Tiny Buddha

Tag: self-care

  • 19 Techniques to Calm a Highly Sensitive Nervous System

    19 Techniques to Calm a Highly Sensitive Nervous System

    “You can’t calm the storm, so stop trying. What you can do is calm yourself. The storm will pass.” ~Timber Hawkeye

    The sun is setting, and the cold wind is gently blowing in my face. I’m sitting on a rock that’s about ten feet tall, overlooking the Peruvian city of Cuzco. I can hear dogs barking, groups of teenagers laughing, the low hum of traffic, and the music blaring from cars in the distance. As it goes dark, the lights of thousands of houses begin to flicker on like fireflies.

    I should be enjoying this picturesque scene, but I’m not. My mind is racing too fast for me to make sense of anything that I’m thinking.

    The only thing I’m able to fixate on is the intense ball of worry that sits in the top of my chest. Every thought introduces a new problem and a restless attempt to solve it. But the thoughts themselves aren’t that important. They’re really just a manifestation of a physical tension that I’ve been holding onto for far too long.

    This was my life with relentless anxiety.

    For years I didn’t understand why I would get anxious, nor did I have the capacity to relax my body when the physical symptoms came to visit. Was I just born with a sensitive nervous system? Had life experiences conditioned me to be that way? Was it both? Ultimately, it didn’t matter. Anxiety was there, and it was making itself heard, loud and clear.

    Fortunately, I learned, slowly but surely, in both my work with others and my own personal experience, that anxiety could be tamed and reversed. But it was only after I was able to bring greater awareness to my body and progressively convince my nervous system that I was safe and it was okay to be calm that I was able to make any lasting change.

    Calming your body and mind doesn’t happen overnight. It takes practice, but it’s a real possibility.

    Here are nineteen ways to calm a highly sensitive nervous system.

    1. Focus on the calmest part of your body.

    Instead of sitting directly with uncomfortable feelings, sensations, and tensions, we can place our attention on wherever in our body we find a sense of calm. By doing that, we can familiarize ourselves with relaxation and sit with it until it deepens. For example, your legs may be twitching, but perhaps you feel stillness at the back of your neck. Draw your attention there.

    2. Set boundaries and manage your energy wisely.

    If you’re dealing with anxiety, then you’re burning more energy than you usually would. And when your energy is low, it’s more difficult to regulate your feelings. That’s why it’s important to manage your energy wisely and not be afraid to set boundaries and say no to things that you don’t feel are in your best interest.

    3. Self-soothe through affirmations.

    Affirmations are only useful if they’re having a helpful impact on your state of being. Repeating positive phrases that you don’t truly believe in can actually have the opposite effect. So instead, choose an affirmation that feels true to you, such as “I am strong enough to survive this panic.” And try experimenting with how you talk to yourself—the tone of voice, pace, care behind the words—instead of just focusing on the words you are saying. A slow, calm, and reassuring internal voice can be a great tool to calm the body.

    4. Journal from the perspective of your stress.

    Sometimes your anxious thoughts just need to be respected and expressed coherently by getting them out of your head and down on a piece of paper. Writing from the perspective of stress, exploring what’s fueling it and what it wants us to know, also helps us take a step back from our worries.

    5. Journal from the perspective of your calm.

    When you’ve written down your stressful thoughts, you can dialogue (and reason) with it from the perspective of a calmer and wiser voice.

    6. Try Taoist Inner Smile Meditation.

    This meditation is one where you feel a smiling energy in your body. Most people find this easiest to do by visualizing a smile or bringing a slight smile to their face. The effect of the inner smile meditation is cumulative, and it can be an effective way to signal to your brain that you’re not under any threat.

    7. Finish the sentence “My nervous system wants to…”

    This is another journal exercise that helps connect your thoughts to your feelings so you can take a step back from your thoughts. You may discover that your nervous system wants you to take a break, rest, or get some fresh air.

    8. Create compassionate imagery.

    Like the inner smile meditation, compassionate imagery is a way to tell your brain that you’re safe and it’s okay to relax. You might want to visualize a person or a place, either real or fictitious, where you’d feel the most calm, safe, and connected.

    9. Increase bodily awareness.

    Anxiety can feel like it comes out of nowhere, but that’s rarely the case. By increasing bodily awareness, either through meditation, yoga, or just regularly checking in with how you’re feeling, you can catch the early signs of tension in your body before they get too difficult to manage.

    10. Slow down to six breaths a minute.

    Studies have shown that six breaths a minute seems to be the number at which we get the most benefits in terms of relaxation. As most of us breathe a lot quicker than this, any attempt to reduce the rate at which we breathe—with a focus on extending the exhalation—is a useful practice.

    11. Play around with your body language.

    How we position our bodies and physically move through the world has a big impact on our emotional state. Bringing more awareness to how you’re holding your body from moment to moment—how you sit, stand, communicate, etc.—can help you to address habits of tension.

    12. Establish a mindful movement practice.

    It can be hard to remember to be aware of our bodies, which is why a daily or weekly embodiment practice is useful. You might want to try yoga, qigong, or tai chi, the Feldenkrais method or the Alexander Technique, or any other practice. Just try to find something you enjoy and that works for you.

    13. Dance.

    Dancing is a great way to reduce stress and increase your bodily awareness. If you don’t like the idea of a formal practice, then this might be for you. And the good thing is you don’t need to get any special training or even leave your house—you can just blast your favorite song and get moving.

    14. Visualize a future calm self.

    Our minds are largely predictive machines, so when we expect to be anxious, that’s what will happen. We can begin to disrupt this cycle by visualizing a future state of calm, which sets a more useful expectation.

    15. Imagine your mind in slow motion.

    This is just another trick to break out of unhelpful patterns. An anxious mind will move rapidly, whereas a mind that is intentionally moving slowly will start to move us out of a state of anxiety.

    16. Laugh (even if it’s forced).

    Laughter is another great way to take our body out of a state of stress. In fact, the reason we laugh might be an evolutionary signal that everything is okay and that a perceived threat has been averted. It doesn’t matter if it feels forced; your brain will still get the message, and you might even find that you end up really laughing anyway.

    17. Try chanting or singing meditation.

    Both chanting and singing slow your breathing down and stimulate the vagus nerve, which is another quick way to transition from a state or fight-or-flight to rest-and-digest.

    18. Hum.

    Some people don’t like to chant or sing, but luckily humming does pretty much the same thing.

    19. Visualize healthy and rewarding social situations.

    A lot of bodily tension comes from an unconscious perceived threat in the world—particularly the social world. By visualizing healthy relationships and positive social situations, either real or imagined, we are convincing the social part of our brain that we’re connected and safe.

    —

    If my experience with anxiety and my work as a therapist have taught me anything, it’s that there is no best way to manage our nervous systems. There is only the way that works for you. By permitting yourself to experiment and play around with different techniques, you’ll be better positioned to uncover the most effective way to calm your highly sensitized nervous system.

    Let us know in the comments which techniques have worked for you and if there are any that we might have missed!

  • How to Stop Reacting in Anger When You’re Triggered

    How to Stop Reacting in Anger When You’re Triggered

    “Freedom is taking control of the rudder of your life.” ~Yukito Kishiro

    “What’s for dinner?” It’s a simple enough question. Yet it’s one that has made me lose my mind at my husband on more than one (or ten or twenty) occasions.

    It’s not the question itself. It’s a valid question and one that needs an answer (at least by one of us).

    A trigger of mine is being asked to answer a question when I’m already in the middle of something, feeling overwhelmed, emotionally exhausted, or just sick of answering questions.

    So then I snap and overreact.

    I’ve come a long way in my personal growth journey, but I’m by no means perfect. I still react in anger but to a lesser extent and less often. I get mad, but I don’t stay there. I screw up, but I can apologize with humility and forgive myself.

    When we’re in reaction-mode to life’s challenges, we aren’t in control. We react in ways that are not in tune with how we want to be.

    Learning to navigate our triggers not only enables us to take back control and enjoy life more, it has an amazing trickle-down effect to those around us too. It better connects us in our relationships and models for others or our children what it looks like to be gracefully resilient so those in our circles can mimic the same.

    So, what does it look like to react in anger?

    Someone at work criticizes you and you instantly get defensive.

    Your partner asks you to do something when you clearly have your hands full, so you immediately get pissed.

    Plans change unexpectedly, and you panic or get irritated.

    Someone in your life is controlling or manipulative, so you either get scared and shut down, or feel livid and lash out.

    Someone does something that goes against your core values like being mean or inconsiderate or lying, and you explode.

    It can also mean reacting to your own thoughts or actions and getting angry with yourself for “doing it again,” being lazy, or failing.

    And all that leads to feeling guilty for saying things you don’t really mean or making a mountain out of a molehill, or maybe even rehashing past events.

    It can lead you to beat yourself up again for how you handled things in the past.

    And it can leave you feeling misunderstood because you recognize that your reaction stems from something deeper than this one incident;  a culmination of events, or some underlying fear created this trigger for you.

    Why We Are Reactive in the First Place

    We are reactive or over reactive when our stress response is triggered sending us into fight, flight, or freeze mode.

    We react on autopilot. In this space, we aren’t in full control, and it’s hard to see things clearly and objectively.

    Sometimes our triggers relate to events from the past. For example, you may get triggered when someone ignores you because your parents frequently neglected you when you were a kid, causing you to feel unimportant. Other times, our triggers are events that make us feel out of control.

    For example, one of my triggers used to be slow drivers on the highway. I would instantly snap into fight mode and get angry. I’d drive too close to them or shake my fist (or special finger) at them, honk my horn, or speed past them in a fit of rage.

    Sitting here calmly as I reflect back on my past, reactive self, I’m a little embarrassed and shocked remembering the actions I took while angry. That’s because I’m in a calm place and my fight mode is not initiated, so I have full control at the moment. I wouldn’t do any of those things when I’m in a healthy mental space—those choices don’t reflect the kind of person I want to be.

    When we react from a place of fear and anger, we rarely feel good about the things we say and do.

    How to Stop Being So Reactive and Respond to Stress More Calmly

    We don’t have to let our fear and anger control us. At any time, we can make a choice to respond to life from a calmer place. Here’s how.

    Prioritize self-care so you’re less likely to feel overwhelmed, exhausted, or on the verge of snapping.

    If you overextend yourself or regularly neglect your needs, you’ll likely feel triggered by even minor annoyances because your default state will be imbalance and agitation. And you’ll find it nearly impossible to handle major issues because you won’t have the inner strength to handle them. Take good care of yourself, mentally, physically, and emotionally, and everything will feel more manageable.

    Set yourself up to not be reactive by identifying your stress triggers.

    What things lead you to react in anger or fear? Awareness is key here! Create a list of things that you know trigger you, and why.

    Then describe how you typically react when those triggers occur.

    For example, a trigger of mine has always been other people getting angry at little things that I don’t think warrant being angry about.

    Funny enough, my reaction to their anger was anger! I would get mad that they are angry and yell at them to be calm. Obviously, this strategy didn’t work for me.

    Then ask yourself, “How do I want to respond instead”?

    As I reflected on how I usually reacted to my triggers, I realized I would rather remain composed than lose my cool and flip out. If I could pick any response to other people being angry, it would be for me to stay calm and in control.

    And that’s one of the main reasons I realized I have such a strong reaction to other people’s anger. I think that the “right” way to be in this world is to be calm, kind, and compassionate. When someone reacts in the polar opposite way, it conflicts with my values, and ironically, I end up getting angry with them.

    This is why this step is so important. We often react in ways that are not in tune with our values when emotions are running high, so we need to consciously decide, in advance, how we want to respond in stressful situations.

    From there, think about what you are trying to control that you have no control over.

    At a certain point, I realized that some people are going to get angry, and I won’t agree with their behavior. My anger stemmed from judging their reactions and wanting to control how they were feeling and behaving. I have no control over other people. I may be able to influence them, but I will never be able to control them.

    If traffic triggers you, you may be trying to control your time because being delayed makes you feel anxious. If chaos triggers you, you may be trying to control your environment to create a sense of safety. If angry people trigger you, you may be trying to control how other people react and experience stressful situations.

    Now, ask yourself, “What do I have control over?

    Since I don’t have control over what other people do, and wanting to control them was creating anger within me, in order to reach my desired response of staying calm and in control I had to shift my focus to myself. Because the only thing I have control over is what I do.

    So when someone else is angry and I think they’re overreacting, I can take some deep breaths, step away from the situation, and ask the other person how I can help (in an effort to help calm them), or just sit back and allow them to process the situation however they need to in that moment.

    I started to notice that as I stopped reacting to anger with anger, the people around me showed less anger over time. And when they did get angry, they didn’t stay angry as long.

    I started to realize that they were often mimicking me, whether they realized it or not. Of course, part of it was that I was no longer adding to the anger and fueling it from my end too. But seeing what it looks like to stay calm and in control is an important skill to witness. It shows others what it looks like so they can do the same.

    —

    We all get triggered at times, but we don’t have to say and do things we regret, which will ultimately damage our relationships and leave us feeling bad about ourselves. With a little self-awareness, we can stop reacting on autopilot and start responding to life from a calm, neutral place. Maybe not all the time, but more often than not, and we’ll feel a lot more peaceful and in control as a result!

  • How Meeting and Re-Parenting My Inner Child Helped Me Love Myself

    How Meeting and Re-Parenting My Inner Child Helped Me Love Myself

    “To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance.” ~Oscar Wilde

    The journey to meeting, loving, and re-parenting my inner child was a long time coming.

    In 2018, I went through a devastating breakup. I’d been through breakups before. They suck, they hurt, some of them left me in deep abysses of sadness for a long time, but this one was something different.

    I can honestly say I felt levels of pain I did not know were survivable for a human being. Many days, I did not want to survive; I couldn’t imagine continuing to be in that level of pain for another moment. It is indeed a miracle I survived and came out on the other side thriving!

    So, what was the cause of so much pain?

    Well, it wasn’t him, I’ll tell you that much. While I loved that man more deeply than I previously knew possible to love someone, and so it made sense for it to be more painful, it didn’t make sense for me to be crying non-stop for months. I felt like I was being ripped to shreds from the inside out. The pain was relentless and wasn’t lifting even a tiny bit as time went on.

    So, I sought help to get to the root issue. The real cause of my pain was the tremendous amount of unresolved trauma I was carrying, a complete inability to love myself—in fact, I had no real understanding of what it meant to love oneself—and a massively wounded and scared little girl running the show at my core.

    To sum up: I had a great amount of sexual trauma, abandonment trauma, complex PTSD, and low self-worth, and I only understood validation as coming from outside of me. This breakup unearthed all these issues in one violent movement, like ripping a Band-Aid off a scab.

