Tag: progress

Why Someone Else’s Success Isn’t a Threat to Yours

“Stop beating yourself up. You are a work in progress; which means you get there a little at a time, not all at once.” ~Unknown

I got embarrassed at the gym.

I sat down at the bench press, ready to hoist up 135 pounds of iron. My goal was eight reps for the first set.

Before I started my first set, I heard someone huffing to my left. I looked over and saw a young guy benching 315 pounds!

I counted his reps, and he went all the way up to eight. It was the same number of repetitions that I aimed for, only I was lifting 135 pounds, which is one 45-pound weight on each side (compared to his three on each side).

How embarrassing!

In that moment, I felt like I was wasting my time at the gym.

This young ~~guy~~ beast was leagues ahead of me in terms of physical strength. For the same number of reps, he could lift 180 pounds more than me. That difference is so much that, despite the point I’m making, my pride told me to omit this story.

Pride isn’t a good thing though, so here’s the story!

Others’ Success Is Not a Threat to Yours

I didn’t leave the gym early from discouragement because I realized two things.

1. I can bench press my bodyweight now (150 pounds), which is something I had wanted to do for a long time.

2. LA Fitness has mirrors for walls. Peering into a mirror, I noticed how much stronger I looked than ever before.

In other words, I had a lot of progress to be happy about, and that’s not all that I noticed. Literally one minute before this happened, I saw a man downstairs; he was walking on the treadmill, and he was obese.

I came full circle and realized that here I was feeling embarrassed for my puny bench press, when someone like the guy downstairs could possibly be jealous of my physical conditioning. It helped me understand why the overweight man, the beast, and I should all ignore each other’s progress.

Detach Your Progress from Everyone Else

Unless you’re having a competition with a friendly wager, your personal progress is 100% independent from the world and the people in it.

So what if the guy next to me can bench press a small car? That doesn’t impact me unless I make it my new standard.

So what if the guy on the treadmill is out of shape compared to many others at the gym? That doesn’t change what he’s there to do.

Also, there is a difference between using someone else as a representation of where you want to be and letting their success threaten your sense of satisfaction in the progress you’ve made or are making.

If you need to clarify your goal, you can then say something like, “I want the physique of Hugh Jackman.” That’s useful because it gives you a clear target (visually) of where you want to end up.

What I did in the gym did not start with me—it was from the outside in. I saw the guy in the gym, and I interpreted his strength as a strike against the value of my progress and goals.

I think it’s easy to mix up referencing and enviously comparing, because both involve the desire to improve. One is to clarify an idea while the other is a guilt-ridden, envious focus on who are you not.

No Pain, Still Gain?

I think it’s common to be envious of someone’s progress and want to use that as a motivator. But such “negative motivation” is mentally draining and relatively ineffective (guilt and discontentment are short-minded and inferior ways to move forward in life).

There’s something really important I’ve experienced in the last couple of years: amazing progress doesn’t require emotional pain; it only requires consistent effort. From the story, did you notice what seeing the 315-pound bench presser did to me? It made me hesitate to make progress, which doesn’t make sense.

Seeing him bench that much decreased my motivation to exercise because my efforts seemed futile in comparison. Of course, we’re human and we will always look around to see what others are doing, but when it comes to our progress, it seems we’re better off disregarding what we see.

The Permanent Cure for Envy Is Progress

It’s easier to let go of a disappointing comparison to others when you see and know you’re making progress. Otherwise, a sense of futility and despair can set in (and unfortunately, I know this from experience!) I don’t even expect or care to bench 315 pounds, but I know I can continue to get stronger every week, because I’ve proven it.

I mentioned earlier that I can bench press my body weight (150 pounds). Well, a couple years ago, I had a close call in the gym: I couldn’t get the barbell back up on my fourth rep (without a spotter), and I had to duck my head out from underneath the bar as it crashed into the bench.

How do I know it was close? The rough “grip” part of the bar actually scraped my head on the way down! And it was only 115 pounds. I’ve made a ton of progress since then. But if we’re going to make comparisons, let’s go for the extremes.

Compare my one push-up a day to this guy’s 315-pound bench press. Head-to-head, his achievement makes mine seem less than worthless, and yet, my one push-up a day transformed my life. This is why comparisons are invalid—your progress is only relative to you, not other people.

Since I started my one push-up a day mini habit two years ago, I’ve gained twenty pounds of mostly muscle because the more progress you make, the more you’ll be willing and able to make.

Who or What Is Your Most Bothersome Comparison?

