fully connected, we become whole.

    What happens when we find the connection?

    When we are connected, it is possible to know our pleasures, desires, fears, ambitions, and anxieties for what they actually are. We perceive them with clarity and without any internal conflict.

    For example, if fear arises, we notice a few things about it.

    1. We realize that there is nothing dangerous actually taking place, except in our minds.

    2. That our heart rate changes, and muscles tense up as the fearful thought arises.

    3. That the “I” is talking to us and telling us to be afraid.

    Knowing these things, we are already one step ahead of fear. The next time it arises, we can predict its pattern. Without worrying or overthinking, now we can solve the real problem at hand, if one exists at all!

    When we are connected, our instincts also become stronger, and we understand what is right and wrong for us. We can make big decisions easily and have no regrets later.

    Four years ago, I had a persistent feeling that I should adopt a dog. Despite having no experience raising a puppy, my instincts kept telling me I needed to do it. My parents and a few of my friends advised against it. They said, “You don’t know what you’re doing. You will end up returning the poor animal the very next day.”

    This time, I listened to myself. I went through the learning curve that comes with taking care of a furry friend but never regretted my decision. Today, our life is unthinkable without our dog, and I am a much better person because of him.

    A strong connection is sometimes all we need, and in some cases, all we have, to keep us sane in this evolving world.

  • If You Always Date People Who Aren’t Good for You, Read On

    If You Always Date People Who Aren’t Good for You, Read On

    “I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions.” ~Stephen Covey

    Just a few short years ago, I sat across the table from a lovely man on a first date. It had taken a couple months to get there due to our busy schedules, but it seemed to be worth it. He was easy to talk to and seemed like a great guy.

    During the course of the evening, we discussed what we were looking for and he told me that he was still married, but his divorce would be final in a few days. While I was disappointed to hear this, I rationalized it. I told myself that at least he was honest about it, and besides, he was almost divorced.

    The divorce took place just as he said, and I decided to continue seeing him. What followed was a yearlong very painful, but sometimes fun relationship.

    It was on again, off again, and never quite came together. He would decide that he really cared for me and tell me so with tearful declarations, then back away. The last time he ended it was via text message.

    Unfortunately, I hear similar stories all the time. The common theme is: two people meet and feel instant attraction but hear alarm bells or see red flags. They decide to continue to date anyway because the feelings are there.

    There’s a whirlwind romance for a few weeks or months after which things end painfully. Then he or she is heartbroken and ready to lose faith in love.

    This breaks my heart because it’s so very avoidable. We need to remember that we have choices, even when it comes to love. When we take responsibility for our lives we give ourselves the power to create the things we want.

    We tend to think that matters of the heart are outside our realm of influence, but I disagree. If we would only take our love lives into our own hands instead of leaving things to chance and bemoaning the results, we could have the love we so long for.

    It really is up to each of us to create the best lives possible for ourselves, and we must step up. The best way to do this in your love life is to start dating smarter.

    A lot of us believe that we can’t choose who we’re attracted to, that we must go with either our hearts or our heads. We tend to think we must choose passion and accept the pain that comes with it, or settle for people who bore us but are good to us.

    I used to think this way, but what I’ve found is that it’s possible to adjust one’s preferences over time. With a bit of persistence, we can train ourselves to want what is good for us and to make better, healthier choices.

    You can make a commitment to yourself and the life you want to live. You can then make choices that are consistent with the commitments you make.

    You already do this in other areas of your life. You know that you can make healthy food choices to help you stay in shape and live a long life. You go to the gym for the same reason. You head off to work or school even when you don’t feel like it because you enjoy the benefits that come from these actions.

    You can choose to date smarter by dating only those people who are capable of having a healthy relationship with you.

    Many of us feel that we can’t stop ourselves from ending up with people who hurt us over and over again. We long to make better choices, but just can’t seem to feel anything for potential partners who would be good for us.

    Most of us live inside our comfort zones, and unfortunately, having unfulfilling romantic relationships may be part of the life you’re used to living.

    If you always end up dating people who mistreat you, abandon you, or are emotionally unavailable, consider the possibility that this may be happening because of a pattern you’ve developed.

    Once you’re able to see a pattern, you can decide whether or not it works for you and commit to changing it if necessary. You can choose to take your love life into your own hands by developing patterns and habits that will result in your ultimate happiness.

    We formed many of our patterns early in life as an attempt to have our needs met by our primary caregivers, usually our parents. This makes sense because we learn how to interact in the world from them before anyone else.

    When I uncovered my own patterns, I found that I believed that it was best to meet my own needs as much as possible. I was terrified to count on anyone else or ask for anything because of the way in which I grew up. I thought that no one would want to be with me if they were to discover that I was not perfect.