    All this ugly, unhealed stuff was exposed and shot into my awareness like a volcanic eruption, and I had no means of escape. All I could do was deal and heal. So that’s what I did.

    There were a lot of things I did, and still do, to facilitate this healing. Therapies, somatic healing modalities, and spiritual methods. None are necessarily better than the other. They all worked together to weave a rich tapestry of healing approaches to choose from at any moment.

    But since this is about inner child work, that’s what I am going to talk about.

    I believe many of us have wounded inner children running the show. Everyone we meet has an inner child expressing themselves through adult bodies. To what degree that inner child is wounded ranges on a wide spectrum, mostly based on how well their needs were met by their caregivers.

    My therapist suggested I purchase The Abandonment Recovery Workbook by Susan Anderson and begin working through it on my own in between our sessions. I furiously raced through the chapters, hoping that once I finished, I could date and find someone to hopefully mitigate the unrelenting pain. However, as I worked through and neared the end of the book, it became clear to me that I was in no way ready for someone else yet.

    The workbook contains several exercises, but there were a few dedicated specifically to identifying, visualizing, or meeting your inner child—a younger, more tender, innocent version of yourself that just needed to be seen, heard, and accepted for who they are.

    It helped for me to find photographs of myself from three to five years of age to aid in visualizing this child. Looking at that little girl and imagining she still lived inside me, deep inside my being.

    Once adult me was able to see her, I had to learn how to hear her and how to communicate with her. Via meditation, I’d visualize her and ask her questions:

    What does she need right now?

    How can I make things better for her right now?

    What is she feeling about this situation?

    I’d have to sit until I received an answer from her. This came as a thought or a feeling, sometimes a visual image or memory. Oftentimes, all she wanted was to be held, so I’d visualize my adult-self holding this small girl and giving her the comfort and compassion she desperately needed.

    This is the re-parenting. The part where we respond to ourselves in the ways that we would have wanted or needed when we were small children. To be seen and heard, rather than molded to act or behave a certain way. To be truly responded to, based on the needs we were expressing.

    The dialogue exercises with my little girl continued daily, sometimes multiple times in a day. It just depended on how intensely my inner child needed something from me that day, or how intently I was listening at the time.

    Sometime after I’d begun this dialogue, I was at work and delivered a small thank-you token to a colleague for doing a quick project for my office. He kissed me on the forehead in return. It made me very uncomfortable, and I quickly exited his workspace.

    I walked out to the street to run an errand, and within me, my little girl was raging. It felt like there was an inferno of anger brewing within my gut. I recognized in that moment I was not listening to my inner child, and she wasn’t having it, now that we had begun communicating with each other.

    So, I stopped. I tuned in. I asked her what she needed.

    She told me this man had violated her space and she felt unsafe, and I’d promised, capital “P” promised, she said, stomping her feet as young children often do, that I would take care of her from now on, and I hadn’t when I allowed someone to violate my physical space without saying something. She would not be appeased until the matter was resolved.

    The inferno continued to rage inside my belly until I walked back down the street, back into his office, and told him, “I do not want to be kissed by my coworkers. I’m sure others may not be bothered by it, but this is a boundary for me.”

    Of course, he apologized profusely, and we have never had any inappropriate run-ins again. But more importantly, immediately upon taking care of myself and my little girl, the inferno subsided.

    I took care of her and made her feel safe and secure. I continue to do so in my day-to-day life now.

    The above example was an extreme one. She is not always so easily heard. Sometimes I ask her what she needs, and it’s just to move the body, go for a walk. Other times it’s a cookie she wants. Often, it’s just to be acknowledged. Validated. To be told, “I hear you, I see you, your feelings matter.”

    As with any relationship, the needs, communication, and dynamics are ever-evolving.

    But I can say without a doubt, the connection between my adult-self and my inner child is the most valuable relationship I have, and today the amount of love I have for myself, due to inner child work, is above and beyond anything I could have ever imagined.

    I used to feel, most of the time, that I was not enough. Since doing this healing work, I now know I am enough, in all situations and places.

    Where there was typically a sense of impending doom and danger, there is now a lightness and delight and a true, deep happiness that has nothing to do with outside circumstances—just the pure joy of an inner wholeness I never even could have dreamed of.

    That’s what happens when we truly see and hear our inner child and respond to their needs without judgment. We feel love and safety like we’ve never known, and we finally realize we deserve nothing less.

  • What No One Tells You About Setting Boundaries: The Good, Bad, and Ugly

    What No One Tells You About Setting Boundaries: The Good, Bad, and Ugly

    “Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.” ~Rumi

    Three years back was the first time I dared to set a boundary and be assertive in a friendship, and guess what? She blocked me on her phone, and we stopped being friends.

    It came as a rude shock because I was quite invested in the friendship. Not only did we have good times together, but I had helped her search for and find a job and even babysat her kid for a long while free of charge. I felt betrayed and hurt. It made me feel like I was the one in the wrong, the bad person, and like I had no right to say what felt right to me.

    I admit that I was early in my journey of being assertive and learning how to set boundaries, so my skill set wasn’t the best. But despite the mayhem and chaos it caused, it was a good thing for me.

    We were similar in many ways, and I knew she was a lovely person. Still, I didn’t particularly appreciate that she always wanted to be in charge, acted as though she knew it all, only wanted her way, and behaved as though she had the world’s worst problems.

    I empathized with her because she shared her struggles with me. But I didn’t share mine back partly because I wasn’t comfortable and partly because I felt there was no place for me; it was only about her. So, one day, when I’d had enough, I exploded and said what I had to say, rudely, and that ended the relationship.

    Three years later, when the dust settled, we started talking. We are cordial, civilized, and respectful now. We share laughs and anecdotes, but it’ll never be the same because we’ve both changed, and our relationship has changed as well.

    After taking this journey, I’ve concluded that being assertive and setting boundaries is not as easy as it sounds. But it’s the only way to regain your sense of self, sanity, and self-love.

    What are the Benefits of Maintaining Boundaries?

    Boundaries are limits between us and other people that enable us to honor our feelings, wants, and needs and take good care of ourselves. We need to set boundaries because:

    • Boundaries offer protection against people who habitually do things that leave us feeling uncomfortable.
    • Correcting troublesome behavior and letting other people know what’s acceptable or not, where we stand, and what we are willing to tolerate drastically improves our sense of self.
    • Setting boundaries helps us trust ourselves and, in turn, trust others.
    • It helps us treat ourselves and others as equal with respect and dignity.
    • It teaches us what’s essential for us and gives us the courage to stand up for it.
    • It builds our confidence as we work on our assertiveness muscle.
    • Boundary-setting is generous to others because it allows them to grow and take responsibility for themselves, their actions, and their issues.

    So, if boundary-setting is such a good thing, what’s the problem?

    The problem is that it’s hard, especially for people who are not used to setting boundaries. It can make you question yourself and your intentions and turn your world topsy-turvy.

    Why Is Boundary-Setting So Difficult?

    Most people with weak boundaries:

    • Are not aware of their needs, and this takes lots of time and practice.
    • Are afraid to stand up for themselves.
    • Don’t believe that they deserve to have their boundaries recognized and honored.
    • Are afraid that people will think they are selfish.
    • Think it is wrong to think about themselves because of various cultural or religious influences.
    • Believe that what they want is unreasonable.

    How Do You Start Setting Boundaries?

    1. Take inventory.

    Have you ever been in a situation where you felt like you were being taken advantage of, taken for granted, or treated disrespectfully? When you feel any of these things, you need to ask yourself:

    • What are you feeling? Is it anger, hurt, betrayal?
    • What brought about those feelings? What did the other person do? Did they disregard your feelings or act dismissive? Did they cross a line you’d rather no one cross?
    • How did you react to the situation? Did you ignore it, make an excuse for them, or get angry and resentful but fake a smile?
    • Why did you tolerate this behavior and respond this way? What were you afraid of?

    So, the first step is being conscious of what happened and what you’re feeling.

    This is essential because it helps you become aware of your needs, wants, and limits; notice when someone is neglecting or violating them; and reflect on how you usually respond—and why.

    2. Be honest and courageous.

    The second step is being honest about what you would like to do in the situation and reflecting so you can find the fairest and healthiest way to respond.

    Then comes the hardest part: finding the courage to act even if it may displease, anger, or irritate the other person.

    Everything inside you might scream that this is a mistake. You may feel scared, anxious, and even unsafe speaking up. But remember that ignoring the issue is not a solution because you will just end up feeling resentful if you continually avoid saying what you really want to say.

     What No One Tells You About Setting Boundaries

    1. You may feel guilty.

    Somewhere down the line, you may have learned that your needs, feelings, and wants are less important than others’. When you start making changes, it may feel like you are embarking on a journey of selfishness and betraying the very core of your being.

    2. You will likely make mistakes.

    You are learning a new skill, and mistakes are bound to happen. You may overreact to minor issues or fail to communicate your feelings and needs accurately or clearly. There’s no right or wrong here, only a learning curve. You can always change your decision or apologize later if you realize that your decision wasn’t the best.

    3. It sometimes feels like you are at war with yourself.

    To some extent, that’s what this is. A war with what you once believed to be true but isn’t anymore, a war against your default responses.

    4.  It is not easy.

    It will sometimes mean wrong turns, slip-ups, and lost relationships. But if you’re honest with yourself, you may realize that those relationships were already dead to begin with; you were trying to nurture doomed relationships because you were afraid to let them go.

    5. It makes you confront demons you didn’t know you had.

    Your insecurity, your feelings of low self-worth, your fear of being rejected or alone—all this and more bubbles to the surface when you get honest about why you’ve struggled with boundary-setting and start pushing past your blocks.

    6. It takes all you have, tears you up, and breaks you down.

    But when it’s all done and over, you build strength, wisdom, and trust in yourself. You learn to give your feelings more credence, knowing they’re an internal signal that something is off and you need to investigate them further so you can decide what’s really best for you.

    So yes, boundaries can be life-changing, but the emotional upheaval that often accompanies them isn’t for the fainthearted. Changing yourself, getting out of your comfort zone, and doing what is right for you can trigger your reptilian brain, which craves safety, making you feel like you are doing something wrong. Arnold Bennett rightly says that all change, even for the better, is accompanied by discomfort.

    Deepak Chopra said that “All great changes are preceded by chaos.” I believe the benefits of maintaining boundaries make the chaos worth it.

  • 45 Simple Self-Care Practices for a Healthy Mind, Body, and Soul

    45 Simple Self-Care Practices for a Healthy Mind, Body, and Soul

    “There are days I drop words of comfort on myself like falling leaves and remember that it is enough to be taken care of by myself.” ~Brian Andreas

    Do you ever forget to take care of yourself?

    I know. You’re busy, and finding the time to take proper care of yourself can be hard. But if you don’t, it won’t be long before you’re battered from exhaustion and operating in a mental fog where it’s hard to care about anything or anyone.

    I should know.

    A few years ago, I had a corporate job in London, working a regular sixty-hour week. I enjoyed working with my clients and colleagues, and I wanted to do well.

    But I had no life.

    I rarely took care of myself, and I was always focused on goals, achievements, and meeting the excessive expectations I had of myself. My high tolerance for discomfort meant I juggled all the balls I had in the air—but at the expense of being a well-rounded human being.

    So I made an unusual choice. I quit my job and moved to Thailand to work in a freelance capacity across many different countries and companies, which enabled me to set my own hours and engagements.

    I began to take care of myself better, scheduling in time alone, for exercise and for fun.

    I got to know myself better and know what I needed—not just to function, but to flourish.

    But guess what?

    At the end of last year, I spent Christmas alone in bed, completely exhausted.

    Why did this happen?

    Well, I had been running my busy website and consulting in seven countries in just two months. I forgot to take care of myself again, and I got a nasty case of strep throat.

    Self-Care Isn’t a One-Time Deal

    The strep throat was a harsh reminder that self-care isn’t something you do once and tick off the list.

    It’s the constant repetition of many tiny habits, which together soothe you and make sure you’re at your optimum—emotionally, physically, and mentally.

    The best way to do this is to implement tiny self-care habits every day. To regularly include in your life a little bit of love and attention for your own body, mind, and soul.

    The following ideas are tiny self-care activities you can fit into a short amount of time, usually with little cost.

    Pick one from each category, and include them in your life this week.

    Tiny Self-Care Ideas for the Mind

    1. Start a compliments file. Document the great things people say about you to read later.

    2. Scratch off a lurker on your to-do list, something that’s been there for ages and you’ll never do.

    3. Change up the way you make decisions. Decide something with your heart if you usually use your head. Or if you tend to go with your heart, decide with your head.

    4. Go cloud-watching. Lie on your back, relax, and watch the sky.

    5. Take another route to work. Mixing up your routine in small ways creates new neural pathways in the brain to keep it healthy.

    6. Pay complete attention to something you usually do on autopilot, perhaps brushing your teeth, driving, eating, or performing your morning routine.

    7. Goof around for a bit. Schedule in five minutes of “play” (non-directed activity) several times throughout your day.

    8. Create a deliberate habit, and routinize something small in your life by doing it in the same way each day—what you wear on Tuesdays, or picking up the dental floss before you brush.

    9. Fix a small annoyance at home that’s been nagging you—a button lost, a drawer that’s stuck, a light bulb that’s gone.

    10. Punctuate your day with a mini-meditation with one minute of awareness of your thoughts, feelings, and sensations; one minute of focused attention on breathing; and one minute of awareness of the body as a whole.

    11. Be selfish. Do one thing today just because it makes you happy.

    12. Do a mini-declutter. Recycle three things from your wardrobe that you don’t love or regularly wear.

    13. Unplug for an hour. Switch everything to airplane mode and free yourself from the constant bings of social media and email.

    14. Get out of your comfort zone, even if it’s just talking to a stranger at the bus stop.

    15. Edit your social media feeds, and take out any negative people. You can just “mute” them; you don’t have to delete them. 

    Tiny Self-Care Ideas for the Body

    1. Give your body ten minutes of mindful attention. Use the body scan technique to check in with each part of your body.

    2. Oxygenate by taking three deep breaths. Breathe into your abdomen, and let the air puff out your stomach and chest.

    3. Get down and boogie. Put on your favorite upbeat record and shake your booty.

    4. Stretch out the kinks. If you’re at work, you can always head to the bathroom to avoid strange looks.

    5. Run (or walk, depending on your current physical health) for a few minutes. Or go up and down the stairs three times.

    6. Narrow your food choices. Pick two healthy breakfasts, lunches, and dinners and rotate for the week.

    7. Activate your self-soothing system. Stroke your own arm, or if that feels too weird, moisturize.

    8. Get to know yourself intimately. Look lovingly and without judgment at yourself naked. (Use a mirror to make sure you get to know all of you!)