Try this: Think about your version of the 315-pound bench press guy. Does someone else have the fame, power, money, or respect that you crave? Do you know someone who has your dream job?

Whatever you came up with, admit and internalize that it is irrelevant to your journey and personal progress.

There will always be someone who is further along the path than you are in every area. Instead of seeing that as a threat to your success, see it as irrelevant to your success, because it is! I can’t think of a single time that I changed my life because I thought I compared unfavorably to another person. Can you?

It’s great to have other people in life for support, socializing, and new perspectives, but when it comes to your personal progress, it seems best to leave others out of it, and especially so in the early stages of your growth in an area.

If you’re already world class in running, comparisons to other elite athletes might motivate you to get to the next level (and even in a healthy way). But in that case, you already have the solid foundation to build from. Many people don’t have such a powerful foundation, which is possibly why they want to improve, and so the comparison (to someone well ahead of them) makes them overreact.

In my case, I might try to lift too much weight and hurt myself or else quit going to the gym because it’d seem trivial by comparison. That’d be a mistake, as what seems to be a little bit of progress in the world’s eyes can compound and completely change your life.

The only person you have to measure up to is the person you were yesterday. If you can beat that person, trust me, you’re doing very well.

Envy image via Shutterstock

April 4, 2016
You’re Allowed to Be a Masterpiece and a Work in Progress

March 21, 2016
3 Things That Can Help You Bounce Back from Failure

“If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn’t sit for a month.” ~Theodore Roosevelt

The year was 2011 and I had been working as customer relations officer in a private healthcare firm for three years. It was as boring as it sounds, and I had been planning my escape toward self-employment for around a year by working in the evenings as a personal trainer.

I imagined that on the final day I’d exit the office for the last time in a blaze of happiness and jubilation, thrilled that I’d finally taken the plunge. In reality, as soon as I walked out and the summer breeze hit my skin, I got an instant rush of sweaty palms and an uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach.

“Have I done the right thing? Am I making a massive mistake here?”

The momentum into self-employment had been planned for up to the month before. I’d go into local businesses and offer free sessions thinking that some would convert into paying clients.

It had worked for another personal trainer I knew. By the time I left my job I had four big businesses lined up to visit with my offer.

At the start of the week I was confident I was hitting the world of self-employment running. At the end of the week I was staring into the abyss;

Four businesses visited—zero sign ups.

I knew I was in a challenging situation when I was sat in my kitchen on a Tuesday morning, rain pouring down outside (I live in the UK, after all!), with not a clue what to do next.

In resilience science there is a concept called “critical slowing,” which states that a system is most vulnerable after a period of trauma with little time to recover.

Sitting alone in my kitchen on that Tuesday morning while everyone else was at work, I was experiencing my critical slowing and facing a choice. Do I persevere forward or do I bathe in familiarity (aka – get a job)?

Now approaching my fourth year of self-employment I frequently think back to that moment, the fear I felt, the uncertainty that suffocated every part of me. I think about where I’d be right now if, instead of brushing up on my marketing, I went straight to the job searching sites.

What helped me get through?

1. Burning the boats.

In 1519 AD Spanish commander Hernan Cortes led his army to invade what is now known as Mexico. As he led his men to land, he instructed one of his officers to burn the boats behind them so they would have no choice but to fight forward.

While I was in no mood to invade anything, I took a cue from Cortes and made a promise to myself that I wouldn’t go back to the job I’d just left.

I knew if I gave myself the option of going back, there would be a chance I’d choose it because it was familiar, it was a regular income again, and I would have certainty again.

I also knew it most definitely wasn’t what I wanted to do with my life, and so eliminating it as a choice meant it freed up my mind to think about what choices were available to me.

This meant contacting more companies and refining my message about what I was offering.

Lesson: In the height of emotion it is easy to choose the perceived easiest option. This tends to be what’s most familiar. Hold off on this option, as it could be leading you back to what you don’t want.

2. Refining expectations.

It’s very easy when starting out in anything to compare yourself to people who’ve ‘made’ it—become a millionaire, gotten the body people desire, the fun experiences shown across their social media. Their success becomes your expectation.

I was the same, and it became incredibly draining, especially after my first week of hell!

I found it important to reassess my expectations. Based on this new feedback of zero sign-ups, I had to reassess what it would be beneficial for me to focus on.

Lesson: Beware of what you’re comparing your reality with. Look at what you think should be happening and decide whether that’s actually helping you or hindering you. Failing is inevitable at some point; if your expectations are blind to this, it’s going to be a big shock.