    I hid parts of myself I thought others wouldn’t like and didn’t date very often. When I did, I chose men who didn’t want to get close enough to see me. In this way, I kept myself safe, even though it meant being excruciatingly lonely for many years.

    Have you developed patterns and habits that are keeping you alone? If so, it’s never too late to trade them in for some new ones.

    Consider making new choices about who is allowed to be part of your life. Some examples include; ending relationships with anyone who is toxic to you, only spending time with people who treat you well, and dating only those who are emotionally available.

    It will take some time to get used to this new way of dating, but it is possible to teach yourself to appreciate partners who treat you well. Start by giving them a chance.

    Instead of prioritizing looks, job descriptions, and finances, how about placing more importance on emotional availability and kindness? If someone is excited about you or indicates that they are interested in a relationship, why not see where it goes instead of categorizing them as “desperate”?

    Try spending time with different types of people, especially if you tend to go for one “type” all the time. You may not feel instant chemistry, but over time you’ll become accustomed to being treated well. Once you do this for a while, you’ll wonder what you ever saw in the people you used to date.

    If all the people who are good to you aren’t your “type” then you need a new type. These things can be changed, just like habits. It may not be easy to change, but it is possible if you act consistently over time.

    This is a much better strategy than giving up on love or waiting for the person who treats you poorly or dumped you to realize what he or she lost. Spoiler alert—they won’t. They may return, but you’re likely get more of the same or worse.

    As for me, I was finally able to see that I was pushing away perfectly wonderful men because they seemed too excited about me. It wasn’t long after that last text message from Mr. On-again-off-again that I met the wonderful man who became my husband.

    I was able to welcome him into my life and let him love me, and it was fun, easy, and drama-free. There was not a single red flag to be found.

    I saw that things can happen very quickly with the right person when your hearts are both open and you know what you want. It really doesn’t have to take very long or be difficult.

    You have what it takes to have a wonderful relationship if you want one. If you will commit to the life you want to have and then take actions that are consistent with your commitment, you’ll be well on your way.

    You don’t have to be a slave to your emotions or settle for whatever life hands you. True and lasting love is almost inevitable if you will take action on your own behalf.

    Start right now by taking responsibility for your love life and dating smarter. Your future happily in love self will thank you.

  • 6 Things My Heroes Taught Me About Overcoming Hard Times

    6 Things My Heroes Taught Me About Overcoming Hard Times

    “A hero is an ordinary individual who finds the strength to persevere and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles.” ~Christopher Reeve

    It all happened so suddenly that it felt just like a flash flood. One minute the road was clear and drivable, and the next it was a raging river. Before I knew what happened, my life went from being only slightly a mess to being a complete mess, my car teetering on the edge of the water, ready to go for a swim at any minute.

    I had left a job I liked and found a job I thought I would love, but didn’t end up loving at all.

    I had hurt a good friend who was extremely important to me, and is now out of my life for the most part.

    I felt like a financial mess from constantly playing catch up and living paycheck to paycheck, and I was going to have to move out of an apartment and town I really loved.

    It’s funny how when even just one thing is going great, all the other things that aren’t going so hot are manageable. But if nothing is okay, then everything seems insurmountable and completely overwhelming.

    Faced with more doom and gloom than I could stand, I wanted to melt into my bed and never get back up. And honestly, for a few days I did.

    I didn’t want to talk to anyone about what was going on. I didn’t want to admit defeat or ask for help. Even my very best friends only knew bits and pieces of what was going on inside my head. And honestly, the one person I would have bared my soul to, the person who I always ran to with stuff like this, was no longer speaking to me.

    So now what? I realized that if I didn’t want to talk to the people who inspired me most, I could still apply what I had learned from them. They had taught me so much over the years through their advice, and their example, that through them, I found my way.

    1. You can cry for five minutes and then you have to put your big girl pants on and deal with it.

    One of my best friends, and someone whose strength I really admire, taught me that life isn’t going to wait for you to have a pity party; it’s going to go on without you.

    She always says to her kids and friends, “Where does crying get you? Nowhere.” So, while it’s okay to cry a little and allow yourself some much-needed time to wallow, eventually that has to end.

    Spend a weekend in bed with some feel-good movies and junk food, journal your feelings, take a long hot bath, cry and scream into your pillow, and indulge in some self-care and pampering. But don’t get stuck there. It is so easy to get stuck there.

    Give yourself a cut off time to pull it together and start to figure out how you are going to get through this bump in the road. Becoming a blubbering mess isn’t an option, as tempting as it is.

    2. Laughter is the best medicine.

    You have to have a sense of humor about your situation. Laughter can bring down blood pressure and relieve stress. You’d be doing yourself and your health a favor to find some humor each day in the ridiculousness that you are going through. There’s even something called laughter yoga, which in and of itself is funny, but honestly, they are on to something. Have you ever felt bad after a good laugh?