    9. Make one small change to your diet for the week. Drink an extra glass of water each day, or have an extra portion of veggies each meal.

    10. Give your body a treat. Pick something from your wardrobe that feels great next to your skin.

    11. Be still. Sit somewhere green, and be quiet for a few minutes.

    12. Get fifteen minutes of sun, especially if you’re in a cold climate. (Use sunscreen if appropriate.)

    13. Inhale an upbeat smell. Try peppermint to suppress food cravings and boost mood and motivation.

    14. Have a good laugh. Read a couple of comic strips that you enjoy. (For inspiration, try Calvin and Hobbes, Dilbert, or xkcd.)

    15. Take a quick nap. Ten to twenty minutes can reduce your sleep debt and leave you ready for action.

    Tiny Self-Care Ideas for the Soul

    1. Imagine you’re your best friend. If you were, what would you tell yourself right now? Look in the mirror and say it.

    2. Use your commute for a “Beauty Scavenger Hunt.” Find five unexpected beautiful things on your way to work.

    3. Help someone. Carry a bag, open a door, or pick up an extra carton of milk for a neighbor.

    4. Check in with your emotions. Sit quietly and just name without judgment what you’re feeling.

    5. Write out your thoughts. Go for fifteen minutes on anything bothering you. Then let it go as you burn or bin the paper.

    6. Choose who you spend your time with today. Hang out with “Radiators” who emit enthusiasm and positivity, and not “Drains” whose pessimism and negativity robs energy.

    7. Stroke a pet. If you don’t have one, go to the park and find one. (Ask first!)

    8. Get positive feedback. Ask three good friends to tell you what they love about you.

    9. Make a small connection. Have a few sentences of conversation with someone in customer service such as a sales assistant or barista.

    10. Splurge a little. Buy a small luxury as a way of valuing yourself.

    11. Have a self-date. Spend an hour alone doing something that nourishes you (reading, your hobby, visiting a museum or gallery, etc.)

    12. Exercise a signature strength. Think about what you’re good at, and find an opportunity for it today.

    13. Take a home spa. Have a long bath or shower, sit around in your bathrobe, and read magazines.

    14. Ask for help—big or small, but reach out.

    15. Plan a two-day holiday for next weekend. Turn off your phone, tell people you’ll be away, and then do something new in your own town.

    Little and Often Wins the Day

    With a little bit of attention to your own self-care, the fog will lift.

    You’ll feel more connected to yourself and the world around you.

    You’ll delight in small pleasures, and nothing will seem quite as difficult as it did before.

    Like that car, you must keep yourself tuned up to make sure that you don’t need a complete overhaul.

    Incorporating a few of these tiny self-care ideas in your day will help keep you in tune.

    Which one will you try first?

  • How I Saved Myself by Surrendering When Everything Fell Apart

    How I Saved Myself by Surrendering When Everything Fell Apart

    “And here you are, living despite it all.” ~Rupi Kaur

    “I surrender!” I said this mantra out loud as my life was spiraling out of control.

    I had spent a summer in college as a camp counselor separated from my fiancé. He sent me no letters and did not keep in touch. Still, I held on. By the time I came back home, we were broken. I had also realized he was emotionally abusing me. It took that separation to make me see it.

    I realized I had been truly alone in the relationship. I was never lonelier than being with someone who refused to listen to me. A summer of independence brought me a new love of solitude, but it also made me realize I didn’t have a soulmate in him after all.

    I was forced to face that this life wasn’t perfect. I wasn’t perfect. But… I was enough. I needed to believe that to keep moving.

    When I said my mantra of surrendering, I was on a rollercoaster of emotions. I didn’t know where my life was going. The wedding planning ended. He called it off through text. I was left emotional and without closure. I didn’t know what would happen next. I just decided to be curious rather than try to control it.

    I woke up to the fact that I didn’t have to know everything. I had to just trust. This both terrified me and propelled me forward. I didn’t know if things were going to be okay, but I knew I would make meaning out of whatever would happen.

    I wanted to teach youth how to surrender too. I figured that would be my legacy since it had healed me of so much in life.

    I had already applied to graduate school, and I would start at Brandeis very soon. I was worried about being on top of it all while going through this heartbreak. I was a Type A student, president of four clubs and an honors student. I didn’t exactly have time for love back then, but I didn’t realize I had a choice to let my ex go if I wasn’t satisfied. I put too much effort into trying to make it work when it wouldn’t.

    I didn’t see that my effort to make everything work was actually blocking better things from coming my way. In other words, I had to stop holding on so tightly to life. I had to let go. I had to surrender to survive. I had to go with the flow to find my flow. I had to learn how to be happy for no reason other than to simply be.

    When I did that, my whole life opened up for me. I practiced radical acceptance and realized my place in this world mattered. I stopped white-knuckling through my problems and pain. I stopped waiting for love and decided to love myself. I started to see myself as capable and good no matter how others mistreated me. I decided by letting go, I would not give up. I made a promise to myself to always be authentic.

    Life didn’t go as planned. I left Brandeis MAT program for teaching because I realized I didn’t want to be a high school English teacher anymore. It was the hardest decision of my life because I also did not have a backup plan.

    So, I surrendered again. And again and again through it all.

    I surrendered when I found other ways to help youth. I surrendered through a bipolar breakdown and a relapse to the hospital years later. I surrendered when I went on disability and all expectations of my life were changed. I surrendered through bad side effects to meds and awful doctors. I surrendered all through my life because I knew despite how hard things could be, I was still doing good. I was still helping others. I was still waking up each morning appreciating being alive.

    It came down to the simple things. I didn’t need certain labels or popularity. I needed to rest, to do nothing sometimes. To breathe. To just live.

    I saw myself as rising in my own ways.

    I realized I couldn’t look back. Here’s what I held onto instead:

    1. Finding Purpose

    When I let go of my need to control, I became more mindful. I started to think about how I wanted to spend my time. Was it for achievements or authenticity?

    I had nothing, so I had nothing to lose when I left Brandeis. Serendipitously, I had a branding internship the same time a brand manager of a large TV personality discovered me. The internship taught me how to manage my own image and ideas while the manager wanted to simply own me like a puppet master.

    I had a choice. I could live on my own terms or have someone take over my life. I turned down advances from this man. I wasn’t going to fall for the same red flags as I did with my ex-fiancé. I let go; I surrendered.

    I decided to make my own way and live authentically as a person, not a brand, sharing my story along the way. I used my mental health journey to help end stigma and my writing for sharing insights on life.

    I did not let walking away from the brand manager stop my story. Instead, I redefined it for myself. I was enough as I was. I didn’t need anyone to discover who I was meant to be. I would live my life for me.

    My purpose became in proving him wrong, that I could make it on my own. Then, it became for me, to show myself I was worth it. I focused on living in the moment and just following my passions without a plan. That’s what saved me. But it wasn’t the only thing.

    Purpose dawned on me one day while I was simply walking my dog through the woods in my backyard. I listened to birds chirping. I grounded myself by looking up at the blue sky. I touched the bark on the trees. I felt my inner voice beckoning me to love this life as it was, not as I wanted it to be. I didn’t have to do anything. I just had to be in this moment. That’s all life was asking of me.

    It took simplicity to make me realize my purpose wasn’t just a to-do list. It wasn’t fixing everything. It wasn’t mastering every skill. It wasn’t making things work when they wouldn’t.

    I had to separate myself from the “shoulds.” I had to find the gift in what I was going through. In taking the time to do nothing but think, far away from a stressful schedule, I realized that my purpose was to be happy without needing a reason to be. That took a different kind of bravery.

    2. Forgiveness

    I wasn’t able to move on from the injustices of my life very easily. I had anger in me from living under others’ control and abuse. I had loss, which I felt every day, etched into my skin. I knew what it was to be alone. I had settled too often and always saw the best in people.

    I grew up walking on eggshells surrounded by abusers. It was an endless pattern I stopped in my twenties. After my ex-fiancé left me, I found a new type of strength. I realized the only power anyone could ever have over me was the one I consented. No one could steal the core of who I was. No one could take certain things away. No one could define me but me.

    I took my power back through forgiveness. It didn’t happen right away. I meant “I love you” to my ex, but then I realized it was governed in fear. Fear of doing this life on my own.

    Sometimes life makes you continually face the very thing you’ve been avoiding. You keep getting redirected to it even as you resist. You find yourself with the same lessons you needed to learn before.

    There’s a quote that reads “You repeat what you don’t repair.” Well, I was there. I was back there constantly in my anger and hate of those who I thought stole something from me.

    But when I decided to forgive them, I released it. I gave it back to the universe and pulled my heart from the chaos. They didn’t deserve it. It wasn’t for them. It was for me. I had to let them go and surrender so I could heal myself. I forgave myself in the process, too, for not knowing enough, for not seeing the truth.

    My heart wanted to hold onto the anger so that I could do something with it. I soothed it, though, with self-compassion. I made meaning of the events of my life by helping others through similar things.

    That meant I had to say goodbye. Goodbye to those who didn’t know me enough to love me right. Goodbye to the me that was in survival mode and didn’t know I could just let go and live. Goodbye to the dark nights of the soul where I felt like giving up and suicidal ideations crossed my mind. Goodbye to the past. Goodbye to the insecurities. Goodbye to the pain. Goodbye to the worst of it all.

    And then I said it. “I forgive you.” I salvaged myself from the wreckage of the storms I had suffered. I pulled myself out of the ruins of an old life. I realized I was the one who decided my fate. I was the captain of my soul. I was finally free.

    3. The Reason

    I found my way by allowing myself to go on the detour. I realized that I was meant to go down the wrong road so I would be sure of the right one. My road was brilliant, one of authenticity, that uplifted me above all that I had gone through. I was able to look at my life and see what really mattered. I suddenly knew what I was here to do.

    I was here to share my gift. Any insight I could. To love.

    I started volunteering, writing, speaking to youth, and advocating for mental health awareness.

    I stopped living in the stigma of struggling and became open about my story.

    I surrendered to what was happening.

    I stopped fighting every little thing that came my way.

    I didn’t need to know what would happen with the lives I touched and the good things I did along the way. I just had to follow my path hoping others would follow it too, making it a little easier for someone else.

    All I had to do was surrender—be still, quiet my mind, allow rather than resist, let go, and find myself even when losing it all.

    Surrendering isn’t easy. In fact, it’s one of the hardest things we can do. That’s because we want control. But sometimes, surrendering is seeing uncertainty as beautiful. We don’t have to know what lies ahead in order to move forward.

    What will you do when you surrender, stop fighting reality, and allow yourself to live in your life as it is?

    Can you improve a situation, share a kindness, give to a greater cause, become a better you, and build a better world? Can you dream of doing such things? That is the first step to resilience. Focus on the beauty found in the broken situation and in you. Focus on the light you can bring into the darkness.

    It doesn’t take away from the horror of any hardship to believe in yourself and your ability to make change from it. That takes its own grieving time. But during that time, you can’t let it consume you. The tragedy that befell you, the heartbreak that happened, the hurt inside that you can’t let go… they are indeed senseless. Hence, it is imperative you don’t get stuck on asking why, as many do.

    Instead of viewing yourself as a victim, it’s time to be a victor. Overcome the odds. Let what hurts and irks you be the fuel to your fire.

    Hardships do not define us.

    What you have been through, your circumstances, do not define you.

    There will be days where you need to prioritize self-care and forgiveness for who you had to be to get to this point. Maybe you were white-knuckling through the pain in your self-care journey, maybe you did what you did in order to survive, but the good news is that today is a new day for you.

    Hold space for the sacred gift of simply being alive on those days.

    It works like a cycle. You will feel all the emotions on the spectrum, which means you will feel anger and sadness and doubt, but you will also feel joy and love and hope again the longer you hold on, the more patience you practice with yourself.

    A reason not for why this happened but why to go on will come to you.

    That reason is everything.

    When you want to give up, that’s when you say, “I surrender,” which isn’t the same thing. Giving up is shutting down. Surrendering is letting go.

    When you surrender, you don’t need things to work out a certain way. You accept life as it comes, which leads to a breakthrough. When you give up, you breakdown. Surrendering is the sacred step to realizing your full potential. It’s realizing you are your own hero, and you must not stop now.

    When you let go, you realize everything could change tomorrow. All it takes is choosing this very moment and living it. Mindfully surrendering is about releasing your fears and doubts so you can see clearly and letting the light come through.

    Don’t wait for life to change to create peace, joy, and purpose. Choose to make the best of what you have in your life, right now as it is. Surrender. Say the words, and it will change your life.

  • How to Create Happiness Outside of a Relationship and Enjoy More of Your Life

    How to Create Happiness Outside of a Relationship and Enjoy More of Your Life

    “Remember, being happy doesn’t mean you have it all. It simply means you’re thankful for all you have.” ~Unknown

    For many years I was single. But I wasn’t just a regular single, I was a miserable one.

    Rather than enjoying a time in my life when I didn’t have to care about anyone else but myself and using it to devote my full attention to my purpose and passions, I chose to ride the “woe is me” train.

    I would complain about being single daily and covet other women’s “luck” in dating. I would blame every guy I dated for “just not being ready,” or somehow else at fault.

    I didn’t realize I was the common denominator in all my failed relationship attempts.

    I was the one who chose to spend time with these men and ignore the big red flags that would crystalize themselves early on.

    Instead of taking time to patiently vet and reject men that were not good for me, I allowed my desperation to entertain any man that would show interest.

    My inability to find happiness outside of a relationship was ultimately what kept me single.

    The saying “you attract what you are” was true in my case. I was miserable single, so I kept attracting miserable relationships. 

    I continued down the same path until I decided that something needed to change.

    I realized that I had outsourced the job of making me happy to the many men that I dated.

    Their presence, their commitment, and their interest in me would determine how happy I was. Unfortunately, due to my questionable taste in romantic partners, that would often mean not so happy. So, I decided it was time to change that.

    That is when things started to shift, and I called in the life and love that I wanted. Here is what I did to find happiness outside of a relationship:

    Dealing with the Absence of a Relationship

    One thing I have learned is that in the absence of a romantic relationship I had to find fulfilling activities that made me happy.

    When you are single you have a lot of time. Time to think about everything you feel is missing.

    I would spend my evenings watching romantic movies on Hallmark wishing my life were like the plotline of the movie.

    And more often than not, all it did was make me more miserable. So, I decided to utilize that free time in the evening in a better way.