3. Keeping self-talk in check.

This is where knowing about psychology saved my skin. I knew that, just because I was thinking in a certain way that didn’t mean I had to take it as truth.

Let me tell you, when I was sitting in my kitchen on that Tuesday morning, people at work earning money, me earning nothing, I was not thinking, “Aaron, you are on fire, you are doing well, this was a great decision!”

But I knew that thoughts tend to be mood-dependent, so I had the awareness to allow them to pass instead of letting them guide any decisions I needed to make right then.

As I moved around in different environments and my mood changed, my thoughts became more rational about what I needed to do. I began to think clearly again and developed new ideas on how to proceed.

Lesson: Just because you’re thinking it, that doesn’t mean it’s true. How you think in a happy mood will be completely different to how you think in a low mood. Recognize what’s the best mood to make a decision in and the moods in which it’s a terrible idea to make a decision.

Over the years, as I reflected on these three factors that helped me carry on, I noticed they were coping strategies that people chose in others areas as well.

For me, it was my disastrous first week of self-employment, but I saw it in people experiencing trouble in dieting, having trouble in their relationships, or simply going through a troubling period of their life.

The path back to control began in their head. The same is true for you.

Jumping man image via Shutterstock

September 15, 2015
A Simple Yet Powerful Method for Making Big Changes

“Whenever I go on a ride, I’m always thinking of what’s wrong with the thing and how it can be improved.” ~Walt Disney

As a kid, I never realized how lucky I was to grow up less than an hour away from Disneyland.

I was spoiled by how often I would visit the park and get the whole Disney. Unsurprisingly, I have been a fan of Walt Disney and Disneyland since I was young. He was even the subject of my first book report.

When I was about seventeen years old I had an annual pass and spent countless hours in the park trying to absorb all the history and nerdy trivia I could.

This was about ten years ago, which also happened to be the same summer of their fiftieth anniversary celebration. Even during all the commotion of the fiftieth, I couldn’t get enough Disney! I decided to go back and learn more about Walt and his life.

Looking back, his accomplishments were both awe-inspiring and seemingly inevitable.

It was his determination and ingenuity that led to his almost guaranteed success, despite his limited education and resources. Especially when he was just starting out, despite some setbacks, he was always moving forward.

There are many great stories, quotes, and anecdotes about Walt’s life that made an impression on me, but one in particular has always stuck with me.

Walt knew that his business was risky and that the best way to stay successful was to constantly improve what he was creating. This led to a principle known to all Disney employees as “plussing.”

It’s the idea that you start a project the best way you know how, even if it’s not perfect.

Day by day you make small adjustments to your project. Your focus becomes all about improving the project as you build momentum toward your goal. Even if you start slow, momentum is always progress and anytime you can see progress, it gives you confidence to keep going.

You don’t have to make movies or build theme parks to take advantage of this principle though. I have seen this play out and be extremely effective in my own life.

In August of 2014 I moved from Las Vegas to Denver. I went from living on my own to a spare room in my mother’s house.

I didn’t have a job when I made the move, but I quickly landed a part-time job in addition to the work I was doing on an online business I was building.

At the time I weighed about 280 pounds and had way more debt than I was comfortable with. I didn’t really want to admit it at the time (who does), but it was obviously an extremely low point in my life. My “scorecard” was not looking great.

It’s not that I hadn’t been trying to improve these situations; I had tried a lot of different solutions to my situation. The mistake I was making, which I can clearly see now, was that I was trying to pull off dramatic change overnight instead of working on steady progress.

I found a new diet that a lot of people had success with and I immediately ordered the supplies to give it a shot. After a few days of trying the diet and trying to stick with the dramatic change, I felt like I was failing, so I gave up.

Sound familiar to anyone else out there?

Trying to quit or stop something suddenly often doesn’t work out. If you haven’t created any momentum or new habits, it’s extremely difficult to make dramatic changes in short periods of time.

Changing your life is no small thing and it takes time. It may start slow but once you build momentum you also pick up speed.

Even if you set a simple goal of making your mornings less hectic and you don’t feel like you have a energy to make a change. That’s okay!

Start with the smallest change possible; all that matters is that you start. If all you can do today is untie your shoes, great! Take that step today and see what else you can add in tomorrow.

This principle has been working for me since I moved to Colorado, even before I was aware of it.