    If you’re so miserable you can’t think of anything funny, don’t go it alone. Hang out with a friend who can usually make you laugh, or call someone who does the same. I usually call my mom because she inspired this advice, and every time we talk about the crazy stuff going on in our lives, we always end up laughing about it.

    3. What you did before won’t work now if you want a different outcome.

    These next three pearls of wisdom, about taking action and setting goals, come from a mentor and dear friend who’s advised me over the years.

    You have cried, you have laughed, and now it’s time to think about how you got here.

    True, some situations are completely unavoidable, and life can deal us some horrible blows we could not have anticipated. However, if you contributed to your current situation, even in the smallest way, you have to reflect on what got you there.

    That shouldn’t take long—it should be glaringly obvious where you went wrong—but the key here is to actually change that behavior. That’s the hard part, and honestly, something that has to be continuously worked on.

    I eventually realized that I needed to change my impulsive decision making after it caused me to lose a relationship that was very dear to me, among other things. Consciously making the decision to work on it daily, and seeing the change that choice has made in my life gave me back a sense of pride, and makes the sting of that mistake more bearable.

    However, it’s easy to do this while in the midst of dealing with the fallout of a miscalculation or mistake. You think, man I’ll never do that again, what was I thinking? I’m going to change! But then when all is right with the world and these troubles are a distant memory, you can slip back into old habits.

    Unless you make a commitment to stay aware and work daily to change, and stay changed for the better, you will find yourself back here again, and again, and again.

    4. A plan is only good if it is actionable, and you take action.

    As you start to feel better, you will want to come up with a plan. It’s amazing how empowering it is to tackle the problem head on and figure out what outcome you want and what you need to do to get there. But is it realistic? Is it something that will make your current situation and your future better?

    Here’s a tip: It shouldn’t be the first plan you think of. Usually that one is the easiest, “the quick solve,” and it won’t get you where you want to be in the long run. You have to think long and hard about what you really want, how you feasibly can get there, and if it is doable at this time with the resources you have.

    Make sure your working toward what you want every day, and tweaking as you go if it starts to look like you aren’t making any headway. Checking in with yourself and staying grounded will help you stick to the plan and see success.

    Usually when I make a plan I think a lot about what I want, not necessarily what I need. I decided to keep my head out of the clouds this time, and made a more realistic plan then I usually would have.

    I had to accept some unwelcome changes (moving, new financial situation, loss), but knew those things were necessary to be successful this time around. In the process I found a new career I love, and am on my way to overcoming months of remorse over past situations.

    5. Suck it up and do what you have to do to get where you want to be.

    A few years ago, the good friend and mentor I mentioned earlier suggested that, to catch up on bills and get out from behind my current financial situation, I should give up my car. That way I would save money by not having a monthly car or insurance payment. After a few months of saving and catching up I could buy a used car outright. She suggested taking the bus and getting rides from friends when needed in the meantime.

    Aghast, I told her there was no way I could do that.

    “Why not? Because it would be too hard?” she had pointedly asked.

    I just told her I wasn’t willing to give up my car, and instead, decided on a quick solve that fixed the problem for the moment, but not in the long run. I never got to exactly where I wanted to be financially.

    Now looking back, I see the wisdom in what she was suggesting. Sometimes we need to make a sacrifice and do something unpleasant to get to a better future.

    Nothing worthwhile comes by walking an easy, breezy path, and it shouldn’t. I thought about this a lot when recently deciding to move somewhere much cheaper so I could save money and catch up. Sure, it wasn’t what I wanted to do, but it was necessary to get on the right track.

    It can be really hard to decide to bite the bullet and do something difficult that you really don’t want to do, but once you’re through it on the other side you will be glad, and proud, that you did.

    6. Keep believing that the best is yet to come.

    It doesn’t matter how old you are, or how wrong things have gone, there’s always potential for a better tomorrow. It’s not going to stay this way forever; it can’t. Don’t get so bogged down in the misery of today that you forget to get excited for the future, and what you’re doing to make it a good one.

    A close friend and soul sister of mine had a bumper sticker that read: Always believe that something wonderful is about to happen. She helps remind me that you have to keep the hope inside you alive, because nothing is so far gone that it cant be fixed, or grow into something new and better. In the meantime, life is passing you by.

    Find some good in your day and appreciate it in between all the wallowing, planning, and doing. You don’t want to miss out on months of your life because something bad happened and now that has become your entire focus.

    It could even be something as small as a walk with your dog, or the smell of fresh air blowing in through your window. Every day has something to enjoy, even for a moment, before we get back to going hard after our goals.