    I came up with a beautiful nighttime routine that included coloring, listening to music, and reading a book on spirituality or personal growth.

    I would fill the void with activities that filled me up.

    Same for the morning times. Instead of lying in bed and scrolling through Instagram until all I saw were couples and babies, I started running.

    Not only did I get into the best shape of my life because of it, but I also discovered a new passion for running and working out that quickly turned into a hobby I’m now passionate about.

    By dealing with the absence of a relationship head-on I found activities that made me happy.

    Dealing with the Sadness of Singleness

    The second thing I did to find happiness outside of a relationship was learn to deal with the sadness that singleness often brings with it.

    It’s no secret that being single can suck.

    No matter how often single people are made to believe that being single is a blessing, it can be hard to see it when that blessing seems to last forever.

    What I have learned is that rather than avoiding, suppressing, and denying the sadness, I had to learn to embrace it.

    I needed to allow the ebbs and flows to pan out accordingly. By deeply feeling the sadness and despair, I also enabled myself to feel the joy and excitement that followed after.

    Reminding yourself that no emotion lasts forever, and that you will eventually overcome it, is the light at the end of the tunnel that keeps you going.

    Therefore, you must make it a habit to tune into your inner well-being daily. Here are three ways I do it:

    1. Start your mornings with a meditation practice that centers you and puts you in tune with how you are really feeling.

    2. Start journaling your thoughts to better understand your fears and worries. You can commit a few minutes in the morning or evening to it.

    3. Commit to a daily gratitude exercise. Multiple times throughout the day, stop what you are doing and simply list three to five things you are grateful for. They can be as simple things as your home, furniture, or the body parts that serve you well.

    There are many different habits that you can choose from. The only thing that matters is that you create a safe space and routine that allows you to feel your emotions without judging them.

    This will help you deal with the sadness of singleness.

    Dealing with the Uncertainty of Dating

    The last thing I had to learn in order to find happiness outside of a relationship was how to navigate through the dating space without feeling burned out or discouraged.

    Dating nowadays feels like you are entering the twilight zone. With many different terms and stages describing the act of dating, many people are not sure what they are doing anymore.

    Are you dating, hanging out, hooking up, or maybe just “chilling”?

    If you don’t know, chances are you are stressed by the uncertainty. And that feeling of anxiety sucks.

    It’s a constant ride on a roller coaster of emotions controlled by the other person.

    So, how can you learn to deal with the uncertainty that dating oftentimes brings with it?

    The first step is to increase your self-esteem and remind yourself that your relationship status does not determine your worth.

    When a romantic relationship does not progress the way you want, you may feel discouraged and disappointed. These feelings are valid and should be honored; however, you have to remember that they are only feelings. That means they will pass.

    Instead, use affirmations to build yourself up daily and celebrate all your minor successes, the positive impact you have on the people around you, and how far you’ve come as a person. This will help you remember all the great qualities you bring to a relationship and will be a blessing to the person you are with in the future.

    The second step is to focus on the fun.

    In a world of billions of people, it may take some time to find the one person you would like to spend the rest of your life with, who happens to want the same.

    Uncertainty is part of the dating process. Rather than shying away from it, try to focus on the fun of dating. Meet people without any expectations and instead decide to just have a good time and enjoy their company.

    By doing that, you will naturally feel less anxious, because you are not trying to control your date’s experience, only your own.

    Because of today’s societal pressure to be boo’d up by a certain age, it can often feel depressing when you are not in a committed relationship. Which then leads to unhappiness.

    However, by taking matters into your own hands and deciding to create happiness for yourself, you allow yourself to experience life and live in the present moment.

  • Why We Need to Be Present to Enjoy Our Lives, Not Just Productive

    Why We Need to Be Present to Enjoy Our Lives, Not Just Productive

    “Presence is far more intricate and rewarding an art than productivity. Ours is a culture that measures our worth as human beings by our efficiency, our earnings, our ability to perform this or that. The cult of productivity has its place, but worshipping at its altar daily robs us of the very capacity for joy and wonder that makes life worth living.” ~Maria Popova

    I was high on productivity. I had one full-time job, two part-time jobs, and a side hustle. I was getting everything done. Sounds perfect, right?

    Then I started hating my life.

    I had read enough books and articles to tell me how I was not doing enough. Enough self-help gurus had told me that what I needed to do was max out every single hour I had to be minutely close to being “successful.”

    My co-workers often got intimidated by my jam-packed calendar. I don’t exaggerate when I say that every minute of my life was scheduled. Sheldon-level scheduled, with dedicated “bathroom breaks” and everything.

    I ran three to-do lists: daily, weekly, monthly. This was my way of setting out for maximum efficiency. I said “yes” to my boss so often I had become his favorite. Work-life balance, what’s that?

    Tasks were flying off my list like never before—so many horizontal breakthroughs! I wore this as my badge of honor for a while, this art of getting it all done. And why not? I was rewarded for it in money, praise, promotions, awe.

    But then it didn’t feel so great. Instead, I became downright miserable.

    Why Busyness-Productivity Is A Mirage

    I don’t claim that productivity is bad. Doing fulfilling work by minimizing distractions and getting deep focus is truly rewarding.

    But it is crucial to stop and question why you’re doing what you’re doing. It is necessary to pause and reflect on the value of your tasks and actions. Otherwise, productivity translates to useless busyness.

    When I became this productivity freak, I never stopped to ask if any of the things I was doing were giving my life meaning. I was doing a demanding full-time job that didn’t provide me any purpose. My days became a blur of mindless task completions. My mind, heart, and soul were absent from my work. Any given Monday didn’t look so different from a Tuesday three weeks prior.

    And it wasn’t even like I was happy.

    I was meeting all my deadlines, but I was spending no time with my family. There were enough accolades to prove all my achievements but not enough art to fulfill my soul. I answered every email I received within twenty-four hours, but I hardly focused on long-term self-growth.

    On the outside, my life never looked better. But on the inside, I was worse than I had ever been. Distraction, schedules, irritability, and deadlines were the monsters that ruled my life.

    After a month-long burnout, I hit the problem nail in the head. I knew I needed to move on. But how? I resolved to take a calculated leap of faith. I found a client willing to pay me for my freelancing services for at least two to three months and made a thick emergency fund by cutting out on expenses. Then, I quit the unfulfilling full-time job and gave my heart to work that I truly found meaning in. I stopped making productivity my goal. I opted to choose presence instead.

    Presence > Productivity

    I read Annie Dillard’s, The Writing Life, in which she memorably wrote, “how we spend our days, is of course, how we spend our lives.”

    After reading this book, I realized that productivity would only be fruitful when coupled with presence. I knew then that presence was what would make my rewards meaningful.

    What is presence? Presence is the art of being in the moment, the luxury of pausing, the virtue of stillness. It is being alert, aware, and alive to this moment.

    There’s a reason why our culture runs for productivity instead of presence. Productivity helps us shut away from reality. It keeps us “busy” into a future that is yet to manifest.

    It is so much easier and convenient to take the shield of productivity against the beautiful, buoyant, and sometimes disruptively painful present.

    Performing one task after next gives us an excuse to not fully live, not completely concentrate, not unbiasedly accept.

    I used to be that way—trying to avoid the truth that I was not finding my work meaningful. I wouldn’t accept that this job was emptying me slowly, living in denial of a reality I was living. Was I not getting things done? I was, more than ever before. But was I happy? I had never been more unhappy with my own choices.

    Being productive every minute of every day meant I could avoid the fact that many of my friendships were depleting, toxic, and unhealthy. I was lying to myself that it was all to have a good social life. In reality, I would go out of my way to avoid being alone, to avoid answering the big questions pertaining to my life that can only be answered in solitude.

    But coupling our actions with productivity and presence can have an astounding effect on our lives. It can make every task we do driven with intention, purpose, and meaning. Presence is what helps us reap the internal rewards that come with doing fulfilling work.

    Choosing Presence

    If you are anything like me, choosing presence over productivity can take some practice. Productivity was my normal mode of operation. It was easy; it came naturally. But opting for presence in my actions wasn’t so simple.

    The art of being present and intentional in all my tasks was like writing with my non-dominant left hand. I searched for help and stumbled upon Tim Ferris. He often says to think of your epitaph to cut through all the noise and maze of productivity. It is a way to find out what truly matters to you by getting a super-zoomed out version of your life.

    As morbid as it sounds, that is what I did. I imagined what I would like to carve on my epitaph, and the important stuff came into a laser-sharp focus:

    I needed to write. I needed to make time for solitude, for serendipity, for hobbies. I wanted to create more memories with my family. I wanted to let go of draining friendships and put all my energy into relationships that filled me with fulfillment, meaning, and growth. Taking it one step at a time, I decided to hand in my resignation. I landed my first writing gig in under two weeks.

    And hey, it’s not like I don’t struggle to write with my left hand anymore. But I am growing each day. It takes some practice and effort to make room in your calendar to “be present.” I am learning to be uncomfortable by turning the volume down of “getting things done.”

    I have noticed that it is the minor changes that count. It is taking a little more time to craft that email mindfully. It is that courageous “no” to a project that can help you surpass your quarterly KPIs but take away from your family time. It is choosing to take a soothing fifteen-minute walk break over checking off another mindless to-do list task.

    Presence is a process. It requires the discipline to focus on the present moment when productivity pushes you to see a non-existent future. Presence is your un-busy existence of utterly unadulterated joy. It is your creativity’s cradle. It is your time to just be.

    So do it. Make the hard choice. Live your life with presence to help you find joy in the now instead of pushing toward some destination in the future. None of us really know where the future will bring us, but we can all choose to enjoy the scenery along the way.

  • How 10 Minutes of Daily Meditation Can Calm Your Mind and Relax Your Body

    How 10 Minutes of Daily Meditation Can Calm Your Mind and Relax Your Body

    “Peace. It does not mean to be in a place where there is no noise, trouble or hard work. It means to be in the midst of these things and still be calm in your heart.” ~Unknown

    I began the morning with a meditation. After taking my dog out and brewing the coffee, I sat in my sunny living room, my little dog Frankie nestled beside me. I perched cross-legged, a blue pillow on my lap for warmth. I closed my eyes and began to focus on my breath.

    When ten minutes passed, I raised my hands in appreciation. “Thank you for this day. Thank you for my family and for our health. Give me strength, wisdom, and love.” Then I extended my hands forward, “So that I may give strength, wisdom, and love.” Finally, I stretched both arms out sideways, wiggling my fingers in my peripheral vision, a reminder to be fully aware. This is how I start every day.

    It wasn’t always this way. My older brother Marc tried to get me to meditate when I was fourteen. Although he was a patient teacher, I didn’t understand the point of the exercise.

    “Let’s sit together. Close your eyes and concentrate on your breath.”

    “Why do I have to do this?

    “Just sit, Lise. It’s good for you to learn. We will do it together.”

    “OK, but why?”

    Marc tried, but I resisted. I stopped meditating as soon as he went back to college.

    Years later, as part of my psychology training, I took classes which touted meditation as a stress-reducing technique. During the classes, there were demonstrations which I always enjoyed. I sat back, breathed deeply, and felt a deep flow of relaxation inside me. But, back home, I had no follow-through. Once the classes were over, so was my meditation.

    My breakthrough into daily meditation happened in 2020, one of the few good things that arose from that dreadful year. I was home, virtually every minute of my life. I didn’t have to dash from of the house, brave traffic, and arrive at the office by 9:00. Mornings stretched more languidly. It was easier to find those ten minutes to breathe every morning.

    Now I sit every day. I scan through my body, noting points of tension, areas of pain and pressure. Simple awareness of the tension shifts any pain, and my body settles.

    My mind, free from my constant to-do lists, drifts along, as if floating on the waves of a gentle sea. I hear the sounds of the house around me, the heater outside, working mightily to warm our home; Frankie the dog beside me, sighing. My stomach muscles unclench. I notice thoughts drifting in. I don’t attend to them. The thoughts fade away. Peace.

    Of course, that’s when meditation goes well. Sometimes every minute slogs on. My scalps itches. “I forgot to return that phone call,” I think, and my body tenses into high alert. “Oh no, I have to write that woman back!” My throat tightens. “What if that editor doesn’t like my submission?” My stomach jams into a knot. I cannot let these thoughts go. “I suck at meditation. Why can’t I just breathe? When will these ten minutes be over?”

    Sometimes meditation goes like this. It isn’t always peaceful, and it doesn’t always feel good. The key, I’m told, is to keep at it. Like any skill, the more we practice, the better we get at it. It is no accident that we say one “practices meditation.” I didn’t get decent at writing in one year either.

    If you are like the fourteen-year-old me, you might be asking, why meditate at all? There are so many benefits I don’t even know where to begin; here is a partial list. Meditation…

    • Soothes anxiety: When you learn to focus the mind, your thoughts don’t spin off into anxious “what-ifs,” spiraling into anxious ruminations.
    • Calms anger: Focusing on breathing calms the mind, stopping our internal tirades over people who have wronged us.
    • Improves the immune system: The body is not designed to be in a constant “fight or flight” mode. When we are tense, our immune system works poorly. When we relax, our immune system resumes its work.
    • Lowers blood pressure: Meditation is a proven technique for improving hypertension.
    • Manages emotional reactivity: This is a big one. It is easy for me, sensitive soul that I am, to feel hurt and wounded by other people. Meditation allows me to detach from the provocations of the moment, and to tap into inner peace. Once I have calmed myself, I find freedom from reacting emotionally. I can bring more thoughtfulness and wisdom to my relationships.

    Happily, the benefits of meditation extend past the ten minutes into the whole day.

    Now that I practice regularly, I notice when my shoulders leap to attention. With mindfulness, I can lower those shoulders down.

    I notice when my stomach tenses up, and I can breathe that tension away.

    I notice when my mind anxiously swirls around my to-do list and I can tell my mind to relax.

    The awareness that comes from a regular ten-minute mediation follows me throughout my day, helping me stay calmer and more serene.

    A while ago, I was getting ready for a radio interview, as part of my recent book promotion. I had an hour to spare, and I thought I’d make a quick phone call to an insurance company.

    This “quick” phone call dragged into an infuriating forty minutes. I was on hold, listening to inane music, on some incessant torture loop. Finally, the customer service rep came on, but we had with a terrible connection. I could barely hear her, as she was undoubtedly on another continent, and I couldn’t understand her either.

    After a brief exchange, which I barely fathomed, she declared she couldn’t help me. I got off the phone in disgust.

    “I’m so aggravated! I just wasted an hour on the phone with this stupid company and now I have an interview in fifteen minutes. What a colossal waste of time! I have this radio interview and I am so upset I can barely think!”