Instead of jumping into a drastic diet, I decided to go slow. I started wearing a Fitbit, which encouraged me to walk more and challenge friends to see who could walk more during the week. After a few months, that was my new habit, I started paying more attention to calories and how much I was over eating.

Even though I ended up losing the majority of those competitions, I was losing weight, which is all I really cared about.

In fact, as of a few days ago I am down to a little over 240 pounds. It’s not where I’m stopping, but it is drastically better than any progress I’ve made and without any of the guilt or struggle that I had experienced before.

After living in Colorado for less than a month, I decided to scrap the website I had been working on. I was trying to build a community through this website, without first being involved in that community—rookie mistake. Things weren’t panning out like I had hoped (duh) and I realized I needed to go in a new direction.

From this new direction I’ve continued to make constant but minor changes, and I can clearly see the progress I’ve made. The results are not immediate, but they continue to improve more and more over time.

I am still living with my mother which is not where I want to live at twenty-seven years old, but I’ve definitely moved closer to my goals since arriving in Colorado. In fact, my car is even paid off, another first for me!

The positive changes I’ve experienced since that move and really throughout my entire life are because of small but constant adjustments. When you think about it, that’s how all great things are achieved. One small improvement at a time.

It’s the principle behind the couch to 5k training program, it’s what led Edison to a working light bulb. It’s the principle that guided a relatively poor and uneducated farmers son from obscurity to being one of the most successful and iconic businessmen of the 20th century.

I figure, if “plussing” worked to make Disneyland a success, it can probably help you make a positive change in your life.

Actually, that’s my challenge to you. Wherever you are in life, whatever you are trying to achieve, take a minute to think about how this principle can help you reach your goal.

What one action can you take today? It doesn’t matter how small it is; take that step. Even if that means that all you do is untie your shoes so it makes tomorrow morning a little less hectic.

Start there and keep going, take tomorrow’s benefit and turn that into even more progress the following day. If you miss a day, it doesn’t mean progress is over or you’ve failed. It is only a delay, treat it as such and keep moving toward your goals.

Time for change image via Shutterstock

August 20, 2015
When You’re Frustrated by a Delay: 8 Reasons to Appreciate It

“All great achievements require time.” ~Maya Angelou

We all have a picture of what we want in our heads.

We get attached to a timeline for achieving it. We fantasize about the results and how it will bring us happiness.

We begin to work hard to attain it.

But when we don’t get it right away, we get frustrated. We want things to move as quickly as possible.

If we want a relationship, we want to find our perfect partner as soon as we can. If we’re building a career or a business, we want success in months. If we want to master a skill, we expect to get good after several weeks.

Right now, I’m in this in-between stage.

I’m in between getting my dream off the ground and where I want it to be. Because my dream hasn’t materialized yet, there are days where I lose motivation, because deep down I feel that if it’s not happening yet then maybe it isn’t for me.

I hate waiting; I hate this grey area zone that I’m in.

I want the results now. I want the validation. I want to make sure that I’m not wasting time and that what I’m doing means something.

But I’m learning that it doesn’t work like that.

When we resist this period of time, it creates a lot of anxiety, but if we look closer we may find that the delay actually contains great lessons for us.

I’ve been trying to live a more intentional life of happiness and meaning. But the anxiety I’m feeling doesn’t align with what I say I want—and it’s not even getting me closer to it. In fact, I’m creating more delay. I procrastinate, I resist, and I sulk.

So I’ve made a conscious decision to understand the lessons.

It was difficult at first, especially since I felt that “must have it now” feeling. The last thing I wanted to hear was that I needed to wait some more. I resisted this because I deluded myself into thinking that if I ignored it, perhaps things would move along at a faster speed.

But over time, as the lessons got clearer, I got more inner peace and reassurance that things are moving at the right time.

What can we learn from delays?

1. A delay is an opportunity to let go of attachment to outcomes.

When we let go of our attachment to specific outcomes, we’re better able to concentrate on our craft.

This is something to appreciate, because what happens if the result isn’t what you imagined it to be? Will you stop creating? Will you stop working on your passion?

2. A delay can help us realize how badly we want it.

Do you want it badly enough to keep working at it despite not getting the immediate result you want?

3. A delay can help us build a stronger foundation.

It prepares us and helps us develop our muscles.

Get better at your craft. Figure out ways you can better use it to serve others.

We practice and learn during this waiting period so that when the time comes, we are equipped to handle it better.

4. A delay can teach us to think outside the box.

When our way is not working and we’re cornered, it can force us to come up with new ideas and new ways of doing things.