    My husband gazed at me. “Why don’t you do your meditation thing?”

    I glared at him. I really just wanted to righteously complain. But my husband was right; I was a wreck.

    I sat in my bedroom and closed my eyes, focusing on my breath. Immediately I sensed my body’s distress. My heart rate was elevated. I breathed rapidly. My shoulders were raised and my stomach was in spasm.

    “My god,” I thought. “My body is completely dysregulated, all from one stupid phone call.”

    Quietly, I focused. I felt my muscles relaxing and my heart rate slowing. I ended the meditation, feeling like a different woman, and started the interview with a smile on my face.

    That is the power of a regular ten-minute meditation practice.

    Let’s be clear. Everyone, no matter how busy, has ten minutes to spare. You can do this, and build yourself a calmer, more peaceful life, in a healthier body.

    One final tip: it is best to find a regular time of day for your meditation practice. Do your breathing every morning, or every bedtime, or every evening after work. Otherwise, you will keep putting it off until later. If you are like me, you might even put it off for forty years.

  • 10 Things to Do When You Feel Sad, Hopeless, and Defeated

    10 Things to Do When You Feel Sad, Hopeless, and Defeated

    “Rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.” ~J.K. Rowling

    I’m no stranger to feeling hopeless and defeated. After many failed relationships, physical, sexual and emotional abuse my entire life, two bankruptcies, and the recent loss of my online business (October 2020), you could say I’ve been through enough to last two lifetimes.

    I’ll admit, there were many times I wanted it all to end. There were many days I just didn’t know how much more I could handle. My recent loss has devastated me beyond words. Everything I’ve worked so hard for in the last three years has completely been obliterated. I’m numb and feel defeated almost every day.

    At fifty-eight years old, starting over doesn’t interest me, but I have no choice. I know what to expect. I’ve been here before. It’s ugly, messy, frustrating, stressful, and exhausting. Every day I wake up I don’t really feel like getting to the computer to work.

    I don’t really feel like doing anything, to be honest, but lay in bed and cry. I go through serious waves of anxiety throughout the day. They hit me fast, hard, and without warning. I want to throw up. I want to curl up in a ball and die. I want someone to tell me this is all a bad dream and tomorrow things will be back to normal.

    None of that happens. And I force myself to get to work and start a new day.

    Your Struggles and Pain Are Real

    Pain is pain, chaos is chaos. No matter what it looks like to you. Never let anyone tell you your feelings are ridiculous. Don’t ever think that you’re overreacting. What your feeling is real, and you need to honor your emotions, feel all the feels. Just don’t stay there. The longer you stay down, the harder it is to get back up.

    Here are ten things to do when you are feeling defeated, hopeless, helpless, and sad—all things that have helped me, that I hope help you too.

    1. Cry your eyes out.

    Too many of us hold back our tears because we think it’s a sign of weakness. It is absolutely not, and it’s almost mandatory to get those tears out. Go back to the last time you had a good cry fest and try to remember how you felt afterward. I’m guessing you felt like a ton of bricks was just lifted off your shoulders.

    Crying is very therapeutic. Do it. As often as you have to. Scream and cry into a pillow if you have to but get those tears out.

    2. Call a friend.

    While this almost sounds too simple, most don’t even think about doing this either because they don’t want to burden their friends, or because they’re too stuck on their problems to consider talking about something else.

    Pick one person you absolutely love talking to and just chat your cute little face off. You can talk about your problem if you think it will help, or you can use this as an opportunity to get your mind off of things. Just talk!! About anything, everything, silly things and nothing.

    I remember the day my business crashed, and I was so angry and upset but also embarrassed because I didn’t want anyone to know what happened to me and that my business was gone. After a week I decided to call one of my dear friends, and not only was he great at comforting me but also reassuring me that things were going to be okay. It was such a huge relief to get this confirmation from a friend.

    Sometimes we need to hear comforting words!

    3. Volunteer.

    I tell everyone this. If you’re sad, go volunteer. Like right now. You can’t even imagine the power behind helping someone or something (aka furry critters) in need. Your heart fills up and then explodes, you cry happy tears, and it honestly just gives you so much joy.

    Find an organization that resonates with you and call them. Go spend an hour a week there. This will soon become your happy place and something you will look forward to every week.

    4. Write yourself a love letter.

    I’ll be honest, I haven’t written one in a while, but I think it’s time.

    A love letter to yourself is so powerful and therapeutic. In this letter you tell yourself all the amazing and awesome things about yourself. You list all the reasons you shouldn’t feel like a loser. You tell yourself to brush off your bum and pick yourself back up again.

    You can go on and on about how wonderfully amazing you are. Write out all the things you love about yourself and all your radiant and redeeming qualities.

    Now before you say, “Oh, I don’t love anything about myself,” stop right there.

    Go look in the mirror right now. I bet you have the most beautiful eyes and the most sweet smile ever. Or maybe you are a feisty, determined person. Or maybe you have a heart of gold! I bet there are a million awesome things about you. Find them and write about them.

    5. Put on some loud music and sing and dance.

    Oh yeah. Choose the loudest, thrashiest music you have (and love) and crank up the stereo. Or maybe you love country or jazz or whatever! Turn it up and rip off the knob. Dance, sing, jump around your house like a silly fool.

    Sometimes when I’m feeling down, I put on the saddest music with the hardest hitting lyrics, sing loud, cry my heart out, and remarkably afterward I feel a million times better!!

    Let loose and lose all your cares and woes in your favorite music. You’re gonna feel amazing, you’ll even get a little workout in, and your adrenaline will be pumped up a wee bit, so you’ll maybe even feel unstoppable! Go you!

    6. Go for a walk.

    Another simple thing to do that we often overlook. For many of us, when we’re feeling really sad, we don’t want to get dressed and go out. We want to stay inside and cry and eat junk food (more on that later), but you can’t stay there forever.

    You have to get yourself out of your dark place. You have to take action steps (pardon the pun) to move forward and be happy again.

    Get your shoes on and get outside. You never know who you’re going to run into or what kind of super cool things can happen to you. Be open to surprises and chance meetings. Or maybe you’ll just find and see little things that bring a smile to your face.

    7. Watch funny movies and eat junk food.

    Yes, I said it. Eat junk food, aka comfort food. They call it comfort food for a reason. Because that’s exactly what it does. And yes, I get that we may have a teeny sore belly in the morning, all depending on how much comfort food you consumed the night before, but really, chocolate and chips and donuts and cake really do the soul good.

    A small word of warning here, though: Only do this if you can let yourself enjoy eating and aren’t mindlessly binging to numb your feelings, and please don’t make this a daily habit. We all know eating junk food is bad for us. It’s a nice quick fix on a really sad day but not something you should do all the time. Remember, life is all about balance too. That includes your eating habits.

    So find your fave movies—I usually opt for funny ones or super action thrillers—and lose yourself in it. Forget your cares and woes even if only for two hours or so and let yourself indulge a little.

    8. Write a truth letter.

    Yes, I love writing letters. It’s the best therapy out there, I swear! Much like a love letter to yourself, a truth letter is a letter you will write to someone or something that is causing you grief and sorrow.

    This is where you get to write out all your anger, all your hurt; every damn emotion you feel about this person/thing, get it all out! I know some people who have written truth letters that were thirty pages long. You write until you can’t write anymore!

    This is something you can do every time you have hateful or angry thoughts about this person or thing. Eventually the thoughts won’t show up so often.

    9. Set a timer.

    We already know we can’t stay in this sad dark place for too long, or it will consume us. After a few weeks of feeling like this set a timer for fifteen minutes, twice a day. In this time slot, feel angry, sad, cry, scream, or do whatever else you have to do, but when the timer is up try to compose yourself and shift your attention elsewhere—on your work, a hobby, helping a friend, anything other than your own problems.

    Negative thoughts will arise outside of your time slot. But remember, you can choose whether or not to engage with them. You always have a choice to let your thoughts pass without getting caught up in your mental stories. That’s up to you to do.

    Yes, this is hard to do, but the benefit is that you are allowing yourself time to grieve without allowing your grief to totally consume you and dominate your days.

    10. Have a ‘me’ day.

    Even if you can’t take the whole day, try to take at least a few hours to pamper yourself. Get a manicure or pedicure or do one for yourself at home. Get your hair done, take yourself out on a date. Do something you enjoy, something that gets you into a state of flow.

    Whatever it is that you do, do it in honor of yourself and how amazing you are. Take this time to love yourself, as hard as that may be, and just be present with you and only you.

    —

    As I go through my difficult time, I keep telling myself that this is temporary, I’m gonna be okay, and to keep the faith. I believe everything always works out in the end, exactly the way it’s supposed to, whether we understand it or not, and this brings me comfort.

    But don’t deny your emotions.

    I think the most important thing to remember is that you must honor and feel your feelings, but you can’t stay there. It’s important to take steps to get back to your ‘normal,’ whatever that looks like for you, or to accept that it’s time to create a new normal.

    Baby steps are better than no steps at all. Do one or two little things every day and before you know it, you’ll be smiling and feeling better about yourself and life again.

    You got this, babe!

  • The 6 Personalities of People-Pleasing and How I Overcame Them

    The 6 Personalities of People-Pleasing and How I Overcame Them

    “The truth is, you’re never going to be able to please everybody, so stop trying. Remember, the sun is going to continue shining even if some people get annoyed by its light shining in their eyes. You have full permission to shine on.” ~Unknown

    I used to be a rebel. I was the girl at the party who would waltz into a room and have everyone in awe, their attention and curiosity caught by my presence. I felt it, they felt it, it was magnetic. I loved it—I had become the girl I wanted to be.

    That was until one night at a party, while I was making a batch of popcorn in the kitchen, someone came up to me and asked, “Why do you need to prove yourself all the time?”

    This question caught me so off guard. I was instantly confused. I was staring into space trying to figure out how I was proving myself all the time. So, I asked exactly how I was doing this.

    It turned out that when someone shared a story about themselves, I would share one of my own, and it came across as bigger and better. This person went on to tell me, “Actually, no one likes it, and it’s totally not necessary to win over your friends.”

    Holy moly. My blood started pumping faster through my veins, my face was burning up, my gut was wrenching at the thought of these people who I called friends not liking me. I thought I had finally found my community of like-minded souls.

    In this exact moment, I made the biggest decision of my life.

    It was time to squash down who I was, again. You see, I was in my mid-twenties, and I finally felt free from my childhood patterns. I was confident. I had friends. I could finally be me—who I was without the filter.

    They needed a toned-down version of me.

    So, I began to hide.

    I would sit in the corner or behind someone else. I wouldn’t share stories of my life adventures. I stopped dressing to impress. I apologized for silly things, and I watched every move I made around these people. It was exhausting, but the fear of them not liking me was crippling.

    Over the years I perfected these new behaviors of how to not be “too much” for the people around me. I went from being a wild, carefree soul to someone who was filled with anxiety in every social scenario.

    These new patterns overflowed into my work, family, relationships, and friendships. I became oversensitive, reactive, and uncomfortable to be around.

    After a decade of self-punishment, I was on a call with someone who I was working with, and they called me out for apologizing for not getting something right, even though it was the first time I had tried what they were teaching.

    Then the words that flew out of my mouth were: I did it again.

    Seriously, here I was, thinking I had it all figured out. I had adapted my behaviors, beliefs, patterns, and values to get through life, all in order to please other people. This was the slap on the face that I needed.

    So, I went on a deep soul journey that involved journaling daily. I took a real good look at myself and what I had created in my life. I began evaluating friendships, my work, the people in my day-to-day life, my family, and my environment.

    I had created a reality where I was no longer happy.

    My life revolved around everyone else’s needs, and I placed them before my own. I had become so aware of people’s energy, reactions, body language, and tone that I felt like I was suffocating.

    And for what?

    To not have friends, to not have people like me, to sacrifice my life for others.

    From that moment forward, I chose me.

    In order to do that, I needed to recognize how I’d formerly denied myself and my feelings so I could become aware of when I was tempted to fall into old patterns.

    Let me share with you the six personality types I lived through for a decade, how they play out in our daily lives, and how I overcame them.

    The Six People-Pleasing Personality Types

    The Approval Seeker

    When I was living in approval-seeking mode, my actions were geared toward praise. I would do anything to be the best employee in my jobs, from working overtime to taking on extra responsibility. I would play by the rules when it came to my family. I would make an effort to be noticed by my friends, all while chasing that sense of belonging.

    Praise was the fuel that kept me going. It reinforced the things I was doing right.

    The remedy to being an approval seeker is self trust, owning my values and my beliefs instead of looking for external validation. I simply started by questioning my motives in my actions.

    If I suspected I was doing something solely or primarily to receive approval, I asked myself, “Would I make this choice if I were being true and fair to myself?”

    The Busy Bee

    As a busy mumma of two, wife, business owner, sister, daughter, and friend, there was a time when I thought I had to keep it all together for everyone around me. I was the person who organized all the parties, Christmas dinners, birthday celebrations, family get-togethers, kids’ school activities, groceries, holidays, and anything else you can think of.

    The people around me saw me as dependable and organized, and they knew that I would do any task to help out. Of course without any fuss because I was being of service to the ones I loved.

    After I spotted a yoga class I really wanted to attend and realized I needed to make time in my schedule, I started to review my weekly routine. I realized I didn’t have to be everything for everyone at all times, which was hard to accept since “acts of service” is one of my love languages. But I knew being less busy was an act of kindness and love for myself.

    The Conflict Avoider

    When people raise their voice or assert their authority to me, I tend to crumble. It looks like I am still standing there, but in my mind, I’m in the fetal position on the floor.

    Speaking up for what I believe in is sometimes easy when I am fueled by passion for topics I love, but there are a few people in my life who turn me back into the conflict avoider in a second.

    In tense situations with these people, I often observe what is about to play out and create an exit strategy. I ask myself, “What do I need to do? Who do I need to be? What do I need to say to get me out of here?”

    When I recognize I’m doing this, I now take a few breaths to ground myself before leaning into the discomfort I’m feeling. I consider how I can stay true to my values and respond in a way that opens the space for discussion.

    The Self-Sacrificer

    This is the most common form of people-pleasing because it’s driven by love. It happens with our nearest and dearest.

    I once had a boyfriend who was into punk music, and slowly, over time, while dating him, I turned into a punk chic. I listened to his music, I wore all black, I tore up my clothes, and I went from blonde to black hair. I would have done anything for his love.

    Self-sacrificing is when we put others’ needs ahead of our own, fitting in with their agendas and adapting to them, yet in this process we lose small pieces of ourselves.