5. A delay can teach us to accept that anything worthwhile takes time.

It takes time for things to grow. It takes time to build trust. It takes time to build anything.

The sooner we get this, the sooner we’ll free ourselves from anxiety, and the faster we’ll focus on doing what we need to do.

6. A delay can teach us to be productive while waiting.

When we’re able to accept that some things are out of our control and that things don’t always happen as fast as we’d like them to, we’re better able to be productive, since we’re not overwhelmed and distracted by fear and anxiety.

7. A delay can teach us to acknowledge and appreciate progress.

With conscious effort, I am able to see my accomplishments and all the progress I have made so far instead of discounting it just because I’m not yet where I want to be.

This is important because it’s removed the resistance that kept me from doing the work I needed to do; plus, I feel more fulfilled.

8. A delay can teach us to be grateful for what we will receive.

Because I have put in my sweat and tears in starting my dream from the ground up, I will make sure I will do whatever it takes to nurture it and not take it for granted.

—

A delay it not a denial. Just because something isn’t happening now, that doesn’t mean it’s not for us.

I still get impatient but it’s getting easier, because I know that a delay can serve a greater purpose, and our greatest good.

So, if you’re going through a tough time right now and something isn’t quite materializing yet, hang in there. Find reassurance in knowing that a delay can actually benefit you.

You may not see it now, but hold on to this faith. This will help you find inner peace and enable you to keep taking action so you can get closer to what it is you want.

Photo by Luz Adriana Villa

July 24, 2014
Accepting Imperfection and Making Peace with Our “Piece in Progress”

“Being happy doesn’t mean that everything is perfect. It means you’ve decided to look beyond the imperfections.” ~Unknown

I’m back in New York City after touring for the last five years as a global musical scientist.

My international and domestic sonic experiments took me all over the world to exotic lands and faraway locales.

I climbed the Inca Trail for four days straight while combating altitude sickness, learning how to speak at low capacity oxygen levels (imagine Darth Vader), and hemoglobin adaptation became my mantra.

I also wrote and recorded a number one single in Copenhagen, Denmark. Likewise, I traveled to France, Finland, Russia, and Spain, as well as several national stops: Austin, Texas, DC, Boston, California (twice), and Hawaii, to name a few.

I even lived with a Costa Rican family and became a real ‘tico’ in San Ramon. Furthermore, I discovered a floating village in Cambodia, talked art science shop in Singapore, and had the backs of my knees lit on fire with moxibustion in Koh Samui, Thailand.

Sounds glamorous, but in all that life spice the one consistency was myself, and let me tell you, you can really get to you.

As wonderfully liberating and bohemian as it was to pick up and play from country to country, from foreign foods, cultures and languages, to random rules, regulations, and rites of passages, it also became a constant struggle to perfect the adventures.

Naturally, practical fears ensued: How would I finance myself on the road from tour to tour? What would happen if I couldn’t understand the language? How would I be able to reach anyone in the middle of the Amazon?

But the worst mind chatter came from my own self-doubt: How is this record manifesting given the fact that I have a unfamiliar, makeshift studio instead of my usual recording space? Is this one gigantic failure?

Does anyone understand what I’m doing or what I mean? Can anyone hear those ambient birds behind the vocal and piano line? Is there even a piano at the next stop? Wait, why am I doing this again? What is a musical scientist?

I was obsessed with perfection, particularly as it related to my work, and it was starting to take the fun out of my experience.

As an artist/scientist hybrid, I usually feel balanced between the creative and logistical, but the need to perfect my experiments started to weigh on the childlike, free, and non-judgmental parts of myself.

I was striving for my work to be a huge success upon initial conception instead of letting the manifestations of failures become the real magic in process.

It was during my time in Singapore while visiting a friend that I developed a perspective change to help me combat this uber desire to micromanage my situations.

With eighteen hours on the plane to think, I began to imagine that we all have a life pie with slices representing certain parts of our life. For instance, each sector could be divided into finance, love, health, relationships, career, and so forth.

It dawned on me that the majority of the folks I met and had deep conversations with on my travels shared stories of their imperfect piece(s): “I lost my job,” or “She dumped me,” or “I come from a messed up family.”

It was often easier for people, myself included, to dwell on the missing segment, the piece that didn’t match the others, and focus on trying to tweak the weak.

The pattern I recognized was that no soul’s life pie was ever completely maximized, at least not at the same time. There’s always a “piece in progress.” Maybe one, two, perhaps even half the pie didn’t look like the rest.