    It’s a personal crime when this happens because it takes years to rediscover all the things we once loved.

    Experimenting is the cure to finding that feeling of pure happiness we once held. I took belly dancing and various yoga classes, went for walks in different places, and challenged myself to try new and old things to see if they lit me up. I also reminded myself that I don’t need to sacrifice my interests and needs for anyone else because, if they truly love me, they’ll want me to honor those things.

    The Apologizer

    Sorry! Oops, sorry. Oh yes, I would apologize for everything from accidentally bumping into someone at the grocery store to taking a long time getting drinks at a bar.

    I eventually realized I apologized all the time because I believed I was at fault in each situation—not just super observant and sensitive to other people, as I’d formerly believed. I blamed myself for all kinds of things, from meeting my needs to taking up space.

    One day I decided to walk the busy city streets with my head held high, no more side-stepping to get out of other people’s way or apologizing for almost bumping into them. I bit my tongue and simply reminded myself that it is okay to have my own agenda, I am not to blame for things that are out of my control, and I have a voice.

    The Sensitive Soul

    Often, I would guard myself against the world, even though I wanted to trust it, because I had a hard time creating emotional boundaries. The word “should” always hung over my head—I should always be available, I should be able to listen whenever someone needs me. But this took a huge toll.

    Everyone would come to me to share their story, offload their junk, and then move on, leaving me with a negative energy load. I would push down my feelings and pretend everything was okay. Also, I felt like I couldn’t share my story with others because they were in a bad mood, feeling sad, or the timing wasn’t right. I was a doormat.

    I needed to address my conditioning in order to stop taking on other people’s problems. Why did my feelings come second to others’? Why were their stories more important than mine? I discovered that I had been putting others on a pedestal and that I needed to dig deep into the “shoulds” and start tackling them one at a time until I was able to speak up and set limits.

    —

    I started people-pleasing because someone told me I was always trying to prove myself, but ironically, that’s what people-pleasing is—trying to prove you’re a good person by doing all the right things so no one will be upset or disappointed. Ultimately, though, we end up disappointing ourselves.

    Since I’ve started challenging these personalities, I’ve slowly offset my need to please. It hasn’t been easy, but I’m now a lot closer to the person I used to be—someone who likes who she is and has nothing to prove to anyone.

    Do any of these personalities sound familiar to you? And how are you going to tackle it?

  • Congruent Depression: What It Is and How to Overcome It

    Congruent Depression: What It Is and How to Overcome It

    “Not all of the depression that people experience is an illness… Unlike clinical depression, congruent depression is actually appropriate to your situation.” ~Dr. K

    ​Every day is the same. Every day I’m stiff. Every day I’m tired. These are the two main things that people with fibromyalgia deal with. It’s been like that for a couple of years now. Six to be exact.

    I’ve faced so much hardship all at one time: no job, no income, no friends, dealing with an emotionally immature/narcissistic mother, and not living where I want to live. All of this is making me sleep poorly.

    It’s all been chaotic and stressful and hasn’t helped my fibro or been helpful since discovering my highly sensitive personality trait a year and a half ago.

    I read that when you have fibro, you’re often depressed. However, anyone would feel mentally down in the dumps if they experienced these painful sensations all the time. Then for a little while, I started to believe that maybe I ​was​ truly depressed. I met all the criteria, after all.

    So I hopped onto the free listener service, 7 Cups. I’ve been using it for almost two months, and it’s helped me somewhat. It‘s good to have somewhere safe to vent, to feel heard and validated. It’s also nice to know someone is actively listening to what you’re saying. Still, despite this intervention I’ve had days where I’ve felt down.

    However, today, the clouds parted.

    I watched a video on YouTube by Dr. K on congruent depression.

    It’s a type of affective depression that occurs​:

    -When you’re in circumstances that you can’t control or have little control over

    -When you have no fulfilling purpose

    -When something is lacking from your life

    This type of depression is actually normal. You’re experiencing a very human reaction to a slew of negative situations that you feel you have no power over. It is your body telling you that something needs to change.

    It can also happen if you feel you have no direction, or the paths you’ve taken have always led to bad outcomes.

    ​Congruent depression can be remedied if one does the following​:

    1. Find purpose of some kind.

    Life purpose is complex nowadays, and our brains haven’t caught up. There’s very little physical labor needed to survive. Most of us don’t have to chop wood, work in fields, or trudge back and forth to a well, and I’m pretty sure no one rides horses on dirt roads. It’s harder to find true purpose when you don’t really need to do anything because everything is done by a machine.

    But we can still find purpose by working on something that matters to us personally, fighting for causes that we believe in, finding ways to help other people, and pursuing our interests and passions.

    2. Connect with people (to deflect loneliness).

    As humans, we are wired to be social/connect, but our modern digital world doesn’t help with this. We’re the most connected we could have ever possibly imagined, yet we are very disconnected. I believe this, aside from social media, is also another factor in the increasing rates of suicide.

    We need to connect with friends and family—face to face. And we need to really be present with them, honest with them, and open to their honest feelings so we can connect on a deeper level. When we can’t connect face to face, virtual connecting works just fine, so long as physical distance doesn’t turn into emotional distance. This is why I’m trying to post more to social media—so I can genuinely connect with people and feel less alienated.

    3. Find some way to deal with mind-numbing boredom (that doesn’t involve gaming, binge watching, social media, etc.).

    Our leisure activities in the hyper-digital age are all about consumption, not creation. There’s less painting, playing instruments, working with our hands—the kind of things that bring pleasure and joy to the person and society at large.

    Find a hobby that you can immerse yourself in, something physically engaging and maybe even creative—something that will get you out of your head and into a state of flow.

    4. Address the issues that contribute to your feeling of helplessness.

    Re-locate, find another job, or break off toxic relationships, if these things are contributing to your depression. None of these things are easy, but just taking steps to create positive change can help you feel empowered and more in control of your life.

    I’m actually considering moving at some point, pending COVID updates and my health, because I know this would go a long way toward improving my state of mind.

    5. Focus on self-discovery/self-help.

    Uncover your past traumas and commit yourself to healing. Work on identifying and overcoming limiting beliefs. Discover how you’re sabotaging yourself or holding yourself back so you can get past the blocks that keep you stuck.

    It’s only by learning about oneself, without the input of others prejudices or judgments, that one can find peace and happiness.

    *Self-help resources are free and plentiful nowadays. There are eBooks, podcasts, YouTube channels, blogs, websites, and Facebook groups to help with your personal development. You can also use astrology, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, and the enneagram to get a better look at yourself on an individual level. I personally have been using astrology and tarot to understand myself and have found both very helpful, and I’m loving the book Becoming Bulletproof by Evy Poumpouras.

    You can take all the prescriptions you want, do all the therapy there is out there, but for many, these are costly, time-consuming Band-Aids. They are not fixing what’s actually wrong—the drudgery of working a dead-end job you hate, the pain of staying with an abusive spouse, etc.

    That’s not to say taking medication or doing therapy is wrong. However, if you’re doing therapy and taking medication and nothing seems to improve, then you need to do more. You have to make actual changes in relationships, jobs, and lifestyles, to really feel different.

    Medication and therapies are simply aids to help you regain a better footing in the physiological and psychological sense. The rest is truly up to you.

  • What Happened When I Stopped Drinking Alcohol Every Night

    What Happened When I Stopped Drinking Alcohol Every Night

    “First you take a drink, then the drink takes a drink, then the drink takes you.” ~F. Scott Fitzgerald

    I love Sophia Loren. There’s a picture of her in my home looking eternally youthful and refreshed. From what I’ve been told, it’s due to her nine to ten hours of sleep each night.

    When I look at this picture, I see someone who revels in the delights of life. Food, laughter, sex, work, motherhood, and self-care. Not long ago I stared at that picture thinking, “How could I admire someone so much and live my life in such a different way from hers?”

    Have you heard of the halo effect? It’s when you do the things you know are right for your body, mind, and spirit, and in doing so you begin to exude this powerfully beautiful and enticing energy others can’t get enough of. I now realize my relationship with the daily habit of alcohol was actually diminishing the glow of my halo. It was essentially stealing my joy, time, money, looks, well-being, and especially my slumber.

    Who knew that for so long my beauty sleep was being hijacked by alcohol!

    Puffy face, dark circles, dry mouth, red eyes, weight gain, and not to mention the headache, elevated heartbeat, anxiety… these are just a few of the lovely side effects I experienced with overindulging in the bottle.

    In trying to reduce overwhelm, I inadvertently was fueling it through interrupted sleep and the fuzzy feeling the following day. 

    Do I think alcohol is bad or that drinking is off-limits? No.

    I do know for myself that the daily two, sometimes three, glasses of wine took a toll. It stole any type of focus and motivation the next day to follow through on all the things I said I would accomplish the night before, basking in the embrace of my main squeeze, Mr. P (Pinot Noir, that is.)

    My relationship with alcohol was stealing my ability to step into the life I claimed to desire.

    I wanted to release weight.

    I wanted to make more money.

    I wanted to write my book.

    Until I released the hold Mr. P had on me, I knew deep down I would never come close to achieving any of those dreams.

    Every morning I wake up and ask myself three things:

    1. How do I want to feel today?
    2. What is one thing I can do to love myself today?
    3. What can I give to others today?

    My answer to #2 was often…

    “Drink more water.”

    “Start weight training.”

    “Let go of gluten.”

    The truth was the one true voice within was quietly and patiently saying day after day, “Take a break from alcohol.”

    I just wasn’t ready to listen.

    A phone call eventually prompted an experiment in courage.

    For ninety days I promised a friend I would join her on an alcohol reset. After I hung up that fateful Sunday, I went to the calendar to mark the ninetieth day. Immediately fear crept in with thoughts like “You’ve tried this before, and it didn’t work” and “You won’t even make it through tonight.”

    Fortunately, in that moment, something other than myself took over. It was as if I was whisked into something beyond my own comprehension, because the next 120 days flew by. In fact, after day twenty-one I stopped counting. I no longer was ticking off the calendar to when I could finally have a drink. Why? Probably because I knew in my heart the steady drip of wine each night was simply not serving me, my purpose, my body, or my pocketbook.

    Why was this time different? Because I looked at it as something I “got” to do rather than “had” to do. I viewed it as a gift rather than a cleanse.

    What is on the other side of a toxic relationship with alcohol? More than I could imagine. Every morning I wake up and think, “I am so lucky.” It’s as though I’ve captured more time in my day, and each moment holds a sense of sacredness.

    I’ve seen sunrises by candlelight, baked banana bread before bed, and gotten more done by 8am than I ever did after 5pm.

    I’ve finished a Netflix show without falling asleep… and actually remembered what I watched.

    I’ve released twenty pounds.

    I wake up hydrated.

    My skin seems to have reversed in time a la Benjamin Button.

    The list goes on and on.

    The other day my mother gave me a compliment that made me cry… in a good way.

    She said, “You know, it’s like your skin, your hair… you look like you used to look when you were younger.”

    For so long I was using wine to push down the unwanted feelings of anxiety and overwhelm. While I thought I was “taking the edge off,” I was actually making myself edgy!

    These days, I plan my fun based on how I want to feel the next morning. What I’ve discovered is that taking a break from happy hour can literally transform not only the other twenty-four hours of your day but your life as well.

    When you have enough energy and vitality to embrace the day, you start to find little miracles everywhere in the form of simple pleasures, a pleasant conversation with a friend, or a moment that might have sent you into a tailspin… but now you breathe through it with patience and grace.

    People often ask me, “Do you ever have a glass of wine… ever?”

    Probably every two weeks or so if I am being social (and socially distancing) with family or friends. Do I enjoy it? Yes and no. In fact, the few times I have had a glass or two, it no longer held any energy for me. It’s now a “take it or leave it” kind of thing.

    In fact, it’s as if moderation moves you toward abstinence.

    Why? Because I am no longer willing to sacrifice how good I feel the next morning for alcohol.

    I also revel in the reduction of anxiety! Why would I want to go back to something that was creating the exact experience that was causing me to emotionally suffer?

    Yes, there are people who can drink daily and function fine, and there are those who can’t drink at all. And then there are people like me who know alcohol isn’t the kind of friend they want to hang out with every day but perhaps in very small doses every so often.

    Drinking is marketed as sexy, elegant, and unifying.

    Is slurring your words sexy? Is stumbling out of a restaurant elegant? Is not remembering the conversation you had with a friend unifying?

    The reality for me was alcohol made me feel drained, grumpy, and even a wee bit nauseous. How you feel is creating your day and, in essence, your life. So, if you feel cluttered and haphazard waking up, you are creating a cluttered and haphazard day. 

    I used to wake up and run to the kitchen. Waiting for me was the one thing that would decide if I needed to beat myself up or pat myself on the back. Like the scale, the opened bottle of wine oftentimes determined if I was “good” or “bad” the previous day.

    Only one-fourth of the bottle left? Bad girl!

    Three-quarters left? Good girl!

    So much time, energy, and thinking put into the act of drinking!

    In the end, bedtime is the best of all.

    Four hours of alcohol-free sleep is WAY more rejuvenating than nine hours of alcohol-infused sleep. Waking up feeling your body buzzing (in a good way!) is the best high of all.

    If your inner voice is asking for a break, maybe it’s time to listen.

    Sweet dreams.

  • 20 Powerful Self-Care Quotes to Help You Feel and Be Your Best

    20 Powerful Self-Care Quotes to Help You Feel and Be Your Best

    Hi friends! I decided over this long holiday weekend to give myself a break for some much-needed self-care, which I imagine we could all use right now.

    We’ve all been pushed, stretched, and challenged this year. We’ve all given our all, done our best, and perhaps wondered at times if it was good enough.

    That’s the thing about difficult times—we often make them so much harder by expecting a lot from ourselves, pushing ourselves, and beating ourselves up when we fall short.

    We expect ourselves to always be happy. Or productive. Or confident. Or present. Or there for other people.

    We expect ourselves to always be at the top of the game even if we sometimes put ourselves at the bottom of our priority list.

    But we can’t possibly be all of these things all the time, because we’re not perfect, we’re human. And to be human is to be messy, inconsistent, and full of contradictions. To have days when we knock it out of the park and days when we stare at the park from our window. In pajamas. With chocolate stains. If we even make it to the window at all.

    If you can relate to any of what I wrote above—if you hold yourself to a ridiculously high standard, push yourself to the point of exhaustion, or drain yourself trying to be everything for everyone—take a few minutes to reflect upon these twenty self-care quotes. Read them, absorb them, carry them into your day. Because you deserve a break. And you need it to feel and be your best.