I visualized a life pie like a leaky faucet. As soon as you fix one of the spouts, the pressure adjusts to the other side, and pretty soon you’re exhausted trying to Band-Aid all these pressure points.

I’m reminded of my favorite tale, “The Story of The Golden Buddha,” by Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen.

To paraphrase, approximately 300 years ago, the Burmese army planned to invade Thailand.

Thai monks had an incredibly gorgeous golden Buddha statue within their monastery and wanted to protect their treasured possession during the attack, so they covered the statue with dirt, clay, and sticks.

As the Burmese pressed into Thailand, they killed all the monks, but left the precious Buddha be, as it was disguised.

During the mid 1950s, the monastery was relocated to make way for city developments, and as the monks began moving the Buddha, the clay began to crack and fall to the floor. Only then, after all that time, did the gold underneath begin to shine.

To me, the tale’s a constant reminder that we, like the golden Buddha, spend too much precious time cloaking ourselves with mud in the form of societal coding, personal pressures, and expectations deeply fixed in fear.

But, by accepting these self-perceived shortcomings as part of the bigger picture, we realize that we each have our own labyrinth as we go through life. This is how we learn life’s lessons, slowly revealing more of our golden uniqueness.

If we obsess about perfection, we’ll just stay stagnant and idle instead of moving forward with our pieces in progress, allowing them to be part of the journey toward self-realization.

Even the gravitationally bound system consisting of stars, dust, and matter that constitutes our universe has endless imperfections, such as windstorms, black holes, and galactic hurricanes.

If we, as humans, are living in this totality of existence rooted in chaos, we can only expect to mirror it. Understanding that there’s nothing wrong with us for having imperfect life pies can help us make peace with our piece in progress—and ourselves.

Photo by Matteo.Mazzoni

June 8, 2014
Practice, Persevere, and Trust That You’re Making Progress

“As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live.” ~Johann Von Goethe

I am on a journey of trust. It’s been about trusting my body, knowing that it can take care of itself without the control of my mind.

For three and a half years, my body and mind have been enemies and I have been trying so hard, and knowingly, too hard, to get back to where I was at seventeen.

It all began when I had an episode of hyperventilation in January 2010, when I heard that my Granny, who was terminally ill, had just suffered a heart attack.

She survived it, but I knew she was going to go soon and I had never lost anyone before. It scared me and caused this anxious reaction. I feared the same thing would happen to me. My parents told me otherwise, and I believed them.

My Granny died that April, and my reaction to it all was very delayed. It took me several weeks to let it all out.

I was fine then until that August, when my parents and I stayed in a rented apartment that resembled a home of an elderly couple. It reminded me of my Granny, and that was the trigger.

I hyperventilated again. This time, rather than breathing and relaxing, I thought the best way through was to tense up.

I didn’t realize that this would be my automatic reaction whenever I got stressed for the next three and a half years.

It felt like my body had an invisible belt that tightened, no matter how I tried to relax.

Even if I didn’t feel stressed about anything in particular, this tension polluted events that I had looked forward to because I was trying so hard to enjoy myself, which made it all the more frustrating.

Over time, it began to worry me. I would wake up, hoping it would disappear, and ask for a day where I could just breathe in a relaxed, normal way again. When I wouldn’t, I thought of the consequences of chronic tension and worry and what it would mean to my health.

Living away from home in my second year of university, I experienced severe anxiety and mild depression.

I had been suffering inside alone until January 2013, when I told family and friends, hoping that they would understand and give me some support. Still struggling, I went to my doctor and asked about therapy.

For four months, starting in June, I did cognitive behavioral therapy to help improve my thought patterns so I could learn to react to stress in a more rational way. I also received modules to help me through hypochondria, which was the key problem.

Mid-way through my therapy, I had an emergency kidney operation. While recovering in the hospital, I found that my mind trusted my body to breathe, simply as a survival instinct. I knew then that I could do it and hoped that I would be able to continue to breathe easily once I was better.

I recovered at home for most of the summer and found that, as I got healthier, my mind got busier. Old controlling patterns returned and my anxiety was back.

I saw improvements, though, as I continued with therapy. When the four months were up, my therapist was pleased with how well I had done, bringing my severe anxiety and mild depression down to the sub-clinical, everyday range.

She reminded me that I had done all the work myself, and that she had only be there to listen, which I think is something to remember if you want to get counseling.

After I was discharged I had a couple of wobbly months. I described it as being like a child who has had their training wheels taken off their bike. I wondered, though, when that period would end so I could start living the life I wanted.