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  • How to Be Successfully Content with Your Life

    How to Be Successfully Content with Your Life

    “Success is liking yourself, liking what you do, and liking how you do it.” ~Maya Angelou

    Color within the lines. Math, physics and chemistry—there’s absolutely no point in taking drama. A main meal of straight A’s and a side order of volunteer work. A four-year degree with a “safe” major from a reputable college. Then comes the corner cubicle career at a listed company. What about the four-bedroom house and the annual holidays abroad? We can’t possibly forget about those things

    All through life, from infancy to adulthood, we are told what it means to be successful. We are given a textbook definition, based purely on societal constructs that have existed for far too long without critical questioning, and then expected to attain this success without any consideration given to individualism—a core characteristic of what it means to be human.

    Not so long ago, I would have happily been the poster child for a successful young adult who was on a clear trajectory toward even more success.

    I colored only in my coloring book in a demure manner, using colors that were realistic and often leaving some of the more obscure colors completely untouched, while my younger brother scribbled unhinged and feverishly on just about every reachable surface with absolutely all the colors in his crayon box.

    When I got to high school, I swapped writing and performing in plays for physics and chemistry because I needed something more credible for my college applications. I was rewarded for this choice by being accepted into one of the most revered schools in the country, while some of my peers failed to even graduate from high school.

    And so, I continued with this mindset into university where I spent countless all-nighters studying in lieu of socializing and well, to be quite honest, actually living my life.

    I distinctly remember one night in particular when an old love interest called me up to say that he’d like nothing more than to pick me up and take me out just like he’d done dozens of times before.

    I recall heartily laughing at his admission mostly because of that fact that he’d recently moved across the country. I also vividly recall his excitement as he explained that he was on a surprise trip back in the city. The excitement, however, was short-lived as I insisted on staying indoors to study for a test and in doing so rejected what was one of the most grand and sincerest gestures that has ever been extended to me.

    Once again, my one-track minded behavior was rewarded, and I graduated summa cum laude.

    I entered the workforce with the same vigor and intention to excel that I’d now been wholly ingrained with. I worked long hours, traveled extensively, and missed out on everything from birthdays to bachelorettes. The most horrifying part was that I barely felt a shred of remorse because—you guessed it—my absenteeism was rewarded with more perks and more promotions.

    Everything was going swimmingly. According to my bank account, my LinkedIn profile, and the suburb I lived in, I was successful. And just think, there was even more yet to come.

    Now, I don’t know if you’ve ever been thrown a curveball, but it’s something completely and utterly unexpected. One day you’re casually walking down the street, daydreaming about the perfect outfit for tomorrow’s not at all planned “run-in” with the office building cutie, when a tiny unknown object flies straight into your eye leaving you with the distinct feeling that you’re going to be left permanently blind.

    If you think that this sounds a little too detailed in description to be just a vague and random example, you’re right. Unfortunately, this is exactly what happened to me one bright and sunny spring day on my way back to the office from a quick lunch.

    What I remember most was not so much the excruciating pain but the fear of what was going to happen to my eye as an endless stream of tears cascaded down my face. I walked briskly into the bathroom and tried my best to wash out any debris that may have been the source of my painful discomfort and profound anxiety.

    I looked up at the mirror and anxiously inspected my eye. Never mind bloodshot and red, my eye was an almond-shaped pool of scarlet with absolutely no remnants of any white sclera. No matter what I did, the tears just wouldn’t stop.

    Never one to be a loud alarmist, I made my way into the office and calmly informed my co-workers of what my innocent casual stroll down the road had resulted in. Expecting a rush of panic and swift assistance, I was instead met with questions around my month-end numbers that were needed to compile the final monthly report. Not even the gesture of fetching the first-aid kit which I knew was stowed in a nearby filing cabinet had been made.

    As fiercely independent as I am, throughout my life I have always been, and gratefully still am, surrounded by exceptionally caring friends and family who have always readily come to my aid when the situation demanded it. I was, therefore, seriously shell-shocked by my co-workers’ demeanor of being blatantly unbothered by my medical emergency.

    After the stunned realization had passed, I provided my month-end numbers, grabbed my car keys and announced that I’d be leaving to seek medical attention. I was still deathly scared, but I knew that it was solely up to me to remedy this awful situation.

    I was, thankfully, able to find a nearby medical center, and I hastily made my way into the emergency room. Compared to the cold reception of my coworkers, the staff at the medical center were an absolute Godsend. They warmly talked me through the procedure of needing to flush out my eye with an orange fluorescein dye that would be used to detect any foreign bodies.

    It’s an eerie and especially frightening feeling being all alone on a medical bed with bright lights shining directly on your face while unknown medical professionals try to ascertain your fate. After what felt like hours, the attending doctor confidently announced that my eye was in fact free of any foreign particles and that I was most likely still experiencing the abrasion that the particle had left.

    She prescribed some antibacterial serum and sent me home with a very pirate-esque eye patch. Still visibly shaken and somewhat skeptical of the good doctor’s diagnosis, I slowly drove home all the while continuously trying to calm myself down.

    Just as I got home, I received several messages from work with the main inquiry not centered around my well-being, but rather around the need for me to be at a very important client meeting that afternoon, as I was the only one with the on-the-ground knowledge needed to chair the meeting.

    An incredulous wave of confusion swept over me as I struggled to comprehend my reality. My mom, who had serendipitously been visiting me, expertly comforted and soothed me. After washing my face and changing my clothes, I felt a little more clear-headed and decided to attend the client meeting.

    With an eye-patch and an emptiness I’ll never be able to fully articulate, I drove to the client meeting with a firm resolve that today would be the day I start defining what success means to me, because it surely couldn’t be what I’d experienced earlier that day.

    From here I started, and in many ways, I’m still continuing, my journey of carving out a definition of success—one that truly and indisputably aligns with my authentic self.

    I took the decision to re-evaluate all that I’d been told my entire life about what it means to be successful, all that I’d done so far and all that I wanted for my future.

    I have since cast away the stifling societal definition of what it means to be successful and replaced it with one that better suits my values and true ambitions, which have very little to do with the heftiness of my bank balance or the grand title that I bear as a professional.

    To me, success is consistently showing up for my loved ones and spending meaningful time nurturing the relationships that bring me irrefutable joy, by being truly present and engaging, and not sending a last-minute apology text for missing a date or a pricey present for forgetting a birthday, as I’ve done so many times in the past.

    Success means being healthy. And I don’t mean the “I can hike up that mountain in under an hour” kind of healthy. Well, that would be quite nice, but what I’m referring to goes beyond just physical health. In my mind, being healthy also includes my mental, emotional, and spiritual health and well-being in addition to whether or not I can keep up with my Pilates instructor.

    Success is also my tangible contribution to the world I live in. Not the taxes that I pay or the sporadic donations that I make toward charities with beneficiaries that far outweigh the aid that they receive, but rather the direct impact that my actions have on another human life.

    In practice, my new and still evolving definition of success means that I no longer prioritize work over my loved ones or my health.

    My sense of urgency around deadlines and work commitments has been tempered with the realization that there will always be a fire to put out or a contract to win. I liken the working world to the scene of a rowdy morning fish market with countless fishmongers vying for your attention as you race from one deadline to the next, so it falls upon you to be deliberate about how you expend your energy at work.

    I am also more mindful of switching off from work when I virtually log off or physically leave the office. I can happily admit that I am far more than content to step away from my job should something more pressing in my personal life demand my attention.

    This is not to say that I have resigned myself to a B-grade performance—I honestly think that there is something in my DNA that prevents me from not being the meticulous individual that I am. It’s more the case that I do not spend ludicrous amounts of time perfecting a report and I no longer agree to take on far more than what my capacity allows simply for the sake of wanting to appease my superiors. I continuously strive to maintain my commitment to delivering excellence; however, it is no longer at the expense of my personal happiness and well-being.

    I have also started paying more attention to my mind, spirit, and body.

    If I am anxious about unpleasant thoughts, I spend a few minutes calmly doing some deep breathing.

    If I am disheartened by the actions of the world, I gently remind myself that in the midst of darkness and injustice there are precious slivers of light and goodness that will always prevail.

    If I am tired, I hang up the phone and sleep.

    If I am hungry, I stop what I’m doing and find something to nourish my body.

    All obvious cues that I had once upon a time either been utterly oblivious to or blatantly ignored.

    Most importantly, I have opted to dedicate more of my time—and not merely my careless money—toward aiding causes that resonate with my desire to bridge disparity gaps and advocate for accessible education.

    By far, this has been the most rewarding aspect of the change in direction of my life journey, which I would undoubtedly attribute to my willingness to redefine what success means to me. And sure, there are times when I revert back to old habits, but I am much kinder to myself these days, and so I get up the next day and just try again.

    We’re not often told this, but your definition of success is exactly that—yours.

    We’ve unquestioningly taken the standard societal definition of success, which has left many of us running helter-skelter chasing our own tails trying to win a race we never even signed up for.

    Defining what success means to you may just be the first step in seeking the peace and contentment that we all so desperately desire.

  • What You Need to Do If You Feel Overwhelmed

    What You Need to Do If You Feel Overwhelmed

    “You are worth the quiet moment, you are worth the deeper breath. You are worth the time it takes to slow down, be still, and rest.” ~ Morgan Harper Nichols

    I want to talk about overwhelm, which is something I suspect I’m not alone in dealing with, especially given our current global situation.

    Even before the pandemic struck, I was on the edge of overwhelm. I live with two autoimmune conditions—rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia—both of which cause me to have health issues when I’m stressed out.

    I started the year completely stressed out, thanks to a new health condition that reared its head: some irregular tissue was growing inside my duodenum, affecting my digestion. On my first visit to a specialist to try to remove it in February, it turned out to be far more extensive than expected, and I had to be rescheduled for a far more involved procedure.

    Then COVID hit, and I was deferred for a bit. To say that I was struggling is an understatement: we were isolating at home, my health was in jeopardy, and while we believed that the tissue wasn’t malignant yet, it was definitely the sort of tissue that was trying to become cancer.

    I found it difficult to do my usual tasks, and I was decidedly fatigued and somewhat short-tempered from adding all this additional stress and uncertainty into what was already a fraught situation.

    Not knowing what else to do, I fell back on some serious self-care practices. I’m not talking about face masks and bubble baths, though I did increase the number of baths I took using Epsom salts, since they soothed the aches and pains that came with my increased stress levels.

    I spent far less time than usual on social media, in order to avoid “doomscrolling”: that’s where you keep scrolling through social media to find the latest, most upsetting information on whatever catastrophes are occurring. To my husband’s consternation, it also meant that I stopped watching the nightly news with him; instead, I would read a book, or watch something light and happy on my laptop.

    I made sure to get outside every day as long as the weather permitted, in order to allow nature to do its thing and make me feel better. I set and met a goal to exercise at least five days a week for twenty minutes or more, and I made sure to drink a lot of water and not skip meals.

    I also returned to my meditation practice, which had lapsed in prior months, as it sometimes does, and established a bedtime routine to set me on a path to successful sleep

    Here are my takeaways from that time period.

    If you need time away from it all, take it.

    If you need to establish boundaries with those around you in order to protect yourself, your emotions, your mental health, and/or your energy, it’s fine for you to do so. You cannot pour from an empty cup, so it’s important to take care of yourself.

    Give yourself permission to step away from the noise of the world.

    Specifically, you have permission to:

    • Turn off the news, or reduce your intake
    • Reduce your time on social media if it stresses you out
    • Unfollow social media accounts that are too negative for you
    • Reduce your contact with negative individuals in your life by setting boundaries
    • Put yourself on time out if you need it
    • Take a mental health day
    • Say no to things you don’t want to do (even if you already said yes)

    It is 100% okay for you to take a break. It is okay for you to need time out, or time off. It is okay for you to prioritize your self-care.

    Prioritizing your mental health and your self-care are two of the best things you can do for yourself and the people around you, as I learned again this spring. With things the way they are in the world right now, many of us are shaken up and need to boost our physiological needs and shore up our feeling of security.

    While I’m not a psychologist, I am familiar with Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, which is usually shown as a pyramid. At the base of the pyramid are basic human needs such as shelter, sleep, food, water, and exercise. The next tier, which is also pretty large, is safety and security, and it includes things like employment and health.

    The pandemic has rocked our worlds in ways that have shaken that pyramid. It’s hard to work on any of the higher-tier stuff, like romance, dreams, and plans, and spiritual matters, when the foundation of our personal pyramids need shoring up.

    That’s one of the reasons I returned to basic self-care for myself. Exercise, hydration, nutrition, and sleep were on my list. Those are all from the base level of the pyramid.

    Turning down the noise from the outside world, while remaining informed in small snippets, allowed me to remain connected to what was going on without spinning myself into a stress ball.

    Being on a more even keel allowed me to move through that time period without completely losing myself to stress and anxiety.

    And as for that adenoma? I was operated on the day before my birthday, and though it turned out to be a bigger procedure than anticipated, the biopsies came back clear. One less worry to move forward with.

  • How Self-Care Can Actually Save the Planet

    How Self-Care Can Actually Save the Planet

    “Take care of the earth and she will take care of you.” ~Unknown

    The morning the sky turned red and the sun didn’t come out, I decided I wanted to sell my car. In a strange way, it seemed like an ultimate act of self-care.

    Mind you, my wife and I are a two-car family and neither of us commute in the traffic-clogged Bay Area. So losing a car wouldn’t be a hardship. Instead, it would be a frank statement of living my values. A way to stage my own protest and live true.

    I now understand this is what my friend John was all about.

    I knew John some years ago when I lived in the Adirondacks, and he was a career environmentalist. And instead of driving everywhere, he rode his bike everywhere 365 days of the year. Up and over mountains. In the pouring rain. All the way to the grocery store and back, many miles away.

    I’ll never forget seeing a blurry smudge up ahead on the road one snowy day. There was John, gamely pedaling his way up a hill in a snowstorm. At the time, I thought he was nuts. Maybe even a little dramatic.

    Now I think he is wise and admirable. Because even back then, John really got it. We are truly living in an emergency.

    This is why creating a lower-consumption, greener life with a smaller carbon footprint is the next arc of my own self-care. For what is true self-care but returning to the often-quiet whisperings of your own internal voice? Turns out, she’s been asking for this for quite a while.

    All it took for me to turn this switch was waking up to a strange, dark Oakland morning recently. I looked at the clock and it was well past 8AM. Yet my entire bedroom was as dark as if it were 2AM.

    I sat up, confused and uncertain. I suspected historic wildfire pollution in the upper atmosphere from was responsible… but this was extreme.