I realized that my therapy work had gone out of the window and that I had to continue practicing what I had learned in those four months for the rest of my life.

For the last year I have been reading the articles on Tiny Buddha. I have been motivated and inspired by the stories from people who also dealt with anxiety, depression, and loss. Sometimes just reading a post would make me feel better.

However, just reading their tips only took me so far. I needed to try them out for myself, to see if they worked for me. It’s that word, practice, that I have been struggling with, and patience and perseverance. These are my words that help me through, and now I can add trust.

Practice, Patience, Perseverance, and Trust

I find knitting is a great representation of all these things.

Without practice, you won’t expect those uneven stiches to improve and or the projects to be completed. Without patience, you won’t accept your flaws and will be extremely angry with yourself. Without perseverance, you won’t be able to see your improvements being made, and without trust, you will be deprived of the belief that you can achieve great things.

I find knitting is a great way to relax, and scientifically proven to slow the heart rate and calm the mind.

Another thing that helps me is my stress journal. Writing is an effective way of logging of your thoughts, processes, and achievements. It is also scientifically proven that writing relaxes the mind.

Music, such as instrumental tracks, have also been effective for me. There are plenty on YouTube such as “relaxdaily,” who creates beautiful New Age music. Other types of relaxing music come in meditation form, such as PMR (Progressive Muscle Relaxation), which loosens tense muscles all over the body.

It can take a long time to see progress when you’re using these kinds of tools, and I often need to remind myself of that. But I now trust that I will get better at this.

I have been making good progress and I have tense days every so often, but only the other day, when I was having a mild panic attack, did I realize that it’s about perspective.

I had been so tight inside because I thought I had to be relaxed all the time, and I wasn’t. I felt I had to breathe slower so I wouldn’t be susceptible to high blood pressure and my mind wouldn’t take control, preventing me from just being.

But I’ve come to realize I don’t need to try so hard. Recently I’ve started trusting my body, telling myself that I am healthy and I am living a healthy lifestyle. I’ve begun to trust that I can breathe freely if I allow myself to.

We all experience stress, anxiety, and depression in different ways, and we all recover in our own unique ways too. However, it’s not about finding a cure. It’s about taking power back from our thoughts so we don’t allow stress and fear to control us.

We all want to enjoy our lives, and we can: by being patient with our progress, persevering with our progress, and trusting that we are making progress.

Eventually, you will see that progress. Just keep practicing.

Photo by Hartwig HKD

April 14, 2014
4 Ways to Embrace Slow Change When You’re Feeling Impatient

“Change is not a process for the impatient.” ~Barbara Reinhold

I love it when change happens quickly. Sometimes things just click, and everything shifts all at once.

When I met the man who’d become my husband, we were married only thirteen months later, and in those thirteen months we both transformed to our very cores.

The problem is that those thirteen months aren’t the entire story. They cut off the three years of intense personal work I did before I met him, all the while wishing to be in a healthy relationship.

Without those three years of work (and the years of work he did before meeting me), we couldn’t have moved that fast from a healthy place. We would have been living a fantasy.

I’ve done that before in relationships—pretended that I was changing faster than I was. Eventually the bubble would burst, and we’d need to see where we really were.

Real change usually takes a long time.

So how do we deal with this? How can we embrace three (or one, or five, or thirteen) years of working on a change without caving in to our impatience?

1. Find ways to get the qualities you’re wanting right now.

Some of the qualities I wanted out of my changed relationship pattern were love, companionship, and adventure.

There are plenty of ways to connect to those qualities without actually being in a relationship. I went on adventures with my roommates, talked things over companionably with my best friend, and learned to accept love from myself and those around me.

Not only does this help you feel better in the moment, it also helps you begin the inner changes that lead to outer change.

(Sneaky benefit: sometimes we only think we want something, and that’s why it hasn’t happened yet for us. When we connect to the qualities behind the change we’d like to make, we get what we’re really wanting, whether it goes according to plan or not.)

2. Trick yourself back to the present moment.

When my “internal committee” is throwing a small fit about how long something seems to be taking, I call its bluff.

So you think it’ll take me ten years to get to the place where I can have the kind of relationship I’m wanting?

Well in five years, would I rather be five years closer to that desire or not? In eleven years? In two months?

Usually even my most stuck-in-the-mud resistance answers “yes” to all those questions. So then I bring us back to the present.

Since I know I want to move forward on this no matter how long it takes, what’s one action I can do now to embrace the change I’m making, slow as it may be?

(Sneaky benefit: though you’re focusing on the future, this gets you back into cultivating the qualities you’d like in the present moment, which is the only place you really live anyway.)

3. Make friends with your resistance.

If you could wave a magic wand, right this moment, and have the change you’re wanting, would you feel 100% satisfied with it?

Hopefully at least part of you says “no,” because that means you have information on where to work.

If a small part of you thinks that a relationship sounds rather terrifying, then you can ask it what needs to change so you can feel safe.

Maybe you need to learn better boundaries. Maybe you need to choose better partners. Maybe you need to feel more comfortable receiving love from yourself first.

Repeat this often enough, and you’ll have connected with all the parts of you that need to change.

(Sneaky benefit: this helps you make a change from a place of wholeness and alignment, instead of running roughshod over parts of yourself to get what other parts of you want.)

4. Let it be hard.

Positivity is a wonderful thing, but forced positivity puts you in resistance to what’s really going on in you.

So take ten or fifteen minutes to let it be hard.

Write a rant in your notebook.

Ask a friend for a hug.

Listen to a sad song and cry a bit.

When you free up the energy trapped in the sadness (or anger, or fear—whatever you feel), you may find it easier to embrace change with grace.

(Sneaky benefit: this is also a backdoor to wholeness. While wallowing in negativity is usually counterproductive, giving yourself time to grieve helps you heal.)

How about you?

What changes are you working toward that you really wish would just happen already? What helps you deal with your impatience?

Photo by Hartwig HKD

November 6, 2013
10 Powerful Benefits of Change and Why We Should Embrace It

“If you do not create change, change will create you.” ~Unknown

We are often resistant to change, and we don’t realize that change itself is constant.

Even if you resist or avoid it, it will enter your life just the same. When you initiate the change yourself, it’s pretty easy to adapt to it, since it’s a wanted one.

But are the unplanned and unexpected changes bad? What if all changes were good by default?

I have been embracing change since a young age. During my life I have lived in five countries and in over twenty-five apartments, changed five schools and about five different careers.

At first it is a bit difficult and annoying, but after a while you get used to the change so much that if it doesn’t come for a while, you end up moving the furniture at home in order to feel something changing.

Changes connected with moving from country to country impacted my personality. Thanks to them I became more flexible and open-minded. Now I understand cultural differences and appreciate diversity.

Each of the career shifts brought knowledge and new experiences. As a result, apart from the professional experience I learned how to resolve conflicts with difficult colleagues and how to work with unbearable bosses.

Career related changes brought self-confidence. All those changes led me to the realization of what I wanted to do with my life.

The biggest change in life occured when I got married. The change brought love, peace, and comfort into my life. As a result, a new me was born—me being a wife, mother, and happy woman.

Finally, the big change I initiated by quitting a good job and embracing the passion of writing made me truly happy and satisfied.

In general, when looking back, I realize that all the good things in my life are the results of changes that occurred in the past.

People usually avoid changes and prefer to stay in their comfort zones, but I am true believer that once you get the courage and take the first step to change, your life will become much better.

Below are just few benefits of change: (more…)

September 13, 2012
How to Enjoy Your Routine and Still Work Toward Goals

“There is little success when there is little laughter.” ~Andrew Carnegie

As a former night owl converting to a morning person, I’ve made a few discoveries about adopting a new routine.

Now that I wake up before sunrise, I experience a slow decline in my enthusiasm at around 10:00AM.

The other day, I realized that I had not yet poured myself a cup of coffee. Completely floored at how I managed to forget—but also grateful and proud that my energy stayed up naturally up until that point—I made my way to the office coffee machine.

I felt a sense of panic as I searched for the coffee bean bag on the counter—nowhere to be found. I looked in the grinder to see if perhaps the leftover grinds from yesterday could somehow fill my mug today. It couldn’t.

I finally looked in a cabinet nearby and—tah dah!—a whole stash of coffee beans ready to be ground! A sense of calm came back instantaneously. What I realized between 10:00AM and 10:11AM, while searching for coffee, is this:

I’m deeply fond of the comforts of my routine, whether I choose to admit or not.

I’ve fought it for the past few years. I’d come into the office sluggish and frustrated, and it was written all over my face to the point where co-workers would avoid me. I didn’t find a sense of purpose in my job, and since I was a transparent person, I justified that it was okay to show it.

I was miserable during many parts of 2009 and 2010. I thought if I embraced my routine, I would somehow be settling. (more…)

February 16, 2011