    What the hell was going on?

    I took out the sleepy dog, who was equally befuddled. When I tried to rouse our urban chickens, they wouldn’t emerge. Instead, they stayed on their nests, clucking quietly and believing, like me, it was still the middle of the night.

    I walked out into the front yard and looked around. The sky was a weird dystopian orange, and I looked at it bleakly. That’s when I became completely and totally afraid. Clearly, the world was seriously broken… and if I didn’t get it before, I sure as hell did now.

    I began to cry. All of California was now burning or severely polluted, freak acts of nature were now the norm, and I felt smaller and more powerless than ever.

    The dreaded future we’d read so much about, and had assumed would never happen in our lifetimes, had indeed arrived. There is no putting if off anymore.

    And yet. In falling apart, we often can be quickly and sometimes radically reborn. I learned this lesson when my daughter died eight years earlier, and I was forced to reinvent my life and my work. I discovered self-care at the time, a practice I’ve since written about extensively. Now a new awareness began to sink in.

    That morning, I sat myself down and assessed the situation. I wondered if it actually was possible to weave self-care into my new, very urgent sense of environmentalism. Or perhaps this was the new self-care, version 3.0?

    Because now I know I need both, very, very much.

    Here is what my new ‘green self-care’ practices look like. First of all, I am only willing to live my values now, and not someone else’s. That means I put myself and the earth first, before the entreaties of corporate entities, like oil and gas companies, that don’t have my best interests at heart.

    I’m beginning to realize my fealty to them has been purely habitual, like thinking of my bike as an “only sometimes for exercise” ride.

    My new commitment means I will drive a lot less and now rely mostly on walking or riding my bike. My city has lots of lovely walking and bike paths, and I know how to use them. When I have to hitch a ride, I can drive with my wife or friends. There’s a bike sharing station just down the street, and I’m no stranger to public transportation, so I’ll use that as well. One way or another, I’ll get where I need to go.

    Here’s the self-care angle: all that walking and biking is bound to be good for my body, right? When I lived in New York City and San Francisco, I walked many miles and rode the subway or bus every day. I never owned a car. So why did I need to now?

    I’m cutting red meat entirely out of my diet. While I’ve often said I was going to do this, I would cave to the occasional burger or lamb craving. But now meat is officially off the table. I’m even thinking I will take the plunge and try going vegan for a month, to completely remove cows from my life. The health benefits are obvious.

    There are also all the low-consumption tricks we can do in our homes, and some merge nicely with self-care. Washing your clothing in cold water preserves the fabric a lot better, and hanging clothes to dry in the sun adds a peaceful touch of Zen to the day. Reducing your dependency on screens gives your brain and your eyes a much-needed rest, while it reduces stress on the power grid.

    In fact, unplugging from the myriad sources of electronica will make my life far less stressful in general. Do I need to deeply immerse in social media and news feeds of all my devices? No. Instead, I can turn them off and return to reading good old books, and journaling in my notebook. I can start playing my piano again and do more jigsaw puzzles. I can call my sisters or old friends just to chat. Meditating seems to be a fit here, as well.

    I can see plenty of walks in nature in my future, too. But this time I won’t be so focused on rushing along for the sweatiest workout.

    Now I’m inclined to move slowly and savor the natural, but fragile beauty around me. Which is, not coincidentally, what researchers have decided is essential for optimal brain health. Not to mention an excellent way to beat anxiety and depression.

    Can it be that by simply embracing green practices, my own self-care will be kicked up a notch as well? I say yes. And now I’m ready to develop an entirely new set of conscious, healthy habits.

    I suspect I will not dive into them all at once, in one sweeping, radical do-or-die move. Instead, I will ease my way along, experimenting with what works and what doesn’t, so I can build a truly sustainable new set of green self-care practices.

    At the very least, it’s not only what I want and need. It’s what the Earth clearly needs as well.

  • What Self-Care Is

    What Self-Care Is

  • How to Take Good Care of Yourself During the Coronavirus Pandemic

    How to Take Good Care of Yourself During the Coronavirus Pandemic

    EDITOR’S NOTE: You can find a number of helpful coronavirus resources and all related Tiny Buddha articles here.

    “Self-care is how you take your power back.” ~Lalah Delia

    For more than a week now, I’ve been immersed in how to handle the pandemic that is unfolding all around us. By now, one thing is clear to me. We are either our greatest allies or our own worst enemies at such times. How we react makes all the difference.

    One friend brought home a three-inch tome all about pandemics, determined to read her way through it. Another began advising everyone on how to correctly make homemade hand sanitizer. Still another insisted that by ignoring the entire thing, she was serving herself best. “There’s too much hype,” she declared. “I refuse to buy my way through this.”

    And you know, she had a point. As did everyone else.

    After my wife and I realized all of our emergency supplies were seriously old, we threw them out. A week before the Bay Area released a “shelter in place” order, we waded through the crowds of people at Costco. All around us, people were frantically loading their carts with toilet paper and bottled water.  The panic in the air was palpable. And we were not immune to the panic.

    Like halfbacks snatching an intercepted pass, we emerged triumphantly with a hard-won six pack of disinfecting spray. It was handed to me by a clerk who spotted them hidden behind a forklift. Indeed, the people who worked at Costco were clearly being run ragged by the intensity of the crowds pouring into the place. All of them had the firm, polite efficiency of ER nurses practicing triage.

    I came home determined not to panic, and yet found I was now glued to the major media. I couldn’t stop checking it hourly as if taking my eyes off of the situation could prove fatal. Finally, when I could take it no longer, I turned to a soothing activity—a jigsaw puzzle—and I promptly lost it.

    As I sat there, weeping into my half-finished picture of the Grand Canyon, I realized the coronavirus has left me stressed out and immeasurably sad. Our world is, indeed, having a crisis and there will be more suffering ahead. Perhaps even a lot of suffering.

    I simply couldn’t avoid the truth any longer. Taking a deep breath, I allowed myself to simply melt down as much as I needed to. I had a good long cry, and half an hour later I felt remarkably better.

    Instantly, I became clear-headed enough to carve a path forward for myself. This one did not involve binge shopping, or massive media consumption. Instead, I developed my own COVID-19 Self-Care Checklist. For along with the handwashing and disinfecting, I find I must take care of my vulnerable, tender heart as well.

    In fact, I suggest we all do. Here’s how I now proceed.

    1. Limit media consumption to a sane amount.

    Only you know what that means. But if you’re dreaming about media, leaping in in the middle of the night, or binging on it until you feel slightly sick, it’s time to back off. Such constant checking does give us a sense of control, but beware. Even though the news moves quickly, we do not need to consume media than a few times per day. Any more than that just creates more anxiety.

    2. Get together virtually.

    This idea is catching on quickly and for good reason. A paid Zoom account ($15 per month) enables you to have group meetings of up to 100.

    When you click on the Gallery view (top right corner) you can see every person in attendance. Consider using this for virtual hang outs including tea parties, happy hours, coffee klatches, book clubs, and dinner parties. I’m finding it’s a great way to stay in touch with faraway relatives—we’re ‘seeing’ each other more than ever suddenly. And if money’s tight, there’s always FaceTime and Skype

    3. Namaste nods work just as well as ‘foot shakes’ and elbow bumps.

    Alternative greetings now abound as we’re no longer meant to hug. My sister suggested the Namaste nod, and I have to say, doing so when I greet someone makes my heart feel ever so much better. It feels right for these times somehow.

    4. Walk in natural spaces.

    I’m blessed to live in the Bay Area, where wonderful parks and beaches abound, and we can access them with walks, runs, and hikes even with our “shelter in place” order. Here’s what I love about going out into nature: there are no hard surfaces teeming with germs to hang on to, and it’s easy to keep that critical three to six foot distance from others.

    Furthermore, a 2014 Finnish study found that strolling in a park or other natural setting for just twenty minutes provides significantly more stress relief than walking on city streets.

    5. Have a good cry when you feel need to.

    We all agree—this is a scary situation. One wants to “keep calm and carry on,” yet the cost of repressing our natural fear and grief is high. Far better to have a temporary meltdown, even in the privacy of our bedrooms, and then emerge clear-eyed and better able to cope. We will help ourselves and be better prepared to help others.

    6. It’s okay to ask for help.

    Sometimes asking for help can be small and personal. Maybe we need someone to watch our kids while we go for a stress-relief run, or maybe we need a hug from a family member. Ask for what you need, and you’ll serve yourself and everyone else in the long run. It’s time for us to get over our differences and support each other big time, just as generations before us have done in a crisis.

    7. Take immune support supplements.

    For some this is seen as useless, for others a godsend. If you believe some Vitamin C, or D, or ginger and garlic tonics—or whatever you take—will help you stay healthy, there’s a lot of power in that. My own preferences run towards zinc lozenges and Wellness Formula capsules. Why not? They can’t hurt and potentially can do us some real good.

    8. Make sure your own emergency supplies are up to date.

    I have to say, replenishing our own stock and getting it organized with a written inventory gave me a tremendous sense of relief. It dialed back my feeling of panic significantly.

    If you can’t immediately purchase everything you’d like because supplies or your own funds are low, keep calm. For even now, as the Bay Area stays at home, we are allowed to grocery shop. I plan to gently replenish the stock in my nitrile gloves, mask in place, as the crowds deplete and the situation settles. I’ll also have my own little baggie of disinefecting wipes for the shopping cart if the store’s supply is out.

    This situation is likely to last for months, and experts do assure us the food supplies will last in the US. So we simply need to work with it. Whether or not we are ultimately quarantined or will even have to use these back up supplies (the dehydrated potatoes, the cans of beans) is beside the point. They helped me feel like I actually had a modicum of control in hard times.

    9. Be compassionate with yourself and others.

    This is when people get tense, and tempers tend to run short. We often don’t perform up to expectations because we’re stressed. And yet, this is also when we need to practice loving-kindness towards ourselves and everyone else. We truly are doing the best we can, even if doesn’t look like it. So let’s give each other—and ourselves—a break. And yeah, expect yourself to be somewhat freaked out. That is very normal in a highly abnormal situation.

    10. Ask yourself what you need right now.

    This question is foundational, and it’s something we almost always forget to do. When you check in with yourself, you learn things that may surprise you. Try it right now. Put a hand on your heart or your belly, and close your eyes and silently ask. Your body will tell you just what she or he needs.

    Do you need a long, warm bath or to stop your work at home and take a walk? Do you need to meditate? To sit down and play with your kids for a while, or get some good hugs? If you’re alone, do you need to Facetime a dear friend, or give your mom a call?

    Whatever you need, do your best to honor that need. It will definitely serve you in the long run, perhaps even keeping you well as your own stress naturally lowers.

    May my checklist help you relax and find your way back to loving self-care … even in such crazy times.

  • Why My “Self-Care” Did More Harm Than Good

    Why My “Self-Care” Did More Harm Than Good

    “Self-care is how you take your power back.” ~Lalah Delia

    Self-care is not a bubble bath.

    I mean, it might be, if you’re the kind of person who feels like they’re committing a mortal sin by allowing themselves to wade in hot water with a candle or a book for twenty minutes alone. If that’s you, then yes. Please allow yourself a bubble bath. Regularly!

    Same with a massage. Or scheduling time for exercise. Or buying yourself some new underwear. Or taking a nap.

    If the idea of doing these things makes you feel squirmy and selfish and, Nooooo, I just can’t! then this is probably your brand of self-care.

    It is not mine, though.

    You see, I’ve never had a problem giving myself more treats. More me time! More pleasures! More whatever-I-feel-like-right-now! Treat Yo-Self wasn’t something I needed to be talked into—it was just public permission to do more of what I had always done.

    By this kind of definition of self-care, I was winning the Self-Care Olympics. Why was it so hard for everyone else? I wondered, as I treated myself to another bath after my middle-of-the-day nap following by my weekly massage, while my taxes from three years ago went untouched for another day, the organic groceries in my refrigerator rotted in deference to another night of Treat Yo-Self takeout, and I canceled a therapy appointment because I just didn’t feel like going (again).

    For the longest time, I waded in an ocean of cognitive dissonance. I didn’t feel like the kind of person who had a drinking problem, or lied, or who didn’t follow-through, or was flaky, or God forbid, lazy. I mean, I had so much evidence to the contrary! I was accomplished, I got a lot of things done, I presented well, people still loved me, and I had such good intentions!

    Except my behavior pointed squarely to those things.

    The disconnect ate at me. I knew I was tap-dancing a whole lot. I knew my good intentions were an excuse for shitty behavior. I knew that I was skating by in a lot of scenarios at work, with friends, in my financial life, at home. I knew that most of what I had accomplished was done at fifty percent, or less. I cut corners a lot.

    I knew, even if I didn’t know, that much of my life was a house of cards.

    So when I practiced the Instagram brand of #selfcare by pampering myself, I had this niggling sense that maybe more pampering wasn’t what I actually needed.

    Which brings me to discipline.

    Discipline has begrudgingly become my brand of self-care. Discipline is what has actually created freedom in my life, contrary to what I long believed. I thought my free-spirited ways were an act of rebellion against the monotony of life. That I was showing some kind of ballsy dissent toward the banality of adulthood Carpe diem and all that!

    Meanwhile, through my twenties and thirties, I trembled inside, unsure as to why everyone else seemed to do adult things so easily and automatically. I thought maturity was an automatic function of time, a passive effect of getting older. Somehow, it would just magically happen!

    Alas, no.

    This one concept has made an enormous difference in my life: for me, self-care looks like discipline.

    It looks like finishing things I start and pausing for a minute before I start another thing to consider the implications of starting said thing in the first place: financially, timewise, energy-wise, and who I might be impacting negatively if I don’t follow through.

    It means boundaries on screen time. Limiting the amount of sugar I put in my body.

    It means teaching my daughter to do things for herself instead of doing them for her because the latter is easier and causes less friction in the moment. It also means following through on consequences I lay down for her, even though it makes my life temporarily harder.

    It means waking at basically the same time every morning, so I get in the practices that keep me steady before the rest of the world wakes up: morning pages, meditation, coffee, quiet.

    It means abiding by commitments and being very exact about the commitments I make.

    It means sticking to my word as much as possible, even when I don’t want to.

    It means saying no to myself more than I say yes.

    It means asking if my future self will thank me for what I’m about to do versus my in-this-moment self, and actually listening when the answer is, No, your future self will not appreciate this, Laura.

    It often means doing what’s necessary over what’s fun.

    Self-care for me means discipline because that’s what is uncomfortable for me. That’s what I struggle to do. It goes against my default patterning, and going against our patterning is how we change.